Liisa North, Fellow with York’s Centre for Latin & Caribbean Studies, has received the 2005 Pío Jaramillo Alvarado Award from Ecuador's Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences for her contributions to knowledge of Latin American societies and Ecuadorian society.
Left: Liisa North
The international and inter-institutional jury honoured North, York professor emeritus in political science, for her important research on Ecuadorian history and Ecuador's social and political realities over the last 30 years, calling her "an intellectual who has demonstrated a commitment to human rights."
The Pío Jaramillo Alvarado Award is granted to an individual or institution that stands out for making extraordinary contributions to the social sciences in Ecuador that deserve recognition as an example for Ecuadorians. Jaramillo Alvarado was one of a group of urban intellectuals who founded the Instituto Indigenista Ecuatoriano (IIE, or Ecuadorian Indigenist Institute) as the Ecuadorian branch of the Instituto Indigenista Interamericano headquartered in Mexico City, in 1943. Jaramillo Alvarado was elected as first director of the institute which was formed to disseminate the indigenist ideal: "to liberate the Indian from the slavery in which he lives."
More information and a profile of North is available on the CERLAC Web site and in the CERLAC Handbook of Fellows.
This article was submitted to YFile by Shana Shubs, administrative assistant at the Centre for Research on Latin America & the Caribbean.