NOTE – The courses below are just a few selected examples of the type of content that may be found in upper-level SLLCS courses. The specific courses offered will vary by quarter. Always consult the official schedule, or discuss with your SLLCS advisor if you have questions. The senior seminar is regularly offered.
SPAN 3300 Travel Narratives (4 Credits)
Travel accounts, rather than candid and unbiased testimonies about places and people, are challenging texts that require critical analysis. This class offers an overview of the evolution of travel narratives, from the times of the Grand Tour to contemporary accounts representing cross-cultural interactions between Spaniards and their ‘others’. Travelogues by authors such as Washington Irving, Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, Julio Camba and Juan Goytisolo. Prerequisite: SPAN 2300 or equivalent.
SPAN 3510 Sex, Bodies, and Power in Imperial Spain (4 Credits)
This course considers the body a key locus of social and political struggle in the 16th and 17th Centuries in Spain and in the Indies. Contemplating the role of a variety of discourses from diverse fields (medicine, law, philosophy, theology, politics), we will ask such questions as: What is the body and how does it work in physical terms? How is the body used to perform or problematize legal, moral, and social identities? How is the body used as a mechanism to marginalize, control, or exclude individuals or groups, or to legitimize the authority and power of other individuals or groups? We will contemplate representations of the body in diverse media and genres (painting, sculpture, engravings, theater, novels, poetry, autobiography, medical treatises, moralizing tracts) in order to reconstruct the complex epistemology through which the body, and especially problems of race, gender, and sexuality, was conceptualized in the 16th and 17th Centuries. Particular attention will be paid to the representation of the materiality of the body (physiology as a key to moral and cultural difference), eroticism, homosexuality, cross-dressing, ‘monsters,’ sickness, and reproduction, considering the representation of such corporeal phenomena to be a privileged space for interrogating the ideologies and structures upon which Power is built. Enforced Prerequisites and Restrictions: SPAN 2300, 2350, 2400 or equivalent.
SPAN 3704 Topics in Spanish - Latinx Border Identities & Inclusive Excellence: Decolonizing Cultural Frameworks
Note - Courses with the codes SPAN 3701 through 3704 are topics courses - upper-level advanced study courses with a specific subject matter determined by the instructor that can vary from quarter to quarter. This is one specific example of a topics course recently offered; future offerings of SPAN 3704 may have a different subject/focus.
The focus of this class is border identities, a contemporary concept that emerged from Border Studies Theory to describe the movement across diverse borders, such as geography, nationality, race, gender, sexuality, language, and culture. Through the analysis of cultural text (e.g., novels, short stories, slam poetry, comic strips, music, film, visual arts, and social media) we will explore the dynamic dialogues, processes, and exchanges that take place amongst Latinxs in the United States in their journeys to reclaim and articulate their identity. Furthermore, this class will center on active discussions around the notion of inclusive excellence, understood as the practice of equity, diversity, and inclusion. Two fundamental questions that guide this course are: 1) how do these unique and diverse Latinx voices, as tangible examples of border identities, fit in traditional white Academic institutions, concretely, at the University of Denver (DU)?; and 2) why are these Latinx border identities extremely important and necessary to decolonize not only Academic institutions, but inclusive excellence as we know it, in order to move beyond good intentions, create meaningful change, and imagine other possibilities and futures? Some of the topics of this course include: the complex political and cultural exchanges along the United States-Mexican border; performing Mexicanidad; transnational double-crossings through art, music, and food; intersectional spaces; Chican@ and Latinx activism; (des)identifications and coping with feelings of not belonging; Latinx stereotypes and representations in media; Latina women reclaiming their voice, body, and sexuality; and, the decolonization of masculinities, amongst other interesting and relevant topics. Prerequisite: at least one of SPAN 2300, SPAN 2350 or equivalent.
SPAN 3990 Senior Seminar (4 Credits)
This is the capstone course of the Spanish major and requires students to complete an in depth, scholarly study of a topic or issue pertinent to their seminar's central theme(s). Spanish majors must take a minimum of one senior seminar and this course must be taken at DU once a student has reached senior standing. Prerequisites: SPAN 2300, SPAN 2350 (or equivalent) and at least twelve credits at the 3000 level. A selection of seminar topics includes Latin American Popular Culture, Contemporary Spanish Novel, Pre-Columbian and Colonial Andean Literature and Culture, Puerto Rican Literature and Society, Layqas, Ñakáqs and Saqras: Representations of the ‘Supernatural’ in Quechua Oral Traditions, Latin American Narrative, El Romancero, Contemporary Socio-Political Poetry in Latin America, Latin American Women Poets, and Masterpieces of Latin American Literature. Prerequisites: SPAN 2300, SPAN 2350 (or equivalent) and at least twelve credits at the 3000 level and senior standing.
For additional Spanish course descriptions, visit the DU Bulletin at http://bulletin.du.edu/undergraduate/coursedescriptions/span/.