Faculty

Susana Albert has a degree in Spanish Philology from the Universidad Complutense Madrid with a specialty in Linguistics. She is a specialist and certified in Business Spanish by the Madrid Chamber of Commerce. She has been the coordinator of the Spanish department at the University Center Villanueva-EBS in Madrid since 1999. She has been an ELE professor since 1994 and collaborates with the NYU-Madrid summer program since 2005.

Montserrat Alonso Cuenca, from Spain, received her degree in Hispanic Philology from the Universidad de Alcalá, Madrid. She has an ABD in Science Education from Universidad de Alcalá, Madrid, an M.A. in the Teaching of Spanish as a Foreign Language from Universidad de Alcalá, Madrid, and an M.A. in Latin American Literature from Maryland University. She has been teaching at several U.S. universities since 1996, including Maryland University at College Park, USAC in Madrid, Syracuse University in Madrid and Alcalingua in Spain. Currently, she works with IES Abroad in Madrid where she teaches Spanish courses at all levels and is Coordinator of the Spanish Department. She has taught at NYU Madrid since 2011. She was a trainer for professors of Spanish as a second language at Universidad de Valencia and Universidad Internacional Menéndez Pelayo. Montserrat Alonso has attended and participated in several national and international conferences about methodology and teaching of Spanish Language as a Second Language. She has been Committee Member Creation and Design Curriculum of IES Abroad in Spain. She is the co-author of a Spanish textbook “Embarque ELE” a modular beginning-intermediate and advanced Spanish program, published for the editorial Edelsa, in Madrid in 2011. Her areas of interest are: Teaching Spanish as a Foreign Language: Handbooks and others resources for learning and teaching Spanish. Creation and Design Curricular.

Almudena Ariza holds a BA and MA degree in Medieval History, doctoral studies in Numismatics and her Ph.D. in Arabic and Islamic Studies from the Complutense University of Madrid. Since January 2000 she has taught courses, delivered lectures and directed travel seminars with several American university study abroad programs including New York University, Stanford University, Syracuse University, University of San Diego and others. She teaches courses on the history of Islam in Spain, International relations between Spain and the Mediterranean Islamic Countries, the History of Sefarad, and History, Politics and Literature of Spain.

Robert is an Emmy, Peabody and Goya-winning documentary filmmaker. Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, he relocated from Brooklyn to Spain to direct and produce The Silence of Others, in collaboration with Almudena Carracedo. Executive Produced by Pedro Almodóvar, The Silence of Others has won over 40 international prizes, including the 2019 Goya for Best Feature Documentary (Spain’s Academy Award), a Peabody Award, the Panorama Audience Award and the Peace Film Prize at the Berlin International Film Festival, and was shortlisted for Best Documentary Feature for the 2019 Academy Awards. Robert won an Emmy as producer/writer of the documentary Made in L.A., and he spearheaded the three-year impact campaign that brought the film to audiences around the world. He produced and directed the documentary Laid to Waste and line produced several independent films. Robert is a Creative Capital Fellow, a Sundance Documentary Fellow, and holds an MFA from the University of Southern California’s School of Cinema-Television.

Aída Bueno received her Ph.D. in Social and Cultural Anthropology (sobresaliente cum laude) from the Department of Anthropology, Facultad de Ciencias Políticas y Sociología, from Universidad Complutense de Madrid. Her expertise lies in the field of African Diaspora Studies and Afro-descendent Cultures in Latin America. Professor Bueno spent time in both Brazil and Cuba, conducting fieldwork regarding religions and cultures originating from Africa.  Since 1999, she has been teaching various undergraduate and graduate Anthropology courses and is currently conducting research at the Centro de Estudios in migration and racism.

