At the University of Texas at Austin, Fernando Lara teaches seminars on 20th century Latin American architecture and urbanism, as well as studios related to the continent’s current urban challenges. In The Rise of Popular Modernist Architecture in Brazil, published in 2008 by the University Press of Florida or in his several articles Prof. Lara has discussed the modern and the contemporary Brazilian architecture, its meaning, context and social-economic insertion. His latest publications look at the modernist vocabulary and spatiality being appropriated by the humblest favela dwellers. In 2005, he founded Studio Toró, a non-profit devoted to the challenges of water conservation and urban flooding in Latin America.