Ei! My name is Antônio Jorge Medeiros Batista Silva (yes—four last names!) and I'm a '25 from Governador Valadares, Brazil. My journey to Dartmouth has crossed two continents, three countries, and over 10 schools—and I'm a strong believer that everyone's path to the Big Green was unique in a way. At Dartmouth, I study Linguistics, Native American & Indigenous Studies, and Spanish. I am passionate about social justice, language-learning, and the oxford comma!
This class is an introduction to the Spanish minor and major courses and, although I did not expect to particularly like it, it not only turned out to be my favourite but it made me start considering a degree in the department!
In this class, we analysed different productions of Latinx American theatre. Prof. Analola Santana was probably the best person I met this year at Dartmouth. Being her student was a very important experience as I try to navigate my potential majors and minors.
In this class, I was able to carve time out of my busy Dartmouth schedule to study and learn my Indigenous language: Krenak. With the help of Prof. Gokke, all students were encouraged to develop a final project that spoke to their community's needs for language learning and revitalisation. It was an extremely important class for me, not only academically, but also for my personal healing process.
I had the honour of spending my sophomore fall in Madrid, taking part in the Spanish FSP. There, Prof. Martín was not only a great professor, responsible for my favourite lecture of the program, but also an incredible company throughout our classes and in-country trips. Great way to wrap up my Spanish minor, honestly!
This was my second class in the NAIS department, and thus it took me one step closer to wrapping up my major. Nonetheless, it was Prof. Powell's genuine charisma and caring personality that made it my favourite of the term!
This course was definitely life changing! Prof. Pochedley, a visiting post-doc of the Potawatomi nation did a great job at keeping the students engaged while teaching us to see the land we inhabit as a source of knowledge and spirituality. In a majority Indigenous classroom, we got to develop individual projects related to our traditional homelands, learning to navigate the world through Native world lenses.
Prof. Gómez is one of those profs I've always wanted to take a class with. His work with the Horror genre in Modern Spanish literatures amazes me, and it was an honour to guide in-class discussions and develop my own research on the themes of science, testimony, and fear.
LING54 is an umbrella course: the actual content of the course may vary each year, but it is the common letter-number code to refer to the course taught abroad by your accompanying Dartmouth Linguistics professor. In this year's Linguistics Foreign Study Program (FSP), LING54 was a 'Language Documentation' class, wonderfully taught by Prof. David Peterson.
Before this class, I had no idea what visual and cultural studies actually encompassed. Every chat with Prof. Broner opened my eyes to a different analysis or method for interpreting literature, and for that, I feel truly lucky! We got to discuss films made by Indigenous women from all over Latin America, exposing the class to distinct ways of interacting with and stewarding the environment.
I decided to use my biweekly People Places Pines post to share a rather overlooked aspect of Dartmouth College's history: our activist past, present, and futures. Before applying here, I was aware of the school's historic occupation movements: in 1969, when Parkhurst Hall (where administration is based) was seized by students in protest of the Vietnam War; in 1986, when students erected four 'shanties' in the middle of The Green, calling the school to divest from its financial entanglements with the South African apartheid; and the 2013 take-over of the annual Dimensions Show—when prospective students are invited onto campus—to call administrators' attention to the blatant racism, homophobia, and misogyny students were facing.
If I am being completely honest, knowing Dartmouth's history of impactful political organizing was one of the leading factors in my choice to apply here as my Early Decision choice. As if in a foreshadowing moment, high-school senior me wrote his Common App personal statement about the time I spent camping outside the British Columbia Legislative Assembly in Victoria, protesting in defense of Indigenous land rights. Now, as encampments calling for divestment from Israel are set up in numerous college campuses—not only across America, but all throughout the world—I am inspired to take part in yet another historic moment in our College's history.
And, if you read this post up to this point, and think I might be pushing a certain political perspective onto potential applicants, that is not my intention. The objective of this post isn't to commemorate nor to condemn either the student-protesters who took over the Green the night of May 1st, or our administration—who quickly responded by calling the police to forcefully dismantle the camp. This post isn't about taking sides. This post is about drawing parallels between my own experiences as a student on this campus and the numerous other student-led protests that marked this institution's history.
In my opinion, there's nothing more aligned to Dartmouth's traditions than student activism, and it's definitely one of my favourite outside of class activities. So why shouldn't we proudly take part in it?
From orientation week to your classes, you can easily find community at Dartmouth! Read on to know how I met my Dartmouth family and where you might also find yours.