Isabel Cadenas Cañón holds a PhD in Cultural Studies from New York University, with a dissertation about the representations of absence in contemporary Spanish visual culture. She also holds an MA in Performance Studies from Université Paris III Sorbonne Nouvelle and an MFA in Creative Writing form NYU. Her areas of research include film-essay, poeticity and memory, all from a materialist-feminist approach. She is a writer and audio producer. She has published two books of poetry and is a regular contributor to several newspapers and magazines (La Marea, eldiario.es). She produces audio documentaries for different radio outlets (Deutsche Welle, La cafetera) and doesn’t believe in the separation between academic and artistic work.

Carmen Carballo Sanchiz, from Spain, received her degree in Spanish Philology (Linguistics) from the Universidad Complutense, Madrid. She has taught Spanish Language at Duke University and since 1992 she has been teaching at several other American university programs in Spain such as New York University, Middlebury College, University of Delaware and Pepperdine University. Since the summer of 2004 Carmen Carballo has been teaching Spanish grammar at Middlebury College in Vermont and California. Her interests include language pedagogy and materials development.  

Almudena is an Emmy, Peabody and Goya-winning documentary filmmaker. Born in Madrid, Spain, Almudena Carracedo developed her professional career in the US, where she directed and produced her debut feature film, the Emmy-winning documentary Made in L.A. In 2012 Almudena returned to Spain to work on The Silence of Others, in collaboration with Robert Bahar. Executive Produced by Pedro Almodóvar, The Silence of Others has won over 40 international prizes, including the 2019 Goya for Best Feature Documentary (Spain’s Academy Award), a Peabody Award, the Panorama Audience Award and the Peace Film Prize at the Berlin International Film Festival, and was shortlisted for Best Documentary Feature for the 2019 Academy Awards. Almudena is a Guggenheim Fellow, a Creative Capital Fellow, a Sundance Time Warner Documentary Fellow, a United States Artists Fellow, and holds an honorary doctorate from Illinois Wesleyan University.

María Castillo (PhD. 2008, Hispanic Language and Literatures, New York University) was born in Argentina and arrived in Spain in 2002. She is currently teaching Spanish at NYU and USC in Madrid. Her interests include literature, film and popular culture. After graduating in Performance Arts in Universidad de Buenos Aires, she taught film semiotics at Universidad del Cine and took part in several research projects in Argentine theatre.

Cristina Colmena holds a PhD in Cultural Studies from New York University. Her dissertation tackles the relationship between narrative and visual culture. She also holds a MFA in Creative Writing from NYU and a Master in Cultural Management from Universidad de Sevilla where she obtained two bachelor’s degrees, in Audiovisual Communication and in Journalism. She is a  writer and a playwright and some of her plays have been staged in Washington DC, Miami, New York, Havana and Madrid. She has published a book of short fiction and some of her stories have been included in different journals and anthologies. She has also worked as a journalist, screenwriter, TV producer and in cultural management. 

Dr. Julia Doménech completed her Ph.D. (Magna cum Laude) at the Universidad Autónoma Madrid (1997) and has been an Associate Professor at its Art History Department (2007-2010). Since 1998 Dr. Doménech has taught at NYU Madrid and, at present, she also teaches at Middlebury College in Madrid. She has written extensively on painting and the visual arts, especially in the 19th century, with a focus on gender issues, text/image relations, and visual knowledge. Her book La belleza pétrea y la belleza líquida. El sujeto femenino en la poesía y las artes victorianas (Petrified Beauty and Liquid Beauty. The Female Subject in Victorian Poetry and the Visual Arts) was published in 2010 by Editorial Fundamentos. Currently she is completing a new book on the construction of visual space in the Nineteenth century.

