Michael Conniff is the director of the Global Studies Institute at San Jose State University, where he promotes curriculum reform, faculty and staff development, exchanges with foreign universities, and programs to prepare students to succeed as citizens and professionals in the world at large. Conniff earned degrees at UC-Berkeley and Stanford (Ph.D. 1976) and has published a number of books on modern history, most recently A HISTORY OF MODERN LATIN AMERICA (with Lawrence Clayton), AFRICANS IN THE AMERICAS (with T. J. Davis), and POPULISM IN LATIN AMERICA. He has lived overseas for a dozen years, has held several post-doc appointments (including three Fulbright tours), and served in the… U.S. Peace Corps. He lectures often in Portuguese and Spanish. Before joining SJSU, he taught history at the University of New Mexico and created Latin American studies programs at Auburn University and the University of South Florida.