Study

STRUCTURE OF THE COURSE OF STUDY

Recommended Study Plan:

MODULES AND COURSES

MODULE 1 – BASIC MODULE (15 ECTS)

This module contains the comparative regional studies core. Here students are taught the inter-American, cultural history, history of ideas, cultural studies, and literary studies foundations for their studies. The content of the module concerns the comparative literary and cultural analysis of cultural exchange, processes of transculturation, myths, identities, cultural topographies, popular culture, and media. Students practice analyzing differences and similarities in the discursive constructions of various cultural areas of the Americas.

COMPULSORY ELECTIVE MODULE 2, 3 and 6 (10 ECTS each)

Students must choose one of the following modules:

COMPULSORY ELECTIVE MODULE 2a/b/c

In this elective module, students work on their academic language skills in Spanish or English.

COMPULSORY ELECTIVE MODULE 3a/b

In this elective module, students explore issues of area and regional theory from a perspective of cultural geography or, in more depth, cultural and/or literary issues in the field of North American Studies.

COMPULSORY ELECTIVE MODULE 6a/b/c

In this elective module, students deal with the causes, forms, conditions, and opportunities of migration, with the representation of migration in the media and with discourses on migration and integration, or with basic questions of human rights protection and dimensions of human rights policy (prohibition of torture, humanitarian intervention, UN human rights protection, prohibition of discrimination, and many others). Alternatively, they can deal in depth with questions of a literary and cultural nature from the field of Latin American Studies.

MODULE 4 – NORTH AMERICA: CULTURE AND LITERATURE (10 ECTS)

Module 4 offers a research-oriented study of the cultures and literatures of North America (USA, Canada, Anglophone Caribbean) from the colonial period to the present. It deals with cultural and literary developments in North America, partly in an inter-American and transatlantic comparison. Students learn to approach individual phenomena of North American cultures and literatures (ethnic literatures, interculturality, mediality, gender theory, popular culture, etc.) from a cultural and literary studies perspective.

MODULE 5 – AMÉRICA LATINA: CULTURA Y LITERATURA (10 ECTS)

Module 5 offers a research-oriented study of the cultures and literatures of Latin America from the colonial period to the present. The module includes developments in the history of literature and culture in Latin American linguistic and cultural areas, especially processes of inter-American and transatlantic cultural exchange. Students learn to approach individual phenomena of Latin American cultures and literatures (discourses of identity, cultural contact and translation, regional and ethnic cultures, modernization processes, literary institutions, among others) from a cultural and literary studies perspective.

MODULE 7 – NORTH AMERICA: POLITICS AND SOCIETY (10 ECTS)

In Module 7, students examine political processes, economic developments, and social problems in North America in a national and international context. This module also deals with the analysis of the dynamics of transformation processes from a historical and social perspective.

MODULE 8 – AMÉRICA LATINA: POLÍTICA Y SOCIEDAD (10 ECTS)

In Module 8, students deal with political processes, economic changes, and social challenges in the Latin American cultural area in the context of globalization and integration processes. This module focuses on the analysis of the dynamics of transformation processes from a historical and social perspective.

MODULE 9 – PROJECT MODULE (5 ECTS)

Module 9 consists of a project, which usually takes the form of an internship proposed and organized by the students themselves with a regional, interregional, or transregional focus. The self-organized internship and/or the arrangement or participation in an academic event must take place in detailed coordination and consultation with Prof. Jansen in the summer semester or Prof. Paul in the winter semester. The students’ work ends with a report (15,000 characters, in Spanish in the summer semester and in English in the winter semester). The project module can be taken in the second or third semester.

MASTER’S THESIS (30 ECTS)

The master’s thesis will focus on a regional, inter-, or transregional topic in or between disciplines involved in the program.

ACADEMIC AND EXAMINATION REGULATIONS

Linked here you will find the official degree program and examination regulations for the master’s program The Americas/Las Américas.

MODULHANDBUCH

Here you can find the official Module Handbook.