Latin American and Iberian Cultures

Return to: USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences  

The Department of Latin American and Iberian Cultures offers two majors (Spanish; and Latin American and Iberian Cultures, Media and Politics) and three minors (Spanish, Luso-Brazilian Studies and Latin American Studies). Our programs emphasize the languages and cultures of Latin America and the Iberian Peninsula.

With an intellectual and pedagogical commitment to cultural differences and interdisciplinary education, the undergraduate program actively explores various social, theoretical, political or historical aspects of Latin American and Iberian cultures, including literature, folklore, cinema, art, music, food and architecture. Students are critically challenged and encouraged to consider and reconsider a number of important issues including the growing importance of popular culture in the Iberian Peninsula and Latin America and the role of race, ethnicity, class, gender and sexuality within Iberian and Latin American societies.

The department encourages students with a wide range of interests to combine a Spanish major with a double major or minor in another discipline within the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences or other schools at USC. Students will work closely with a group of engaged scholars who are committed to bringing their cutting-edge research to the classroom and to preparing students as global citizens. Faculty undergraduate advisers are available to help provide information and assistance to students wishing to explore these various options.

The department also offers basic language instruction in both Spanish and Portuguese through which students can satisfy their foreign language requirement.

Taper Hall of Humanities 156
(213) 740-1258
FAX: (213) 740-9463
Email: laicdept@usc.edu

Chair: Samuel Steinberg, PhD

Faculty

Professors: Erin Graff Zivin, PhD*; Julian Daniel Gutierrez-Albilla, PhD; Sherry Marie Velasco, PhD*

Associate Professors: Roberto Ignacio Díaz, PhD*; Samuel Steinberg, PhD

Assistant Professors: Natalie Belisle, PhD; Ronald Mendoza-de Jesús, PhD

Professors (Teaching): Marianna Chodorowska, PhD; Andrea Parra, PhD; Sarah Portnoy, PhD; Goretti Prietto Botana, PhD              

Associate Professors (Teaching): Carolina Castillo Larrea, PhD; Jaclyn Cohen-Steinberg, PhD; Jamie Fudacz, PhD; Gayle Fiedler Vierma, PhD; Anahit Hakoupian, PhD; Leah Kemp, PhD; Lori Mesrobian, PhD; Ellen Oliveira, PhD; Natalia Peréz, PhD, Consuelo Siguenza-Ortiz, PhD; David Zarazúa, PhD

Assistant Professors (Teaching): Marie Enright, PhD; Martin Ocon-Gamarra, PhD; Karen Peréz, PhD

Master Lecturer: Maria Fages Agudo

Emeritus: Ana Teresa Martinez-Sequeira, PhD; Mario Saltarelli, PhD; Carmen Silva-Corvalán, PhD*

*Recipient of university-wide or college teaching award.

Undergraduate Degrees

General Information

Spanish Language Proficiency Examination

Students with previous exposure to Spanish are required to take a placement test, administered by the Testing and Assessment Center. See also language@usc. Students with no record of previous exposure to Spanish are not required to take the placement examination and should contact the department for assistance.

Courses in Spanish

All courses at the 200, 300 and 400 levels are conducted in Spanish unless otherwise noted in the course descriptions that follow. Courses are kept small to allow for maximum interaction between students and professors.

Advisement

A college undergraduate adviser is assigned to provide academic advisement prior to registration and throughout the academic year.

Honors Program

The BA in Spanish with Honors is available to students who have a GPA of at least 3.5 in courses counted for major credit and an overall GPA of 3.0 (by the time of graduation). Desire to complete the major with honors typically should be approved by a department faculty member no later than the second semester of the junior year. To complete the honors program the student must write an honors thesis in Spanish in conjunction with a 400-level course. The thesis, in the range of 25–30 pages (6,250–7,500 words), must be endorsed by a departmental honors committee by April 1 of the senior year.

Spanish Undergraduate Students Association (SUSA)

Students majoring or minoring in Spanish are eligible to join SUSA, the Spanish Undergraduate Students Association. Each year SUSA sponsors a variety of activities that enrich the cultural, intellectual and academic experience of the undergraduate student.

