Course Description
Military dictatorships were forms of Government repressive and violent in most of Latin American countries, of which stands out the dictator, a man who wields absolute power and was superb, cruel, and capricious. The dictator was also a leader who was convinced to possess a divine image and higher.
This course focuses on the representation of the dictator through the analysis of novels, songs, and films and expects to provide the student with a deep knowledge about the historical and political processes in Latin America. Including the lyrics of the songs of protest that were censored in the periods of dictatorship, the stories of novels and films are narrated—and sung, in the case of the songs—in realistic, satirical or allegorical ways. In addition to studying the tendencies of the dictator novels, the student will establish emotional ties between the tyrant and the reader, medium memory reconstruction, political awareness, and overcoming the trauma caused by the violence and repression.
Course Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Student Learning Outcomes:
By the end of this course, students will be able to:
- Compare and contrast the different literary styles and narrative strategies used by Jorge Ibargüengoitia, Manuel Puig, Roberto Bolaño, and Gunter Silva.
- Compare and contrast narrative strategies of a cinema post-dictactorias by Jorge Fons, Diego Lerman, Andrés Wood and Adolfo Aristaráin.
- Use various strategies for literary analysis as well as the basic literary terms, concepts, and methods of literary and cultural criticism.
- Contextualize the films, literary texts, and songs with the socio-historical and political coordinates of Latin America.
- Analyze these works in the context of the so-called Latin American Boom and Postboom.
- Identify and synthesize the main topics in the Novel of the Latin American Dictator, Films and Song.
- Write a paper showing the appropriate level of sophistication in literary and cultural analysis.