ASiAn invASion wElcomEd - ProMéxico

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UNAM, Awarded
for its Influence
in Ibero-America
The National Autonomous University of Mexico
(UNAM) has received the 2009 Prince of
Asturias Award for Communication and Humanities
in recognition of its influence on the
Ibero-American culture and environment.
The jury for the award, given since 1981
by the Prince of Asturias Foundation of
Spain, judged UNAM to be “the academic
and formative model for many generations
of students from diverse countries. It has
nourished the Ibero-American environment
of very valuable intellectuals and scientists.”
The largest public university in Mexico
and Ibero-America “has promoted powerful
currents of humanistic, liberal and
democratic thought in America and it has
extended its decisive influence to create an
extraordinary variety of institutions that enlarge
the academic world and link it to the
society they serve,” the jury said.
UNAM was founded in 1910 as an institution
of superior teaching that was the heir to
the Royal and Pontifical University of Mexico,
created in 1551. In 1929, Mexico’s government
granted it autonomous status and the
institution adopted its current name.
It is Mexico’s most important public university
and one of Ibero-America’s most
important research and education centers.
It has approximately 300,000 students and
PRIZE WINNERS
Mexican institutions and individuals who have winned the Prince of Asturias Award:
• UNAM
Communication and Humanities, 2009
• El Colegio de México
Social Sciences, 2001
• Ricardo Miledi (neurobiologist)*
Scientific and Technical Research, 1999
• Carlos Fuentes (writer)*
Writing, 1994
• Francisco Bolívar Zapata (molecular biologist)*
Scientific and Technical Research, 1991
• Fondo de Cultura Económica (Editorial fund)
Communication and Humanities, 1989
• Marcos Moshinsky (physicist)*
Scientific and Technical Research, 1988
• Pablo Rudomin (neuroscientist)
Scientific and Technical Research, 1987
• Emilio Rosenblueth (seismic engineer)*
Scientific and Technical Research, 1985
• Juan Rulfo (writer)
Writing, 1983
• José López Portillo (politician)*
International Cooperation,1981
more than 34,000 professors and researchers.
From its classrooms have come Mexico’s
three Nobel Prize winners - Mario Molina, in
Chemistry (1995); Octavio Paz, for Literature
(1990); and Alfonso García Robles; Peace
Nobel Prize (1982). Also, six of the eight who
have received the Prince of Asturias prize
have graduated from this university.
In the area of humanities, UNAM has
been recognized for its openness to Ibero-
American thoughts and ideologies and also
as a home for distinguished thinkers and
professors from around the world. Its humanities
research centers, such as its institutions
of historical, philosophical, philological
and aesthetic investigation, have generated
more than 2,700 books. Also, 16 specialized
periodicals are edited in its schools.
UNAM is in charge of administering the
National Library and the National Newspaper
Archive, as well as a network of 141
university libraries. It’s also in charge of one
philharmonic orchestra and a symphonic
one; radio and television stations; Mexico’s
most important film library, at the University
Center of Film Studies (Latin America’s
oldest film school); and a network of university
museums.
In 2007, UNAM’s main campus in Mexico
City, was declared Cultural Patrimony of Humanity
by UNESCO for being a monumental
collection of 20th century modernism.
Also, the university has several buildings in
Mexico City’s historic center that have also
been considered cultural patrimonies of humanity.
The Prince of Asturias prize is awarded
each year to eight people or institutions in
the areas of art, international cooperation,
harmony, social sciences, communication and
humanities, sports, scientific and technical research
and writing. n
source: prince of asturias foundation
* graduated from unam
www.fundacionprincipedeasturias.org