Global Arc

This course explores the cultural productions surrounding narcos and cocaine in Colombia and Mexico, two countries whose imaginaries have become globally associated with drug trafficking. Beginning with the transformation of the coca leave into an illegal global commodity, passing through the emergence of the figure of the "sicario" in the 1980s, all the way to Netflix's 'Narcos' vision of the War on Drugs and cryptococaine, the course will engage critically with so-called narco-aesthetics in chronicles, movies, television series, short stories, podcasts, and art

The junior seminar discusses major challenges to the study of culture, literature and society in Portuguese and Spanish-speaking countries. Focusing on text and audiovisual materials, students will acquire methodological tools to develop their own independent research projects. Topics may include: identity, memory, democracy, visual arts, health, race, gender, migration, global cities, sustainability, climate change, citizenship, and digital humanities. It is co-taught in English, with sources in English, Spanish and Portuguese. Students are welcome to use any of the three languages in their written work.

An overview of Latin American literary masterpieces in the twentieth century. We will focus on the period of the Latin American boom in the 1960s, and discuss how novelists responded to political events in the region that include: the Cold War, the Cuban Revolution, the Central American wars, the military dictatorships in Argentina and Chile, etc. Authors studied will include: Jorge Luis Borges, Gabriel Garcia Márquez, Isabel Allende, Mario Vargas Llosa, Gabriela Mistral, Juan Rulfo, Pablo Neruda, Reinaldo Arenas, Julio Cortázar.

Why write or read novels in the age of hyper-information and immediacy? What can the novel tell us about the present and its conflicts? In this course, we will reflect on different forms of present-day violence through the quiet and careful reading of 5 novels by young Spanish writers. The course will facilitate interaction and collaboration with students at Northwestern University, and during April students from both universities will participate in a virtual encounter with some of the authors, as well as in an online workshop.

The development of cultural patterns and literary forms in Spanish America since the late 19th century. Topics may include: the importance of oral traditions and popular music in forging identities; the literary and ideological import of modernismo, travel literature in the 19th century; and the avant-garde movements of the 1920s. Two 90-minute classes. Prerequisite: a 200-level Spanish course or instructor's permission.

This course studies the role of culture in Argentine modernity including its political and ideological uses and the aesthetic and formal traditions it generated. Topics include: the production of national and state fictions, the history of Argentine populism, the role of the popular in the national imagination, memory politics and State terrorism, neoliberalism and privatization, and new forms of political participation.

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.

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.

This course will explore the discursive and imaginary construction of the Amazon rainforest in Latin American cultural production. It will focus on how cultural production has contributed to the representation of the Amazon rainforest, emphasizing its environmental crisis and the struggles of indigenous peoples. While engaging with the history of Amazonia and with different cultural artifacts --including chronicles, travelogues, novels, films, and paintings-- we will study, among other topics, colonialism and neocolonialism, the modern concept of "nature", extractivism, indigenous ontologies, and ideas on the end of the world.

This course introduces students to a number of traditions in critical theory from Latin America and beyond. How does ideology work? How do we understand art's relation to history and politics? How can political philosophy help us understand ongoing global conflicts and movements? Readings include selections from the Black Radical tradition, Marxism, Feminism, Subaltern Studies, Aesthetics. Authors include C.L.R. James, Theodore Adorno, Nelly Richard, Denise Ferreira da Silva, Roberto Schwarz, Silvia Rivera Cusicanqui, as well as select examples from literature and film.