Graduate Degrees

The MA and PhD, Comparative Studies in Literature and Culture (Spanish and Latin American Studies) are offered through the Comparative Studies in Literature and Culture program. See here  for degree requirements.

Certificate in Foreign Language Teaching

The Certificate in Foreign Language Teaching provides certification in the theory and practice of second or foreign language teaching for student language teachers concurrently enrolled in graduate degree programs in foreign languages or related graduate programs at USC; for graduates of such programs who are teaching languages; for external candidates concurrently enrolled in similar programs in accredited colleges or universities; or for graduates of such programs who are teaching languages. The certificate is meant to supplement graduate study in the literature or linguistics of foreign languages. It is also meant to supplement classroom teaching. Therefore all candidates for this certificate are required to have taught a second or foreign language for at least one academic year at USC or elsewhere. At USC, this requirement and the course work requirements can be fulfilled concurrently, but external candidates are required to show proof of such teaching experience as a condition of admission.

In addition to teaching, certificate candidates must complete a minimum of four courses (minimum of 12 units) in four areas of study — linguistics, language acquisition, language teaching methodology, and the teaching of literacy or the literature or culture of a second or foreign language.

Requirements for Completion

The program consists of a practicum and a minimum of four courses: one each in linguistics, language acquisition, language teaching methods, and the teaching of literacy, literature or culture.

Linguistics: (minimum of 3 units) LING 411x Linguistics and Education  or, with permission of instructor, an appropriate course in the linguistics of a particular language

Language Acquisition: (minimum of 3 units) LING 527 Second Language Acquisition  or an appropriate alternative course

Language Teaching Methods: (minimum of 3 units) MDA 593 Practicum in Teaching the Liberal Arts  or EALC 562 Teaching of the East Asian Languages  or SPAN 511 Techniques and Procedures of Teaching Spanish as a Second Language  or an appropriate alternative course

Literacy/Literature/Culture: (minimum of 3 units) An appropriate course in teaching of the literature or culture of a particular language

Programs

Bachelor’s Degree

• •  Latin American and Iberian Cultures, Media and Politics
• •  Spanish (BA)

Minor

• •  Latin American Studies Minor
• •  Luso-Brazilian Studies Minor
• •  Spanish Minor

Courses

Portuguese

• •  PORT 120 Portuguese I
• •  PORT 150 Portuguese II
• •  PORT 175 Accelerated Portuguese I
• •  PORT 220 Portuguese III
• •  PORT 225 Accelerated Portuguese II
• •  PORT 240 Portuguese IV
• •  PORT 250g Visions of Brazil
• •  PORT 300 Introduction to Social and Literary Studies
• •  PORT 302 Introduction to Brazilian Literature
• •  PORT 316 Portuguese for Business and the Professions
• •  PORT 342 Brazilian Cinema
• •  PORT 390 Special Problems
• •  PORT 590 Directed Research

