The Department of Romance Studies had the opportunity to hire two Brazilianists at the same time—Professors Gustavo Furtado and Lamonte Aidoo—allowing a significant multiplier effect that would not have been available to Duke without the Mellon Foundation's support for Humanities Writ Large. Brazilian Studies is a rich area within comparative area studies as Brazil is both quite similar to (for instance in areas of slavery and race relations) and rather dissimilar from (in terms of language and emerging perspectives on race and sexuality) the United States.