UGRD > LATAM
Latin American Studies Courses
LATAM 101 Latin America: Contemporary Society and Culture +
Description:
This course introduces the people, events, and trends shaping Latin American societies and cultures today. Readings provide a historical overview and examine regional similarities and local differences, including: social institutions such as family; politics and political cultures; religious institutions and practices; and ways that race, ethnicity, and gender shape national cultures and subcultures. More Info
Offered in:LATAM 160 Building Language Justice: Translation, Migration, and Linguistic Human Rights +
Description:
This interdisciplinary course introduces the concept of Language Justice through the field of Translation Studies. Students will study translation as a tool of both colonization and decolonization through readings in Latin American studies, literary translation, linguistic human rights, and translation activism. Language diversity is related but not easily mapped onto other categories including race, nationality, class, and citizenship status, and this course will use translation as a lens to analyze creative cultural forms that represent language diversity through the histories of migration in Latin America and the US. Creative activities and written assignments will hone critical thinking skills, enhance translation literacy, and attune students to the linguistic diversity around us and the choices that go into production any translated work. ***Taught in English, this is a hands-on, interactive course designed with the support of the Mellon Foundation. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
LATAM 205L Latin American Film +
Description:
This course examines Latin American feature and documentary film to analyze social, cultural and political themes and issues. Topics include: the development of national cinemas and their genres; film as art and industry; film and political engagement; representations of women and gender; and selected social and cultural subjects. More Info
Offered in:LATAM 210G Food, Culture, and Society in Latin America +
Description:
This course explores the history and cultural significance of food in Latin America. Topics include indigenous agriculture; ritual uses of food; how European colonization changed food habits; the development and social impact of export crops; food and national identities; and problems of food self sufficiency. Assignments, including some field work, also examine food and cultural stereotyping. Counts toward the concentration in Latin American studies. Capabilities addressed: Critical reading, critical thinking, clear writing, collaborative learning, academic self-assessment. More Info
Offered in:LATAM 240L Work, Environment, and Revolution in Latin America +
Description:
This course explores the place of work, environment, and political struggle in the past and present of Latin America. How have struggles around work and environment shaped Latin American history and culture? The course examines themes of environmental justice, food sovereignty, indigenous rights, and labor conflicts within the context of economic and environmental transformation. More Info
Offered in:LATAM 255L Gods and Slaves: Latin America before 1800 +
Description:
This course introduces students to the history and cultures of early Latin America, an area of the world that includes Mesoamerica (Mexico and Central America), South America, and the Caribbean. In this class we will examine the political, cultural, and social dimensions of the major Pre-Columbian civilizations; the causes and consequences of Spanish and Portuguese colonization; the establishment of New World societies and economies in the sixteenth century; and the vastly divergent forms of mature colonial society across the continent in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. More Info
Offered in:LATAM 256L Skyscrapers and Shantytowns: Latin America since 1800 +
Description:
This class attempts a wider reckoning of the last two centuries in our ''Latin'' hemisphere, broadening and contextualizing core topics such as slavery and revolution, contraband and informality, inequality and exclusion, economize booms and busts, environmental and technological change, gender and demographic change, migration and mass culture. In addition to these core interpenetrating themes, the class also addresses how history is produced, consumed, and transformed. More Info
Offered in:LATAM 262L Latin American, Iberian, and Afro-Luso-Brazilian Literatures in Translation +
Description:
Taught in English, this course offers students the opportunity to study in translation major works from Spanish and Portuguese-speaking contexts that shed light on human concerns, ideas, and realities. Students will interrogate the meaning and value of reading literature as a laboratory of the mind that affords insight into human experience, in particular the experiences of individuals who belong to cultures, races, or genders different from one's own. No knowledge of Spanish or Portuguese required. More Info
Offered in:LATAM 303 Reform and Revolution in Latin America +
Description:
This course examines case studies of twentieth-century political movements in Latin America that have attempted to restructure social and economic systems and establish new political orders. Readings provide historical background. Topics include: guerrilla insurgency; revolutionary agendas and reforms; revolutionary cultures and identities; and new social movements, including women's movements. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
LATAM 305 The Caribbean: Culture and Society +
Description:
This course examines the cultural, historical, and social development of the Caribbean. A point of departure is the historical phenomenon of Western colonization with the Caribbean at its center and the ways in which the 'narratives' of said colonization express the cultural dilemma, legacy of slavery, racial and national implications, and environmental impact of this process. Topics may include the Haitian Revolution, the Cuban War of Independence, n?gritude/negritud, the Cuban Revolution, decolonization, diaspora, race and creolization, and others. More Info
Offered in:LATAM 360 Language and Power in the Americas +
Description:
This course examines the nature of language power in the construction and history of cultures, nations, and identities in the Americas. The relationships among indigenous languages and colonizing languages Spanish, Portuguese, and English, and their role in the cultural self-fashioning and formation of political subjects will be studies through themes including contact, conflict, conquest, resistance, translation, and transculturation. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
LATAM 375L Afro-Luso-Brazilian Cultures +
Description:
This course will offer an introduction to the cultures, histories, and politics of the Portuguese-speaking world (namely Portugal, Brazil, Angola, Cabo Verde, Guinea-Bissua, Mozambique, and Sao Tome and Principe) as seen primarily through key literary, historical and filmic texts. Materials and class discussions will center around themes of colonialism, the struggle for independence, post-colonialism, gender, class, race, dictatorships, national identity, historical memory, and (im)migration. This course includes an explicit focus on comparison between the cultures of Brazil, Portugal and those of the PALOP (Portuguese-Speaking nations of Africa), specifically their experiences with colonialism, the path to independence, and post-colonialism. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
LATAM 380L Afro-Luso-Brazilian Cinema +
Description:
This course examines some of the film cultures of Brazil, Portugal, and Lusophone Africa (more specifically, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau, Cabo Verde, and Angola), including their representations of popular culture, poverty and famine, underdevelopment, favelas and musseques, classism, racism, sexuality, gender and childhood. At the same time, the course analyzes movie language, film aesthetics, social debates about cinema and social role of the filmmaker by comparing and contrasting national cinema industries of Brazil, Angola, Mozambique, and Portugal. All films will be spoken in Portuguese and West African Portuguese Creoles but subtitled in English. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
LATAM 454L Argentina +
Description:
This course is a cultural interpretation of Argentina based primarily on historical, cultural, and literary works. The aim is to explore the process of nation-building in the Latin American context. Topics include: the role of the intellectual in political culture; gender and nation; literature and nationalism; media and politics; and globalization. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
LATAM 478 Independent Study +
LATAM 479 Independent Study +
Description:
Study of a particular area of this subject under the supervision of a faculty member. More Info
Offered in:LATAM 485 Special Topics +
Description:
Selected topics in Latin American Studies, taught by staff or visiting lecturers. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
LATAM 490L Internship Course in Latin American and Iberian Studies +
Description:
The Internship Course in Latin American and Iberian Studies is designed to provide students with meaningful, mentored experiential learning while exploring possible careers and making professional connections. Relevant fields include education, media, public agencies, arts, translation, law, health, non-profits, etc. More Info
Offered in: