Biography

Eliseo Jacob has a Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin with a background in contemporary Latin American and Brazilian literary and cultural productions. As a faculty member in the Department of World Languages & Cultures at Howard University, he teaches courses on Portuguese language and Brazilian popular culture that encourage students to engage more with Latin America through study abroad.  

Dr. Eliseo Jacob's recent publications contextualize literary and cultural representations of São Paulo’s urban periphery as part of a larger analysis regarding the relationship of the public sphere to marginalized communities of color in Brazil’s urban spaces.  His current book project, Masculinidades Marginales: Race, Masculinity, and the City in Latin American Literature, is an examination of literature produced by writers from underrepresented communities in major Latin American cities at the turn of the 21st century in order to understand how representations of male youth raise larger questions surrounding citizenship.  He asserts that writers from contemporary marginalized urban communities in the Americas are employing creative strategies that are inherently political due to their ability to contest hegemonic discourses on how Black and brown bodies can affirm their identities in the space of the city.

Dr. Jacob was recently awarded a Fulbright U.S. Scholar Award for the 2021-22 academic year.  He will be conducting a project on writing communities in the urban periphery of São Paulo and collaborate with faculty at the University of São Paulo.