Patricia Saldarriaga

Beginning Spanish I
This course is an introduction to the fundamentals of grammar and focuses on the development of four skills in Spanish: comprehension, speaking, reading, and writing. Emphasis will be placed on active communication aimed at the development of oral and comprehension skills. This course is for students who have not previously studied Spanish. Students are expected to continue with SPAN 0104 after successful completion of SPAN 0101. 5 hrs. lect./disc.

Lusa-Hispanic Painting from the Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque Eras
The main goal of this course is to analyze art. Focusing on aesthetics, we will learn to appreciate the differences between Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque painting. Regarding formal elements we will work on the use of lines, colors, proportions, and perspective. Artistic appreciation will be complemented with readings on historical and theoretical issues regarding the intersection between imperial power and religion, race, and ethnicity (Casta painting), mythology, the use of the body as a metaphor, still lifes, and Vanitas painting. The course will also include a chapter on art by ‘forgotten’ women, as well as a chapter on architecture, including Brazilian colonial monuments. Students will compare artistic manifestations from Portugal, Spain and the New World, and will be able to trace connections with contemporary art. Among artists included: El Greco, Clara Peeters, Velázquez, Josefa de Óbidos, Goya, Illescas and The Quito School of Art, Villalpando, Correa, and Cabrera (México), Aleijadinho, Zapata, Master of Calamarca and many anonymous painters from the Cusco School (Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia).

Understanding Decolonial Thought
In this course we will read texts on decolonial theory to analyze cinema from the Americas (e.g. White Zombie, King Kong, Pelo malo, Get Out, Rhymes for Young Ghouls, The Milk of Sorrow, A Fantastic Woman, The Silent House, Too Late To Die Young, The Lost Daughter and Soldiers or Zombies, S1). Decolonizing requires the exposure of structures of oppression that remain in a society after colonization. We will therefore focus on coloniality of power (e.g. intersection of race and capitalism, biopolitics), coloniality of gender (abortion, the privilege of the phallus, hypersexualization, violence against female and trans bodies), coloniality of knowledge (education, privileging the Global North), coloniality of being (religious imaginaries, existential phenomenology), and visuality vs. countervisuality (what we are allowed to see vs. what is there to be seen). Among authors included: Quijano, Fanon, Mbembe, Lugones, Segato, hooks, Maldonado-Torres, Mierzoff, Coates, Wynter, and Ahmed.

Decolonizing Zombies!
Zombies are generally depicted as metaphors that represent contemporary affects. In this course we will study a number of zombie movies with a focus on theories of race, gender, coloniality, iconoclasm, and queer temporality. With a strong emphasis on the American continent, the course will have a global approach, which will allow us to delve into issues of neoliberalism, cannibalism, genocide, diaspora, virus spread, and political criticism. The main goal is to expose colonial structures embedded in the representation of zombies, as well as in the making of the genre. Among films included are: White Zombie, The Night of the Living Dead, Savageland, World War Z (United States); Mangue negro (Brazil), Juan de los muertos (Cuba), El desierto (Argentina), El año del apocalipsis (Peru); Ladronas de almas, Halley (Mexico); Descendents (Chile), Rec (Spain), I’ll see You in my Dreams (Portugal), The Girl with All the Gifts (United Kingdom); Train to Busan (Korea); The Empire of Corpses, and Versus (Japan). (Two 3XX courses or by waiver) 3 hrs. lect.

Decolonizing Porn: Circulating Desire between Europe and the Americas
In this course we will use feminist, queer, critical race, and decolonial theories to analyze porn in Europe and the Americas. The goal is to give students the analytic tools they need to think deeply about the centrality of porn to our lives and to global capitalism, creating jobs in the “gig economy” as well as huge amounts of profit even as it extracts unpaid labor from trafficked bodies. We will consider pornographic photography, cinema, AI, and deep fakes. Texts will include Linda Williams’ Hard Core: Power, Pleasure, and the ‘Frenzy of the Visible,” Gayle Rubin’s “Thinking Sex,” Heather Berg, Porn Work and Jennifer Nash’s The Black Body in Ecstasy. In the SPAN section of the course, students will also be asked to participate in Spanish at least three times on the Spanish-language day of the class. All students will present their public-facing projects at the end of the class. (GloDeFem)/

Making Monsters: Global Visual Culture
In this course we will trace a cultural history of the monster, focusing on the construction of monstrosity as an imaginary concept based on cultural ideas regarding power and its manipulation, deformed and reproductive bodies, witchcraft, sexuality, race, the intelligence of female subjects, transgression of heteronormativity, masculine fears, fears of the other, and fears of the unknown and the powerful. Monsters also have a biopolitical dimension and can manipulate our lives. Using a global perspective (e.g. the Americas, Europe, Asia, Africa), we will study monsters as depicted in science, art, cinema, and popular culture. We will emphasize feminist, decolonial and horror theories, as well as post- and transhumanism. Resources may include: Divine images, mythological and folklore figures, representation of the Native Americans during colonization, freaks, ‘degenerate’ art, industrial and nuclear accident monsters, vampires, zombies, and mutants. 3 hrs. sem.