Lee Douglas holds a PhD in Anthropology from New York University, where she also completed the Graduate Certificate in Culture and Media. She also holds an MSc in Visual Anthropology from the University of Oxford. Combining scholarly research with visual production and curatorial initiatives, her work examines how the past is reconstructed and the future reimagined through engagements with the remnants of political violence. Her current book project, Worlds of Absence, analyzes the intersection of forensic science, modes of documentation, and image-making practices during the excavation of mass graves in Post-Franco Spain. Paying close attention to the circulation of forensic evidence, it asks what the entanglement between science and visual representation reveals about the production and mobilization of knowledge in times of economic austerity and political change. In 2017-2018, she was a postdoctoral Fellow in the Collections Department at the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía. At present, she is the Director of American Space Madrid at the Instituto Internacional, one of Madrid's oldest cross-cultural educational institutions. She is the Visual Essays Editor at Anthropology Now and a member of the Writing with Light Editorial/Curatorial Collective which is committed to rethinking peer-review rubrics for multi-modal visual projects. Committed to creating alternative currents for critical scholarship and artistic practice, Lee is a passionate educator and an active member of the Madrid-based film collective Arena para la maquina.

Adam Dubin is part of the full-time faculty at Universidad Pontificia Comillas, where he teaches in the International Public Law Department and directs a Master's program in International and European Business Law. Prior to coming to Spain, Dr. Dubin was a legal fellow in the United Nations Office of the Co-Prosecutors at the Cambodian tribunal and also worked in other countries such as India and The Gambia on human rights issues related to the protection of women and girls. He publishes and speaks around the globe on topics related to access to justice and human rights in developing countries, particularly in the Sub-Saharan African region. He has served as a Visiting Professor at universities in France, Portugal, China and India, and occasionally consults for organizations such as the UN and EU on human rights and development projects, especially in the region of Sub Saharan Africa. Dr. Dubin is an editor of a soon to be released book titled: Gender, Poverty and Access to Justice: Policy Implementation in Sub Saharan Africa (Routledge, 2019).

Dr. Dubin wrote his Ph.D. thesis (Summa Cum Laude) on access to justice for sex workers in Kampala, Uganda at La Universidad Complutense de Madrid (University of Madrid). He holds a Juris Doctorate (Cum Laude) from Pace School of Law in New York and a Master's Degree (Summa Cum Laude) in International Development Policy from the University of Manchester in England. He is currently a candidate for an LL.D (African Child Rights) at the University of Western Cape, South Africa. A native of New York City, Dr. Dubin has lived in Madrid for almost ten years, along with his wife, three children and dog named Vermont.

Mercedes Fernández Isla received her Ph.D. in Hispanic Language and Literatures from Boston University. She has a Master of Arts in Translation of French from Universidad Complutense de Madrid, and a degree in Romance Languages and Philology also from Universidad Complutense de Madrid. She is a Certified Interviewer of the American Council of Teachers of Foreign Languages, and a professor of Spanish as a second language in several American University Programs.

Armando Figueroa received a PhD in Latin American Literature from Columbia University, Department of Spanish and Portuguese, in 1990. He teaches Spanish Language and Composition, and Latin American Culture courses in the undergraduate program as well as Cultural History of Latin America at the MA level. His areas of interest include Contemporary Latin American Literature, particularly from the Spanish Caribbean region, and Literary Theory.

Soledad Gálvez earned her Ph.D. in Spanish (Latin American Literature) from Stanford University in 2002. Her research focuses on literary and cultural responses to projects of modernization and modernity in 19th and 20th century Peru, from a historical, global perspective. She has taught at Hamilton College in New York, the Tufts University-Skidmore College Program in Spain, and the Hamilton Academic Year in Spain Program. She is Assistant Director of Academic Affairs at NYU Madrid, where she also coordinated and taught at the M.A. Program in Spanish and Latin American Literary and Cultural Studies. Her areas of interest include gender, modernities and coloniality, and cultural theory.

Luis Garvía is an economist, lawyer, and electromechanical engineer (ICAI). He holds a Ph.D. in Finance from ICADE (Universidad Pontificia de Comillas) and an Executive MBA from IESE Business School. As an economist he is an adviser in investment plans, expansion, and optimization or rationalization of industrial, financial or property portfolios. His research in the field of Project Finance began in 2006. The title of his thesis is “Systemic Risk in Large Investment Projects Financed by Project Finance.” Luis has analyzed exhaustively power generation projects in general and, in particular, the renewable generation and macroeconomic impact of these. He is also interested in behavioral finance, smart cities, sustainable economy, and Fintech. As a lawyer, he is a specialist in commercial law, particularly Spanish business bankruptcy law.

