Courses

We tell stories for many reasons: to entertain; to seduce; to complain; to think. This course draws upon the literatures and cultures of the romance languages to explore the role of narrative in our construction and understanding of the world.

Full details for ROMS 1102 - FWS: The Craft of Storytelling

Some of the most important and intriguing thinkers, from the Middle Ages to postmodernity, have done their thinking in the romance languages.  This course explores a body of work that would be called philosophical by some, theoretical by others, and that, beyond these names, struggles to articulate fundamental concepts, problems, discourses, and situations.

Full details for ROMS 1113 - FWS: Thinking and Thought

Full details for ROMS 1115 - FWS:Literature and Medicine: Europe, Africa, the Mediterranean

When sugar "was king," that is, when it was valued in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, as we might value petroleum today, European nations went to war in order to possess the sugar producing islands in the Caribbean. Sugar production, slave labor, and the transatlantic trade that they generated were crucial for European empire building and the creation of the enormous wealth that, in comparison with earlier historical periods, rapidly revolutionized agriculture, nutrition, industry, labor, and free trade; racialized Caribbean peoples; and gave rise to transatlantic debates on freedom, abolitionism, and humanitarian philanthropy. Readings include A. Stuart, Sugar in the Blood, S. Mintz, Sweetness and Power, C.L.R. James, Black Jacobins. Films include, Gutiérrez Alea's The Last Supper and M. Kalatozov's I am Cuba.

Full details for ROMS 3010 - Sweetness: How Sugar Built the Modern World

The Romance languages are the lasting imprint of all that happened to the Latin language as it moved through time, territories, and people of many ethnicities.  While the Latin of antiquity retained its prestige in high culture, the natural untutored usage of ordinary people was always free to go its own way.  This course covers the following topics, selected to create a panoramic view:  Formation of the general Romance seven-vowel system from Latin.  Early and widespread sound changes in popular Latin.  Finding and interpreting evidence for trends in popular Latin pronunciation.  The comparative method and its limitations.  Essential later sound changes, some of which ceate a whole new order of consonants unknown to Latin but conspicuous in Romance.  Nouns and adjectives from Latin to Romance.  Formation of the present indicative: the competing forces of sound change and analogical adjustment.  A brief overview of Portuguese.  Variants of the seven-vowel system.  Salient features of Romanian.  Factors that helped shape the vocabulary of Romance.  Medieval diglossia.  Emergence of Romance vernaculars newly recognized by their speakers as languages distinct from Latin and from each other.  Close analysis of the oldest surviving document written unmistakably in Romance (842 C. E.).

Full details for ROMS 3210 - History of Romance Languages I

We stand on one side of a growing crevasse that separates "us" who know about climate change from "those others," who did not know.  This course will deploy works of literature and cinema (primarily from the Romance languages) to think about the unique disruptions to embedded narratives; to develop tools and vocabulary for reading under the sign of climate emergency.  Discussions will be in English.  Students are encouraged to read in the original if possible.  Authors may include: Antonioni, Calvino, Martel, Perec, Schweblin, Verne and Zola.  Topics may include: Historiography, archives, mourning/solastalgia, scale, desertification and the model of compound interest in relation to narrative.  Take-home writing assignments and seminar/research paper are required. 

Full details for ROMS 4360 - Literature and Film After Climate Change

This practicum is designed to better enable the TAs to meet the needs of their students in the understanding and acquisition of the linguistic forms, notions, and functions covered in their course.

Full details for ROMS 5080 - Pedagogy Practicum

Designed to give insight into how to formulate projects, conduct research, and publish one's work, the colloquium offers a venue for faculty-graduate student dialogue in a collegial, intellectual setting.  Meetings are biweekly, 2-3 hours, and are open to all students and faculty in Romance Studies, but required for first year students in the program.  Each meeting, two faculty members will be invited to discuss their scholarship and also a short text of their choice, to be distributed beforehand.

