Nathan Henne

Dr. Nathan Henne, from the department of Quetzaltenango in Guatemala, is Rev. Guy Lemieux, S.J., SAK Distinguished Professor of Latin American Studies and Spanish at Loyola University New Orleans. He earned his Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 2007. His notable publications include: the scholarly monograph Reading Popol Wuj: A decolonial guide (U Arizona Press, 2020); book chapters “Stretching the Boundaries of Epic: Popol Wuj, Maya Literature, and Coloniality” (in Teaching World Epics. MLA. 2023) and “Man are’ taj Utz k’aslemal la’: Indigenous Ecologies and the Limits of Cross Disciplinary Translation” (in Abiayalan Pluriverses, Amherst College Press, 2024), “A Cartography of the Uncertain: The Maya Textual Exile” (in Cartographies of Exile: A new spatial literacy. Routledge Press, 2016, “Untranslation: The Popol Wuj and Comparative Methodology” (in The New Centennial Review: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on the Americas, Spring 2012 (12:2), and numerous translations, including Luis de Lión’s El tiempo principia en Xibalbá / Time Commences in Xibalbá (U Arizona Press, 2012). His current book project is currently titled U’kux Utz K’aslemal and Life in Fullness: Getting to the Heart of Indigenous Ecologies, which explores alternative theoretical approaches to syncretism, mestizaje, and ecology that reflect both pre-Contact and current Maya practices and perspectives. Nathan’s teaching focuses include: Indigenous ecologies, pre-Contact and contemporary Indigenous literatures, Central American literature, translation theory, language theory, culture studies approaches to fútbol, and Spanish language instruction.

Classes Taught

• Revolution!  A Comparison of Guatemalan and Iranian Civil Wars in Literature and Film
• Latin American Novels of the 20th Century
• Spanish American Literature I & II
• Intensive Conversation
• Borderlands Literature
• Spanish Language Classes
• Composition and Syntax
• Indigenous Lit in Translation
• Literature and Film of Central American Revolutions
• Latin American Culture through Film

Areas of Expertise

• Central American Literature
• Literature of the Americas
• Latin American Magic Realism
• Pre-Contact Indigenous Literatures
• Translation Theory
• Language Theory
• Spanish Language Instruction