Mar Gómez Glez is a Spanish writer and scholar. She holds an undergraduate degree in Sociology (1999) from Universidad Pontificia de Salamanca and in Journalism (2001) from Universidad Carlos III. She completed a M. A. in Comparative Literature and Literary Theory (2004) also at Universidad Carlos III and a Ph.D. at New York University (2013), with a dissertation about the uses of secrecy in Teresa of Avila’s writings. As a doctoral student she was a Fellow at NYU Center for the Humanities. Her areas of research include Spanish Contemporary and Golden Age Literature and Theater, continental philosophy, cultural history, and sociological and literary theory. Before moving back to Madrid, her home town, she was teaching at University of Southern California and Bard College. As a writer, her last book Una pareja feliz (2021) was a Nadal Award finalist. She is the author of two more books of fiction  La Edad Ganada (2015) and Cambio de sentido (2010), the children’s book Acebedario (2006), and numerous other plays and short stories. Her plays have been performed in Colombia, India, Germany, Austria, Spain and the US, including Off-Broadway, (Wearing Lorca’s Bowtie, The Duke Theater, 2011), and Off-off-Broadway (39 Defaults, LaMama Experimental Theater Club, 2014). Her work has received global recognition including a 2020 Carlota Soldevila Grant, 2019 Writing Lab SGAE Foundation, 2017 Leonardo Grant (FBBVA), the 2015 Hot Desk International Fellowship at Center Stage, the 2011 Calderón de la Barca Theater Award, the 2008 Arte Joven Latina Award, and the 2007 Beckett Theater Award. She is a regular columnist at El País.

Ellen Carmen Gordon is a human geographer who carried out her PhD research at the University of Cambridge (thesis currently under examination) with a full scholarship from the UK's Economic and Social Research Council. Her PhD research focused on the internal reform of the Ecuadorian state since 2008, and involved extensive fieldwork in Quito, carrying out interviews and participant observation with low and mid ranking civil servants from across the country. She holds an MPhil in Latin American Studies from the University of Cambridge and a BA in Hispanic Studies from King's College London. Her background is in cultural studies, but she now works across the fields of political geography and anthropologies of the state. She has taught on geopolitics, political geography and postcolonial and decolonial geography at the University of Cambridge. She is interested in the state and its transformative potential, historical memory, and political and cultural discourses of nationhood.

Beatriz Inglés Candelas (Ph.D candidate University of Antonio de Nebrija) received an Undergraduate Degree in English Philology from the University of Alcalá de Henares, and went on to study a Masters Degree in Teaching Spanish as a Foreign Language at the UNED University. She has taught Spanish and English languages for 14 years, including at the University College of Kensington and St Francis Xavier College in London. Beatriz is currently developing her doctorate thesis in Applied Linguistics in the field of Sociolinguistics, carrying out Conversation Analysis and contrasting listeners' feedback of English students of Spanish against native Spaniards. Her research is in Applied Linguistics to Second Language teaching in the area of sociolinguistics and conversation analysis.  

She has taught at NYU, at both the undergraduate and graduate levels, since 2011.

Sebastián Lavezzolo holds a PhD in Political Science from New York University, where he completed a dissertation on the politics of banking. He obtained a MA in Social Science from the Juan March Institute and was postdoctoral researcher fellow at the Institute of Political Economy and Governance (IPEG) in Barcelona. He is assistant professor in the Social Science Department at the Carlos III University of Madrid, and his research interests lie in the fields of comparative politics, political behavior and political representation.