Decolonizing Zombies
Zombies are generally depicted as metaphors that represent contemporary affects. In this course we will study a number of zombie movies with a focus on theories of race, gender, coloniality, iconoclasm, and queer temporality. With a strong emphasis on the American continent, the course will have a global approach, which will allow us to delve into issues of neoliberalism, cannibalism, genocide, diaspora, virus spread, and political criticism. The main goal is to expose colonial structures embedded in the representation of zombies, as well as in the making of the genre. Among films included are: White Zombie, The Night of the Living Dead, Savageland, World War Z (United States); Mangue negro (Brazil), Juan de los muertos (Cuba), El desierto (Argentina), El año del apocalipsis (Peru); Ladronas de almas, Halley (Mexico); Descendents (Chile), Rec (Spain), I’ll see You in my Dreams (Portugal), The Girl with All the Gifts (United Kingdom); Train to Busan (Korea); The Empire of Corpses, and Versus (Japan). (Two 3XX courses or by waiver) (Previously SPAN 0381.) (Not open to students who have already taken SPAN 0381) 3 hrs. lect.

Patriarchy’s Toxic Imagination in Global Horror Cinema
What is toxicity and how is this linked to patriarchy and contemporary horror cinema? In this course we will analyze a number of movies in order to understand how the construction of female bodies as monsters is linked to toxic imagination and patriarchal values. Approaching toxicity from Mel Y. Chen’s perspective and using affect theory (e.g. Ahmed), we will delve into issues such as reproductive horror, trans horror, posthumanism, environmentalism, and religious horror. Among movies included: Huesera: The Bone Woman, 2023; Woman of the Photographs, 2023; Crimes of the Future, 2022; Culpa, 2022; Madres, 2021; Titane, 2021; Coven: Akelarre, 2020; Impetigore, 2019; Saint Maude, 2019; Bit, 2019; Mesmeralda, 2019; La casa lobo 2018; The Autopsy of Jane Doe, 2016; Prevenge, 2016; Antibirth, 2016; and Madre, 2016.

Open Topic Research Seminar
In this seminar students will develop a research project on a topic of their choice. At the beginning of the semester, the class will focus on research methodology, the discussion of different cultural theories, and their application. Students will be encouraged to focus on, or make comparisons with, contemporary cultural phenomena that they are passionate about so that they can explore how to discuss current issues from a theoretical perspective. The seminar will include a mixture of group and individual meetings; readings will be adjusted according to students’ interests. At the end of the semester, students will present their final paper in a departmental venue. (Two Spanish at the 300-level or above or by waiver) 3hrs. sem/disc

Literary and Film Analysis
This course will introduce the graduate student to the techniques of literary and film analysis, critical thinking, reading, and interpreting Hispanic literary texts. It is divided into four segments, each of which is devoted to the analytic strategies pertinent to one major genre: narrative, poetry, drama, and cinema. Each student will write several papers and actively participate in class discussions. (1 unit)
Required texts: Antonio Sobejano-Morán. Tornasol. Guía para la interpretación de textos literarios y cine. 3rd. ed. Panda Publicatons/ Wilkes Barre: Pennsylvania, 2021. ISBN: 978-0-981-8392-9-5
Mariana Enríquez/ Laura Datolli. Chicos que vuelven. La María: Eduvim, 2015. ISBN: 978-987-699-304-3

Understanding National Borders Through Cinema
In this course we will focus on the border and its representation in cinema, especially the US-Mexico border, as well as other Central and South American borders. We will also include Spain/Africa borders as well as imaginary borders. The goal is to understand what borderland means, its liminality and political relevance. We will pay special attention to the representation of migrants on both sides by focusing on issues of racism, capitalism, neoliberalism, as well as bio- and necropolitics. For critics such as Sayak Valencia (gore capitalism) and Ariadna Estévez, forced migrations can be understood as political strategies to mobilize and depopulate rich regions. Among the movies included: Que viva México (1932), Espaldas mojadas (1955), El Santo en la frontera del terror (1969), Babel (2006), Sleep Dealer (2008), Sin nombre (2009), La jaula de oro (2013), 600 millas (2015), Savageland (2015), El desierto (2016), México Barbaro (selection of shorts 2014, 2017), Ánimas (2018), Culture Shock  (2019), Vuelven/ Tigers Are Not Afraid (2019), Pájaros de verano (2019), Adú, (2020), Sin señas particulares, (2020), 499 (2021), Noche de fuego (2021), La purga infinita (2021), Las leyes de la frontera (2021), American Carnage (2022)  and  El salto (2023). (1 unit) 
Required texts: Access to materials will be provided online. 

Political Monsters in Cinema
In this course we will discuss what is a monster, and who becomes a political monster in contemporary cinema from Latin America and Spain. Considering some critical texts (e.g., Cohen, Negri, Quijano, Segato, Lugones, Valencia, Ramírez-Blanco) we will emphasize the representation of female bodies, and their depiction as cannibals, ghosts and witches. (1 unit)
Required texts: Access to materials will be provided online.