James Maharg (Ph.D. University of Illinois)
Associate Professor of Spanish
(312) 996-3238
jama@uic.edu



Overall my research has been largely within XIXth and XXth century Latin America literature, until within the last four years or so I have been drawn towards aspects of utopian/millenarian religious writing in XVIth century Mexico. After exploring the work of Argentine essayists Ezequiel Martínez Estrada in a book study, several articles and papers, I came to realize that the work of Spanish thinker José Ortega y Gasset was an important intellectual presence there and throughout Spanish America and Argentina in the 1930’s and 1940’s and the tracing of his reputation among Argentine intellectuals yielded another monograph and more articles. Next I became attracted to Spanish American modernismo, particularly the work of the Cuban Julián del Casal and the Mexican Amado Nervo, which generated another monographic study. My current research centers on the utopian vision of Vasco de Quiroga, Bishop of Páscaro, Michoacán. within the context of Franciscan millenarian positions in their strivings to create the New Jerusalem in the New World. Finally, since my graduate days I have maintained a continuing interest in the language, literature and culture of the Lusophone world and have been regularly engaged in the teaching of Portuguese in the department.






Publications:

A Call to Authenticity: The Essays of Ezequiel Martínez Estrada. University of Mississippi Romance Monographs, 1979
Los primeros modernistas. Madrid: La Muralla, 1983.
José Ortega y Gasset. Antología del pensamiento político, social y económico sobre América Latina. Madrid: Ediciones de Cultura Hispánica, 1992.

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