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This course explores the diversity within Spanish (European, Christian) as well as Amerindian cultures at the time of the Conquest. Many Old and New World texts can be read as complex examinations of national, religious, ethnic, and personal identity understood as both destiny and choice and as an ongoing quest or adventure. Identity assumes many forms here: multiple and sometimes divided allegiances, border-crossing, passing and disguise, conformist and nonconformist assimilation. We will focus on four prominent themes: biological and cultural mestizaje as ideal, as curse, and as amoral reality (the cases of Dona Marina/La Malinche, Gonzalo Guerrero, Nunez Cabeza de Vaca, the Inca Garcilaso); the discourse of barbarism and civilization, or what it means to be fully human (the debate between Las Casas and Sepulveda, Vitoria's launching of international law, the ethnographic achievements of Sahagun and Acosta); the struggle over the soul of the Church: Is Christianity inherited or acquired? In particular, is it compatible with racist blood-purity statutes aimed at converted Jews and Muslims (the cases of Fray Luis de Leon, Santa Teresa, Ignacio de Loyola, and the moriscos)? And, finally, the unstable boundary between the masculine and the femi nine: Is anatomy destiny (the cases of Santa Teresa and Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz)?
Unless preregistered students attend the first class meeting or communicate directly with the instructor prior to the first class, they will be dropped from the class list. NOTE: Students must still submit a completed Drop/Add form to the Registrar's Office.
COURSE FORMAT: Discussion
Level: UGRD Credit: 1 Gen Ed Area Dept: HA RLAN Grading Mode: Graded
Prerequisites: NONE Links to Web Resources For This Course.
Last Updated on MAR-19-2002
Copyright Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut, 06459