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Twin Cities Campus

Hispanic and Lusophone Literatures, Cultures, and Linguistics M.A.

Spanish & Portuguese Studies
College of Liberal Arts
Link to a list of faculty for this program.
Contact Information
Department of Spanish and Portuguese Studies, 214 Folwell Hall, 9 Pleasant Street SE, Minneapolis, Minnesota, 55455 (612-625-5858; fax: 612-625-3549)
Email: spptgrad@umn.edu
Website: http://spanport.umn.edu
  • Program Type: Master's
  • Requirements for this program are current for Fall 2018
  • Length of program in credits: 36
  • This program does not require summer semesters for timely completion.
  • Degree: Master of Arts
Along with the program-specific requirements listed below, please read the General Information section of this website for requirements that apply to all major fields.
Students entering the Hispanic and Lusophone Literatures, Cultures, and Linguistics PhD program without an MA from another institution, or with an unrelated graduate degree may elect, but are not required to, earn the MA at the University of Minnesota.
Program Delivery
  • via classroom (the majority of instruction is face-to-face)
Prerequisites for Admission
The preferred undergraduate GPA for admittance to the program is 3.00.
Other requirements to be completed before admission:
Prospective students generally have completed an undergraduate degree or substantial coursework in the fields of Hispanic literatures and cultures, Lusophone literatures and cultures, or Hispanic linguistics, although individuals with other backgrounds may be admitted. Students admitted to the program are required to be fluent in Spanish or Portuguese. The Graduate Studies Committee may require completion of background coursework, without graduate degree credit, for admitted students with insufficient preparation.
Special Application Requirements:
All application materials must be submitted electronically through the ApplyYourself application system by December 15. Applicants are accepted for admission for fall semester only. Please refer to the Application Checklist for important details. The following is required for the application: the Departmental Application; a personal statement; a writing sample representative of the applicant's level of scholarly development; three letters of recommendation; five-minute voice sample; a Curriculum Vitae; GRE or TOEFL (or MELAB or IELTS) test scores; and transcripts. For more information, see the Department of Spanish & Portuguese Studies Applying page: http://spanport.umn.edu/grad/applying.html
Applicants must submit their test score(s) from the following:
  • GRE
International applicants must submit score(s) from one of the following tests:
  • TOEFL
    • Internet Based - Total Score: 79
    • Internet Based - Writing Score: 21
    • Internet Based - Reading Score: 19
    • Paper Based - Total Score: 550
  • IELTS
    • Total Score: 6.5
  • MELAB
    • Part 1 (Composition) score: 80
Key to test abbreviations (GRE, TOEFL, IELTS, MELAB).
For an online application or for more information about graduate education admissions, see the General Information section of this website.
Program Requirements
Plan B: Plan B requires 30 major credits and 6 credits outside the major. The final exam is written and oral.
This program may not be completed with a minor.
Use of 4xxx courses toward program requirements is permitted under certain conditions with adviser approval.
A minimum GPA of 3.50 is required for students to remain in good standing.
Required Courses (6 Credits)
All students must take the following teacher-training courses for a total of 6 credits.
SPPT 5999 - The Teaching of College-Level Spanish: Theory and Practice (3.0 cr)
SPPT 5995 - Directed Teaching (1.0 cr)
SPPT 8920 - Introduction to Hispanic and Lusophone Literatures, Cultures, and Languages (2.0 cr)
Outside Coursework (6 Credits)
All students must take at least 6 credits of outside coursework, selected in consultation with the advisor.
Program Sub-plans
Students are required to complete one of the following sub-plans.
Students may not complete the program with more than one sub-plan.
Hispanic Literatures and Cultures
This sub-plan is limited to students completing the program under Plan B.
Students receive a solid intellectual and professional preparation in Iberian and Latin American literatures and cultures. Works and intellectual movements are studied in their historical, social, and cultural contexts, combining the approaches of literary and cultural criticism with those of intellectual history, sociology, gender and sexuality studies, among others.
Spanish Peninsular and/or Spanish American Literatures and Cultures (24 Credits)
Take 24 or more credit(s) from the following:
· SPAN 5160 - Medieval Iberian Literatures and Cultures (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5170 - The Literature of the Spanish Empire and Its Decline (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5180 - Don Quixote (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5190 - The Crisis of the Old Regime: Spanish Literature of the Enlightenment and Romanticism (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5150 - Contemporary Spanish Literature (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5550 - Caribbean Literature: An Integral Approach (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5560 - Global Colonial Studies in the Hispanic World (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5570 - Nineteenth Century Latin America: Enlightened Thought, Nation Building, Literacy, Cultural Discourse (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5580 - Latin American Cultural Integration in the Neocolonial Order (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5590 - The Impact of Globalization in Latin American Discourses (3.0 cr)
Hispanic Linguistics
This sub-plan is limited to students completing the program under Plan B.