Full details for ROMS 6100 - Romance Studies Colloquium

We stand on one side of a growing crevasse that separates "us" who know about climate change from "those others," who did not know.  This course will deploy works of literature and cinema (primarily from the Romance languages) to think about the unique disruptions to embedded narratives; to develop tools and vocabulary for reading under the sign of climate emergency.  Discussions will be in English.  Students are encouraged to read in the original if possible.  Authors may include: Antonioni, Calvino, Martel, Perec, Schweblin, Verne and Zola.  Topics may include: Historiography, archives, mourning/solastalgia, scale, desertification and the model of compound interest in relation to narrative.  Take-home writing assignments and seminar/research paper are required. 

Full details for ROMS 6360 - Literature and Film After Climate Change

For more than two centuries, revolutions have marked the rhythm of modernity.  In 1780, the original meaning of revolution - an astronomical rotation - was transformed in order to apprehend a social and political overthrow.  This course will investigate the multiple uses of this crucial concept of political theory, from the revolutionary canon (Blanqui, Marx, Fanon...) to the classics of conservatism (Maistre, Cortés, Schmitt...), which depict contemporary history as a conflict between revolutions and counter-revolutions, socialist and fascist revolutions.  We will explore the connections between history and theory, and stress the global dimension of revolutions, forged by a permanent transfer of ideas and people from one continent to another.

Full details for ROMS 6650 - Revolution: An Intellectual History

FREN 1210-FREN 1220 is a two-semester sequence.  FREN 1210 is the first half of the sequence designed to provide a thorough grounding in French language and an introduction to intercultural competence.  French is used in contextualized, meaningful activities to provide practice in speaking, listening, reading, and writing.  Development of analytical skills for grammar leads students toward greater autonomy as language learners.  Students develop their writing skills by writing and editing compositions.  Readings are varied and include literary texts.  Daily preparation and active participation are required.

Full details for FREN 1210 - Elementary French

FREN 1230 is an all-skills course designed to improve oral communication, listening comprehension, and reading ability; to establish a groundwork for correct writing; and to provide a substantial grammar review. The approach in the course encourages the student to see the language within the context of its culture.

Full details for FREN 1230 - Continuing French

This course will introduce English speakers to highlights of France's contribution in art, architecture, music, philosophy, political theory and literature to Western civilization. We will consider works from the Middle Ages to the Revolution. We will read texts from epic poems of the medieval period, study romanesque architecture and continue through the imposition of absolute monarchy. Classicism and the important thinkers of the Enlightenment whose political theories were in large part adopted by the framers of the U. S. Constitution.

Full details for FREN 1720 - French Classics

This intermediate conversation and composition French course is designed for students interested in business fields such as Hospitality, Business Management, and Marketing, those looking for an internship or a job in French-speaking businesses or students interested in exploring the language and cultures of the French-speaking business world.  The course will focus on improving oral and written skills through the acquisition of specific vocabulary and the review of essential grammatical structures commonly used in business.  Students will use authentic written, visual and listening materials and engage in interactive activities relevant to the professional world and its intercultural dimension.

Full details for FREN 2080 - French for Business

This intermediate-level course is designed for students who want to focus on their speaking and writing skills. Emphasis is placed on strengthening of grammar skills, expansion of vocabulary and discourse levels to increase communicative fluency and accuracy. The course also provides continued reading and listening practice as well as development of effective language learning strategies.

Full details for FREN 2090 - French Intermediate Composition and Conversation I

Reducing your foreign accent improves your ability to communicate in two ways: learning to distinguish and to produce clearly the full inventory of sounds in French increases both your ability to understand the spoken language and your ability to make yourself understood when speaking.  Because it distracts many listeners, a heavy foreign accent can prevent you from getting your message across even if you speak quite fluently.  This course focuses specifically on accent reduction and will interest anyone intending to use French in professional arenas such as international business, law, and project management, the import-export and hospitality industries, art restoration and curation, secondary and post-secondary teaching, or the performing arts.  By the end of the course students will achieve noticeably improved pronunciation, greater fluency, improved aural comprehension, and increased self-assurance in spoken French.

Full details for FREN 2092 - Pronunciation of Standard French

This advanced-intermediate course is highly recommended for students planning to study abroad as it aims to develop the writing and speaking skills needed to function in a French speaking university environment. A comprehensive review of fundamental and advanced grammatical structures is integrated with the study of selected texts (short stories, literary excerpts, poems, articles from French periodicals, videos) all chosen for thematic or cultural interest. Students write weekly papers, participate in class discussions of the topics at hand, and give at least one oral presentation in class.

Full details for FREN 2095 - French Intermediate Composition and Conversation II

In this course, furthering oral communication skills and writing skills is emphasized. A comprehensive review of fundamental and advanced grammatical structures is integrated with short stories, literary excerpts, videos, poems, and articles from French magazines or newspapers, all chosen for thematic or cultural interest. Students write weekly papers (essays and translations), have daily conversations focusing on the topics at hand, and give at last one presentation in class. This course is highly recommended for students planning to study abroad in a French speaking university.

Full details for FREN 2180 - Advanced French

This course, designed to follow FREN 2095, introduces students to an array of literary and visual material from the French and Francophone world.  It aims to develop students' proficiency in critical writing and thinking, as well as presenting students with the vocabulary and tools of literary and visual analysis.  Each section of FREN 2310 will have a different focus-for example, colonialism and the other, or the importance of women and sexual minorities in French and Francophone history, performance in literature and film, or image and narrative-but all sections of FREN 2310 will emphasize through writing assignments and in-class discussions, the development of those linguistic and conceptual tools necessary for cultural and critical fluency.

Full details for FREN 2310 - Introduction to French and Francophone Literature and Culture

This 1-credit optional course aims to expand the students' vocabulary, and advance their speaking and reading skills as well as enhance their knowledge and deepen their cultural understanding by supplementing non-language courses throughout the University.

Full details for FREN 3020 - French Foreign Language Across the Curriculum (FLAC)

This course is designed to familiarize students with works from the Renaissance, the Classical period, and the Enlightenment, as well as the cultural and historical context in which these texts are created, reflecting a dynamic period of significant change for France. Texts by such authors as Rousard, du Bellay, Montaigne, Molière, Marquerite de Navarre, Corneille, Diderot, de Lafayette, Racine, Perrault, Rousseau. Students may read texts in the original languages or in translation.

Full details for FREN 3220 - Readings in Early Modern French Literature and Culture

The concept of "intellectual" - the writer or scholar who takes a political commitment - was born in France at the end of the nineteenth century.  From the Dreyfus Affaire to the recent polemics on French "identity," passing through Vichy, the Algerian War and May 68, intellectuals established a symbiotic relationship between culture and politics, becoming a sort of national brand, object of both admiration and contempt outside of the country.  The aim of this course is to revisit some crucial moments of this history, focusing on different attempts to define the nature and function of the intellectual, from Emile Zola to Jean-Paul Sartre, from Simone de Beavoir to Michel Foucault.

Full details for FREN 3460 - Intellectuals: A French History

This course will offer an overview of theoretical and historical responses to bodily and cognitive difference.  What was the status of people with (dis)abilities in the past, when they were called monsters, freaks, abnormal?  How are all of these concepts related, and how have they changed over time?  How have we moved from isolation and institutionalization towards universal design and accessibility as the dominant concepts relative to (dis)ability?  Why is this shift from focusing on individual differences as a negative attribute to reshaping our architectural and more broadly social constructions important to everyone?  Authors to be studied include: Georges Canguilhem, Michel Foucault, Lennard Davis, Tobin Siebers, David T. Mitchell and Sharon L. Snyder, and Jasbir Puar.

Full details for FREN 3520 - (Dis)ability Studies: A Brief History

What makes religious violence so intractable, and what has fostered the continuity of this form of conflict over such a long span of time? What is the role of aesthetics in literary descriptions of such horrific violence? Violence as a spectacle raises the question of personal responsibility, making those who observe it complicit even if they do not participate in it. Texts to be considered will include Maalouf's Les Croisades vues par les arabes. Théodore Agrippa d'Aubigné's Les Tragiques, René Girard's La Violence et el sacré, Charlotte Delbo's Auschwitz et après, Shoshana Felman's and Dori Laub's work Testimony, Gillo Pontecorvo's La Bataille d'Algers, Franz Fanon's Les Damnés de la Terre, Assia Djebar's L'Amour, la fantasia.

Full details for FREN 3730 - Religious Violence in French and Francophone Literature

Guided independent study of special topics.

Full details for FREN 4190 - Special Topics in French Literature

Consult director of undergraduate studies for more information.

Full details for FREN 4290 - Honors Work in French

We will read together a wide range of modern European texts-mostly but not exclusively by at least nominally Jewish authors, many of them working in the German intellectual tradition--accompanied by a range of works by Jacques Derrida that engage those thinkers and their texts. Authors will likely include Theodor w. Adorno, Saint Augustine, Walter Benjamin, Paul Celan, Helene Cixous, Hermann Cohen, Sigmund Freud, Edmond Jabes, Emannuel Levinas, Claude Levi-Strauss, Karl Marx, and Gershom Scholem. We will thus be better able to participate in the current re-evaluation of Derrida's legacy, including his Jewishness, and we will read him, among other things, as a proponent of dialogue, sometimes loving and sometimes fiercely agonistic.

Full details for FREN 4428 - Reading Derrida and Others

This course will examine works (literary, ethnographic, juridical, historical, medical, theoretical....) from French and Francophone cultures where questions of sexuality and gender are put on trial or question the status quo of their contemporary social, political and ideological order.  Texts analyzed could include: Joan of Arc's trial documents; 16th and 17th Century Women's Fairy Tales and Witchcraft treastises: 18th Century erotic literature (Diderot's Le Religieuse); ethnographic travel literature (diderot's Le Supplément au voyage de Bougainville) Caribbean slave narratives (Maryse Condés Moi, Tituba Sorcière), modern feminist autobiographical fictions (Monique Wittig's L'Opoponax).

Full details for FREN 4700 - Translating Gender Across Time and Cultures: Fantasms and Realities

Guided independent study for graduate students.

Full details for FREN 6390 - Special Topics in French Literature

We will read together a wide range of modern European texts-mostly but not exclusively by at least nominally Jewish authors, many of them working in the German intellectual tradition--accompanied by a range of works by Jacques Derrida that engage those thinkers and their texts. Authors will likely include Theodor w. Adorno, Saint Augustine, Walter Benjamin, Paul Celan, Helene Cixous, Hermann Cohen, Sigmund Freud, Edmond Jabes, Emannuel Levinas, Claude Levi-Strauss, Karl Marx, and Gershom Scholem. We will thus be better able to participate in the current re-evaluation of Derrida's legacy, including his Jewishness, and we will read him, among other things, as a proponent of dialogue, sometimes loving and sometimes fiercely agonistic.

Full details for FREN 6428 - Reading Derrida and Others

This seminar will explore 20th and 21st century African literary narratives through Felwine Sarr's key concept of Afrotopias defined as an active and activist imaginary, both politically radical and culturally cosmopolitan.  The seminar will discuss how literary works by Ouologuem, Lab'ou Tansi, Yacine, Dib, Waberi , Miano, and others, operate as textual laboratories, using language as the experimental medium through which they create new political fictions. Their narratives range from political parables and bureaucratic dystopias, to Afrofuturism and ecological utopias.  We will examine how they articulate innovative forms of political life, beyond traditional models of the nation-state, citizenship, and democracy.  The texts will be paired with theoretical readings, including Ernst Bloch, Foucault, Balibar, Mbembe, and others.

Full details for FREN 6590 - Afrotopias

This course will examine the ideological prejudices that some of the major works of France's great period of artistic creation underly and structure what many consider the apogee of French culture.  At the same time we will look at the actual historical situation of women, particularly women in positions of power, (Catherine de Medicis, Marie de Medicis, La grande Mademoiselle, Anne d'Autriche, etc.) who were able to exercise political authority in a culture (legal and juridical) denied them any actual political role.

Full details for FREN 6600 - Nasty Woman: The Politics of Misogyny in Classical France

ITAL 1201 is a fast-paced, introductory-level course, designed for students with no previous knowledge of Italian.  Students will be guided in developing four language skills (listening, speaking, reading, and writing) in the context of everyday topics (school, housing, travel personal preferences, simple exchanges about past, future and possible events, etc.).  They will also be introduced to culturally acceptable modes of oral and written communication in Italian, some fundamentals of Italian history, and select current social and political issues.

Full details for ITAL 1201 - Italian I

An intermediate-level course that aims to further develop intercultural, reading, listening, speaking, and writing abilities.   Students will be guided in perfecting their communications skills, improving their cultural proficiency, and developing a critical eye toward printed and visual material drawn from literature, history, politics, arts in the Italophone world.  Conversation skills will be practiced in daily discussions and in individual or group projects and presentations.  A variety of written assignments will help students increase the range, accuracy, and stylistic appropriateness of their writing.  Review of  select grammar topics is part of this course, as is reading parts of contemporary novels.

Full details for ITAL 2201 - Italian III

This course aims to introduce students to Italian literature mainly through readings in prose and poetry from the 20th and 21st century. The course includes significant practice in grammar, vocabulary building, and composition. Course Topic: Living Together in a multicultural society. Our principal reading will be Scontro di civiltà per un ascensore a piazza Vittorio, a 2006 award-winning novel by Algerian-Italian writer Amara Lakhous who came to Italy in 1995 as a political refugee; with this novel, he invites Italian readers to examine their 21st-century reality through the eyes of the immigrant.

Full details for ITAL 2203 - Languages/Literatures/Identities

This course introduces students to special topics in twentieth-century Italian politics, history, and culture, with an emphasis on critical thinking and interpretation. Students who have already taken ITAL 3730 for credit may retake the course, provided that its topic and readings have changed. Conducted in Italian.

Full details for ITAL 3730 - Italian Modernities

Guided independent study of special topics.

Full details for ITAL 4190 - Special Topics in Italian Literature

Consult director of undergraduate studies for more information.

Full details for ITAL 4290 - Honors in Italian Literature

Guided independent study for graduate students.

Full details for ITAL 6390 - Special Topics in Italian Literature

What does it mean to practice theory in the midst of a pandemic? And then what does it mean to return to biopolitics — a mode of theoretical reflection on the enmeshment of life and politics — in the time of Covid-19? These questions lie at the heart of a seminar dedicated to re-examining some of the central theoretical set pieces of biopolitics. Alongside seminal texts from Hannah Arendt and Michel Foucault, we will take up biopolitics in a number of philosophical works from Italy from the likes of Giorgio Agamben, Roberto Esposito, Toni Negri, and Simona Forti in order to think again some of the key words and concepts of biopolitics (states of exception, community, immunity, event) in the time of virus.

Full details for ITAL 6480 - Biopolitics and COVID

In this course, students work on their ability to speak, write, read, and understand contemporary Polish. Students will also develop their intercultural competency. The instructor uses communicative language teaching with emphasis on structured input. Students use the textbook and workbook "Hurra! Po polsku 1" supplemented by Polish-English chapter dictionaries. This class covers chapters 0-9. If a student is not sure of his or her language level, he or she can contact the Polish instructor, Ewa Bachminska, at eb583@cornell.edu.

Full details for POLSH 1131 - Elementary Polish I

In this course, students work on their ability to speak, write, read, and understand contemporary Polish. Students will also develop their intercultural competency. The instructor uses communicative language teaching with emphasis on structured input. Students use the textbook and workbook "Hurra! Po polsku 1" supplemented by Polish-English chapter dictionaries. This class covers chapters 10-20. If a student is not sure of his or her language level, he or she can contact the Polish instructor, Ewa Bachminska, at eb583@cornell.edu.

