I cheated with Claude on an assignment I didn’t want to do. I tried to save the results to a word processor but neither of the ones I usually use would open. So here is what Claude said.
Please find academic articles about undergraduate research in literature
Searching for academic articles on undergraduate literature research.
Searching for academic articles on undergraduate literature research.
I’ll search for scholarship on undergraduate research in literature and English studies from a few angles.
Searched the web
Here are the most relevant scholarly sources I found, grouped by type. I haven’t checked full texts, and several are paywalled.
Foundational book
- Grobman & Kinkead, eds., Undergraduate Research in English Studies (NCTE, 2010). It collects essays on mentoring, responsible research, and ways to disseminate student work, along with case studies of undergraduate research in literature and composition. It is the standard starting point. core
Special issue of Pedagogy (22:1, Jan 2022): “Undergraduate Research as a Future of English Studies”
- Edited by Kristine Johnson and J. Michael Rifenburg, the issue covers mentoring, publication, administrative support, curricular structures, and the nature of humanities research itself. Articles include: dukeupress
- “Undergraduate Research and the Enrollment Crisis in English Literature: Four Lessons from the Sciences.” It argues that undergraduate research in English should be a coordinated curricular feature at every level of the major, not a one-off arrangement for motivated students. silverchair
- “Formalizing Curiosity: Administrative Leadership in Support of Undergraduate Research, Scholarship, and Creative Work” (Laura L. Behling).
- “An Enterprising Take on Undergraduate Research in English: Initiative, Resourcefulness, and the Creation of a Digital Exhibition.”
- Other Pedagogy pieces include Moore, Myers, and McConnell on mentoring practices for English studies, and Bresee and Kinkead on an English major’s progress in a research methods course. sciencegate
Mentoring and publication in literary studies
- Cooper-Rompato, Funda, Kinkead, Marinello, and Fronk, “Undergraduate Research Fellows and Faculty Mentors in Literary Studies” (2010), which identifies two key components of successful undergraduate research. technorhetoric
- Marta Figlerowicz, “Making Long Shots: A Path toward Undergraduate Professional Publication,” which argues that students can try to bridge the gap between undergraduate essays and published scholarship. technorhetoric
- Joseph Janangelo, “Anatomy of an Article,” Kairos 16(1). This case study follows one undergraduate’s revision of a seminar essay into a refereed journal article. It is in rhetoric and composition rather than literature, but it is useful on process. technorhetoric
Archival research as undergraduate literary research
- Laurie McNeill, “Things Fall Apart: Supporting Undergraduate Research in the Archives.” She draws on a first-year writing and literature course and senior English seminars. jhu
- Wendy Hayden’s work on archival pedagogy (2015) is widely cited in this area.
Humanities-wide studies (SPUR, Council on Undergraduate Research)
- Kistner et al., “Academic and Professional Preparedness: Outcomes of Undergraduate Research in the Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences,” SPUR 4(4), 2021. csus
- “Undergraduate Research in Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences: Helping Students Navigate Uncertainty and Build Community through a Structured Cohort-Based Program,” SPUR 7(2): 15–24. It notes that most research on benefits has focused on STEM. cur
- “Leveraging the Role of Library Partnerships to Understand Undergraduate Research Contributions to Humanities Scholarship,” SPUR 2(3), 2019, a University of Michigan case study. cur
Newer, international
- Clark, Giovanelli, and Macrae, “Undergraduate Research in English” (Cambridge, 2022). It covers language, literature, and creative writing, including small-scale research in everyday learning, formal research projects, and publication routes. brookes
Where undergraduates publish literary work
- Literary Undergraduate Research in English (LURe), based at the University of West Georgia, publishes undergraduate work in literature, critical theory, film, and cultural studies. westga
- Mesh is an online journal for undergraduate work across English studies. linguistlist
If you tell me your angle, I can narrow this. It might be mentoring, assessment and outcomes, archival methods, or how to publish. I can also search for more recent work from 2023 to 2026.
Thank you! What about undergraduate research in Spanish and Latin American literature?
Searched the web
I didn’t find a dedicated body of peer-reviewed scholarship on undergraduate research in Spanish and Latin American literature specifically. The field is much thinner than the English-studies literature I sent earlier, so the results below are mostly pedagogy articles, program descriptions, and publication venues.
Closest scholarly material
- Hispania (AATSP): it runs pedagogy articles on teaching literature at the undergraduate level. Examples include “Teaching Mental Health and Suicidality in Modern Spanish Fiction: Approaches for the Undergraduate Curriculum” and “Bridging the Language-Literature Divide via Integrated Performance Assessments in an Introductory Hispanic Literature Course.” These are about teaching rather than student research, but they show how the field treats undergraduate literature courses. jhujhu
- Joseph McClanahan (Creighton) works on Spanish and Afro-Hispanic literature and also lists undergraduate research in the humanities as a research focus. He gave invited talks on involving undergraduates in research, so he is worth looking up as an author. creighton
- Yajaira Padilla, a teaching project at the University of Kansas (2008): a Spanish course meant to give students research skills in Latin American literary studies, taken late in the Spanish major. ku
- Mary Coffey, “Spanish Cultural Studies in the Undergraduate Classroom,” Arizona Journal of Hispanic Cultural Studies (1999): a chronicle of an undergraduate course linking cultural studies to language acquisition. It is dated but relevant. jhu
How programs structure it
- Molloy’s senior seminar (SPA 4900/4910) has students learn qualitative, historical, and textual methodologies before completing a project in the next course. smartcatalogiq
- Stony Brook describes semester-long inquiries in its 400-level Spanish courses that can grow into an honors thesis. stonybrook
- Kentucky offers an independent research course leading to an undergraduate thesis in Hispanic Studies that can cover Spanish and Latin American literature. uky
These are course descriptions rather than articles, but they are useful as models.
