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Dr. Mariela Gutiérrez receives "Distinguished Professor Emerita"

 

The Department of Spanish and Latin American Studies would like to share the excellent news  that our dear colleague Dr. Mariela Gutiérrez has been granted the title of "Distinguished Professor Emerita".

As the President of the University Dr. David Johnston says in the  notification letter to Dr. Mariela Gutiérrez "Through your award winning research and international engagements, you have served as an exemplary  ambassador for UW."

She will be formally recognized during the fall 2009 convocation  ceremony on Saturday, October 24 at 10:00 a.m.  Her dedication and many contributions to the Department  of Spanish and Latin American Studies are greatly appreciated.

Congratulations!

 

Biographical Statement

Dr. Mariela A. Gutiérrez is Full Professor of Spanish at the University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.  Dr. Gutiérrez is Member of UW Senate (Research Council 2002-04; Honorary Awards Council 2004-06; UW “Colleague” at the Council Ontario Universities (2006-2008), Member of the UW Teaching Excellence Council (TEC-2004-06) and is past Member of the Board of Women Studies Program (1993-2000). For seven years Dr. Gutiérrez was Chair of the Department of Spanish & Latin American Studies (1997-98; 1999-2005). She holds a B.A. Honours in Latin American and Peninsular Studies and a M.A. in Latin American and Peninsular Studies, both from McGill University, Montreal, Canada and a Ph.D. in Latin American and Peninsular Studies from Université Laval, Quebec, Canada.

Dr. Gutiérrez has been recipient of several major awards.  To mention a few, she received the University of Waterloo’s 1993 Distinguished Teacher Award, and the Canadian Association of Hispanists’ 1993 Award for the Best Scholarly Article published by a Canadian Hispanist, for her article «Rosario Ferré y el itinerario del deseo: un estudio lacaniano de “Cuando las mujeres quieren a los hombres” (Rosario Ferré and the Itinerary of Desire: a Lacanian Study of  “When Women Love Men”).  In May 2001 she was the recipient of Círculo de Cultura Panamericano’s First Prize for Best Essay awarded for her essay titled “Sab, el Werther esclavo de la Avellaneda” (Sab, Avellaneda’s Enslaved Werther); together with this award she received CCP’s First Accésit for her essay “Tambores de gesta afrocubanos: El Sese de Orúmiga y el Ekue de Sikán” (Afro-Cuban Epic Drums: Orumiga’s Sese and Sikán’s Ekue).  In November 2001 she was awarded membership in the prestigious Swedish association PEN International (Affiliated Cuban Letters) receiving a commemorative diploma. In May 7, 2004, Gutiérrez was awarded the Medal of Honor of the City of Bagnères de Bigorre in the French Pyrinees in recognition of her vast contributions as literary critic and essayist to disseminate and make known world-wide fictional and socio-historical literature written by Latin American female authors.  Also, in May 2004 Dr. Gutiérrez was bestowed the University of Waterloo’s 2004 Arts Outstanding Performance Award for continued outstanding achievements level in research, teaching and service. On April 17, 2006 she was elected “by acclamation” at U.W. Senate “COU Colleage” to represent U.W., together with President David Johnston, at the Council of Ontario Universities. In July 2006 Dr. Gutiérrez was selected unanimously by the U.W. Research Council’s Awards Committee as recipient of the U.W. Award for Excellence in Research; which she received during the October 21, 2006 Fall Convocation ceremony.  In November 17, 2006 Gutiérrez was bestowed a most outstanding accolade by being inducted in the distinguished Royal North American Academy of the Spanish Language. Lastly, in May 1, 2007 Dr. Gutiérrez was bestowed the University of Waterloo’s 2007 Arts Outstanding Performance Award for continued performance at an outstanding level in research, teaching and service. 

            Dr. Gutiérrez’s fields of expertise are Latin American Literature and Civilization, specializing in Afro-Hispanic Studies and XX century’s Latin American Women Writers.  Her chief publications are: Los cuentos negros de Lydia Cabrera: Un estudio morfológico (Universal 1986), El cosmos de Lydia Cabrera: Dioses, animales y hombres (Universal 1991), Lydia Cabrera: Aproximaciones mítico-simbólicas a su cuentística (Madrid: Verbum 1997), El Monte y las Aguas: Ensayos Afrocubanos (Madrid: Editorial Hispano-Cubana 2003) and Rosario Ferré en su Edad de Oro: Heroínas Subversivas de Papeles de Pandora y Maldito Amor (Madrid: Verbum 2004); she has also authored eighty five works as refereed articles in scholarly journals as well as chapters and essays in books such as The Social Studies, Lonergan Review, Pasos, Diáspora, Letras Femeninas, Revista Canadiense de Estudios Hispánicos, Monographic Review, Revista Iberoamericana, Andinica, Journal of Caribbean Studies, Journal of Afro-American Studies, Revista Encuentro de la Cultura Cubana, to mention a few. 

            At present, two new publications by Prof. Gutiérrez are expected for release in August 2008 by the Edwin Mellen Press (London/New York). An Ethnological Interpretation of the Afro-Cuban World of Lydia Cabrera (1900-1991) is a compilation of several of Gutiérrez own works on Lydia Cabrera’s opus in English translation; Afro-Cuban Short Stories by Lydia Cabrera: Selected, Annotated and Translated by Mariela A. Gutiérrez gathers 40 consequential works by Cuban writer Lydia Cabrera in annotated English translation. For the past nineteen years Dr. Gutiérrez has represented U.W. —as keynote speaker, lecturer, researcher and also reading papers at national and international conferences— all across Canada as well as in eighteen of the United States, and in countries such as Italy, Spain, France, Denmark, Sweden, Russia, England, Puerto Rico, Costa Rica, México, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Argentina, the Dominican Republic, and Trinidad and Tobago.

Further information on research here.
For books recently published: http://arts.uwaterloo.ca/arts/gradres/RecentBooks.html