Lesson 1: Introduction
The Text and the General Education Program.
This text has been developed for use with The American University's
General Education Course 37.210, "Latin America: History, Art, Literature".
We felt it was necessary to prepare a special text because we were not able
to find any text, or combination of texts, which achieved the purpose of
the course. The first edition of the text, which is now obsolete, was prepared
in the Summer of 1990. This version was done in the Summer of 1993 (and
corrected in the Summer of 1997), and it includes considerable new material
to more fully support the purpose of the course.
That purpose, as the course syllabus describes it, is as follows.
This undergraduate General Education course explores the history of
Latin America through the words of the writer, the brush of the painter,
the pen of the cartoonist, and the lens of the photographer. It will include
the Latin (Spanish/Portuguese +Islamic), the African, and the Indigenous
cultural heritages in Latin American history, and will seek to show how
these strands have combined to produce a unique Latin American culture.
The relationship to Anglo-America, and especially the United States, will
also be explored on a cross-cultural basis.
The major objective of this course is to study Latin America as a unique
culture-area by using an interdisciplinary approach (history, art, and literature).
History will be the basic discipline used to organize the course; art and
literature will be used to illustrate and to provide windows of insight
into that history with visual, plastic, and written images.
The course must be placed in the context of the University's General
Education Program. Again, quoting from the course syllabus:
Relationship to the General Education Program: Course 37.210, "LATIN
AMERICA: HISTORY, ART, LITERATURE" is a second level course in Curricular
Area III (the International and Intercultural Experience), in the University's
General Education Program. This dimension of the curriculum is designed
to develop an informed understanding of the diversity of the world's cultures
and the critical issues which challenge policy makers in our increasingly
interdependent world. Each second level course builds on and extends concepts
and skills introduced in a designated foundation course in the same or a
related discipline. In order to complete the International and Intercultural
Experience with course 37.210, "LATIN AMERICA: HISTORY, ART, LITERATURE",
you must have previously completed one of the following foundation courses
in Area III: 23.150: Third World Literature; OR: 33.140: Cross-cultural
Communication; OR 03.100 Culture: Human Mirror.
Organization of the Text:
The text is organized into 24 Lessons corresponding to the semester's
scheduled class sessions (see the Syllabus for each day's assignment). With
some exceptions, each lesson consists of a reading assignment from this
text, the instructor's list of slides which will be shown in class, and
a literature reading. The literature readings for the first portion of the
course will be from this text. Toward the end of the course there will be
required readings from Contemporary Latin American Short Stories,
edited by Pat McNees.
There will also be two optional outside reading texts: Latin America:
A Concise Interpretive History, by Bradford Burns (6th edition)
and Art of Latin America: 1900-1980 by Marta Traba.
The purpose of these supplemental texts is to give you additional material
if you should want to explore in greater depth the points raised in class
and in this text. The material from the Burns and Traba texts will not appear
in unannounced quizzes and exams.
How to use this text.
This text is an integrator of the outside texts, the instructor's class
lectures, the slides shown in class, and other materials. The text will
pull together the three basic disciplines which are the heart of the course:
history, art, literature. You should use the text as your basic guide to
help you do this and in the process learn more about Latin America in an
interdisciplinary way.
When preparing for class, you should go through the following steps:
1. Read the instructor's notes and the slide list for the Lesson in
this text first.
2. Try to see how the slides will be used to illustrate the major points.
There is space available for you in the "slide list" to jot down
any questions you may have before class.
3. Read the literature assignment in this text (or in the McNees book),
and try to see how this literature reading relates to the historical material
being covered.
4. Prepare for unannounced quizzes by making sure you can identify key
personalities and important concepts.
5. Do the review exercises on the Macintosh computer program, typing
in your answers in the spaces provided on the computer program. Check the
Syllabus to see when each disk must be turned in for grading. Any questions
on the unannounced quizzes will be taken from this computer program. (Questions
on the mid-term and final exam will be similar to those on the computer
program).
In class, use the text the following way:
6. When the instructor projects the slides for discussion, ask any questions
you may have about the Lesson, using the notes you made while studying.
7. Many of the slides will be paintings, sculpture, architecture, photographs
and cartoons which will use art to illustrate the history and literature
being studied. See if you can spot and understand the relationship between
the art, the history and the literature. If you can't see the relationship,
ask about it.
8. Make any additional notes you wish on your copy of the "slide
list" in this text.
Acknowledgments.
This text would not have been possible without the assistance of a great
number of individuals, including: long-suffering students in earlier offerings
of the course; Director of General Education Ann Ferren; John Schillinger,
Naomi Baron and Amy Oliver of the Department of Language and Foreign Studies;
Director of University Computing Frank Connolly; Director of the New Media
Center Terry Fernandez; Anderson Computing Lab Director Victoria Eisele;
Language Resource Center Director Bill Caldwell; Evita Canal de Beagle and
La Perrichola; and the word processing and computer graphics specialists
María M. Macarena, María M. Mactusi and María M. Ochocinco.
Most of the drawings were done by students, many of whom also took earlier
offerings of the course: Ferdinanda Hogroian, Kevin Kim, Daniel Neuland,
Ilya Schillinger, Jen White, and Daniel Silver. Jill Gordon, as course assistant
in 1996-97, provided invaluable editorial comments.
Figure 1-1: Ojo de Dios (Eye of God)
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