SPAN 354W 001 Topics in Cultural Contact and Exchange – Border Studies: Borderlands as Spaces of Encounter in the Hispanic World

This course explores the concept of the border in literature and other artistic and historical media across the centuries, drawing on diverse contexts from the Hispanic world (including the United States). Students will examine la frontera not merely as a geopolitical boundary where conflict, negotiation, cultural exchange, and hybridity unfold, but as a threshold or borderland in which identities (nationality, social class, race, ethnicity, gender) are contested and reconfigured. Topics include border conflicts, imperial expansion, nation-building, slavery, and immigration, studied through a variety of materials such as short stories, chronicles, autobiographies, films, songs, artistic artifacts, and architectural and spatial layout. Through discussions, written reflections, and presentations, students will learn to think critically about these topics and to develop original arguments in both written and spoken Spanish. The class will be conducted in Spanish, and most of the materials will also be in Spanish.