Full details for POLSH 1132 - Elementary Polish II

In this course, students continue working on their ability to speak, write, read, and understand contemporary Polish.  Students will also enhance their intercultural competency.  The instructor uses communicative language teaching with emphasis on structured input.  Students use the textbook and workbook "Hurra!  Po polsku 2" supplemented by Polish-English chapter dictionaries.  This class covers chapters 1-10.  If a student is not sure of his or her language level, he or she can contact the Polish instructor, Ewa Bachminska, at eb583@cornell.edu.

Full details for POLSH 2033 - Intermediate Polish I

In this class, students master their language skills: oral communication, listening and reading comprehension as well as creative and formal writing.  Students also deepen their cultural competence.  Classroom discussions include issues of contemporary Poland and various aspects of Polish culture.  Students have writing assignments and one oral presentation in class.

Full details for POLSH 2103 - Advanced Polish I

PORT 2010-2020 is a full year course intended for students who have already taken the first level of Portuguese, or as an intensive introductory course for those who are native/near native speakers of Spanish.  An all-skills course with particular emphasis on Brazilian Portuguese spoken within the contexts of its culture, it presents a fast-paced review focused on improving grammatical accuracy, pronunciation and on enriching vocabulary.

Full details for PORT 2010 - Intermediate Brazilian Portuguese for Spanish Speakers I

Intended for students who have already taken the first level of Portuguese, or as an intensive introductory course for those who are native/near native speakers of Spanish.* An all-skills course with particular emphasis on Brazilian Portuguese spoken within the contexts of its culture, it presents a fast-paced review focused on improving grammatical accuracy, pronunciation and on enriching vocabulary.

Full details for PORT 2020 - Intermediate Brazilian Portuguese for Spanish Speakers II

This course provides intermediate level students with the opportunity to advance their oral and written fluency, proficieny, and understanding of the grammar of Portuguese.  In addition, students will be introduced to several cultural aspects of the Lusophone world, including regionalisms of Portuguese language.  This goal will be achieved with the aid of literary and journalistic texts.  Students will be expected to give individual and group presentations, as well as to write short pieces in the target language.  The course is tailored to bridge language learning and content-based courses and research in Portuguese.

Full details for PORT 3200 - Advanced Portuguese II

While building language proficiency and accuracy through communicative activities, the course encourages students to actively interact with one another. The instructor facilitates communication and provides feedback and language learning strategies that guide students to take responsibility for their own learning and become active participants in the process. The course also introduces students to the many peoples and cultures of the Spanish-speaking world, prompting them to make comparisons with their own culture. Additionally, lectures provide students with opportunities to reflect on relevant grammar topics and assist students in developing language learning strategies. Class discussions are conducted entirely in Spanish. After SPAN 1120, students may take SPAN 1230, SPAN 2070, or SPAN 2090 depending on their LPS score at the end of the course.

Full details for SPAN 1120 - Elementary Spanish: Review and Continuation

While building language proficiency and accuracy through communicative activities, the course encourages students to actively interact with one another. The instructor facilitates communication and provides feedback and language learning strategies that guide students to take responsibility of their own learning and become active participants in the process. The course also introduces students to the many peoples and cultures of the Spanish-speaking world, prompting them to make comparisons with their own culture. Additionally, lectures provide students with opportunities to reflect on relevant grammar topics and assist students in developing language learning strategies. Class discussions are conducted entirely in Spanish. After 1210 students may take SPAN 1120 (fall) or SPAN 1220 (spring).

Full details for SPAN 1210 - Elementary Spanish I

The goal of this low-intermediate course is to achieve a higher level of comprehension as well as to advance oral and written expression in a cultural context. Classes are in Spanish and the language is actively used in communicative and creative activities. Students engage in linguistic and literary analysis of texts to acquire new vocabulary, complete analytical exercises, and develop reading strategies. Students continue developing writing skills through composition, and review grammatical structures independently with some clarification by the instructor as needed. After this course, students may take SPAN 2000, SPAN 2070, or SPAN 2090.