This track is centered on the relation between language and its context of use, encompassing social, pragmatic, and discourse factors. It provides students with a strong background in the following areas of Hispanic linguistics: phonetics, phonology, syntax, pragmatics and discourse, historical linguistics, language variation, and second language acquisition.
Required Linguistics Courses (12 Credits)
Phonology
Take 6 or more credit(s) from the following:
· SPAN 5711 {Inactive} (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5721 - Spanish Laboratory Phonology (3.0 cr)
· LING 5302 - Phonological Theory I (3.0 cr)
Syntax/Pragmatics
Take 6 or more credit(s) from the following:
· SPAN 5716 - Structure of Modern Spanish: Pragmatics (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5714 - Theoretical Foundations of Spanish Syntax (3.0 cr)
· LING 5201 - Syntactic Theory I (3.0 cr)
· LING 5206 - Linguistic Pragmatics (3.0 cr)
Electives (12 Credits)
SPAN 5701 - History of Ibero-Romance (3.0 cr)
SPAN 5711 {Inactive} (3.0 cr)
SPAN 5714 - Theoretical Foundations of Spanish Syntax (3.0 cr)
SPAN 5716 - Structure of Modern Spanish: Pragmatics (3.0 cr)
SPAN 5717 - Spanish Sociolinguistics (3.0 cr)
SPAN 5718 - Spanish Language Contact (3.0 cr)
SPAN 5721 - Spanish Laboratory Phonology (3.0 cr)
SPAN 5930 - Topics in Ibero-Romance Linguistics (3.0 cr)
SPAN 5985 - Sociolinguistic Perspectives on Spanish in the United States (3.0 cr)
Lusophone Literatures and Cultures
This sub-plan is limited to students completing the program under Plan B.
This track prepares students in Portuguese studies, understood as an interdisciplinary critical formation through which the cultures and literatures of Portugal, Brazil, and Lusophone Africa are approached. Students are trained in the main historical periods, cultural movements, and social issues pertaining to the Portuguese-speaking world, both nationally and transnationally, within relevant comparative frameworks.
Required Courses (24 Credits)
Lusophone Literatures and Culture
Take 12 or more credit(s) from the following:
· PORT 5520 {Inactive} (3.0 cr)
· PORT 5530 {Inactive} (3.0 cr)
· PORT 5540 {Inactive} (3.0 cr)
· PORT 5910 - Topics in Lusophone Cultures and Literatures (3.0 cr)
or PORT 5930 {Inactive} (3.0 cr)
Spanish Peninsular or Spanish-American Literatures & Cultures
Take 12 or more credit(s) from the following:
· SPAN 5160 - Medieval Iberian Literatures and Cultures (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5170 - The Literature of the Spanish Empire and Its Decline (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5180 - Don Quixote (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5190 - The Crisis of the Old Regime: Spanish Literature of the Enlightenment and Romanticism (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5150 - Contemporary Spanish Literature (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5550 - Caribbean Literature: An Integral Approach (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5560 - Global Colonial Studies in the Hispanic World (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5570 - Nineteenth Century Latin America: Enlightened Thought, Nation Building, Literacy, Cultural Discourse (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5580 - Latin American Cultural Integration in the Neocolonial Order (3.0 cr)
· SPAN 5590 - The Impact of Globalization in Latin American Discourses (3.0 cr)
 
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· College of Liberal Arts

View future requirement(s):
· Fall 2022
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SPPT 5999 - The Teaching of College-Level Spanish: Theory and Practice
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Every Fall
Theoretical grounding in the general principles of second language acquisition and guidance with their practical applications to the teaching of first- and second-year Spanish at the college-level. prereq: Grad or instr consent
SPPT 5995 - Directed Teaching
Credits: 1.0 [max 1.0]
Grading Basis: S-N only
Typically offered: Every Fall
Taken in conjunction with SPPT 5999. Language acquisition theory as applied to foreign language instruction at college level. How current theory translates into practice through hands-on practical application particular to communicative language instruction practiced in Department of Spanish/Portuguese Studies. prereq: Grad student with concurrent enrollment in 5999
SPPT 8920 - Introduction to Hispanic and Lusophone Literatures, Cultures, and Languages
Credits: 2.0 [max 9.0]
Grading Basis: S-N only
Typically offered: Every Spring
This two-credit seminar will familiarize beginning doctoral students in the areas of Hispanic/Lusophone literary and cultural studies and Hispanic linguistics. Course must be taken during spring semester of the first year. Topics to be covered include: expected milestones and progress prior to reaching ABD status; methods for writing conference abstracts and presentations; the basics of academic writing in cultural studies and linguistics; how to transform a seminar paper into a publishable piece of scholarship; best practices for determining appropriate conference and publication venues; how to start formulating a dissertation project in the early stages of the graduate career; tactics for requesting funding and completing scholarship/grant applications; collegiality and professionalism in the discipline prereq: Graduate Student
SPAN 5160 - Medieval Iberian Literatures and Cultures
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
The major literary genres developed in Spain from the Reconquest to 1502, with reference to the crucial transformations of the Middle Ages, including primitive lyric, epic, clerical narrative, storytelling, debates, collections, chronicles, "exempla," and the Celestina (1499-1502).
