This course will examine the treatment of Latin America in (mostly) Hollywood film. It will look at films set south of the border, films about the border itself, as well as the presence of Latino stars (actors, directors, etc.) in the US film industry. Hollywood is, after all, located in the ambivalent borderland that is Southern California: once part of the Spanish Empire, later part of Mexico, and now increasingly marked by ongoing Latino immigration. Its cinematic output thus negotiates a set of fears and desires about the foreign other, but also the domestic self, as they play out on the silver screen over the course of a century of film. To study the issues these movies raise, we will examine genres from comedy to the Western, musicals to action adventures.

Assignments:

Students will have to: 1) write a weekly blog post (20% of the final grade); 2) with a classmate, facilitate one of the class discussions (20%); and 3) write a final paper of 6-8 pages (60%). Graduate students will, instead of the final paper, write a presentation, with slides, of 10-15 pages, that could be given in a conference or workshop.

Language of instruction: English.
Instructor: Jon Beasley-Murray, jon.beasley-murray@ubc.ca