MALAS Student Profile: Karina Beltran

October 11, 2016

Karina Beltran
MALAS/MA Spanish & Portuguese 2019
History; Linguistics

Among the new master's students whom the LAII welcomed in fall 2016, Karina Beltran comes to the LAII as a dual degree student in Latin American Studies and Spanish & Portuguese.

Karina received her B.A. in Spanish with a minor in Portuguese from the University of New Mexico (UNM). She originally decided to attend UNM for her M.A. in Spanish and Portuguese due to her relationships with professors here on campus and also because of her interest in variations of Spanish spoken throughout Latin America. As such, after one year in her M.A. program in Spanish and Portuguese, she applied for a dual-degree program with Latin American Studies. Currently, Karina is focusing her studies on the historical aspect of her degree, and is most interested in looking at nation formation and its relationship with and influence on many of the great Latin American authors.

At UNM, Karina works as a Spanish teaching assistant, where she teaches beginning level Spanish courses to students of all ages. She has excelled at and enjoyed creating lesson plans, completing curriculum, and working in collaboration with other teaching assistants and professors.

When Karina has free time, she enjoys reading short story collections in Spanish or Portuguese, practicing South Korean, and mentoring elementary-aged youth when her school schedule permits.

After graduation, Karina plans to travel to South Korea where she hopes to gain more experience teaching for a period of time, with the eventual goal to become a university professor who focuses on the combination and overlap of history and literature.

To read other profiles, see the LAII's graduate student directory.