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.
Six months have passed since my last post here on People Places Pines, and oh, did I miss this! Writing weekly updates here has become my own way of journaling about my college experiences, so it was somewhat annoying to be away from it. Nonetheless, I had a blast of a time—both over summer break, when I had the chance to go back home to Brazil, and during fall term, when I was studying abroad in Madrid, Spain.
Being away—not only from the blog, but from campus, my friends, my belongings, my support network, etc—was so hard I decided to come back earlier. As I mentioned in a previous post, I was meant to embark on to my Linguistics FSP this winter term, meaning I would fly straight from Madrid to Auckland. Crazy, right? For a myriad of reasons, I decided to postpone my second quarter abroad to next year.
Now, it has been a challenge to relearn how to navigate campus.
I got a new dorm, meaning a new roommate and a whole new perspective of campus' incredible landscape;
I got a new major, meaning new classes and new professors to get familiar with;
A new job, meaning a new routine;
And a whole new class to meet, meaning almost a thousand new faces around Foco!
My new dorm!
A part of me feels like a middle-schooler arriving mid-semester at a new school. As if it had not been enough to go through the whole adaptation process we all experience in freshman fall, I feel like it is happening once again now that I'm back after such a long time. Of course, it is somewhat easier once you have done this before. "I've been there, done that," you know? But, honestly, it can still be challenging.
I am glad to be back, but am especially grateful for having such good friends I can come back to. My new roommate is my boyfriend, my new major is one I have lots of friends to share classes with, and my new job is a super exciting opportunity!
Come back next week to hear more about what I'm up to!
Walking around the Wellelsey campus, it's clear that it was built with intentional incorporation of the surrounding nature. The architecture of many buildings were also mindfully crafted to support Wellesley's unique principles.
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.
