SPAN 341:Translating Contemporary Puerto Rican Poetry
( “Translating Hispanic Culture” )
Professor Luis Othoniel Rosa, Ph.D.
Fall 2021
lrosarodriguez2@unl.edu
Tues. and Thurs.’s 12:30:-01:45
TEAC-247CITY
“no es luto, es resistencia..”
OVERVIEW:
During the last 15 years the colony of Puerto Rico has gone through a massive economic crisis ($74 billion debt to Wall St.), the cruelest austerity measures, the biggest emigration of its peoples, two unprecedented category five Hurricanes, a month of earthquakes, a summer of massive and successful protests and now a global pandemic. And yet... poetry in Puerto Rico has never been better than in those 15 years. There is a poetic
boom in that same island that has been hit by the worst iteration of disaster capitalism. Why? Why is poetry flourishing amidst catastrophe? In this class we will attempt to answer this question as we read and translate many contemporary and living Puerto Rican poets. Every week each student will translate 3 to 4 poems from Spanish to English. These poems have never been translated before, thus this will be an opportunity to do very original work all the while we create awareness about the situation in Puerto Rico for the English speaking public. Translating poetry requires us to delve into the historical, cultural and aesthetic contexts from which the text emerges, rather than being a mere reflection of the translator’s linguistic competence. We will learn how translation is both an art and a tool for freedom and equality. We will also learn how poetry is not a luxury.
Students interested in creative writing, disaster capitalism, feminism, cultural studies, Spanish and Latin American culture inside and outside
the U.S.A. will find this course particularly useful.