SN1109 Comparative Hispanic Culture
Course convenor: Dr Arantza Mayo
Overview
The course provides a selective but wide-ranging introduction to culture in the Hispanic world. It explores a broad range of cultural manifestations from different socio-historical contexts both independently and comparatively from a topic-based perspective. Materials may include plays, narratives, paintings, sculptures, musical compositions and architectural works, while topics may be drawn from (but not be limited to) the following: ‘Power’, ‘Subversion’, ‘Discovery’, ‘War and Destruction’, ‘The Body’.
The course is taught over 20 contact hours. Classes combine lecture-based sessions with seminar-style meetings. Students are expected to have read these texts in advance of each meeting and come to the class ready to participate in discussion.
Assessment
The course is entirely examined through coursework produced in English:
Essay 1 (1200-1500 words: 30%
Essay 2 (1500-2000 words): 60%
In-class assessment: 10%
Bibliography
Primary materials will be made available to students in PDF files or similar. The works studied will include, amongst others:
M. Vargas Llosa, La fiesta del chivo/The Feast of the Goat
H. Cortés, Cartas de relación/Letters from Mexico
J. R. Ribeyro, ‘La juventud en la otra ribera’/’Youth is on the Other Shore’
B. de las Casas, Brevísima relación de la destruición de las Indias/A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies
P. Picasso, Guernica