Span 489 - Cities of the Past Future: Literary Institutions & Peripheral Modernity in the Latin-Am. Avant-Garde

Institution:

Washington University in St Louis

Subject:

Description:

This class proposes a study of the Latin American avant garde as a phenomenon of "peripheral modernity" and as a critique of the "institution literature" developed by 19th century and modernista liberalisms. This reading, rather than merely proposing a one-by-one reading of canonic texts, seeks to engage the avant garde as a global cultural phenomenon with impact in literature, art, society, and ideology. To achieve this, the class focuses on four regional contexts of the avant garde. First, we visit post-Revolutionary Mexico, to understand the way in which the avant garde redefined notions of literature in Latin America by carefully analyzing the stakes of groups such as the estridentistas or the contemporaneos. Second, we analyze the reinvention of Buenos Aires as a literary city in the 1920s and 1930s to understand the impact of "peripheral modernity" in the constitution of the avant garde as a specifically Latin-American phenomenon. Third, we discuss the impact of the semana de arte moderno of Sao Paulo, to understand how the idea of "antropophagia" created an articulation of the avant garde with debates of cultural identity and transculturation. Finally, we go to the Andes to understand how avant garde phenomena dealt with the questions of "divergent modernities." Authors discussed include Arqueles Vela, Manuel Maples Arce, Jorge Cuesta, Xavier Villaurrutia, Jorge Luis Borges, Oliverio Girondo, Roberto Arlt, Mario de Andrade, Oswald de Andrade, Manuel Bandeira, César Vallejo, Pablo Palacio, César Moro, and José Carlos Mariátegui. Scholarship includes Peter Bürger, Matei Calinescu, Renato Poggioli, Rubén Gallo, Pedro Angel Palou, Beatriz Sarlo, Fernando Rosenberg, Haroldo de Campos, William Rowe, and Roland Forgues. Prerequisites: Span 307D and Span 308D and at least two 300-level literature courses taught in Spanish. One-hour preceptorial for undergraduates; in Spanish.

Credits:

3.00

Credit Hours:

Prerequisites:

Corequisites:

Exclusions:

Level:

Instructional Type:

Lecture

Notes:

Additional Information:

Historical Version(s):

Institution Website:

www.wustl.edu

Phone Number:

(314) 935-5000

Regional Accreditation:

North Central Association of Colleges and Schools

Calendar System:

Semester

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