Dr. Jerry Dávila

Biography

Jerry Dávila holds the Jorge Paulo Lemann Chair in Brazilian History at the University of Illinois. He currently serves as the Executive Director of the Illinois Global Institute, established in 2019, to advance UIUC's work with international area studies centers on global themes. Dávila's research focuses on the influence of racial thought on public policy in Brazil and state social movements in the twentieth century. He is the author of several books, including 'Hotel Trópico: Brazil's Challenge to African Decolonization' (Duke, 2010), for which he received the Latin Studies Association Brazil Section Book Prize, and 'Diploma of Whiteness: Race and Social Policy in Brazil, 1917-1945' (Duke, 2003). Dávila has taught as a Fulbright Distinguished Chair in American Studies at the Federal University of Minas Gerais (2022) and at the Pontifícia Universidade Católica in Rio de Janeiro (2005). He was also a Fulbright Senior Scholar at the University of São Paulo (2000) and has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Fulbright-Hays Research Fellowship. His writings include publications exploring the experiences of military rule and redemocratization in Brazil, Argentina, and Chile, and the subject of dictatorship in South America. Dávila is a co-author of 'History of World Societies' (Macmillan, 2021) and has held the position of President of the Conference on Latin American History.

Research Interests