Francisco Layna received his Degree in Journalism (1976-1981) from Universidad Complutense and his Ph.D. in Hispanic Philology (febr. 1994) from Universidad Complutense. He has taught at Harvard University, Boston University, and at American university programs in Madrid (New York University Madrid, Middlebury College, and Boston University). Professor Layna has published a series of research works on Spanish literature from the 15th, 16th, and 17th centuries. He has published three books, La eficacia del fracaso. Representaciones culturales en la Segunda Parte del Quijote, La disputa burlesca and USA Cervantes. 39 cervantistas en los Estados Unidos.

Dr. María López Díez (Ph.D. Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, 2003) completed her doctoral thesis in the field of architecture of the fifteenth century. Since then, her research has focused on the architecture, and development of the modern city and its image from a historical perspective. She currently teaches at NYU-Madrid, and Master​'​s program​s​ at ESNE​ (Escuela Universitaria de Diseño, Innovación y Tecnología)​, ETSAM​ (Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura de Madrid)​, and EFTI​ (Centro Internacional de Fotografía y Cine)​, where she teaches various courses related to Urban ​Studies, cities development, Architecture, Art History, Photography, Contemporary Design, as well as others on heritage and Spanish culture. Also, she has started to collaborate with Observatorio Permanente del Hispanismo​, dedicated to promoting Hispanic Culture. 

Víctor Magariño Peñalba graduated from Law School, CEU San Pablo, in 1990 and earned an MBA from ESDEN in 1991. Víctor has broad experience as university professor, keynote speaker, and company trainer and coach in the areas of digital, marketing, sales and executive development. He is also currently teaching at post-graduate programs at ESADE Business School. Víctor accumulates 23 years of extensive multinational experience in sales, marketing and business development leadership positions managing major FMCG and entertainment brands. A former Google Senior Executive, Víctor is well familiar with internet industry dynamics. He is currently Sales and Marketing Director at Comunycarse Network Consultants (IT / Software Industry). Proud father of two, big sports fan, regularly practices soccer, tennis and ski. Strong supporter of Atlético de Madrid (current Spanish Champion League).

Alfonso Muñoz-Acevedo holds a Ph.D. in Telecommunications Engineering from Universidad Politécnica de Madrid and an Executive MBA from IE Business School, both earned with honors. Author of a book, co-author of several book chapters, patents and scientific papers in top-ranked JCR publications, Alfonso's academic interests focus on integrative approaches to complex decision-making in Business. He has taught across a variety of undergraduate and graduate programs at Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, as well as is currently part of the teaching team at the Accelerated Management Program of Yale School of Management Executive Education. Complementing his academic experience, Alfonso relies on broad industrial acumen in the fields of Technology, Finance and Leadership, having held a diversity of positions at international organizations including the European Space Agency and Intel Corporation.

Isabel Pereira earned her Ph.D. in Second Language Acquisition and Teacher Education) at the University of Illinois (Urbana-Champaign) in 1995. She is Assistant Director of Academic Affairs at NYU Madrid. She teaches Spanish at different proficiency levels in the undergraduate program as well as courses in methodology and Guided Research projects for MA students. Her areas of interest include curricular development and second language research, particularly, SLA language acquisition and language pedagogy. 

Cristina Perez Calleja has been teaching literature, theatre, translation and language at New York University Madrid since 2001. Her doctoral research examines twentieth century Spanish theatre and, more specifically, the theatre of humor of the "other" generation of '27. She has also taught at Boston University and Tufts University in the USA and she is currently Academic Coordinator of the Boston University Internship Program in Madrid. In 1998 she founded Language in Business, a company where she directed the Bank Boston (Bank of America) Language Executive Program with more than 175 adult students. In that capacity, she was responsible for developing language courses, selecting the different materials and levels, and for the supervision, evaluation and hiring process. Since 1998  she collaborates with different publishing companies as editor and/or writer. Some of the books in which she has collaborated are Vistas (Vista Higher Learnig, Boston 2001), Ventanas (Vista Higher Learning, Boston 2003) and Manual de Bachillerato de Lengua y literatura (Mcgraw-Hill, Madrid, 2007 and 2008). As a translator she has also collaborated with several film production companies in Spain and has translated a few film scripts: “The book” and “Aupa Etxebeste,” among others.