SPAN 5170 - The Literature of the Spanish Empire and Its Decline
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Prerequisites: Grad student or #
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Major Renaissance/Baroque works of Spanish Golden Age (16th-17th-century poetry, nonfiction prose, novel, drama) examined against historical background of internal economic decline, national crisis, ideological apparatus developed by modern state. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5180 - Don Quixote
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Spring
Analysis of Cervantes' [Don Quixote] in its sociohistorical context; focus on the novel's reception from the romantic period to postmodern times. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5190 - The Crisis of the Old Regime: Spanish Literature of the Enlightenment and Romanticism
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Major literary works/intellectual movements/conflicts represented in written culture, of 18th/early 19th centuries (1680-1845), examined as expressions of long crisis of Spain's Old Regime and rise of bourgeois liberalism. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5150 - Contemporary Spanish Literature
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Major literary works/movements in Spain from 1915 to 2000. Neomodernism, surrealism, social realism, literatures of dictatorship/exile. Postmodernism. Poetry, novel, drama, essays, film, video/TV. Problems of literary history. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5550 - Caribbean Literature: An Integral Approach
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Literature of Spanish-speaking Caribbean. Emphasizes historical legacy of slavery, African culture, independence struggles. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5560 - Global Colonial Studies in the Hispanic World
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Summer
Discourse production in Spanish America between 1492 and 1700. Conquest/colonial writing/counter writing. Historical origin, evolution, impact of cultural, political, socioeconomic factors. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5570 - Nineteenth Century Latin America: Enlightened Thought, Nation Building, Literacy, Cultural Discourse
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Spring
Political/economic contexts. Capitalism, liberalism, conservatism, their discursive media. Essay, journalism, literature, expression of everyday life. Wheels of commerce, progress, industrialization. Romanticism, realism, positivistic faith.
SPAN 5580 - Latin American Cultural Integration in the Neocolonial Order
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Modernismo, historical vanguard, impact of populist politics in patterns of culture/literature. 1900-50. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5590 - The Impact of Globalization in Latin American Discourses
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Every Fall & Spring
Second half of 20th century critical culture. Neo-indigenism, new novel, poetry/antipoetry, theater/drama. Pragmatic search for past/identity. Globalization, its impact in literature.
SPAN 5721 - Spanish Laboratory Phonology
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Grading Basis: A-F or Aud
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Core literature on Spanish laboratory phonology. Phonology from a laboratory perspective. Students evaluate laboratory research methodologies, perform basic acoustic analyses, and design laboratory phonology studies. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
LING 5302 - Phonological Theory I
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Course Equivalencies: Ling 4302W/Ling 5302
Typically offered: Every Fall
How sounds are organized/patterned in human languages. Phonological theory/problem-solving for advanced work in in linguistics. Analyzing data. Presenting written solutions to problem sets. prereq: 5001 or honors student or instructor consent. LING 5302 is directed towards honors students and graduate students.
