Spanish

Is she a traitor, a mother, or a visionary? From Mesoamerican figures and deities to colonial figures, this course reads the figure of the “woman” against the grain by placing Malinche at the center of our engagement with modern Chicanx literature and art that centralize these figures objects in their own understandings of gender and sexuality. In other words, we follow the trace left behind by Malinche. Throughout the course will also trace key figures, myths, and events throughout Latin American cultural histories through the present, including the legend of La Llorona, the religious...

Let’s problematize what we mean by “feminism.” Let’s complicate ideas of who or what is the modern Latinx woman. From art, Latin Trap, literature, and film this is a course that brings together different versions of “feminism” through a queer Latinx lens. In this course we will intimately engage and extend the categories of body, race, gender, and sexuality through varying representations, narratives, and preconceived notions about the power of the Latinx femme in literary and artistic production in our contemporary present. We still study works by Gloria Anzaldúa, Becky G,...

In this seminar, we will examine the main issues concerning the study of code-switching. Defined as the alternation of two languages within the same discourse, code-switching can be used as an effective tool to aid in the understanding of the linguistic architecture of the bi-/multilingual mind. In this course we will critically evaluate the methods used in code-switching research from a morpho-syntactic point of view, as well as current debates regarding the study of this linguistic phenomenon. Finally, this course will provide you with the analytical tools and critical...

From ‘teatro irrepresentable’ to ‘poemas representables’ and ‘novelas cinematográficas,’  this course examines experimental intervention in theater, poetry, and the novel in the first decades of the twentieth century as it relates to early cinema. Centering on Spanish modernist and avant-garde literature, this course spotlights literary-cinematographic texts that test the parameters and limits of the literary as a set of ideological and material as well as sensory and conceptual conventions. Confronting cinema’s formal challenge to the literary writer by introducing temporal-spatial...

How have Latin American nations defined equality? What were the struggles for social justice during the first century of independence? How have those forces shaped the region? The 19th century is a period of great progress and extraordinary turmoil in Latin America. As the region struggles to carve a path out of coloniality for itself, the literature of this period stages visions of hope and fear about the prospects of these emergent nation-states and remaining colonies. We will analyze how these writings trace both the promises and the failures of their “imagined communities.” Drawing on...

A new course that explores how language, culture, race, public discourse and public policy intersect with the health and wellness of US Latinx communities. We will cover a variety of topics, but our main area of focus will be on COVID-19 and its impact on our local immigrant community and at a national level. Classes consist of discussion, active learning exercises and visits from experts. Required textbook: Spanish in Healthcare by Glenn A. Martínez. Available free, online at our library. Only prerequisite: SPAN 228 or consent of the instructor....

Learn about and from Latinx immigrants living and working in Champaign-Urbana. As you learn about their strengths and challenges, you will see how their realities reflect larger issues of immigration on a global, national and regional scale. You will hear directly from local Latinx leaders and people who stand alongside them, working toward immigrant justice.   Students will volunteer in the community or virtually. However, if local conditions with the virus are unsafe, students will not volunteer in the community. *SPAN 232 fulfills the US Minority cultures Gen Ed...