Due to her experience first in the USA and later in Spain she has a very long experience developing language and cultural educational curricula. For that reason, she has been offered to develop several multidisciplinary courses for different American University Departments where she teaches in Madrid. These courses are:
Techniques of Translation (for the Language Department of NYU in Madrid in 2001), Translation through Movies and Theatre (for the Literature and Language Department of Boston University Abroad Program in 2002), Spain Today (also developed and designded with Isabel Pereira for the Language Department of NYU Abroad Program in Madrid in 2005), Internships course: the Spanish business environment and its culture (for the Boston University Internship Academic Program Abroad in 2008), Roaring 20s in Spain: Film, Fashion, Literature, Art & Music (for the NYU Study Abroad Program for the Spring 2011), Workshop in Contemporary Hispanic Issues (developed for the NYU Masters Program in Madrid).

Rocío Prieto Prieto is ABD in Hispanic Philology at the Universidad de Valladolid. She holds an B.A. degree in Hispanic Philology from Universidad de Valladolid. She has taught Spanish as a Second Language (grammar, conversation and composition) at the Universidad de Salamanca, Universidad de Valladolid, Iowa State University, Syracuse University in Madrid, Universidad Autónoma Madrid, and since 2003 at New York University Madrid. She was a trainer for professors of Spanish as a second language at the Universidad de Valladolid, Universidad de Valencia, and Universidad Internacional Menéndez Pelayo. She is the co-author of the Spanish textbook "Embarque ELE," a modular beginning-intermediate and advanced Spanish program, published by editorial Edelsa, Madrid, in 2011. She has participated in several national and international conferences about methodology and teaching of Spanish Language as a Second Language. Her research interests include Teaching Spanish as a Foreign Language, Teaching Spanish to Immigrants, and Sephardic Studies.

Elia Romera-Figueroa is a postdoctoral CIVIS3i-Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions COFUND Fellow at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. She holds a PhD in Romance Studies from Duke University, and an MA in Spanish and Latin American Literatures from the University of Wyoming. Romera-Figueroa has also been a Resident Researcher at the Museo Reina Sofía’s Study Program in Critical Museology, Artistic Research Practices, and Cultural Studies (2023). She is an active member of two research groups at: (i) Universidad de Valladolid (Popular music and urban culture in Francoism: everyday sounds, local dynamics, transnational processes); and (ii) UNED (PoeMAS: More poetry for more people. Poetry in contemporary Spanish popular music).

Her upcoming monograph, tentatively titled Gendering Anti-Francoism: Cantautoras in Spain (1956-1986), reinterprets Spain's tradition, methodologies, and meanings of "protest music" through the study of female singer-songwriters from the second half of Franco's dictatorship (1939-1975) to the last expressions of Second-Wave Feminism (1976-1986). More generally, her areas of expertise include 20th and 21st-century Iberian Cultural Studies, Gender and Sexuality Studies, Social Movements, Sound and Performance Studies, and LatinX in Spain. She has published on these topics in journals like the Bulletin of Spanish Studies or Status Quaestionis and is now working as the co-editor of an upcoming special issue for the journal Cultural Dynamics on Transatlantic LatinX Studies. Romera-Figueroa has taught undergraduate language courses at the University of Wyoming, as well as writing courses and self-designed advanced seminars at Duke University, including its international programs Duke in Madrid and Duke in Spain.

