“¡Cierra, España, Cierra!: Religious Difference and Racialization in the Expulsion of Moriscos”

The Convivencia Lecture Series welcomes Elsa Costa, PhD Candidate in History at Duke University, to discuss "¡Cierra, España, Cierra!: Religious Difference and Racialization in the Expulsion of Moriscos."

Elsa is an intellectual historian concentrating on Spain and its possessions in the Renaissance and Enlightenment. Her dissertation explores how changes in the definition of public happiness accompanied the rise of absolutism in Spain. Originally from Chicago, Elsa has a BA in Latin American studies from Bennington College and an MA in Ibero-American history from Duke. Her other interests include twentieth-century French, German and Brazilian philosophy, medieval theories of pedagogy, and women's writing in contemporary Latin America. She has published or presented papers on all these topics. Her dissertation research took her to Madrid and to Mexico City on a Fulbright-Hays grant, and she is now Bass instructional fellow and Capper fellow at Duke. In her spare time, she likes exploring walking routes of Durham with her dog Ivo and listening to music, most recently Hamilton Leithauser's new live album.