Mantilla Suárez, Rosa Maria

Rosa María Mantilla Suárez is a Ph.D. student in history at Columbia University. Her interests intersect the history of literature and the intellectual and political history of nineteenth-century Latin America. Her current research is a political history of literary criticism with a focus on Colombia, Ecuador, and Perú. She has conducted archival research in different archives and libraries in these countries, as well as in Argentina and Chile.

In addition to her dissertation research, Rosa María is working on the theoretical implications of certain concepts applied to the history of literature and intellectual history.

Her prior work, supported by several scholarships, focused on the sociology of literature, theory, and the history of twentieth-century Ecuadorian literary criticism. Her master’s thesis, for which he received an honors mention, dealt with the Ecuadorian literary vanguard.

Education

Prior to joining Columbia, Rosa María received a B.A. from Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador with a major in Sociology and a minor in Politics (2014) and an M.A. in Sociology from the Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales, FLACSO (summa cum laude, 2018). As part of her work with the Iberconceptos-Ecuador network, she has written a chapter on the concept of democracy in Ecuador, forthcoming in an edited dictionary of political concepts in Ecuador. She has also presented her work at several international workshops and conferences.

Reflecting on her diverse interdisciplinary experiences as a sociologist and a historian, Rosa María has written on this academic background and on the future of these disciplines.

Experience

Before starting her graduate studies, Rosa María worked in public and private organizations related to education and culture. She co-founded and is now a member of a non-profit organization in Ecuador, Seminario Permanente de Historia Política, which aims to promote research and public conversations on the history of Ecuador.

Rosa María also has training and experience in editing Spanish-language texts. She has worked for several publishing houses in Ecuador and teaches academic writing at Ecuadorian universities.

At Columbia, she served as a teaching assistant in Colonial Latin American History and Modern Latin America. She was co-coordinator of the Columbia Latin American History Workshop (CLAHW) between 2021 and 2022.

Rosa María is committed to widening access to education for underrepresented communities and is eager to welcome prospective students, particularly international ones.