Researching Cultures: Leisure and Urban Entertainment in Latin America

How do we define leisure or free time? Who can experience it? Can we choose which activities to perform in our free time? By establishing a dynamic dialogue between leisure/free time and other notions such as play, labor, inequality, alienation, and consumption, we will approach Latin America's urban entertainment scene from the end of the nineteenth century to the present. Beginning with the incorporation of the region into the global economic networks, we will trace the trajectory of the concept of leisure/free time to reflect on socio-political issues such as migration, gender, race, and social class. We will examine historical landmarks alongside examples of urban entertainment: from street celebrations, mass media, and soccer games, to social networks and virtual platforms in a pandemic scenario. Even though this course is mainly focused on Argentina and Uruguay, we will also have the opportunity to study cases from other parts of Latin America. This course will have a strong, mandatory and graded written communications component and is taught in Spanish. It also fulfills the Writing Intensive (WI) requirement for Arts and Sciences students. PreReq: Spanish 308D or 303 and at least one Spanish surveys (341, 342, 342, 370, 380, or Debating Cultures). There are no exceptions to the prerequisite. Students who have completed four or more Spanish surveys (including Researching Cultures and the ones mentioned before) may not take this class and must proceed to the 400-level.
Course Attributes: BU IS; AS HUM; AS LCD; AS LS; AS WI I; FA HUM; AR HUM; AS SC; EN H

Researching Cultures: Leisure and Urban Entertainment in Latin America

SPANISH 3615

Section 01