Rate My Professor Alisa Tigchelaar

Dr. Alisa Tigchelaar serves as Professor of Spanish in the World Languages Department at Calvin University. She earned her BA in Spanish and Philosophy in 1992, followed by an MA in Hispanic Literature from Indiana University in 1995, and a PhD in Hispanic Literature from the same institution in 1999. In her teaching, Tigchelaar emphasizes the Spanish language to broaden students' cultural and relational perspectives while continuing the study of Castilian-speaking peoples and their cultural production. She contributes to Rhetoric Across the Curriculum as a representative from Spanish and has directed Calvin University's semester-long study abroad program in Spain multiple times, including in Spring 2017. Her pedagogical approach welcomes both in-person and remote learners, as noted during adaptations in the pandemic era.

Tigchelaar's scholarship focuses on Early Modern Spanish religious literature, dealing mainly with the production of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Spanish cloistered nuns and what their works reveal about their lives and the expression of their spirituality. She investigates how literature reveals insights about society and people, providing readers a platform to dialogue about their own environments, ideas, and realities. Particular interests include contrasting the roles afforded to secular women versus religious women as suggested in their literary productions. Key publications include "'Puesto un muro en este prado ameno': Cecilia del Nacimiento's Pastoral Drama as Shepherding Space" in Crítica Hispánica 35.1 (2013): 145-168; "Marcela de San Félix's Mystic Theology through Drama: Platonic and Augustinian Influences" (2014); an English translation of the Catalonian medieval poem "Veles i vents" (January 2015); and the co-authored chapter "María de San José Salazar's Mount Carmel: Global Identity through the Natural World in Libro de las recreaciones" (2024) with Antónia Conde, Fábio Mário, Luísa Vilela, and José Eduardo Franco. She has presented works such as "Meaningful Paradoxes: Rhetorical Strategies in Early Modern Female Writing" at the Early Modern Women's Conference in Milwaukee (June 2015) and delivered a lecture at the H. Henry Meeter Center for Calvin Studies in February 2014. Tigchelaar has also contributed to the Diversity & Inclusion for All podcast series, discussing topics like race, racism, transformation, and intersectionality alongside colleagues.