This module looks at minority cultures and identity politics within Spanish and Latin American societies and examines how experience that falls outside the mainstream has been represented in recent film, documentary, and biography. The module also examines how films from Spain and Latin America have articulated critique of pressing political concerns, such as hazards in the environment and the workplace. The module asks how the presence of minority voices in Hispanic societies is shaping our understanding of cultures in the Spanish speaking world. What is normal, and for whom?

How does looking from an outsider’s perspective help us to understand the bigger picture? How can our reading of fiction, film, and other texts expand our knowledge of diversity within the national cultures of Spain and Latin American countries?

The syllabus texts include comics, fiction films, documentaries and autobiography. Texts are drawn from the film and written cultures of Spain, Cuba, Mexico, and Peru and cluster around themes including:

• Disability
• Human rights and social justice
• Labour relations
• Indigeneity
• Domestic politics
• LGBT identities
• Transnational childhood
• Ethnic and religious minority experience

• Discuss knowledgeably aspects of minority identity and political activism in Latin America and Spain as these are represented in film and writing.
• Show ability to read and discuss narrative, filmic and artistic texts by presenting arguments in a structured and coherent manner.
• Offer close textual readings of the texts studied in class and establish relevant historical, cultural, and social connections.
• Understand how questions of diversity and equality are framed in the texts studied and how these questions have been impacted by individual and socio-political circumstances.
• Clearly present an overview of one of the modules themes through the form of a curated visual exposition of an artist’s work or through an informative report supported by archive materials identified and verified by the student

Teaching is provided through lecture and seminar format: lectures will usually be weekly and are supplemented by weekly or fortnightly seminars in which students are divided into smaller groups. In Semester 1 the seminars will be used to facilitate peer to peer learning through presentation and discussion of the assessment that takes the form of a curated exhibit or of an informative news report. In Semester 2 the seminars are also dedicated to peer to peer learning through assigned reading on which students will take turns to report. Reports from both semesters will be uploaded to a virtual learning space so that students can share their work. Key materials for assigned reading and preparation will also be made available through the virtual learning environment. Reading and viewing of essential core texts is compulsory, as is participation in the cycle of seminar presentation. In addition to essays and the semester 1 Report/Project, students submit a précis and bullet points of seminar presentation for upload to Learning Central. There will be feedback on the content of this seminar work and this is informal and not factored into the overall grade achieved. The written form of the Report/Project in Sem 1 is assessed.

There are four components of the module: these are divided across the two semesters

• Semester 1:  Living on the Hyphen: Biographies Across Borders
•                      Work, Dignity and the Environment
• Semester 2   Domestic Politics
•                      Cognition, Disability, Indigeneity

Whilst studying this module, students will practice and develop a number of skills. Not all of these will be assessed formally and included as learning outcomes. Students will be challenged to understand and report on texts which range from graphic novels to complex documentaries. Creative thinking which enables a student to connect texts and establish patterns will be encouraged.

Intellectual Skills

Align developments in rights for groups rendered marginal with social and political developments in Spain and in Latin American nations; make a critical engagement with Spanish and Latin American film and writing alongside awareness of disciplines such as disability studies, feminist studies, LGBT studies and ethnography; acquire greater cognisance of the context in which minority and diversity related texts have been produced and interpreted; appreciate the contingency and constructedness of aspects of identity; understand the differences between experiences of non-normative groups in Spanish and non-Spanish speaking countries; appreciate the value of human variety and understand why the rights of minority cultures are hard won; acquire greater understanding of labour politics; widen knowledge of exile, emigration, and transnational identities.

Transferable Skills

Synthesis of materials in Spanish and oral presentation of argument; application of critical discernment to texts read as a base for individual knowledge and intellectual development; independent study and research skills; facility in academic writing; ability to sustain and defend with factual knowledge a point of view about a text or an argument; ability to express informed opinion; use of archive materials; development of curatorial skills; peer to peer communication. 

Coursework - 10% - Report/Curatorship Project Design - 15 minutes and written report to be submitted - end of autumn semester

Coursework - Essay - 30% (2,500-3,000 words) - Spring semester

Written examination - 60% - 2 hours - Spring examination period

THE OPPORTUNITY FOR REASSESSMENT IN THIS MODULE:

Students achieving an overall pass mark will not be required to re-sit any failed components. Students failing the module overall will have the opportunity to re-sit the module during the re-sit period in August. The re-assessment takes the form of a 2 hour written exam for 100% of the module. (maximum mark: 40%).

