Global Arc

Latin American and Caribbean thought from 1800 to the present, focusing on the conflicting cultural and ideological assumptions of liberalism and nationalism. Topics might include slavery and literature, the writing of history, the intellectuals and power, or the writings of some major figures such as Bolívar, Hostos, Martí, Mariátegui, Fernando Ortiz, or Paz. Two 90-minute seminars. Prerequisite: a 200-level Spanish course or instructor's permission.

Readings and discussion of authors such as Machado de Assis, Cortázar, Lispector, García Márquez, Vargas Llosa, and Puig, considered in relation to the cultures of Latin America and to trends of modern European and American fiction. Does not count as a departmental course for Spanish majors unless readings and papers are done in Spanish. Three hour lecture. Prerequisite: a 200-level Spanish course or instructor's permission.

How is the complexity of the Andes imagined or resolved in its literatures? This seminar will study the plurality of narrations and communities that constitute the Andean world, focusing primarily on Peru and two of its major intellectual movements in the 20th century: the indigenismo and the criollo urban literature. Aspects of the Afro-Peruvian narratives will also be studied. Major authors discussed include: Ricardo Palma, Clorinda Matto, González Prada, Mariátegui, Arguedas, Vargas Llosa, Bryce, Ribeyro, Gregorio Martínez. Conducted in Spanish. Two 90-minute seminars. Prerequisite: a 200-level Spanish course or instructor's permission.

A course focusing on elements of Latin American culture that left a strong mark on the history, literature, and arts of the region. Recent topics include the representation of Che Guevara in novels, film, and photography; the literary response to Tango in Argentina; the impact of the invention of radio in avant-garde poetry. The course will emphasize the connections between history, literature, arts, and visual culture of the region. Two 90-minute seminars. Prerequisite: a 200-level Spanish course or instructor's permission.

An overview of the cultural production and history of major cities in the Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking worlds. Possible topics include Mexico City, Barcelona, Saõ Paulo, Buenos Aires, Havana, and Madrid. The course will examine the representation of the city in literature (poetry and prose), film, painting, photography, and music. Discussions will focus on how historical events determine the possibilities of representation. Two 90-minute classes. Prerequisite: a 200-level Spanish course or instructor's permission.

A course analyzing various Latin American literary and written traditions produced by, in dialogue with, or on behalf of subjects who have an ambiguous relationship with dominant forms of written expression, for example: indigenous people, black people, and women. Special attention will be given to slave narratives, testimonio, autobiography, and the indigenista novel. Two 90-minute classes. Prerequisite: a 200-level Spanish course or instructor's permission.

An examination of the relationship between gender and genre, between the author's experience as a gendered subject, and experiments with literary form. Topics might include women's writing, gay literature, and the aesthetics of camp. Discussions will emphasize the link between experimental forms of writing and the experience of history as a gendered subject. Two 90-minute classes. Prerequisite: a 200-level Spanish course or instructor's permission.

An examination of the ways photography has worked in the construction of the historical, political, social and subjective dimensions of some nations and their citizens in the Hispanic world from the end of the 19th century to our times. Among the issues to be examined are: photographing the national subject; recording history; the foreign gaze; war and propaganda (the Spanish-American war, the Mexican revolution, the Spanish Civil War); the margins of the city; sexuality and abjection.

This course traces different modes of photographic itinerancy from the nineteenth century to the present and, in the process, offers an alternative transnational history of photography. The course accompanies an exhibition of the same title that will take place in the Princeton Art Museum in the fall of 2013. Like the exhibition, the course focuses on the circulation and exchange of images across cultural, social, and national borders; the dialogue between photography and other media; and the ways in which visual archives enact relationships among memory, history, and "photographic poetics."

Forty years after the emergence of Gabriel García Márquez, the narrative works of the Chilean Roberto Bolaño have once again put Latin American literature at the center of the world's cultural mainstream. Quiet poet, public storyteller, and heir of Borges' most intricate speculations and the beatniks' nomadism, Bolaño broke with the recipes of magical realism and opened a fresh literary horizon by combining anti-intellecutal vitalism and erudite conceptualism. This course explores the artistic strategies of an author who made Jim Morrison dialogue with James Joyce, and went from being an anonymous eccentric to a New York Times bestseller.