Professor Yolanda Martinez-San Miguel
  • Professor Yolanda Martinez-San Miguel
  • Research and Teaching
  • Books and Anthologies
  • Articles and Chapters
  • Henry Rutgers Term Professorship in Hispanic and Latin@ Studies
  • Postdoctoral Fellowship in Critical Caribbean Studies 2014-2015
  • GAIA/IRW Interdisciplinary Working Group
  • Dept. of Latino & Caribbean Studies @ Rutgers
  • Rutgers University Press Book Series in Critical Caribbean Studies
  • Certificate in Multicultural Competence at LHCS
  • Graduate Course on Comparative Colonialities-Fall 2015
  • Latino and Hispanic Caribbean Studies-Courses Fall 2015
  • El EnRojo Queer: Comentario
  • ARESTY: Undergraduate Research on Caribbean Studies
  • Radicalism, Revolution and Freedom in the Caribbean
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Comparative Literature: Comparative Colonialities (16:195:516)

Professor Yolanda Martínez-San Miguel

Mondays 2:00 to 5:00 p.m., Comparative Literature Seminarn Room, 195 College Avenue

This course reviews proposes a comparative study of colonialism by studying examples of Spanish, Anglo, French, Dutch and Japanese colonialism.  The course will develop in three complementary directions.  First, it will provide a general definition of colonialism, coloniality, postcolonialism and decoloniality (Said, Spivak, Bhabha, Osterhammel, Young, Loomba, Quijano, Mignolo, Sandoval, Maldonado Torres). Then, we will address the ways in which these debates have been inflected in four different geographical areas in which different colonialisms coexist and collide: the Caribbean, Latin America, Africa and the Pacific Islands.  Finally, each one of these developments will be examined through cultural representations and symbolical productions to propose an alternative canon of post/de/colonial narratives that can be studied in a comparative framework.

Texts:

Most readings available on Sakai, electronic reserve.  Some of the primary texts will be available at the Rutgers Bookstore (www.barnesandnoble.com):

Pané, Fray Ramón.  An Account of the Antiquities of the Indians

Cortés, Hernán, Second Letter

Samuel Champlain, Narrative of a Voyage to the West Indies and Mexico in the Years 1599-1602.

Guaman Poma de Ayala, Nueva Corónica y Buen Gobierno-selections

Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, Royal Commentaries-selections

Carlos de Sigüenza y Góngora, Misfortunes of Alonso Ramírez

José Rizal, “The Indolence of the Philippino” and “Philippines 100 years Hence”

José Martí, “Our America”

Aimé Césaire, Discourse on Colonialism

Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart

Epeli Hau’ofa, We are the Ocean: Selected Works

Pramoedya Ananta Toer, This Earth of Mankind

Donato Ndongo, Shadows of Your Black Memory.

Pramoedya Ananta Toer, This Earth of Mankind

Tsitsi Dangarembga, Nervous Condition 

Juan Tomas Avila Laurel, By Night the Mountain Burns

Junot Díaz, The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

Antonio Martorell, The Lettered Antilles

Tiphanie Yanique, Land of Love and Drowning


Evaluation:*

Class attendance and participation                                                                                     10%

5 short reaction papers on primary readings                                                                        30%

Leading one of the class discussions with a short 15 minute presentation                               10%

Critical review of one of the symposia held by CCA seminar on Archipelagoes                         10%

Final paper proposal due on November 9, 2015                                                                    10%

Final 20-25 page paper due on January 14, 2016                                                                 30%

           
Program of Primary Literary readings:

(Secondary and critical readings will be announced at the beginning of classes)

 
Tuesday September 8: Introduction to class: Discussion of syllabus.

Colonialism, Postcolonialism, (De)coloniality

Jürgen Osterhammel, “Colonialism: A Definition.”  Colonialism: A Theoretical Overview, pp. 15-22

Ania Loomba, Colonialism/Postcolonialism: “Chapter One: Situating Colonial and Postcolonial Studies,” pp. 7-23.

Edward Said, “Representing the Colonized: Anthropology's Interlocutors” Critical Inquiry, Vol. 15, No. 2 (Winter, 1989), pp. 205-225

Quijano, “Coloniality of Power, Eurocentrism and Latin America.” Nepantla: Views from South 1.3 (2000): 533-580.

Mignolo,Walter. “Delinking: The Rhetoric of Modernity, the Logic of Coloniality, and the Grammar of Decoloniality”

Maldonado Torres, Nelson.  “On the Coloniality of Being: Contributions to the Development of a Concept.” Cultural Studies Vol. 21, Nos. 2-3 March/May 2007, pp. 240-270


Monday September 14: Colonialism in the 16th and 17th centuries: the Caribbean

Columbus, Letter to Luis de Santangel

Pané, Fray Ramón.  An Account of the Antiquities of the Indians.

Samuel Champlain, Narrative of a Voyage to the West Indies and Mexico in the Years 1599-1602.

Carlos de Sigüenza y Góngora, Misfortunes of Alonso Ramírez

 
Monday September 21: Colonialism in the 16th and 17th centuries: Tierra Firme

Cortés, Hernán, Second Letter

Guaman Poma de Ayala, Nueva Corónica y Buen Gobierno-The Guaman Poma Website: http://www.kb.dk/permalink/2006/poma/info/en/frontpage.htm (selections)

Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, Royal Commentaries, Books 1 and 8.

 
Monday September 28: Nineteenth Century: The Caribbean and the Philippines

José Rizal, “The Indolence of the Philippino” and “Philippines 100 years Hence”

José Martí, “Our America”

José Martí, “Montecristi Manifesto”

 
Monday October 5: Back to the Caribbean: U.S. Virgin Islands

Tiphanie Yanique, Land of Love and Drowning

Aimé Césaire, Discourse on Colonialism

 
Monday October 12: Indonesia

Professor Janet Walker, Guest speaker. 

Pramoedya Ananta Toer, This Earth of Mankind

Epeli Hau’ofa, “Our Sea of Islands,” We are the Ocean: Selected Works

 
Monday October 19: Indonesia

Pramoedya Ananta Toer, This Earth of Mankind

 
Monday October 26: Africa-Nigeria

Professor Ousseina Alidou-Guest Speaker.

Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart

 
Monday November 2: Africa-Rhodesia, Zimbabwe

Tsitsi Dangarembga, Nervous Condition

 
Monday November 9: Africa: Equatorial Guinea

Donato Ndongo, Shadows of Your Black Memory.

 
Monday November 16*-Class postponed-dinner at professor’s home in mid December

 
Monday November 23: Africa: Equatorial Guinea

Guest Speaker: Yomaira Figueroa, Michigan State University

Juan Tomas Avila Laurel, By Night the Mountain Burns

 
Monday December 7: The Caribbean and U.S. Latinos
Antonio Martorell, The Lettered Antilles

Junot Díaz, The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao.

 
Extra class: Dinner at Professor’s home Monday December 14: Presentation of Final Paper Proposals

Paper due on January 14, 2016. (Date to be confirmed with students at the beginning of the semester)

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