CULP: Spanish Advanced Plus through Film and Literature

PrerequisitesSpecial£

The Programme offers general language tuition with a focus on communicative competence.

At advanced level the focus shifts slightly towards reading and writing whilst still offering plenty an opportunity for oral communication. The syllabus is more topical and the contents feature many a cultural, historical, political and current affairs theme. While the grammar is analysed within a context, explicit grammar instruction becomes an integral part of the course.

One of the aims of the advanced level courses is also presentation skills as the courses aim to cater for the academic needs (i.e. research, conferences) of the students.

This course features no formal summative assessment component and upon the completion of homework, participation and attendance (attendance required is at least 12/15 sessions) students will be awarded a Certificate of Attendance issued by the Language Centre.

For more detailed information about the course please visit our website.

• University staff and students
• Further details regarding Language Centre eligibility criteria are available

A language course for students who already have an advanced command of the Spanish Language (preferably C1), ideally suited to those students who have completed the CULP Advanced course or have taken Spanish at A Level recently.

Number of sessions: 15

The course is based on well-known literary works and films from Spanish-speaking countries, all of which are readily available from the John Trim Centre for Independent Learning at the Language Centre. The concept underpinning this course is one of fostering the learning of higher Advanced Spanish language through listening (mainly films), reading (mainly literature), speaking and writing (both film and literature). The course will begin with a general introduction to the Spanish language with special reference to literary analysis and film-related terminology. Every session will have at least one literary piece and/or film extract whose language will be analysed by means of listening, reading and communicative exercises. Students are expected to read the pieces and watch the films prior to coming to the class (they can borrow them from the John Trim Centre at the Language Centre), so as to be able to focus on varied aspects of their language as well as their background (local Spanish usage, history, author, director etc). There will be discussion about the literary pieces’ and films’ aesthetic, wider cultural, historical and political implications. All teaching and discussions will be in the Spanish language and students will be expected to actively participate and contribute.

Literary pieces [NB: extracts (typically 1-2 pages long) to be read before class; one entire novel for the last class]

• Don Quijote de la Mancha (Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Spain)
• La casa de Bernarda Alba (Federico García Lorca, Spain)
• La lengua de las mariposas (Manuel Rivas, Spain)
• Como agua para chocolate (Laura Esquivel, Mexico)
• Casa tomada (Julio Cortázar, Argentina)
• Cien años de soledad (extracto) y Crónica de una muerte anunciada (Gabriel García Márquez, Colombia)
• Cuentos de Eva Luna (Isabel Allende, Chile)
• Cien sonetos de amor y una canción desesperada (Pablo Neruda, Chile)
• La tía Julia y el escribidor (Mario Vargas Llosa, Peru)
• Los nadies (Eduardo Galeano, Uruguay)
• No oyes los perros ladrar (Juan Rulfo, México)

Poems by:

• Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer (Spain)
• José Hernández (Argentina)
• Luis de Góngora (Spain)
• Francisco de Quevedo (Spain)
• Rubén Darío (Nicaragua)
• Pablo Neruda (Chile)

Films [NB: All films to be viewed before class]

• Mujeres al borde de un ataque de nervios (Pedro Almodóvar, Spain)
• Abre los ojos (Alejandro Amenábar, Chile/Spain)
• También la lluvia (Icíar Bollaín, Spain/Mexico/Bolivia)
• Fresa y chocolate (Tomás Gutiérrez Alea, Cuba)
• Nueve Reinas (Fabián Bielinsky, Argentina)
• Y tu mamá también (Alfonso Cuarón, Mexico)
• El orfanato, (Juan Antonio Bayona, Spain)
• Relatos salvajes (Damián Szifrón, Argentina)
• El secreto de sus ojos (Juan José Campanella, Argentina)
• Belle Epoque (Fernando Trueba, España)

By the end of the Course students will be able to:

• Listening/Speaking

Contribute effectively to discussions about cultural, historical and geographical topics as portrayed in the arts or keep up a casual conversation with a good degree of fluency, coping with abstract and idiomatic expressions.

• Reading

Read literary works and film/literary criticism with a high degree of understanding, enough to cope with an academic course, to read the media for information as well as to understand non-standard pieces.

• Writing

Take detailed notes about a particular artistic representation/literary work and to write a well-structured essay about a literary piece and of a film and/or other topics of their interest

The Course introduces students to the following advanced learning skills:

• Communicate fluently whilst maintaining a high degree of grammatical accuracy;
• Apply their language skills effectively in a broad variety of contexts including academic ones;
• Use relevant language registers and acquire an understanding of the main aspects of the historical, political, economical, cultural and linguistic situation of the countries where the language is spoken;
• Understand audio/visual items from the media depicting artistic works and their background;
• Conduct research in the target language;
• Speak in public and deliver presentations in the target language;
• Acquire necessary skills to retrieve and use multimedia online resources in the target language;

The Course aims also to empower the learners and establish them as life-long language learners.

Presentations, practicals and online learning

• Raven access is required
• Further information regarding Raven is available

• Students Fees: £285 to be paid online. Please select ‘Concessionary’ under the course fee when you make your booking.
• Staff Fees: £320 to be paid online. Please select ‘All charged’ under the course fee when you make your booking.
• Links to the online store will be provided with your confirmation email.
• Payment is required within 24 hours of your booking to secure your place.
• Refunds available after the first lesson only.
• Payment for the courses is made on the Online Store (CULP General Purpose courses), (Raven log in).
• Course materials can be found on Moodle (Raven log in), once the course has started.

• Students are required to attend 80% of sessions
• Full details of all Language Centre programmes can be found on the Language Centre website and Language Centre Online website

• This course features no formal summative assessment component and upon the completion of homework, participation and attendance (attendance required is at least 12/15 sessions) students will be awarded a Certificate of attendance issued by the Language Centre.

Fifteen taught sessions of two hours plus online learning

• CULP: Spanish Intermediate 1
• CULP: Spanish Intermediate 2
• JTC: Advanced Spanish Conversation Hours
• CULP: Spanish Basic 1
• CULP: Spanish Basic 2
• CULP: Spanish Advanced