History of Iberian Culture: challenges of modernity. 18th-20th centuries

elective courses

(in Polish) Obowiązkowa znajomość języka angielskiego na poziomie min. B2. Mile widziana znajomość języka hiszpańskiego.

The aim of the course is to provide a broad panorama of issues related to the history of ideas and culture in the Iberian Peninsula from the 18th to the 20th century including the colonial relations and their postcolonial consequences, migration phenomena and multiculturalism. We will try to show the history of the western part of the Mediterranean area as a response to the broader phenomena of modernity and postmodernity in Europe. The key place in the classes will be given to the literature and visual arts understood from the perspective of cultural studies: as social artefacts that are both a reflection and a place of negotiation of the key ideas and aesthetic currents for a given community.

The key place in course is dedicated to the literature and visual arts understood from the perspective of cultural studies: as social artefacts that are a reflection, and a place for negotiation of crucial currents of thought for the particular community. Fiction, but also paraliterary sources (such as letters, diaries or journals), visual arts like painting, theatre and film will be treated as a litmus paper for the social processes of change, and the place where the tension on the axis of power and society are most visible. We will pay attention to the role of the artist in the modern society as "the intellectual voice of the epoch", his/her ideological implications, and the limits of the creative freedom. We will also interrogate into the internal cultural complexity of Spain (separatist tendencies of Catalonia, Basque Country, Galicia, Valencia), their roots that date back to the beginning of the union of the Kingdoms during the rule of Catholic Monarchs in the 15th century, their transformations, and finally, their contemporary image.

To put it in the nutshell, the eighteenth, nineteenth and early twentieth centuries brought the twilight of the colonial empires, and at the same time a kind of return to the Mediterranean context, not without problems, but also open to new opportunities for dialogue and cultural pluralism. While learning about the Western Mediterranean World we will make use of the postcolonial theory, gender studies, and different definitions of the postmodern human and societies.

The lecture format is more varied than the traditional one; apart from the issues discussed, the cultural processes will be analysed through the close reading of a selection of literary and paraliterary sources as well as by the analysis of visual art: pictures, movies, handcrafts, photography, etc.

Bauman, Zygmunt. (2000). Ponowoczesność jako źródło cierpień. Warszawa.

Babelon, J (1974). Sztuka hiszpańska, przeł. H. Ostrowska-Grabska. Warszawa: WAiF.

Bartkowiak, Danuta. (1993). „Autonomia po hiszpańsku”, Sprawy Narodowościowe, 7(1), s.243-259.

Charnon-Deutsch, Lou. (2003). „Gender and Beyond: Nineteenth Century Spanish-Women Writers” w: The Cambridge Companion to The Spanish Novel. From 1600 to the Present. Turner, Harriet & Adelaida López de Martínez, Cambridge: Cambridge University press. ss. 122-137.

Chartier, Roger. “Lectores y lecturas populares”. Co-herencia, 4 (7), s. 103-117.

Clúa, Isabel. “La morbidez de los textos: literatura y enfermedad en el fin de siglo”, Frenia, IX, s. 33-52.

Gies, David T. (ed.) (2004). The Cambridge History of Spanish Literature. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

González Fernández, Helena. (2009). “La mujer que no es sólo metáfora de la nación. Lecturas de las viudas de vivos de Rosalía de Castro”. Lectora. Revista de dones i textualitat, 15, s. 99-115.

Haidt, Rebecca. (2003). “The Enlightenment and fictional form” w: The Cambridge Companion to The Spanish Novel. From 1600 to the Present. Turner, Harriet & Adelaida López de Martínez, Cambridge: Cambridge University press, s. 31-49.

Husar, Wioletta. „Decentralizacja niesymetryczna w Hiszpanii- implikacje polityczne i ustrojowe”, Annales (Universitatis Mariae Curie Skłodowska), XXI (2), s. 45-63.

Johnson, Roberta. (2003). “From the Generation of 1989 to the Vanguard” w: The Cambridge Companion to The Spanish Novel. From 1600 to the Present. Turner, Harriet & Adelaida López de Martínez, Cambridge: Cambridge University press. ss. 155-171.

Labanyi, Jo. (2011). “Modernidad y representación” w: Género y modernización en la novela realista española. Madrid: Ediciones Cátedra-Universitat de València-Instituto de la Mujer.

Sawicka A. (2003). Paryż-Barcelona-Sitges: modernistyczny "genius loci" w Katalonii. Kraków.

Shubert, Adrian. (1990). A Social History of Modern Spain. Routledge.

Smith Rousselle, Elizabeth. (2014). Gender and Modernity in Spanish Literature. 1789-1920. NY: Palgrave, Macmillan.

Tuñon de Lara et al. (1997). Historia Hiszpanii. Kraków: Universitas.

Turner, Harriet & Adelaida López de Martínez (eds.) (2003). The Cambridge Companion to the Spanish Novel: From 1600 to the Present. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

In terms of knowledge:

- Student has a structured knowledge about the culture and language of the chosen Mediterranean region.

In terms of skills:

- Student knows how to choose and apply knowledge and methods appropriate to various disciplines dealing with the cultural studies and is aware of the potential of an interdisciplinary approach

In the field of social competences:

- is aware of the dynamic development of culture and the emergence of new research methods and paradigms;

- understands the importance of preserving the wealth, integrity and awareness of Europe's cultural heritage, including individual traditions of the Mediterranean.

Written exam (open and test questions).

Assessment: The grade consists of 55% presence and activity, 45% written exam

Two absences are allowed, provided that the Student actively participate in other classes. Third and fourth absence requires written individual credit.