Catalan Program
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New professor and Director of Catalan studies: Edgar Illas Prof. Illas, a native of Olot in Catalonia, earned his undergraduate degree at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona in 1999 (with a “Premi extraordinari” or first in class), and his Ph.D. from Duke University in 2007. He is the author of an award-winning novel, El gel de bany sobre l’esponja (Barcelona: Columna, 2003) and of the book of essays Postmodern Barcelona, currently under review at Duke UP. Upon joining the faculty of the department in August of 2008, Prof. Illas will assume the direction of the Catalan program. |
Catalan is spoken by approximately 10 million people. The Catalan-language area, its main city being Barcelona, spans four states: Spain, France, Italy and Andorra. In Spain, the Catalan-speaking areas are Catalunya, País Valencià, Illes Balears (Mallorca, Menorca and Eivissa), and the “franja” of Aragó bordering Catalunya; in France, the Rosselló-Catalunya Nord; in Italy, the city of l’Alguer in Sardinia. Catalan is the official language of Andorra, a tiny country in the Pyrenees.
Despite the repressive policies of the Spanish and French states, Catalan has maintained a high cultural prestige since the Middle Ages and has played a central role in the political re-emergence of Catalonia as “a nation without a state.” Catalan literature constitutes an extraordinary cultural event that, for multiple reasons, has remained marginal amidst the great European literary traditions. Catalan women writers are especially significant, not only because of their literary value, but perhaps also because, as poet Maria Mercè Marçal put it, they often write subjugated in three main ways: as women, as writers in a minority language, and as members of the working classes. At the same time, the Catalan areas have also produced a prominent tradition of art, architecture and urbanism. Some outstanding figures are architect Antoni Gaudí and painters Joan Miró, Salvador Dalí and Antoni Tàpies, among many others.
Catalan courses at IU give you the chance to learn another Romance language and culture and discover the internal diversity of the Spanish and French states. Given the historical circumstances and the peculiar political situation of these areas, Catalan cultural production is a particularly fascinating space to explore the intricate relations between language, culture, the modern state and globalization.
You need to have fulfilled your College language requirement in either Spanish, French or Italian to begin to study Catalan at IU.
Overseas opportunities
IU has a program in Barcelona through IES. Barcelona, furthermore, is well within reach for students in IU’s Madrid program.
For more information: Contact Professor Edgar Illas.
Links to informative Websites:
- Diccionari i Enciclopèdia
- Televisió de Catalunya
- Catalunya Ràdio
- Ràdio Rac 1
- Diari Avui
- Diari El Punt
- The North-American Catalan Society (NACS)
- Generalitat de Catalunya, Catalonia’s autonomous government
- Institut d’Estudis Catalans, a learned society.
- Culture page of the previous
- The Generalitat’s language page
- Institut Ramon Llull, opportunities for research and grants
- Catalan grammar course, with exercises
- The association of Catalan writers
- Information on Catalan courses
Courses in Catalan:
C400 Catalan Language and Culture I (3 cr.). An introduction to the language as spoken today.
C410 Catalan Language and Culture II (3 cr.). The continuation of C 400.
C450/C550 Catalan literature (3 cr.). Survey of Catalan literature from the Middle Ages to the present. Significant works in all genres will be studied within their historical and cultural context. Issues of nation-formation, hegemony, biculturalism, and marginalization will be paid special attention.
C494 Individual Readings in Catalan Studies (Credits vary).
C613 Catalan linguistics (3 cr.). A description of contemporary Catalan, including a survey of grammar; an overview of the history of the language and its evolution; and topics in sociolinguistics, including the study of attitudes towards the language as a whole.
C618 Topics in Catalan Literature (3 cr.). Topics include medieval narrative, Valencian literature, the Renaixença, Modernisme and Noucentisme, the avant-garde, poetry and resistance, utopias and dystopias, specific writers (Rodoreda, Capmany, Roig, Riera, Barbal), theater and the Barcelona stage. Topics to be explored in a multicultural context and in view of current critical issues and theory.
C803 Individual Reading in Catalan Literature or Language (credits vary).
