Studies in 19th Century Literatures & Cultures (415-0-1)

Topic

Adulterated Nations

Instructors

Nathalie Bouzaglo
847/467-1543
3-139 Crowe

Meeting Info

Kresge 3535 Span & Port Sem Rm: Thurs 2:00PM - 4:50PM

Overview of class

Adulterated Nations

The nineteenth century in Latin America is usually narrated as a national romance in which the utopia of the family was the only project. This seminar explores Latin American writers who, even while following the mimetic imperatives of nationalism or modernizing projects, revealed in the logic of their fictions a nostalgia, a questioning, or even a rejection of the erotic and political utopia. Novels, newspapers, and illustrations treat adultery as the almost inevitable bourgeois transgression. Through the adulterous woman and other transgressive women, these texts reinforce the structure of the nation and, at the same time, risk fictionalizing proposals the nation cannot absorb, proposals that critique modernizing projects. We will read chronicles, poems, novels, advertisements, diaries, and periodicals to trace transgressive or exotic desires, liberating and feminist desires, and ask what strategies each writer chose to narrate and exhibit them

Learning Objectives

• Understand the transition from the letrado (or educated member of the social and political elite) to the modern intellectual.
• Improve students' ability to produce careful close readings of primary texts.
• Develop the tools to analyze the definitions of writing and nation and to understand what these definitions include (and exclude).
• Allow students to develop critical research skills by producing a work of independent scholarship on nineteenth-century literature.
• Gain awareness of the social, political, cultural, and historical factors influencing artistic expression, the relations between the artist and the public, and the potential of creative art to challenge or affirm social and cultural norms. This will include discussions of the leading Latin American literary movements of the period.  

Class Materials (Required)

All course materials will be provided on Canvas.

Enrollment Requirements

Enrollment Requirements: Please contact the department of Spanish & Portuguese to request a permission number, spanish-portuguese@northwestern.edu.