Faculty Spotlight on Javier Krauel
Associate Professor • Associate Chair for Graduate Studies • Co-Director, Study Abroad Global Seminar in Barcelona
Department of Spanish and Portuguese
Four Questions for Faculty
What do you like most about being an arts/humanities faculty?
I feel fortunate to work in the humanities at a time when so many people, outside and inside the academy, seek to not only interpret but also transform our world. The humanities provide fertile ground for resisting the current neoliberal pressure to extend market relations into every facet of our lives.
What project are you currently working on?
I’m currently writing a book tentatively titled Sentimental Publics that seeks to understand how subordinated groups have expressed their political aspirations through particular emotional styles, and in venues that have developed in parallel to the official public sphere.
What work in your field most excites you?
I admire all kinds of different works, but I’m especially drawn to works that interpret culture by combining historicized reasoning with theoretical imagination—works in the humanities that help me learn about the past while dreaming up future possibilities.
If you rubbed a magic lamp and a genie magically appeared to grant you one wish, what would it be?
Increased political and economic support for the humanities, which would lead to an improved job market for our graduate students. Without them, how can one envision the academic humanities of the future?