Enrique Santamaría (Ph.D. in Spanish language, Universidad Complutense de Madrid; M.A. in the Teaching of Spanish as a Foreign Language, Universidad Complutense de Madrid; M.A. in Phonetics and Phonology, CSIC/UIMP). His publications and research interests are in the fields of Applied Languages and Spanish Phonetics. Enrique has taught a wide range of courses at universities and institutions in the US, France, Germany and Australia, such as the University of Virginia, Tufts University, Instituto Cervantes de Toulouse, Technische Universität Braunschweig or University of Sydney. In Spain Enrique has also lectured, among other institutions, at the Universidad Internacional Menéndez Pelayo, Hamilton College in Spain or IES Abroad, where he was awarded with the distinguished Faculty Innovation Award (2007) and Excellence in Teaching Award (2010).

Asier Sarasua graduated from Business School at IE University and earned a Master In Big Data Analytics from IE School of Human Sciences and Technology. Asier has broad experience in the Internet of Things and wearable industry as he has worked as CMO at MainTool, an innovative French startup that aimed to unite both the wearable and watch industry, and has been present in different events as speaker across Europe representing the company as an industry expert. Currently, Asier works as the Head of Customer Success at Graphext, one of the most promising Data Visualization companies all over Europe.

Francisco Seijo earned his Ph.D. in Political Science from Columbia University in 1999. Dr. Seijo has been teaching political science for various North American university programs in Spain including Middlebury College, New York University Madrid, Fundacion IES, Universidad de Nebrija, Stanford University and the University of Southern California since 2000. Previous professional experience includes work as an external consultant for the Spanish Ministry of Labor's Economic and Social Council (CES), the independent development consulting firm Development Strategies and the European Commission. His publications and research interests are mainly in the field of environmental politics specifically all those things related to forest policy and the politics of landscape fires. His work has appeared in peer reviewed journals such as Environmental Politics, Eos-AGU, Journal of Environmental Policy and Planning, Revista de Ecología Política, Cuadernos de la Sociedad Española de Ciencias Forestales, Human Ecology Review, BioScience and Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment as well as in edited scholarly books and the media. Dr. Seijo has also published two poetry books in Spanish, “Arritmias” and the forthcoming “Ensayando la Inocencia.”

Carmen Ana Sierra has a Ph.D. in Romance Languages and Literatures from Five College Consortium, Massachusetts and a Ph.S. ABD in Art History, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. She is currently teaching at NYU Madrid and Duke University in Madrid. She has been a visiting Professor at Hamilton College, Rollins College, Universidad Menéndez Pelayo, and Santander. She has been a curator of various art exhibits, written two books, two catalogues, several articles, poems and lectures at different universities. She was the director of various American Universities in Madrid (Pomona College, Hamilton College, Rollins College, and Cornell University).

Teresa Soto holds a PhD in Arabic and Islamic Studies from the University of Salamanca and an MA in Spanish Literatures from the University of Colorado at Boulder. Her research focuses on Morisco literature and poetics, religious minorities, cultural transfer and intellectual networks in Europe and the Islamic world. She is the author of peer-reviewed articles on this topic and her book A Sombraluz. Lecturas de "El discurso de la luz" de Muhamad Rabadán will be published by Editorial CSIC in 2024. She is also the author of six poetry books, including Un poemario, awarded the Adonáis National Poetry Prize; and, most recently, Crónicas de I., which received the Margarita Hierro International Poetry Prize in 2019. She has worked as a researcher at the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) and at the University of Salamanca, and currently teaches at Duke University and New York University in Madrid.

Antumi Toasijé is a historian, artist and Pan-African activist. He holds a Ph.D. in History, Culture and Thought from the University of Alcalá, with a dissertation on the African presence in the Iberian Peninsula and the Balearic Islands from the Iron Age to present times. A licentiate in General History from the University of the Balearic Islands, he completed the teaching phase of the doctorate in International Relations and African Studies at the Autonomous University of Madrid and he is officially accredited as a university lecturer (PAD ANECA). He has imparted, since 2004, courses and conferences in various universities and institutions in Spain, Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands, UK, Colombia and Ghana. Author of two books and a variety of academic articles, his main interests are African history and politics as well as migratory movements and collective identities from ancient to contemporary times. Antumi Toasijé has promoted various initiatives for the defense and empowerment of African and Afro-descendant populations in Europe, Africa and Latin America. He is the president of the official Council for the Elimination of Racial or Ethnic Discrimination (CEDRE) linked to the Spanish Ministry of Equality.

