STEP Post-Project Reflection Prompts
- Please provide a brief description of your STEP Signature Project. Write two or three
sentences describing the main activities your STEP Signature Project entailed.
My STEP Signature Project was semester abroad program through International Studies Abroad (ISA) based at the Universidad de Belgrano in the Belgrano neighborhood of Buenos Aires, Argentina. At the Universidad de Belgrano, I participated in an Advanced Spanish Intensive Month, a semester of classes designed for foreigners in Argentina but taught completely in Spanish, and a singular course designed for/taught for/taken alongside local Argentine students. Along with the classes at the Universidad de Belgrano, ISA offered a number of local and regional excursions of which I took part.
- What about your understanding of yourself, your assumptions, or your view of the
world changed/transformed while completing your STEP Signature Project? Write one or
two paragraphs to describe the change or transformation that took place.
In spending six months studying with American, French, Italian, Norwegian, Swiss, Colombian, Australian and Argentinean peers at the Universidad de Belgrano in Buenos Aires, I furthered my perspective of and belonging to our globalized modern world. Taking a more humbled position as an American abroad in a globalized world rather than THE “GREAT” AMERICAN in the space, I sat back and learned a lot about those who came from different backgrounds and cultures and what they had to offer. I further accepted my humbled place in our globalized world and further analyzed how I, as all of those around me were doing, could do more to bring those of us from all corners of the globe together in mutual understanding and coexistence. I also gained near fluency in Spanish with my six months in Argentina.
- What events, interactions, relationships, or activities during your STEP Signature
Project led to the change/transformation that you discussed in #2, and how did those
affect you? Write three or four paragraphs describing the key aspects of your experiences
completing your STEP Signature Project that led to this change/transformation.
Every night at dinner I came home to two lovely host parents who spoke close to no English. I had an American roommate through the program who arrived in Argentina with limited Spanish abilities. Sitting between all of these people every night, I spent a lot of time translating from English to Spanish and back to English and vice versa. This, along with many uber rides with Spanish speakers and a multitude of interactions in Spanish between myself and shop/café/restaurant employees and a number of Argentine/Latino peers helped me realize my place in this globalizing world and immensely helped my Spanish abilities.
Furthermore, every class I took this past semester was taught in Spanish. This allowed me to practice Spanish in an academic setting much more than I have in high school and college with one-two Spanish courses a semester. Watching films in Spanish for class, reading in Spanish, writing in Spanish, speaking in Spanish, and thinking in Spanish for every class I took over the past semester significantly helped my cognitive abilities with the language. Though I was spending a lot of free time with American peers speaking in English, my multitude of Spanish classes and classwork, along with my nightly interactions in Spanish with my host parents and Spanish speakers out and about everyday led me to become nearly fluent in the language.
In studying alongside people from all over the world and interacting with locals and other Latinos, I learned how they not only view Americans in our globalized world, but also learned about their cultures, complexities, and worldviews. I specifically spent a lot of time discussing the crisis in Venezuela with the multitude of Venezuelan Uber drivers I had in Argentina and the neighboring countries I visited. Due to the horrific situation in Venezuela, many Venezuelans who could leave the country have fled and picked up odd jobs all over Latin America and the globe. The Venezuelans I came into contact with and myself spoke about their collective desire to return to their beloved homeland, their collective sense of helplessness with the current situation and their collective hope that the situation will improve.
Lastly, I took a class about Latin American History in the 20th Century where I learned about Latin America’s historical abuse at the hands of the United States and took that knowledge with me as I analyzed and understood many Latin Americans’ view of the United States and Americans abroad. In Valparaiso, Chile my friend and I happened upon a wall with “Meik Amerika Greit Again: Yankees Go Home” (Yankees being the word that a lot of Argentineans/Chileans refer to us as). After learning that the United States assisted in taking down the democratically elected socialist presidency in Chile preceding the Chilean dictatorship in the 1970s/1980s and played a direct role in empowering the dictator that murdered thousands of Chilean political dissidents, as well as doing similar things all over Latin America, I greatly understood the adversity many Latinos felt towards us Americans.
- Why is this change/transformation significant or valuable for your life? Write one or
two paragraphs discussing why this change or development matters and/or relates to your
academic, personal, and/or professional goals and future plans.
This evolution in my worldview and betterment of my Spanish abilities helps me greatly as I move forward into this globalized world. Though I am still trying to figure out what to dedicate my abilities to in this lifetime, I am certain that I want to utilize my Spanish abilities and would greatly love to work in relation to or directly in Latin America. Being half Argentina and half Brazilian myself, I feel a connection to the region that was only strengthened with the six months I spent in the city my mother was born in and grew up in. I reconnected to my roots, nearly perfected a foreign language that to me was simply a language in my roots I had lost contact with, and became a more apt citizen of this globalized modern world.