Introductory description

This module explores the importance of slavery, its consequences in Latin American societies and its representation in contemporary Latin American music, film and literature.

Module web page

Module aims

Outline syllabus

This is an indicative module outline only to give an indication of the sort of topics that may be covered. Actual sessions held may differ.

Weeks 1-5: Cuba's literature and slavery

1. Introduction: Defining slavery in Latin America.
2. El Reino de Este Mundo, A new perspective on slavery
3. Carpentier and La Nueva Novela Latino Americana
4. Esteban Montejo's Testimonio
5. Slavery revisited by the Cuban Revolution

Week 7 to 10
7. Rosario Castellanos's Literary Indigenismo
8. Legacies of Slavery in Ciudad Real
9. Mayra Santos Febres and the Puerto Rican Afro Latina perspective
10. Reenactment of bondage and Techniques of Memorialisation in Fe en Disfraz

Learning outcomes

By the end of the module, students should be able to:

• Use knowledge acquired in lectures, seminars, and from prescribed reading as a basis for individual research
• Demonstrate relevant factual knowledge of twentieth-century narrative and its socio-political context
• Develop their linguistic grasp of the target language
• Compare the history and legacies of Transatlantic Slavery in the Spanish Caribbean to Latin American Indigenous exploitation in the continental Americas

Indicative reading list

Primary readings:

Carpentier, El Reino de Este Mundo, Seix Barral, Barcelona, 2007.
Barnet, Miguel Biografía de un Cimarrón , Manchester University Press, 2010.
Castellanos, Rosario, Ciudad Real , Alfaguara, Madrid, 1997.
Santos Febres, Fe en Disfraz, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2009.

International

All modules delivered in SMLC are necessarily international. Students engage with themes and ideas from a culture other than that of the UK and employ their linguistic skills in the analysis of primary materials from a non-Anglophone context. Students will also be encouraged to draw on the experiences of visiting exchange students in the classroom and will frequently engage with theoretical and critical frameworks from across the world.

Subject specific skills

This module will develop students’ linguistic skills through engaging with primary materials in the target language. It will build students’ capacity to engage with aspects of Hispanic culture through analysis of this primary material and through seminar discussion aimed at deeper critical thinking. In particular, students’ awareness of slavery in the 20thc will be enhanced through lectures and seminars which engage in scholarship in the field.

Transferable skills

All SMLC culture modules demand critical and analytical engagement with artefacts from target-language cultures. In the course of independent study, class work and assessment students will develop the following skills: written and oral communication, creative and critical thinking, problem solving and analysis, time management and organisation, independent research in both English and their target language(s), intercultural understanding and the ability to mediate between languages and cultures, ICT literacy in both English and the target language(s), personal responsibility and the exercise of initiative.