PORT 5110: Black, Indigenous, and Queer Characters in Brazilian Literature
Prof. Tania Martuscelli
Tuesday/Thursday 2:15 - 3:00 pm
Location
This course will discuss the portrayal of black, indigenous, and queer people in Brazilian literature from the 19th century to today. Students will read poems, short stories, and novels to better understand how (or if) the representation of these minorities has changed. Class discussions will be based on Standpoint Theory, Africana, and Queer Studies. Taught in Portuguese (readings in Portuguese and English).
SPAN 5200–7200: Spanish Literature: Renaissance and Baroque
Prof. Núria Silleras-Fernández silleras@colorado.edu
MONDAYS, 3:30 to 6:05 pm
Mckenna 103
Iberia 1469–1716: Identity and Cultural Production in the Age of Empire The political, religious, and ethnic configuration, and the cultural production of the Iberian Peninsula dramatically changed between 1469, the year “The Catholic Monarchs” married, and 1716, when Spain became a unified absolutist state. This was a time of unprecedented territorial expansion that situated the Spanish kingdoms at the center of an empire that stretched over four continents. It was a time of transformational processes: the mystification of the “Reconquest,” the enforcement of religious orthodoxy and moral compliance by the Inquisition (1478–1834), the expulsion of the Jews (1492), the brutal subjugation of the indigenous populations of the Americas, the conversion of Muslims and the eventual expulsion of the Moriscos (1609), the ideology of blood purity, the rise of Protestantism along with Catholic mysticism, the reconfiguring of gender discourse, the prevalence of slavery, and the institutionalization of censorship that went hand in hand with the printing press. An enduring Black Legend also developed regarding Spaniards, who were portrayed as bigots, brutish, and unsophisticated, with not much to offer to global culture. Nevertheless, since the eighteenth century, this period has been referred to as the “Siglo de Oro” (1492–1659/1691) – a Golden Age of Spanish letters and art celebrated for its unprecedented creativity. Many questions arise: How can we reconciliate the Empire, the Black Legend, and the Golden Age? Why has Spanish identity been so tied to this time? What discourses on gender, sexuality, race, and ethnicity developed? What was the role of literature in the process of creating, accommodating, and fighting those discourses? How should we, as scholars from our own conflicted time and place, marked by a self-awareness of structural racism and inequality, gender construction, identity politics, alleged respect for difference, and intersectional analysis, study the cultural production of the Golden Age? What theoretical frameworks of reference should we use? Should we subvert our literary cannon or at least ask it a different set of questions? This seminar is going to focus on these and many other questions while studying poetry, prose, and theater. We are going to read well known texts and authors – like Lazarillo de Tormes, Teresa de Ávila, María de Zayas, Lope de Vega, and Miguel de Cervantes – but also more obscured ones. We will focus on what was written (or transmitted orally) and on what was read (or listened to).
SPAN 5320/7320: Tecnologías de la identidad: transculturación, hibridación cultural y cambios de medio
Prof. Élika Ortega
Tuesday 3:30-6:00
McKenna 103
Este curso crea una intersección de dos campos de estudio: los estudios de hibridación cultural (transculturación, mestizaje, aculturación, entre muchos otros términos) y los estudios de cambio de medio. Nuestro punto de partida es que los medios de comunicación globalizados precipitan y aceleran los encuentros culturales que en el pasado podían tomar décadas o siglos. Al centro del curso está una interrogación sobre qué sustratos/vestigios/marcas materiales y formales dejan los encuentros culturales que históricamente han sido violentos, coercitivos o, al menos, asimétricos. Por medio de nuestras lecturas literarias y teóricas investigaremos cómo los cambios de medio y los cambios en los géneros literarios y artísticos subyacen o precipitan cambios culturales. Las lecturas incluyen Primera crónica y buen gobierno de Felipe Guamán Poma de Ayala, el Códice Chimalpopoca, DOC/UNDOC de Guillermo Gómez Peña, y la Herramienta Transfronteriza para Inmigrantes de Electronic Disturbance Theatre entre otras.
SPAN 5430/7430: Trends Hispanic Linguistics: Spanish applied linguistics from a critical perspective
Prof. Tracy Quan
Tuesdays and Thursdays 2-3:15pm
McKenna 103
What does it mean to know a language? Is immersion the ideal context for language acquisition? Why is 90% or more target language-use in the classroom the language teaching standard? What constitutes an error? This graduate seminar explores, through a critical lens, foundational questions and taken-for-granted concepts that underlie and have shaped the field of Spanish applied linguistics. We will learn about key language acquisition constructs (e.g., input, corrective feedback) and the canonical studies that have contributed to their popularity in the discipline. We will then draw on critical, sociolinguistic, and sociocultural research and theoretical frameworks (e.g., critical language awareness, translingualism, raciolinguistics) to problematize the generalizability of these constructs for the teaching and learning of Spanish as an additional and heritage language.
This course will be conducted primarily in Spanish, with readings and assignments in both English and Spanish.