SPAN 5716 - Structure of Modern Spanish: Pragmatics
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall
Concepts in current literature in Spanish pragmatics. Deixis, presupposition, conversational implicature, speech act theory, conversational structure. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5714 - Theoretical Foundations of Spanish Syntax
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Linguistic types/processes that appear across languages. Grammatical relations, word order, transitivity, subordination, information structure, grammaticalization. How these are present in syntax of Spanish. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
LING 5201 - Syntactic Theory I
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Course Equivalencies: Ling 4201/Ling 5201
Typically offered: Every Fall
Concepts/issues in current syntactic theory. Prereq: LING 5001 and graduate student or honors student, or instructor consent
LING 5206 - Linguistic Pragmatics
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Every Spring
Analysis of linguistic phenomena in relation to beliefs and intentions of language users; speech act theory, conversational implicature, presupposition, information structure, relevance theory, discourse coherence. prereq: [4201 or 5201] or instr consent
SPAN 5701 - History of Ibero-Romance
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Spring
Origins and developments of Ibero-Romance languages; evolution of Spanish, Portuguese, and Catalan. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5714 - Theoretical Foundations of Spanish Syntax
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Linguistic types/processes that appear across languages. Grammatical relations, word order, transitivity, subordination, information structure, grammaticalization. How these are present in syntax of Spanish. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5716 - Structure of Modern Spanish: Pragmatics
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall
Concepts in current literature in Spanish pragmatics. Deixis, presupposition, conversational implicature, speech act theory, conversational structure. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5717 - Spanish Sociolinguistics
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Spring
Sociolinguistic variation, cross-dialectal diversity in different varieties of Spanish in Latin America and Spain. Impact of recent cultural, political, and socioeconomic transformations on language. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5718 - Spanish Language Contact
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Analysis of different types/results of Spanish language contact globally, taking into account varying social conditions under which contact occurs. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5721 - Spanish Laboratory Phonology
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Grading Basis: A-F or Aud
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Core literature on Spanish laboratory phonology. Phonology from a laboratory perspective. Students evaluate laboratory research methodologies, perform basic acoustic analyses, and design laboratory phonology studies. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5930 - Topics in Ibero-Romance Linguistics
Credits: 3.0 [max 9.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Spring & Summer
Problems in Hispanic linguistics; a variety of approaches and methods.
SPAN 5985 - Sociolinguistic Perspectives on Spanish in the United States
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Spring
Sociolinguistic analysis of issues such as language maintenance/shift in U.S. Latino communities, code switching, attitudes of Spanish speakers toward varieties of Spanish and English, language change in bilingual communities, and language policy issues. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
PORT 5910 - Topics in Lusophone Cultures and Literatures
Credits: 3.0 [max 9.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Cultural manifestations in Portuguese-speaking world (Portugal, Brazil, Lusophone Africa). Literature, history, film, intellectual thought, critical theory, popular culture. Topics may include writers (e.g. Machado de Assis) groups of writers (e.g. Lusophone women writers), or problematics such as (post-)colonialism or Luso-Brazilian modernities. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5160 - Medieval Iberian Literatures and Cultures
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
The major literary genres developed in Spain from the Reconquest to 1502, with reference to the crucial transformations of the Middle Ages, including primitive lyric, epic, clerical narrative, storytelling, debates, collections, chronicles, "exempla," and the Celestina (1499-1502).
SPAN 5170 - The Literature of the Spanish Empire and Its Decline
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Prerequisites: Grad student or #
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Major Renaissance/Baroque works of Spanish Golden Age (16th-17th-century poetry, nonfiction prose, novel, drama) examined against historical background of internal economic decline, national crisis, ideological apparatus developed by modern state. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5180 - Don Quixote
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Spring
Analysis of Cervantes' [Don Quixote] in its sociohistorical context; focus on the novel's reception from the romantic period to postmodern times. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5190 - The Crisis of the Old Regime: Spanish Literature of the Enlightenment and Romanticism
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Major literary works/intellectual movements/conflicts represented in written culture, of 18th/early 19th centuries (1680-1845), examined as expressions of long crisis of Spain's Old Regime and rise of bourgeois liberalism. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5150 - Contemporary Spanish Literature
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Major literary works/movements in Spain from 1915 to 2000. Neomodernism, surrealism, social realism, literatures of dictatorship/exile. Postmodernism. Poetry, novel, drama, essays, film, video/TV. Problems of literary history. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5550 - Caribbean Literature: An Integral Approach
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Literature of Spanish-speaking Caribbean. Emphasizes historical legacy of slavery, African culture, independence struggles. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5560 - Global Colonial Studies in the Hispanic World
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Summer
Discourse production in Spanish America between 1492 and 1700. Conquest/colonial writing/counter writing. Historical origin, evolution, impact of cultural, political, socioeconomic factors. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5570 - Nineteenth Century Latin America: Enlightened Thought, Nation Building, Literacy, Cultural Discourse
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Spring
Political/economic contexts. Capitalism, liberalism, conservatism, their discursive media. Essay, journalism, literature, expression of everyday life. Wheels of commerce, progress, industrialization. Romanticism, realism, positivistic faith.
SPAN 5580 - Latin American Cultural Integration in the Neocolonial Order
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Periodic Fall & Spring
Modernismo, historical vanguard, impact of populist politics in patterns of culture/literature. 1900-50. prereq: Grad student or instr consent
SPAN 5590 - The Impact of Globalization in Latin American Discourses
Credits: 3.0 [max 3.0]
Typically offered: Every Fall & Spring
Second half of 20th century critical culture. Neo-indigenism, new novel, poetry/antipoetry, theater/drama. Pragmatic search for past/identity. Globalization, its impact in literature.