WESTMINSTER — Alumnus Davíd Carrasco, professor of the Study of Latin America at Harvard University with a Joint Appointment in the Harvard Divinity School and the Department of Anthropology, will return to campus to give a lecture, "Borderlands and the 'biblical' Hurricane: Images and Rhythms of Latino and Latin American Studies," at 7:30 p.m. October 22 in McDaniel Lounge.

Carrasco's visit celebrates two significant new initiatives at McDaniel — a revamped and renamed Office of Diversity and Multicultural Affairs, and the creation of a Latino and Latin American Studies program.

The lecture, which will be followed by a question-and-answer session, is free and open to the public. A dessert reception with live music will begin at 6:30 p.m.

Carrasco, who is an historian of religions at Harvard Divinity School, maintains that we live in a world of geopolitical, cultural and religious borderlands.

"Borderlands means for me the geographical, political, and cultural landscapes straddling countries but also the existential conditions of people who often, if not continually, find themselves at the crossroads of their lives and seek new combinations of resources — cultural and religious — to carry on creative struggles for survival and to thrive," says Carrasco, who is the Neil L. Rudenstine Professor of the Study of Latin America, a distinction named for Harvard's 26th president.

Carrasco — who graduated in 1967 from Western Maryland College, now McDaniel College — has taught at the University of Colorado, Princeton University, and the University of Adelaide. He earned a Th.M., MA, and Ph.D. at the University of Chicago.

He is an historian of religions specializing in hermeneutics in the study of religion, Mesoamerican cities and religions, and the Mexican-American borderlands. He is director of the Moses Mesoamerican Archive and Research Project at the University of Colorado.

In addition to many scholarly books, articles and reviews, Carrasco is editor-in-chief of the three-volume Oxford Encyclopedia of Mesoamerican Cultures. He co-produced the film "Alambrista: The Director's Cut," which spotlights the struggles of undocumented Mexican farm workers in the United States. The film's original version won the Caméra d'Or at Cannes in 1977. In 2004, The Mexican government awarded Carrasco the "Mexican Order of the Aztec Eagle," its highest honor for a foreign national. In 2003, he was elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.