Teaching American literature will make a tremendous difference to him, said Roberto Ferreira, Jr., an American literature professor visiting NIU from Brazil.

It is different to know the United States from the inside, he said. The experience also will affect his students. The lectures in the program have increased his understanding of America and contemporary literature, Ferreira said.

Ferreira is one of 18 scholars from six continents at NIU from June 21 to Aug. 1 participating in the Fulbright American Studies Institute program.

The institute organizes six-week academic programs for multinational groups of university faculty, according to the U.S. Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.

These institutes strengthen curricula and improve the quality of teaching about the United States in academics overseas, according to the bureau.

For this year’s program at NIU, the state department is providing $220,000 in funding, said Lina Davide Ong, NIU director of international training.

This year, the main topic of the conference is redefining American spaces: the city, land and the body.

Lecture topics include cultural and critical spaces; the geography of the body and the family; landscape and history; the suburb, the exurb and the farm; and a technology workshop, among others.

Cross-cultural understanding and letting other countries know America first-hand are the main objectives of the event, said Keith Gandal, director of the series at NIU and an associate English professor.

Ong said 24 guest speakers will be at the event. Scholars from California, Chicago, Massachusetts and NIU will present the programs.

NIU faculty will be able to exchange international perspectives of different subjects, Ong said.

“We are always trying to internationalize the NIU campus,” she said.

Ndonga Mfuwa, a professor from Angola, said the university where he teaches is developing a new department of English. The different lectures he has attended have given him a better understanding of American literature, he said.