Honors Collegium M145: Politics of Crisis: Migration, Identity, and Religion

Honors Collegium M145

Politics of Crisis: Migration, Identity, and Religion

Enrollment: Open to College Honors/College Scholars students

Course Description: (Same as Chicana/o and Central American Studies M126.) Examination of individual and collective religious response of Latin Americans and Latinas/Latinos in U.S. to dislocations, displacements, and fragmentation produced by conquest, colonization, underdevelopment, globalization, and migration.

Lauren Frances Guerra

Dr. Lauren Frances Guerra grew up in the heart of Los Angeles, California. She is of Guatemalan-Ecuadorian descent and an active member of the Roman Catholic Church. She earned her doctorate in Systematic and Philosophical Theology from the Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley. She is currently serving as a Lecturer in the Department of Chicanx and Central American Studies at UCLA and Visiting Professor in the Department of Theological Studies at Loyola Marymount University. As a Systematic Theologian, she approaches the theological task with the complexities of race, class, and gender in mind. Popular Religion and community-based art inform her theologizing. Teaching and research combines all of those things that are most important to her including: faith, culture, and justice. Her current research interests include: U.S. Latina/o theology, Theological Aesthetics, and Chicana/o Studies. Her long-term goal is to serve as an advocate for the U.S. Latina/o community through her work.

Q & A

What is your home department at UCLA?
My home department is Chicana/o & Central American Studies.
How long have you been teaching your HC seminar?
I have been teaching this since 2022.
What is your favorite part about teaching this HC seminar?
I am looking forward to working with the HC students.
What do you find to be the most compelling about the subject matter of this seminar?
Looking at the intersection of religion and politics is always fascinating to me. Issues of migration are pressing for the Latinx community.

What are the learning objectives for this course?
Learning objectives will be available on the syllabus.

Student Feedback

Honors Collegium M145: Politics of Crisis: Migration, Identity, and Religion

“Dr. Guerra created a deep and thoughtful class that allowed students to focus more upon their personal connections to the course material and resonate emotionally to the difficult topics we had to discuss in Politics of Crisis. Dr. Guerra was very kind to share her own personal anecdotes and history to communicate some of the topics that were hard to relate to without having someone testify about them. The aspect of group discussions and group presentations helped all students relate more to each other in a class where it was obvious that some people would feel uneasy about discussing these topics because they do not belong to the community that is being discussed. Dr. Guerra was thoughtful to change deadlines and give the entire class extra time to finish papers as long as we continued to stay on pace with the course content as a group. She was very approachable and thoughtful in understanding student needs and was generous with her time in and outside class to answer questions about writing examinations and text themes.”

“I thoroughly enjoyed Dr. Guerra’s class! It was really insightful and allowed me to think and learn about Latinx culture and identity from a new perspective. I had not taken a Chicanx class before so I think this was a really good introduction to the field. All of the readings that Dr. Guerra assigned to us were eyeopening and I am so glad that we were given plenty of time during class to discuss them. All of my peers were very mindful of what I had to say and I love how Dr. Guerra created a class environment where I felt comfortable enough speaking up and contributing to the discussion. I also liked how the group presentations gave us space to branch out from class topics and share research with the class that we found to be meaningful. She was also very fair when it came to grading. She gave us a rubric for all the writing assignments ahead of time which outlined her expectations very clearly. Overall, I think this class was wonderful and I would definitely taken another one of Dr. Guerra’s classes if I was given the opportunity to. Thank you Dr. Guerra for an amazing quarter!”

Prof Guerra is an awesome prof. She does a great job of introducing issues with empathy and showing the human cost/impacts of things like politics. I also appreciated the academic freedom of the topic for the final and the emphasis on including art and culture as well as politics in the class. She definitely cares about students, and that comes through in her teaching.