Full details for SPAN 1230 - Continuing Spanish

This innovative course focuses on oral communication in Spanish for students who will do special projects abroad or short term study abroad trips.  Emphasis is placed on developing speaking and listening skills and strategies in a culturally relevant context.  It is intended for students with limited or no knowledge of Spanish and active class participation is required.

Full details for SPAN 1501 - Strategies for Spanish Abroad

Designed to expand bilingual Heritage students' knowledge of Spanish by providing them with ample opportunities to develop and improve each of the basic language skills, with a particular focus on writing vocabulary. The heritage student has at least one parent of Hispanic origin and grew up speaking Spanish at home; s/he also finished high school here in the US. After this course, students may take SPAN 2095.

Full details for SPAN 2000 - Spanish for Heritage Speakers

Provides a conversational grammar review, with dialogues, debates, compositions, and authentic readings on health-related themes. Special attention is given to relevant cultural differences and how cultural notions may affect medical care and communication between doctor and patient. The objective of 2070 is to provide practice in real-life application, such as taking a medical history, calming a patient, and how to speak to a Hispanic patient in a culturally acceptable manner. After this course, a student may take or SPAN 2095.

Full details for SPAN 2070 - Intermediate Spanish for the Medical and Health Professions

This intermediate course develops accurate and idiomatic oral and written expression in a cultural context. Students achieve a higher level of syntactical and lexical competence through reading and discussing literary texts and viewing films. Particular emphasis is on writing and editing academic essays with peer/instructor feedback. Classes are in Spanish and the language is actively used in oral presentations and communicative, creative, and critical-thinking activities. Students review grammar structures on their own, with clarification and support of the instructor. After this course, students may take SPAN 2095.

Full details for SPAN 2090 - Intermediate Spanish I (Composition and Conversation)

This advanced-intermediate course is designed to prepare students for study abroad and is required for any Cornell CASA program in a Spanish speaking country.  It also serves as an entryway into the major, and advanced-level courses. Students study stylistics, analyze and discuss texts, view films, and acquire advanced reading strategies. Continued emphasis is on writing and editing academic essays with peer and instructor feedback. Classes are in Spanish, and the language is actively used in oral presentations and communicative, creative, and critical-thinking activities. Students review grammar structures on their own, although the instructor may clarify as needed. Check with the instructor if you intend to take this course concurrently with SPAN 2140, SPAN 2150, or SPAN 2170.

Full details for SPAN 2095 - Spanish Intermediate Composition and Conversation II

Introductory survey of modern Spanish literature. Students develop their analytical skills and learn basic literary concepts such as genre (drama, lyric, short story, and novel) and style (romanticism, realism, etc.) as well as male/female perspectives and the translation of literature to film language. The survey introduces students to Spain's cultural complexity through readings of works by authors representative of its diverse linguistic and literary traditions.

Full details for SPAN 2140 - Modern Spanish Survey

Readings and discussion of representative texts of the 19th and 20th centuries from various regions of Latin America. Among the authors considered are Sarmiento, Hernández, Martí, Darío, Agustini, Cortázar, García Márquez, Poniatowska, and Valenzuela.

Full details for SPAN 2150 - Contemporary Latin American Survey

This course explores major texts and themes of the Hispanic tradition from the 11th to the 17th centuries. We will examine general questions on literary analysis and the relationship between literature and history around certain events, such as medieval multicultural Iberia, the creation of the Spanish Inquisition in the 15th century and the expulsion of the Jews in 1492; the encounter between the Old and the New Worlds; the 'opposition' of high and low in popular culture, and of the secular and the sacred in poetry and prose. Readings may be drawn from medieval short stories and miracle collections; chivalric romances, Columbus, Lazarillo de Tormes, Cervantes, Lope de Vega, Calderón, and Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, among others.

Full details for SPAN 2170 - Early Modern Iberian Survey

This course, which is required for the major, is designed to help the learner develop increased accuracy and sophistication in writing in Spanish for academic purposes and continued oral practice in Spanish. To this end, there will be ample writing and revising practice, with a focus on specific grammatical and lexical areas, customized to the needs of the students enrolled in the course.  All writing will be based on a particular theme relating to Latin America with a focus on film, literary texts, newspaper readings and conducting an interview.

