Lina Britto, a doctoral candidate in the Graduate School of Arts and Science, has been awarded a Newcombe Fellowship by the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation. Britto will receive $25,000 for the one-year fellowship, which is given to doctoral candidates writing dissertations on topics involving religion and ethical values.

GSAS Student Britto Wins Woodrow Wilson Foundation Dissertation Fellowship
Lina Britto, a doctoral candidate in NYU’s Graduate School of Arts and Science, has been awarded a Newcombe Fellowship by the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation. Britto will receive $25,000 for the one-year fellowship, which is given to doctoral candidates writing dissertations on topics involving religion and ethical values.

Lina Britto, a doctoral candidate in NYU’s Graduate School of Arts and Science, has been awarded a Newcombe Fellowship by the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation. Britto will receive $25,000 for the one-year fellowship, which is given to doctoral candidates writing dissertations on topics involving religion and ethical values.

Britto’s dissertation, The Marijuana Axis: The Origins of Narcotrafficking and the "War on Drugs" in Colombia, addresses the first narcotics boom in Colombia in the 1970s in order to elucidate how this profitable, illegal export business challenged the division between legal and illegal activities, and licit and illicit initiatives.

A graduate student in NYU’s Department of history, Britto has also worked as a journalist, writing for publications in Colombia, Bolivia, Spain, and the U.S.

Of the 585 applicants for the 2011 fellowship, 71 were named as finalists, with the 21 Fellows ultimately representing just 3 percent of all applicants. This year’s fellows include scholar in religion, philosophy, anthropology, sociology, history, literature, women’s studies, political science, jurisprudence, and music.

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