ITST385

Listening to Extractivism: Sound and the Capitalocene in 20th- and 21st-century Latin American Literature and Culture

Latin America has a rich and complex tradition of orality, both aural and textual. This course considers 20th- and 21st-century literature and culture in relation to that tradition, considering how recent works build on and, perhaps more importantly, diverge from, oral practices that have been the ground of storytelling, memory making, and political interventions in the region. Throughout the semester, we will attend closely to how Latin American literary and cultural expression wields sound and aurality to portray, comprehend, and challenge the impacts and effects of advanced capitalism. Grounded by Rob Nixon’s concept of “slow violence,” which proposes a capacious understanding of the effects of resource extraction and capitalist reason, the seminar brings a sound studies lens to Nixon’s theory to meditate on topics like gendered violence, genocide and epistemicide, increased forced migration to North America, environmental degradation and ecological disasters, and the impacts of ableism and anthropocentrism on human and more-than-human worlds. In particular, our conversations will inquire into how literature and culture invoke or represent sound, listening, and silence—both thematically and through literary devices and formal structure—as a means of indexing, critiquing, and deconstructing structures of power. Together, we will consider how aurality is deployed in aesthetics as a means of perceiving alternative epistemologies and responding to precarity, inequality, and violence of the Capitalocene.

Discussion of primary works will occur in Spanish and will be informed by critical readings from philosophy, literary theory, media studies, and other related disciplines. As the semester progresses, we will acquire a critical vocabulary (e.g., orality, aurality, orality-literacy binary, intermediality, audile technique, audiovisual litany, acousmatic sound, etc.) for analyzing and discussing sound and sonorities in literary and cultural texts.

CONTENT NOTE: This course will cover sensitive, mature, and charged material, including scenes of sexual and physical violence. You may find some readings and other content difficult.

Language of instruction: Spanish

Instructor: Dr. Tamara Mitchell

Master’s Thesis

All candidates for the M.A. degree with thesis are required to deposit in the Department a thesis of approximately 80 pages, including bibliography and notes. It must be presented in accordance with the university guidelines for the format and presentation of graduate theses.

Candidates will defend their thesis during a one-hour and a half oral examination.

Candidates must register in Spanish 549 in the year in which they intend to submit the thesis.

For information about your thesis preparation and submission, click here.

Shifting Identities and Perceptions in Medieval and Early Modern Italy

Cross-listed with RMST 341

Giotto, Nativity, detail. Scrovegni Chapel, Padua, Italy. The Virgin Mary looks at her newborn child, Jesus, as he looks back at her. We see here the inception of art as expression not just of traditional sacred story, but of human consciousness as experience of a fully embodied identity, a coming together of intelligence, emotions, intuitions and sensations.

This is a course that aims at blending the visual and the literary arts that flourished in the Italian peninsula from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance. We will follow a chronological order, moving from Dante, Petrarch and Boccaccio to Pico, Machiavelli and Castiglione, from Giotto to Leonardo.

We will also pay attention to where these art forms occurred geographically, as different centers of patronage became prominent at different moments in time. We will therefore look at Palermo and Sicily during the 12^th and 13^th centuries, Florence and Tuscany from the 13^th to the 16^th, Milan-Venice in the 15^th and 16^th; finally, approaching the Rome of the Renaissance will also give us the opportunity to look at her ancient, classical heritage.

We will read excerpts from some of the major texts that were produced in these various areas, and familiarize ourselves with the evolution of the visual arts.

If you are planning a trip to Italy at some point in the future, don’t miss this course! Decisions on where to go, where to stay and which wines to taste will rest on your organizational skills; but, having taken this course, you will know all the ins and outs necessary to plan a culturally exciting journey and decide for yourselves which regions’ cultural identities are closer to your interests.

Required texts:

• There are no required books to buy. Required texts are available online, or will be made available via Canvas.
• Selections from the following Primary Texts (either excerpts in PDF or available online):
  • Dante, Vita nuova (book required, see below) +The Divine Comedy.
  • Boccaccio, Decameron.
  • Petrarca, Canzoniere and other works.
  • Pico della Mirandola, On the Dignity of Man.
  • Machiavelli, The Prince.
  • Castiglione, The Courtier.

Recommended texts:

• Schneider Adams, Laurie. Italian Renaissance Art. Westview Press, 2001.

Prerequisite: No prerequisites

Note: Credit will be granted for only one of ITAL 303 or RMST 341.

Language of Instruction: English