Spanish

• •  SPAN 020x Spanish for Reading Knowledge
• •  SPAN 120 Spanish I
• •  SPAN 150 Spanish II
• •  SPAN 220 Spanish III
• •  SPAN 231x Business Spanish: Job Search
• •  SPAN 232x Business Spanish: Business Culture
• •  SPAN 233x Business Spanish: Case Studies
• •  SPAN 240 Spanish IV
• •  SPAN 245 Spanish Through Social Issues in Costa Rica
• •  SPAN 250x Spanish for Business Communication
• •  SPAN 260 Advanced Spanish: Arts and Sciences
• •  SPAN 261 Advanced Spanish: Society and the Media
• •  SPAN 270 Spanish for Heritage Speakers
• •  SPAN 280x Conversational Spanish
• •  SPAN 290gp Introduction to Latin American and Iberian Studies
• •  SPAN 301 Introduction to Literature and Film
• •  SPAN 302 Screen Cultures: From Film to the Internet
• •  SPAN 304 The Art of Fiction
• •  SPAN 306 Performance from Street to Stage
• •  SPAN 308 The Art of Poetry
• •  SPAN 310 Structure of Spanish
• •  SPAN 311 Advanced Spanish Through Contemporary Issues: Oral Emphasis
• •  SPAN 315 Advanced Grammar and Translation
• •  SPAN 316x Spanish for the Professions
• •  SPAN 318 Creative Writing in Spanish
• •  SPAN 320 Politics, Thought, Society
• •  SPAN 321 Sounds, Images, Objects
• •  SPAN 341 Advanced Conversation and Culture
• •  SPAN 350 Cultural Cross-Currents of the Iberian Middle Ages
• •  SPAN 352 The Transatlantic Golden Age: New Worlds Real and Imagined
• •  SPAN 372 Modern and Contemporary Latin American Fiction
• •  SPAN 373 Modern and Postmodern Spanish Fiction
• •  SPAN 375 Latin American Cultural and Literary Theory
• •  SPAN 380g Literature of Mexico
• •  SPAN 381 Narco-World
• •  SPAN 382 The Aesthetics of Violence in Latin America
• •  SPAN 383 Mexican Noir
• •  SPAN 385 The Culture of Food in Hispanic Los Angeles
• •  SPAN 390 Special Problems
• •  SPAN 391 Introduction to Contemporary Spanish Literature (USC Madrid Center)
• •  SPAN 395 Visualizing Cuba: Arts, Politics and Society in Today’s Cuba
• •  SPAN 396 Oaxaca and Oaxacalifornia: Food, Culture, Art and Migration
• •  SPAN 397 Language Loss and Deculturation in Cusco, Peru
• •  SPAN 405 History of the Spanish and Portuguese Languages
• •  SPAN 409 Latinx Food and Social Justice
• •  SPAN 412 Spanish Rhetoric and Style
• •  SPAN 413m Social and Geographic Varieties of Spanish
• •  SPAN 420 Spanish Language Acquisition
• •  SPAN 455 Picaresque Itineraries: Empire and Its Discontents
• •  SPAN 460 Don Quijote: Text and Film
• •  SPAN 462 Literary Cartographies of Latin America and Spain, 1810–1898
• •  SPAN 464 Introduction to Contemporary Spanish Theatre
• •  SPAN 465 Cultural Perspectives of the Iberian Peninsula
• •  SPAN 466 Argentina, Society and the Arts
• •  SPAN 469 Immigration in Spain
• •  SPAN 470 Literature and Media in Latin America
• •  SPAN 471 Postdictatorship Spanish and Latin American Cinema
• •  SPAN 472 The Sixties in Latin America
• •  SPAN 481 Literature and Popular Culture
• •  SPAN 482 Literature and the City
• •  SPAN 483 Gender and Sexuality
• •  SPAN 484 Studies in Visual and Material Culture
• •  SPAN 490x Directed Research
• •  SPAN 495 Seminar for Majors and Minors
• •  SPAN 499 Special Topics
• •  SPAN 501 Cultural Narratives of Spain and Latin America
• •  SPAN 511 Techniques and Procedures of Teaching Spanish as a Second Language
• •  SPAN 513 Spanish Morphology and Phonology
• •  SPAN 514 Spanish Syntax
• •  SPAN 515 Spanish Grammar in Discourse
• •  SPAN 516 Historical Aspects of Spanish and Portuguese
• •  SPAN 517 Spanish Applied Linguistics
• •  SPAN 518 Spanish Sociolinguistics
• •  SPAN 525 Medieval and Early Modern Spanish World
• •  SPAN 529 The Transatlantic 19th Century
• •  SPAN 539 20th and 21st Century Spanish Literature and Culture
• •  SPAN 545 20th and 21st Century Latin American Literature and Culture
• •  SPAN 590 Directed Research
• •  SPAN 592 Practicum in Teaching Spanish
• •  SPAN 594a Master’s Thesis
• •  SPAN 594b Master’s Thesis
• •  SPAN 594z Master’s Thesis
• •  SPAN 596 Research Methods in Spanish Linguistics
• •  SPAN 602 Seminar in Spanish and Latin American Critical Theory
• •  SPAN 603 Seminar in the Cultural History of Spain and Latin America
• •  SPAN 604 Seminar in Gender and Sexuality in Spain and Latin America
• •  SPAN 606 Seminar in Visual Culture in Spain and Latin America