Latin American Studies

This course offers a study of the different pre-Hispanic indigenous peoples, from a multidimensional perspective, establishing dialogues with the processes that these peoples currently experience. 

This survey course is an introduction to the history of Latin America in the 20th century. Students examine processes common to the region, the experiences of specific countries, and Latin America’s relations with the rest of the world. Beyond this, like Hobsbawm, the course considers how Latin America can help us think about the history of wider world.

This course analyzes the emergence and constructions of hybrid and transcultural cultures and identities in Spanish American societies, mainly through some of the fundamental texts that were produced in the 20th and 21st centuries. It examines where and how we can observe hybrid and transcultural phenomena in the texts and the meaning of each phenomenon within a specific socio-historic and political context.  

This course contemplates the following key questions: What significance does a hybrid and transcultural phenomenon have within the context of Spanish America? How can one define and interpret hybridity and transculturation? What are the principal factors that contribute to the production of hybrid and transcultural cultures and identities? What is the process of hybridization and transculturation?  

This course examines recent Latin American films, which are critically analyzed in social, political and cultural context. The course enables students to develop their skills of analysis in an audiovisual, rather than purely literary, context, as well as deepening understanding of the Hispanic world through engagement with its cinematic production. 

This course provides an exploration of contemporary urban social movements. It examines this topic through concepts such as human rights, re-democratization, structural inequalities in Brazil, and collective mobilization. The course also explores the theory related to social movements, including conflict, collective identity, social actor, repertoires, national and transnational networks, and recognition theory.

This course is divided into two parts. Part one examines Spanish narrative prose of the 19th and 20th centuries, taking as thematic reference the city of Barcelona and its writers. Part two explores Latin American culture through representative artistic works (music, writing, painting, and film) and their socio-cultural and artistic framework.

This course focuses on three thought leaders of anti-colonialist social movements in 20th century Latin American: Aimé Césaire, Frantz Fanon, and Fausto Reinaga. It analyzes their main written works with an emphasis on themes of race, culture, and colonial condition.