AMST 255
U.S. Cuban Life-Writing: Nationalism, Narrative, and Exile Spring 2015
Division II Exploring Diversity Initiative
Cross-listed LATS 254 / COMP 254 / ENGL 243
This is not the current course catalog

Class Details

This course introduces students to the genres of life-writing that have become principal forms of artistic, social, and cultural expression amongst Cubans in the United States. Learning about several examples of life-writing including memoir, autobiography, testimonio, and the bildungsroman, students will question how literary form is linked not only to culture but also to the social, economic, and political conditions out of which authors and writings emerge. Common themes or narrative arcs across U.S. Cuban life-writing will be charted throughout the semester in order to understand the currency of particular stories of exile, displacement, and the American dream. The primary question of the course asks: how, and towards what ends, are the genres of life-writing utilized, adapted, and revised by those disavowed by the nation? Readings will include works by Eduardo Machado, Carlos Eire, Virgil Suarez, Gustavo Perez Firmat, Olga Karman, Evelio Grillo, Pablo Medina, Emilio Bejel, Mirta Ojita, and Emilio Estefan. This course works under the Exploring Diversity Initiative’s theme of empathetic understanding allowing students to think through the experiences of exile, as well as the theme of power and privilege, examining how U.S. Cuban exile and writing about it has been structured by political, social, and economic institutions.
The Class: Format: lecture
Limit: 30
Grading: no pass/fail option, no fifth course option
Requirements/Evaluation: students will be evaluated based on weekly journal writings, two short papers, a final comprehensive project, as well as classroom participation
Extra Info: may not be taken on a pass/fail basis; not available for the Gaudino option
Prerequisites: none
Enrollment Preferences: LATS concentrators
Distributions: Division II Exploring Diversity Initiative
Notes: meets Division 1 requirement if registration is under COMP and ENGL; meets Division 2 requirement if registration is under AMST or LATS
This course is cross-listed and the prefixes carry the following divisional credit:
LATS 254 Division II COMP 254 Division I ENGL 243 Division I AMST 255 Division II
Attributes: LATS Core Electives

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