Coordination

Milagros Pacco studied History and Digital Humanities and obtained her master’s degree (2015) at the Universität zu Köln (UzK). During her studies, she worked as a student assistant in the department for Iberian and Latin American History at the Institute of History of UzK, in the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies, and in the Global South Studies Center (GSSC) at UzK.
She has been a research assistant at the department for Iberian and Latin American History at the Institute of History of UzK since July 2017. As a research assistant, she is involved with academic and coordination tasks and developing and establishing the Research Data Management infrastructure at the Maria Sibylla Merian Centre (Mecila) at UzK.

+49-221-470-5480
milagros.pacco@uni-koeln.de

Kompetenznetz Lateinamerika – Mecila c/o Iberische und Lateinamerikanische Abt. Historisches Institut
Universität zu Köln Albertus-Magnus-Platz | 50923 Köln, Germany

Nora Rabe has a degree in Library and Information Sciences from the Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest. After her beginnings as a librarian in Hungary, she turned to and worked long years in academic publishing supporting research institutions and university libraries in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

Starting in August 2023 at Mecila at the IAI Berlin, Nora Rabe is responsible for the acquisition, cataloguing, and supply of selected materials in analogue and digital formats. She is also in charge of the electronic reading room designed for Mecila members (Mecila eLibrary).

mecila.library@iai.spk-berlin.de
Ibero-Amerikanisches Institut – Preußischer Kulturbesitz
Potsdamer Straße 37
10785 Berlin, Germany

Tomaz Amorim holds a bachelor’s degree in Literary Studies and a master’s degree in Literary Theory and History from the Universidade Estadual de Campinas (Unicamp), with an exchange internship at the UzK. He holds a PhD in Literary Theory and Comparative Literature from the USP, with an exchange internship at Humboldt University. He completed post-doctoral internships at the Unicamp and at the FU Berlin (in the Excellence Cluster “Temporal Communities”). He worked as Pedagogic Coordinator at UNEAFRO-Brazil and Guest Coordinator at the São Paulo International Film Festival. He is a poet, literary translator and writes cultural criticism in several Brazilian media outlets.

tomaz.amorim@fu-berlin.de
Rua Morgado de Mateus, 615
04015-051 São Paulo, Brazil

Our Scientific Editor, responsible for the Working Papers Series and other publications, holds a PhD in Philosophy from the Universidade Estadual de Campinas (Unicamp). He was chief editor of Novos Estudos Cebrap (2010-15), visiting researcher at the University of Chicago (2008), associate researcher at the Philosophy Department of Unicamp (2018), and postdoctoral researcher at the Philosophy Department of the Universidade de São Paulo (2019-20). He joined Mecila’s coordination office team in 2020.

+55 11 55740399 | 118
joaquim.toledo@fu-berlin.de
Rua Morgado de Mateus, 615
04015-051 São Paulo, Brazil

María Fernanda Pan Bentancur holds a BA in Latin American Studies from the University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt and an MA in Intercultural Conflict Management from the Alice Salomon University of Applied Sciences in Berlin. Since November 2022 she is part of the Mecila team as assistant for administrative and financial management of the subproject “Medialities of Conviviality and Information Infrastructure” at the Ibero-Amerikanisches Institut (Berlin).

pan@iai.spk-berlin.de 
Ibero-Amerikanisches Institut – Preußischer Kulturbesitz
Potsdamer Straße 37
10785 Berlin, Germany

Sofie Steinberger studied Regional Studies of Latin America at the UzK and is currently a PhD student at the Historical Institute of the UzK and the University of Meknes. From 2017 to 2020 she was a Fellow of the a.r.t.e.s. EUmanities Program (Horizon 2020: MSCA) and spent 18 months doing research in Spain and Morocco. She has been active in various areas of scientific coordination and historical-political education. Among other things, she coordinated the UzK Forum “Ethnicity as a Political Resource”, worked in youth education, for the Academy for Conflict Transformation in Bonn, and is currently curating an exhibition for the Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum in Cologne. Since August 2022, she is part of the team of the Maria Sibylla Merian Centre Conviviality-Inequality in Latin America in Cologne (UzK).

ssteinb1@uni-koeln.de

Universität zu Köln Albertus-Magnus-Platz | 50923 Köln, Germany

Aline Correa holds a Master’s degree in sociology from the Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF), a specialization in Epistemologies of the South from the Latin American Council of Social Sciences (CLACSO) and is a PhD candidate in Latin American Regional Studies at UzK in a joint degree program with USP. Currently collaborates with Mecila as an academic assistant, providing administrative and academic support in the organization of events and the Center’s research program.

acorrea1@uni-koeln.de

Universität zu Köln Albertus-Magnus-Platz | 50923 Köln, Germany

Our Events and Outreach Coordinator has a degree in Social Communication (2013) from USP, and a postgraduate (lato sensu) degree in Business Administration (2018) from the Fundação Getúlio Vargas. She worked in the publishing market before turning to corporate communications in 2017 when she joined the communications team of the Câmara de Comércio e Indústria Brasil-Alemanha. She joined Mecila’s team in São Paulo in 2018.

+55 11 55740399 | 118
melanie.metzen@fu-berlin.de
Rua Morgado de Mateus, 615
04015-051 São Paulo, Brazil

Melissa Costa Baptista holds a bachelor’s degree in International Geography. She is currently pursuing a master’s degree in Interdisciplinary Latin American Studies at Freie Universität Berlin (FUB), focusing on social transformation processes in Latin American societies and their integration into global structures. She is particularly interested in inequalities related to the production and circulation of both food and knowledge. Melissa joined the Mecila team in 2024.

+49 30 266 35 1550
costa@iai.spk-berlin.de
Mecila – Ibero-Amerikanisches Institut
Potsdamer Straße 37, 10785 Berlin, Germany