Relations between China and Latin America date back hundreds of years and have intensified since the founding of the People's Republic of China. Recognizing that meaningful relations with Latin America require an understanding of that varied region, China has established appropriate study and research programs. This essay on current Latin American programs in the People's Republic of China will report on research organizations, research interests of Chinese scholars, and current trends within Latin American studies. The double objectives are to describe China's interest in Latin America and to establish closer contacts between Latin Americanists in China and the United States.

In 1980 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation announced that its Movietone newsfilm collection, containing documentary footage produced between 1919 and 1963, would be given to the University of South Carolina. Soon thereafter one-fifth of the collection, some twelve million feet of unduplicated footage, was shipped to the university's central campus in Columbia. Transfer of the film was suspended, however, when Twentieth Century Fox was purchased by a multinational corporation. Footage for the years between 1919 and 1935, and for the period from September 1942 through August 1944, was included in the initial gift. This material is presently housed and available for research in Columbia, South Carolina. Among these materials are hundreds of thousands of feet of documentary film with Latin American content, much of it untouched since the time it was “vaulted” by Fox fifty years ago or more. As such, this material represents a largely unmined and potentially rich source of film information on Latin America. This research note will suggest the nature and extent of this collection.