Sara Torres Vega holds a PhD in Art Education from Universidad Complutense de Madrid. Her artistic practices, her studio teaching and her scholarly research are all driven by a common impulse:  to reclaim creativity and expression from the rarefied circles of “the art world”, while at the same time recognizing and promoting the centrality of creativity and expression in human experience, across time and space —“the worldliness of art”. This concern has led her to focus her research on an often overlooked corner of the museum world:  the departments, archives and activities of Education housed at most museums.  Her work at the Tate in London, MoMA in New York, and the Reina Sofía in Madrid, has allowed her both to analyze the history of “educational outreach” in those institutions, as well as to propose for the present and future the design, creation and evaluation of truly participatory educational archives and departments in the museum context. As an artist, scholar and educator, her focus has always been on relational and participatory practices that foreground art not as a form of distinction or prestige, but rather as a catalyst for inclusion and social connectivity.

José Carlos Vela Bueno teaches Cinema and Spanish Culture in the Madrid programs of NYU, Middlebury College and Boston University. He also directs the Academic Program of the State University of New York (SUNY) at Albany in Madrid. Carlos Vela has published texts in various conferences and professional reviews and has written two books on Salvador Dalí and Luis Buñuel. He has a Ph.D. (1992) in Hispanic Language and Literatures from SUNY Stony Brook. He is currently writing about El Sur, the short story and the film.

Andres Walliser (Ph.D in Sociology, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid) is an urban sociologist and has a Masters degree in Political Science from the Juan March Institute. He has experience in the academics and professional practice as an urban planner. He has taught in different US programs in Spain, in Hertie School of Governance in Berlin, and in Universidad Complutense where he is currently an associate proffessor in urban studies . He is interested in urban regeneration, participation, social change in the city, urban policy and governance. He has been part as a researcher and consultant in several international projects with both the European Union and private planning offices. Between 2016 and 2018 he has been commissioned by the Major of Madrid to reactivate the former convention center of the city in Casa de Campo.

Daniel Wuebben holds a Phd from the City University of New York Graduate Center and has held full-time teaching positions at the City College Center for Worker Education, the University of California Santa Barbara, and the University of Nebraska Omaha, where he co-founded the Nebraska Post-Secondary Prison Education Project. His creative non-fiction and academic research have appeared in publications such as MAKE: A Literary Magazine, Victorian Literature and Culture, Energy Research and Social Science, Symplokē, and Sustainability, among others. His research and writing in the history of technology and energy humanities extend from two publications on Nikola Tesla and his first book, Power-Lined: Electric, Landscape, and the American Mind (University of Nebraska Press, 2019). In Spain, he has held a Marie Skłodowska-Curie fellowship with a project focused on multimodal communication and energy communities. 

Jason Xidias holds a Ph.D. in European Politics from King’s College London, where he completed a comparative dissertation on post-colonial immigration and citizenship in Britain and France, and a B.A. and M.A. in Political Science and International Relations. He was also a Visiting Scholar at the University of California, Berkeley. He is the author of several books on key thinkers, concepts, and seminal works in Political Science. His main interests are Spanish, French, and British politics. In addition to teaching at NYU Madrid, Professor Xidias has taught at King’s College London and Johns Hopkins University. Prior to becoming an academic, he worked as a Journalist/Research and Editorial Director, managing the production of political and economic reports in 13 countries (Spain, Greece, Cyprus, Turkey, Hungary, Slovakia, Ireland, Singapore, Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire, Mauritania, Ecuador, and Argentina). In this role, he conducted hundreds of interviews with prominent political leaders and businesspeople, including ten presidents/prime ministers.