Hello everyone in RMST 202!

My name is Lucas Ribeiro, I’m a third year psychology student who was born in raised in Vancouver. I am incredibly excited to take part in this exciting course and hopefully to read some great novels and novellas. I suppose I could write a list of hobbies but I’m very scattershot in terms of the things I’m interested, but generally I would say I’m a fan of stories (novels, films, television, etc.), music, tasty food, and everything else most people would say they are interested in.

Part of my excitement from this course comes from the fact that I am Portuguese ethnically. I am a child of immigrants and have been deeply immersed in Vancouver’s Portuguese culture my entire life. I also speak Portuguese, though I wouldn’t call myself fluent, and my curiosity and love of the language is what led to my interest in this course. Learning about individual’s whose languages sound similar to my own, while also learning about the distinct differences present in narratives written in each is fascinating for me as they may reveal some similarities and differences in the cultures that are commonly said to have a common linguistic and cultural ancestor, The Romans and the Latin tongue. More than anything however, I am excited to immerse myself in literature from parts of the world that I am less familiar with, at least in terms of their literary tradition. In particular, Latin American author’s are a bit of a blind spot for me as I do not have extensive experience with books from that region. I’m incredibly excited to get the change to better familiarize myself with a breadth of stories and writings, and hopefully I will enjoy being able to read many novels for a class.

I am also very much a fan of the perspective on romance languages as the “bastard” offspring of Latin. I know relatively well that centuries ago in Portugal, there was push back from aristocrats on adopting the “vulgar” Latin spoken by the common people as an official language of the kingdom, and that the adoption of what came to be known as Portuguese was one of steady cultural evolution and in a way, as a sign of progression from the Roman ancestors. In a way, the evolution of the Portuguese language was a way of establishing Portuguese identity, and this evolution of identity of the various languages spawned from Latin, as well as the dialects, accents, and regional variations that came from these languages, also inform the identities of those that speak them. I am incredibly excited to see if these evolving linguistic identities shine through in the readings, and am overall very excited for this course

I cannot wait to learn more,

Lucas.