SPAN 377 - Art after Dictatorship: Post-Franco Literature and Culture

What happens to a culture when released from systematized repression? This course examines the creative explosion in literature and film produced in Spain after 1975, the year in which Francisco Franco died and his totalitarian regime ended. Conference discussion will concern transformations that characterize the post-Franco era: the recuperation (or not) of historical memory, the emergence of a fluid conception of gender, and the creation of new forms of popular art. Particular attention will be given to the “movida,” the disruptive social and cultural transformations celebrated in the films of Pedro Almodóvar and others. Films and readings will include works by Almodóvar, Ventura Pons, Carmen Martín Gaite, Rosa Montero, Juan Marsé, and Eduardo Mendicutti.

Unit(s): 1
Group Distribution Requirement(s): Distribution Group I
Prerequisite(s): SPAN 321 or equivalent
Instructional Method: Conference
Grading Mode: Letter grading (A-F)
Group Distribution Learning Outcome(s):

Understand how arguments can be made, visions presented, or feelings or ideas conveyed through language or other modes of expression (symbols, movement, images, sounds, etc.).
Analyze and interpret texts, whether literary or philosophical, in English or a foreign language, or works of the visual or performing arts.
Evaluate arguments made in or about texts (whether literary or philosophical, in English or a foreign language, or works of the visual or performing arts).