In this hybrid research seminar on Thursday, October 29, 2026, at 12:00 m, we will have Juliana Jaramillo, who will present her research titled "The Long-Run Persistence of Family Ties in Latin America".
Abstract:
Who interacts with whom shapes access to resources, opportunities, and wellbeing, yet the persistence of said interactions remains poorly understood. This paper documents the long-run persistence of family-level ties in Latin America, tracing connections first established in Spain during the colonisation of the Americas into the present day. Using biographical data on Spanish colonial migrants, we reconstruct historical family networks based on surname associations in Spain during colonisation. We then link these to modern marriage patterns, identified through the joint distribution of surnames in full population data covering nearly 59 million individuals. Our analysis shows that colonial-era family ties remain remarkably persistent: families historically close in Spain are significantly more likely to intermarry today, even 500 years later. A sizeable share of persistence is explained by historical and modern over-representation of homogamous marriages, nonetheless we still find sizeable persistence when we account for these. We document sizeable heterogeneity across locations in Latin America. Persistence is strongest in locations tied to colonial administration and slavery, and in areas with greater modern diversity. Finally, we compare our results with modern-day Spain.
The Zoom link to join the seminar online can be found here. This event is open to the public; all those interested in this topic or the speaker are very welcome to attend. After the presentation, there will be time for questions and discussion.
For any queries related to our UNU-MERIT Seminar Series, please contact Lizeth Melissa Molina Alvarez and Raghav Chakravarthy by sending an email to seminars@merit.unu.edu.