Senior Thesis Prizes

PLAS honors compelling undergraduate scholarship, supporting two awards that recognize stellar thesis work. The Stanley J. Stein Senior Thesis Prize is awarded to the best thesis on a Latin American topic. The Kenneth Maxwell Senior Thesis Prize is awarded for the best thesis related to Brazil.

Group photo from class day

Prize Nominees

Robert Franklin Britt, Spanish and Portuguese 
Investigating Health Access, Experience, and Outcome of Latin American Immigrants in Trenton, New Jersey through an Intersectional Lens

Toby Fishman Janowitz, School of Public and International Affairs
“A Tale of Two Nations”; A Comparative Analysis of Divergence between Haiti and the Dominican Republic 

Alaina Joby, School of Public and International Affairs 
LA ISLA DEL ENCANTO: THE ISLAND OF ENCHANTMENT OR THE ISLAND FORGOTTEN? An Investigation Into “La Reforma’s” Impact on the Quality of Health Among Elderly Populations in Puerto Rico 

Isabel Byers Kingston, Comparative Literature 
In Search of “Bodies of Rhetoric”: Diamela Eltit’s “Lumpérica” and the Legacy of Chile’s Disappeared 

Clara Jane McNatt, Anthropology 
ENTRE DOS: Reflections on the Tango Embrace 

Ana Lucia Palacios, Anthropology 
“Siendo Solidarias Alcanzaremos la Prosperidad”: Belonging, Empowerment, and Prosperity in a Colombian Ecovillage 

Michael Jacob Salama, History 
FLUID IDENTITIES: THE SUBALTERN POLITICAL HYDROLOGY OF THE URUS OF LAKE POOPÓ 

Myla Eleanor Isenberg Wailoo, African American Studies 
The Greatest Technologies are Ours: Carrying the Legacy of Quilombola Culture and Life through Contemporary Afrofuturist Brazilian Art 

2024 Stanley J. Stein Senior Thesis Prize

This prize is awarded by PLAS each year to the student who writes the best senior thesis on a Latin American-related topic.

Michael Jacob Salama

photo of student, parent advisor and director

Department of History

FLUID IDENTITIES: THE SUBALTERN POLITICAL HYDROLOGY OF THE URUS OF LAKE POOPÓ

Thesis Adviser:
Isadora Moura Mota, Assistant Professor of History


2024 Kenneth Maxwell Senior Thesis Prize

This prize is awarded by PLAS on behalf of the Firestone Library to the student who writes the best senior thesis related to Brazil.

Myla Eleanor Isenberg Wailoo

advisor, director and student

Department of African American Studies

The Greatest Technologies are Ours: Carrying the Legacy of Quilombola Culture and Life through Contemporary Afrofuturist Brazilian Art

Thesis Adviser:
Wallace Best, Professor of Religion and African American Studies