The module will be structured around texts which allow students to approach the representation and production of a number of minority groups: the syllabus includes several texts which address the experience of children as transnational adoptees and as ethnic minority adults in their adoptive countries; it includes texts which represent disability in Spain; other texts address the experiences of transgender and transvestite people; films and texts are included which portray religious and ethnic minorities in Spain. Generally the syllabus uses a core text and an associated literature. Students will also be encouraged to connect texts around themes such as childhood, machismo, prejudice, and transnationality.

COMPONENT A: LIVING ON THE HYPHEN: BIOGRAPHIES ACROSS BORDERS

In this component of the module we look at the biographies of three figures whose lives were lived across international frontiers:

• Ana Mendieta (Cuba-USA)
• Elián González (Cuba-USA)
• Asha Miró (India-Spain)

COMPONENT B: WORK, DIGNITY, AND THE ENVIRONMENT

In this component of the module we will look at three films, two from Mexico, and one from Spain.The two films from Mexico are documentaries—Maquilápolis: City of Factories (2006), and En el hoyo (In the Pit, 2006). 

COMPONENT C: DOMESTIC POLITICS

In this component we will look at two films from Cuba and two films from Spain.The Cuban films are Retrato de Teresa (dir. Pastor Vega, 1979), and Fresa y chocolate (dir. Tomás Gutiérrez Alea, 1993). The films from Spain are Solas (dir. Benito Zambrano, 1999), and El bola (dir. Acero Mañas, 2000).

COMPONENT D: COGNITION, DISABILITY, INDIGENEITY

In this component we will look at a film from Mexico—María Novaro’s Las buenas hierbas (2010)—a film from Peru—Claudia Llosa’s La teta asustada (2009)—and two texts from Spain: Miguel Gallardo’s María y yo (graphic novel and documentary film, 2013), and Antonio Naharro’s Yo, también.

Leslie Salzinger Genders in Production: Making Workers in Mexico’s Global Factories (2003)

Iñaki Piñuel Neomanagement: Jefes tóxicos y sus víctimas (2006)

Ewa Mazierska Work in Cinema: Labor and the Human Condition ((2013)

Ann Oakley Housewife (1976)

Ian Lumsden Machos Maricones and Gays: Cuba and Homosexuality (1996)

Barefoot in the Kitchen/Con la pata quebrada (dir. Diego Galán, 2013)

Álvaro Rodríguez Díaz España en su cine: aprendiendo sociología con películas españolas (2015)

Martin Norden The Cinema of Isolation: A History of Physical Disability in the Movies (1996)

Kimberley Theidon Intimate Enemies: Violence and Reconciliation in Peru (2014)

Ryan Prout Piensa diferente: Neurovdiversity in Visual Cultures of Spain and Latin America (2017)

Stuart Murray Representing Autism: Culture, Narrative Fascination (2008)

Olga María Alegre de la Rosa La discapacidad en el cine (2003)

Chanan, Michael, Cuban Cinema (2004)

Fraser, Benjamin, Disability Studies and Spanish Culture: Films, Novels, the Comic, and the Public Exhibition (2013)

Foster, David William, Mexico City in Contemporary Mexican Cinema (2002)

Kuhn, Annette, Women’s Pictures: Feminism and Cinema (1994)

Martínez Martín, María Ángeles, Todo sobre el autismo (2013)

Mendiola García, Sandra Street Democracy: Vendors, Violence, and Public Space in Late Twentieth-century Mexico (2017)

Picone, Mary Small Wars: The Cultural Politics of Childhood (1999)

Quiroga, José, Tropics of Desire: Interventions from Queer Latino America (2000)

Rousseau, Stephanie, Indigenous Women’s Movements in Latin America: Gender and Ethnicity in Peru, Mexico, and Bolivia (2017)

Russo, Vito, The Celluloid Closet: Homosexuality in the Movies (1987)

Yngvesson, Barbara, Belonging in an Adopted World: Race, Identity, and Transnational Adoption (2010)

Topic specific readings and viewings for the seminars and coursework essays, with guiding questions and detailed instructions, will be provided on Learning Central.