The aim of this module is to explore the different ways in which authors and thinkers have engaged with questions of gender and female equality through four centuries of Hispanic culture. This will be done initially by focusing on controversies surrounding women’s access to education and the ‘querelle des femmes’, which represented the major context for feminist debate in the early modern period, before analysing how those controversies are developed and expanded in the Enlightenment. Students will analyse how the presentation of these issues varies not only by period but also by genre, and will study a variety of different kinds of text, from fiction and drama to poetry, essays and visual art. Emphasis will be placed throughout on the detailed analysis of primary texts within their own cultural contexts, allowing students to see how these fundamental questions have been engaged with in different ways over time.

Course Outline

Section 1. Golden Age (Dr Rich Rabone)

Week 1. Introduction to the module. María de Zayas (i): Education, Honour, and Agency.

Week 2. María de Zayas (ii): Gender, Honour, Endings, and Responses.

Week 3. Ana Caro, 'Valor, agravio y mujer'.

Week 4. Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz and assessment.

Week 5. Hour 1. Tips for Essay Writing. Hour 2. Introduction to section 2. What is a critical edition of a text?

Week 6. Reading Week

Section 2. The Hispanic Enlightenment (Dr Leticia Villamediana González)

Week 7. Debates about women's talents and education: Benito Jerónimo Feijoo and Josefa Amar y Borbón's 'Defensa de las mujeres' (short essays available in translation via the Library: In Defence of WomenLink opens in a new window).

Week 8. Casta PaintingsLink opens in a new window: Gender, class, and race in colonial Mexico.

Week 9. Gender and class in Goya's paintings:Link opens in a new window petimetres, majos, majas, and witches.

Week 10. María Rosa Gálvez's antislavery play Zinda.

Students' comments and feedback

'I really enjoyed this module and introduced me to new topics I have never even thought about. It encouraged really interesting discussions in class'.

'Really enjoyed this module and I liked how it was split into two distinct periods to see how the feminist discourse had evolved'.

Assessment Method (2024-25)

• 1 x 2000-2250-word essay of Section 1 (50%)
• 1 x 2000-2250-word critical edition of a text studied in Section 2 (50%)