Full details for SPAN 2180 - Advanced Spanish Writing Workshop

An introduction to Spain's history, plural cultures, and present-day society. Through a series of key literary works, films, and other visual representations we will explore such topics as the place of tradition, religion, and the family in modern Spain. Our focus will be on the transformation of Spain from an authoritarian state under General Franco's dictatorship (1939-1975) into a remarkably diverse and pluralistic nation in which linguistic, cultural, political, and gender differences have been consecrated in a very progressive legislation. This course satisfies the main requirement for the minor in Spanish, may be used as an elective for the major, and is crucial to those planning to study abroad in Spain in the near future.

Full details for SPAN 2230 - Perspectives on Spain

This course offers a broad introduction to Iberian cultures from the Middle Ages to the present.  Focusing on three main themes-space, culture, and everyday life-our main objective throughout the term will be to explore different perspectives unique to the ever-evolving place we now call "Spain." The first half of the term will concentrate on aspects of space, culture, and everyday life in the medieval and early modern context, while the second half of the term will examine the same themes, questions, and concepts but from a modern and contemporary point of view using a wide variety of disciplines and media to explore them, from history, newspapers and music, to painting, film, and television.

Full details for SPAN 2235 - Perspectives on Spain in Spanish

This 1-credit optional course aims to expand the students' vocabulary, and advance their speaking and reading skills as well as enhance their knowledge and deepen their cultural understanding by supplementing non-language courses throughout the University.

Full details for SPAN 3020 - Spanish Foreign Language Across the Curriculum (FLAC)

This course examines the relationship between literature and empire in late nineteenth and early twentieth century Spain. Over the course of the semester, we will engage postcolonial thought to bring new critical discussions to canonica as well as lesser known writers of the period. At the same time, we will examine the critical limits of postcolonial theory, as it is primarily rooted in a European literary tradition that typically excludes Spain. Some of our guiding questions include: Why is nineteenth-century Spain hardly ever remembered as an imperial nation? How did these other geographical spaces shape the symbolic contours of Spanish modernity? What is the relationship between culture, empire, and nation?

Full details for SPAN 4030 - Imperial Fictions

Guided independent study of special topics. For undergraduates interested in special problems not covered in courses.

Full details for SPAN 4190 - Special Topics in Spanish Literature

Consult director of undergraduate studies for more information.

Full details for SPAN 4290 - Honors Work I

This course takes the genre of melodrama as a point of departure for exploring its influence on modern and contemporary Spanish cinema. How have classical forms of melodrama, from Greek tragedy to French revolutionary theater to Hollywood, been incorporated into but also contested and revised within Spanish cinematic production?  What tropes have been carried over from other cultural contexts?  Which ones have been "lost in translation" and why? What are the unique aesthetic qualities of Spanish melodrama? How do melodramatic forms relate to subversion, critique and queerness?  These are some of the questions we'll take up in our weekly discussions. Film screenings scheduled outside of class meetings.

Full details for SPAN 4580 - Melodrama and Cinema

Guided independent study of specific topics. For graduate students interested in special problems not covered in courses.

Full details for SPAN 6390 - Special Topics in Spanish Literature

In this course, we will analyze how narratives and practices of memory intersect and give shape to various political and social landscapes in contemporary Latin America.  We will critically engage with the different theoretical approached developed around the concept of memory both inside and outside Latin America, as we discuss the particularities of individual, collective, national, and global memories.  We will put these critical approaches in dialogue with various forms of cultural and material production (literature, film, performance, graffiti, souvenirs, memorials, etc.) that represent and/or challenge the political realities of countries such as Venezuela, Argentina, Columbia, Chile, Guatemala, Peru and Mexico, among others, from the 1940s to today.  Lastly, we will consider the role discourses of memory play in the contemporary global political stage, and how they have actively shaped debates regarding gender, race, class, and the environment.

Full details for SPAN 6760 - Politics of Memory in Latin America