Miguel A. Cabañas

Miguel A. Cabañas serves as Associate Professor in Michigan State University's Department of Romance and Classical Studies within the College of Arts & Letters. He holds core faculty positions in Chicano/Latino Studies (CLS), Global Studies in the Arts and Humanities (GSAH), and the Center for Caribbean and Latin American Studies, demonstrating deep interdisciplinary engagement across multiple university units.

His research centers on Latin American/Chicano-Latino cultural representation through three interconnected pillars: historical travel narratives examining US-Latin American perceptions, contemporary narco-culture politics, and mobility studies intersecting with identity formation. This trajectory reveals an evolving scholarly focus from 19th-century literary analysis to urgent contemporary issues of drug trafficking representation and transnational identity politics.

Publication trends show consistent exploration of how cultural narratives shape geopolitical understanding, with his 2015 edited volume extending earlier work on narco-culture (2014) and 19th-century travel writing (2008) into broader frameworks of mobility and identity politics. These works collectively establish his expertise in decolonial approaches to cross-cultural representation.

Cabañas has held significant academic leadership roles including Graduate Adviser for Spanish (2012-2014) and Co-Director of Peace and Justice Studies (2008-2009). His international collaborations span teaching appointments at Universidad Autónoma de Sinaloa (Mexico) and Universidad EAFIT (Colombia), plus research affiliations with UNAM and Universidad de Antioquia, reflecting substantial transnational scholarly networks.