SPAN 4403: Spanish-Speaking Cultures through the Arts

3 Credit Hours

Prerequisite: SPAN 2002
This course provides an in-depth exploration of Hispanic artistic expressions as a lens for understanding Spanish-speaking cultures and societies. It critically examines how visual arts, literary texts, music, and other cultural artifacts articulate and negotiate identity within the geopolitical context of the Spanish-speaking world. Through a combination of close readings, critical analysis, and experiential practices, students explore how these creative discourses shape, challenge, and reflect collective identities within Hispanic communities.

Course Learning Outcomes
Students who successfully complete this course will be able to:

Identify key artists, movements, and styles in 20th and 21st-century Latin American art.
Explain the social, political, and cultural contexts that influenced Latin American artistic production during different historical periods.
Analyze specific works of art to determine how they reflect broader regional trends and socio-political concerns in Spanish-speaking societies.
Differentiate between various art movements, such as muralism, surrealism, and conceptual art, within Latin America, outlining their key characteristics and ideological foundations.
Evaluate the impact of Latin American art on both regional and global contemporary art scenes, drawing connections between the texts read in class.
Develop a comparative visual analysis that showcases the connections and divergences between different Latin American art styles and their representations in social media.
Formulate arguments that critique how contemporary artists in Latin America engage with questions of identity, colonialism, and globalization, integrating perspectives from both primary texts and independent research.