Module Catalogue 2024/25

Pre Requisite Comment

None

Co Requisite Comment

N/A

Aims

In consonance with the overall aim of the degrees offered in the SML, the main aim of this module is to contribute to students’ broad-based knowledge of aspects of the history, politics, society and culture in the Iberian Peninsula and Latin America.

The aim of this module is to analyse artefacts of Iberian and Latin American cultural production linked to specific historical contexts, in the light of contemporary critical literature on cultural production, power and society. This module addresses the importance of cultural production from the 20th century to the present day, exploring how agents producing cultural representations (photographers, musicians, writers, poets, journalists, film makers, the media and state institutions) use cultural artefacts to impact on people’s relationships with power and society. The module is taught in Spanish and assessed in Spanish and English. An oral presentation in Spanish is set in semester 1 and one 2750-word essay in English is in place for semester 2. Analysis of the material, lectures, and class interactions during students’ presentations in Spanish provide useful preparation for the Year Abroad at Stage 3. Through a variety of study skills tasks, this module prepares students for more specialist study in Iberian and Latin American cultural and/or historical studies at Stage 4.

Outline Of Syllabus

- Cultural representations, authorship, and politics.
- Representations of political issues in popular culture in Spain during the Civil war, the Franco dictatorship, and memory in the transition to democracy.
- Cultural production around the idea of revolution, the military dictatorships and transition to democracy in Latin America 1959 - 2019
- Examples from Cuba, Nicaragua, Argentina, Chile and Brazil.
- Documentary photography, chronicles, poetry, theatre, graphic novels, film, music.

Intended Knowledge Outcomes

1. A critical awareness of Iberian and Latin American cultural production in the relevant historical contexts of the 20th and 21st Centuries.
2. Critical perspectives on issues of arts and politics. Understanding of the relationships between representations and power.
3. Knowledge of the roles and obligations of Spanish/Latin American artists and how they teach us to place contemporary society and versions of history under close and critical scrutiny
4. To prepare students for more specialist study in Hispanic cultural and/or historical studies.

Intended Skill Outcomes

1. Ability to analyse and historically contextualize a variety of cultural expressions (essay, narrative, drama, poetry, song, and visual media) of political protest, resistance, or revolutionary intent.
2. Linguistic skills in listening in the target language: specifically, organizing heard material and transferring it to notes and extended text.
3. Linguistic skills in written work in the target language, including the deployment of specialist critical and scholarly expressions.
4. Linguistic and communication skills in speaking in the target language in a formal context (presentations).
5. Ability to take notes from books, journals, and primary texts in both English and the target language.
6. Interdisciplinary work (working, that is, with a variety of media and forms of cultural production in order to draw wide conclusions about the topics covered).
7. Ability to argue opinions convincingly in English and the target language.
8. Ability to give an oral presentation in Spanish in the form of a jointly prepared seminar paper.
9. Ability to work in pairs and small groups.
10. Ability to write well-argued and analytical essays in the target language.

Teaching Rationale And Relationship

All knowledge outcomes are addressed by the mix of lectures, seminar delivery and guided group discussion of cultural artefacts presented in context. This module is taught in SPANISH and assessed in Spanish (semester 1) and ENGLISH (semester 2).

Assessment Rationale And Relationship

The oral presentation in Semester 1 allows for practice on commentary on the analysis of one expression, placing it in historical context, and using critical literature. The essay in Semester 2 demands a wider scope of sources for the analysis of cultural artefacts and a deeper discussion of historical circumstances and cultural studies theory.

General Notes

N/A