Latin American Studies Approved Course List
LAS Approved Course List Spring 2024
List is subject to change. Please check the course schedule on Triton Link for the latest information.
The following are interdisciplinary courses available at UCSD that are approved to satisfy the requirements of the Latin American Studies Program. This list is dynamic and subject to on-going revisions. Courses not included in this list may be considered for credit based on content and must be petitioned.
Contact the LAS Undergraduate and Graduate Advisor with any questions on course offerings or petitioning courses.
Courses Offered by the Latin American Studies Program
Undergraduate
LATI 10. Reading North by South: Latin American Studies and US Liberation Movements. The purpose of this class is to study the multilayered relations between Latin American Studies and US Liberation movements, particularly Third World movements, the Chicano Movement, the Black Liberation Movement, the Indigenous Movement, Human Rights activism, and Trans-border activism.
LATI 50. Introduction to Latin America (4): Interdisciplinary overview of society and culture in Latin America—including Mexico, the Caribbean, and South America: legacies of conquest, patterns of economic development, changing roles of women, expressions of popular culture, cycles of political change, and U.S.–Latin American relations.
LATI 130. Latinx Environmental Justice This course will address environmental justice issues within Latinx communities within the United States and Latin America. The course introduces theoretical and methodological explanations to better understand environmental racism, environmental justice, and environmental problems.
LATI 140. Decolonial Thought and Practices in Latin America The purpose of this course is to survey decolonial thought and practice in Latin America throughout the twentieth century. Course content will draw extensively from the writings and experiences of previously colonized peoples in Latin America. Course texts will match primary source documents with historiography in order to situate decolonial thought in its practical historical context.
LATI 150. Digital Oral History in Latin America (4) An introduction to the theory and practice of digital oral history in Latin America. Students will be exposed to the history of orality in the region as a hybrid genre between literature, history, and ethnography. This class will provide a strong theoretical background on oral history as a constant presence in the Latin American cultural scene from the colonial chronicles to the political testimony.
LATI 160. Latin American Third Cinema The purpose of this class is to examine the Latin American film movement of Third Cinema. This course offers students the opportunity to explore representations of imperialism, urbanization, spatial exclusion, poverty, race, gender, labor, state terror, revolution, and neoliberalism. The class combines films with other forms of knowledge production from the region, such as art and literature.
LATI 170. Social Science Research in Latin America The objective of the course is to survey the important contributions of social science research in Latin America in understanding some of the most pressing issues facing our societies today. The class will synthesize the contributions of Latin American researchers and activists to social science research in visible complex issues related to socioeconomic inequality, citizenship, violence and insecurity, justice, and migration.
LATI 180. Special Topics in Latin American Studies (4): Readings and discussion of substantive issues and research in Latin American studies. Topics may include the study of a specific society or a particular issue in comparative cross-national perspective. Topics will vary from year to year. Prerequisites: LATI 50 or permission of instructor, upper-division standing.
LATI 190. Senior Seminar (4): Research seminar on selected topics in the study of Latin America; all students will be required to prepare and present independent research papers. (Honors students will present drafts of senior research theses, of no less than fifty pages in length; non-honors students will present final versions of analytical papers of approximately twenty-five to forty pages in length). Prerequisites: satisfactory completion of LATI 50 and a working knowledge of Spanish.
LATI 199. Individual Study (4) Guided and supervised reading of the literature on Latin America in the interdisciplinary areas of anthropology, communications, economics, history, literature, political science, and sociology. For students majoring in Latin American Studies, reading will focus around potential topics for senior papers; for honors students in Latin American Studies, reading will culminate in formulation of a prospectus for the research thesis. Prerequisites: LATI 50 and working knowledge of Spanish.