Where undergraduates publish
- Portales (Columbia) publishes student work on Iberian, Hispanic, Lusophone, Latin American, Latinx, Indigenous, and Caribbean languages and cultures. issuu
- El texto hispanoamericano (Mount Royal University) published essays on Spanish American literature written in Spanish by undergraduates. mtroyal
- Esferas is an undergraduate and alumni initiative at NYU’s Department of Spanish and Portuguese. issuu
- The USF library guide also lists a peer-reviewed, open-access journal for essays on Spanish, Latin American, and US Latino literatures and cultures. The snippet didn’t give its name, so check the guide. usf
- The Student Journal of Latin American Studies (UT Austin) is no longer published, but its archive may still be useful. utexas
Suggested next steps
- Search the MLA International Bibliography or JSTOR for “undergraduate research” combined with “Hispanic,” “Spanish,” or “world languages.”
- Look at the Scholarship and Practice of Undergraduate Research (SPUR) and Grobman & Kinkead material from my last answer for the general framework.
- Look at the world-languages scholarship on undergraduate research. It likely exists but didn’t surface in these searches.
I can run more targeted searches on any of these angles, such as honors theses, study abroad research, or heritage-speaker students.
Thank you! What about in Latin American Studies?
Searched the web
As with Spanish and Latin American literature, I found few peer-reviewed articles on undergraduate research in Latin American Studies as a field. What exists is mostly individual case studies, program and capstone descriptions, and student journals.
Articles and case studies
- Ashdown, “Involving Undergraduates in Publishable International Research: Experiences in Latin America,” Frontiers in Psychology (2019). The author guided 26 undergraduates in psychological research in Guatemala, which led to five publications with nine undergraduate co-authors. It is in cultural psychology, but the practical advice carries over. It stresses local collaboration and avoiding “safari” research. corefrontiersin
- Sandoval & Morales, “Mandatory Undergraduate Research: Unlocking the Potential of Students at a Latin American University” (2025). The record lists keywords such as career readiness, higher education, and Zamorano. It concerns research inside a Latin American institution rather than research about the region, and the record doesn’t show the discipline, so it is likely agricultural or applied. umn
- Applied community research in a Latin American Studies course. This article describes a new course combining traditional coursework with experiential learning, built around civic engagement with local Latino communities. The search result didn’t show the title or author, so I’d need to look it up before you cite it. informahealthcare
- Brown-Peterson, Peterson & Franco-López, “Getting the Word Out: English-Language Publication of Undergraduate Student Research in Latin America” (2005). It is a short proceedings paper on publication barriers. It appears to concern marine and biological science, so it may be tangential.
How Latin American Studies programs build in research
- Maryland (LACS 458). Its senior capstone has students craft a research question and plan using methods from one or more disciplines, and present at an annual student conference. A graduate-undergraduate mentorship program pairs graduate mentors with capstone students. umdumd
- Macalester. Majors complete an original capstone project of their own design, often based on junior-year semester-abroad work. macalester
- Oberlin. An honors project automatically fulfills the capstone requirement, and all capstone projects include an oral presentation. oberlin
- Bates. The thesis is the interdisciplinary capstone of the major. bates
- Victoria. Students can apply for a Jamie Cassels Undergraduate Research Award and take an experiential course (LAS 320) and a capstone seminar (LAS 400). uvic
- Toronto. An undergraduate research award of up to $2,500 funds projects in Latin America and requires a public presentation afterward. utoronto
- Albany and Ohio State. A LASA 2019 roundtable, “Dynamic Duos,” covers faculty-librarian partnerships, including Albany’s redesign of its undergraduate major with a revamped theory-and-methods capstone. It is a presentation rather than an article, but it is directly on topic. iupui
Where undergraduates publish Latin American Studies work
- Portales (Columbia). It covers Iberian, Hispanic, Lusophone, Latin American, Latinx, Indigenous, and Caribbean languages and cultures. issuu
- Entre Mundos. It is a student-led, peer-reviewed Latin American interdisciplinary journal open to graduate and undergraduate students across Canada. wisc
- Latinx Studies Journal (Wisconsin-Madison). It was formerly Concientización, and it is a peer-reviewed journal of undergraduate writing. wisc
- Américas (Johns Hopkins) is a student-run Latin American studies journal. I didn’t confirm who can submit, so check its guidelines.
- Student Journal of Latin American Studies (UT Austin). It is no longer published, but its archive may still be useful. utexas
Suggestions
- Search the Latin American Research Review, LASA Forum, and the Scholarship and Practice of Undergraduate Research (SPUR) journal using terms like “undergraduate,” “capstone,” or “study abroad” alongside “Latin American Studies.”
- Try discipline-specific teaching journals (history, anthropology, political science), since much of this work appears there rather than under Latin American Studies. For example, Arrarás (2004) analyzed syllabi to see how Latin American politics is taught to undergraduates in the US. fiu
If you tell me your discipline or purpose, I can narrow the search. For example, I can look for work on study-abroad research, archival or oral-history projects, or research with Latinx communities.
Axé.
