Dr Molly Avery

My teaching and research focus on the history of Latin America in the second half of the twentieth century. In particular, I am interested in Latin America’s Cold War, anticommunist internationalism and the history of dictatorship and violence in both the Southern Cone and Central America. While my current research addresses multiple countries in the region, I have a particular interest in the international history of the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile (1973-1990). Both my teaching and research seek to highlight the agency and influence of Latin American actors in the international history of the Americas during the twentieth century.

I am currently working on my first book, Building an Anitcommunist International, which argues that the Chilean and Argentine military dictatorships played a vital – and understudied – role in the conflicts in Guatemala and El Salvador between 1977 and 1984. This book seeks to change prevailing understandings of the Cold War conflagration in Central America, challenging US-centric perspectives and revealing the interconnected nature of histories of anticommunist internationalism, violence and dictatorship in Latin America during the Cold War.

My research has been supported by the Society for Latin American Studies, the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations and the Royal Historical Society, among others.

Prior to joining Sheffield in 2023 I taught at Queen Mary, University of London. I completed my PhD in International History at the London School of Economics in 2022.