Professor Sierra joined Kenyon in 2004. She is a native of Tucumán, Argentina. She received her undergraduate degree from the National University of Argentina (Tucumán) in Spanish and Spanish American literature, and language pedagogy.
Prof. Sierra came to the U.S. in 1996 to pursue a Masters and a Doctorate degree in Spanish American literature at Rutgers University, which she completed in 2000. She is a specialist in Cono-Sur literature. Her research interests include 20th century Spanish American essay, fiction and poetry; modernity and gender in Latin America; the role of space and place in literary and cultural productions; women's writing; and the representation of the city in fiction and poetry.
In addition to publications in the field of transnational feminisms and the postcolonial experience in Latin America, she is the author of Gendered Spaces in Argentine Women's Literature (2012). She also edited Geografías Imaginarias: Espacios de Resistencia y crisis en América Latina…
Read MoreProfessor Sierra joined Kenyon in 2004. She is a native of Tucumán, Argentina. She received her undergraduate degree from the National University of Argentina (Tucumán) in Spanish and Spanish American literature, and language pedagogy.
Prof. Sierra came to the U.S. in 1996 to pursue a Masters and a Doctorate degree in Spanish American literature at Rutgers University, which she completed in 2000. She is a specialist in Cono-Sur literature. Her research interests include 20th century Spanish American essay, fiction and poetry; modernity and gender in Latin America; the role of space and place in literary and cultural productions; women's writing; and the representation of the city in fiction and poetry.
In addition to publications in the field of transnational feminisms and the postcolonial experience in Latin America, she is the author of Gendered Spaces in Argentine Women's Literature (2012). She also edited Geografías Imaginarias: Espacios de Resistencia y crisis en América Latina (2014), a compilation of essays that study the role of space in the humanities. She is currently working on two additional books. Escrituras extremas: anarco-feminismo en América Latina (forthcoming in 2016) is a history of women influenced by anarchism in Latin America. Maps of Wonders: Geographies of the Feminine is a study on the intersections between maps and the arts in the works of 6 women writers and artists from Latin America.
In addition to her academic work, Prof. Sierra is currently working on a historical novel taking place in Buenos Aires at the turn of the Twentieth Century. The tentative title is Las Ranas (The Frogs) and it narrates the life of woman anarchist during the 1900-1910 period.
Professor Sierra is currently the Chair of the MLL department.
2000 — Doctor of Philosophy from Rutgers University
1997 — Master of Arts from Rutgers University
1992 — Bachelor of Arts from National University of Tucuman
This course offers independent study for senior candidates for honors under the direction of the honors supervisor. Normally offered in the spring semester, this course may be offered in the fall with the approval of the student's honors supervisor and the chair of modern languages and literature. Permission of instructor and department chair required.
This first half of a yearlong course is focused on the self in a broader social context for students who are beginning the study of Spanish or who have had minimal exposure to the language. The course offers the equivalent of conventional beginning and intermediate language study. The first semester's work comprises an introduction to Spanish as a spoken and written language. The work includes practice in understanding and using the spoken language. Written exercises and reading materials serve to reinforce communicative skills, build vocabulary and enhance discussion of the individual and community. This course includes required practice sessions with an apprentice teacher (AT), which will be scheduled at the beginning of the semester. Students enrolled in this course will be automatically added to SPAN 112Y for the spring semester. No prerequisite. Offered every year.
This second half of a yearlong course is a continuation of SPAN 111Y. The second semester consists of and continued study of the fundamentals of Spanish, while incorporating literary and cultural materials to develop techniques of reading, cultural awareness, and mastery of the spoken and written language. The work includes practice in understanding and using the spoken language. Written exercises and reading materials serve to reinforce communicative skills, build vocabulary and enhance discussion of the individual and community. This course includes required practice sessions with an apprentice teacher (AT), which will be scheduled at the beginning of the semester. Prerequisite: SPAN 111Y or equivalent. Offered every year.
This course uses literature and film to give advanced students the opportunity to strengthen their ability to write analytically and creatively in Spanish. The course will also have strong emphasis on speaking and reading in Spanish. Works from various literary genres and selected Spanish-language films are among the materials on which class discussion and writing assignments will be centered. To deploy this content, we will use digital technology that supports the acquisition of advanced vocabulary, the development of reading comprehension and writing. A grammar review, focused mainly on typical areas of difficulty, may also be included. Prerequisite: SPAN 213Y–214 or equivalent. Offered every year.
This course examines the history, culture and literature of Argentina since the war of independence. Our study proceeds thematically and chronologically, focusing primarily on works that deal with the theme of nation building. We will examine an array of issues: early nation building, the theme of civilization against barbarism, the loss of the frontier and of innocence, the region's export-oriented agricultural economy, urbanization and industrialization, and dictatorships and revolutions as they are portrayed in a variety of representative works of literature. The course will focus on how particular Argentine communities experienced and responded to these processes. The course will include many of the most celebrated and influential works of Argentine literature. Prerequisite: SPAN 321 or equivalent. Generally offered every three years.
Travel has recently emerged as a key theme within the humanities and social sciences. The academic disciplines of literature, history, geography and anthropology have together produced an interdisciplinary criticism which allows for a more comprehensive understanding of travel as an intercultural phenomenon. This class will explore how travel and related forms of displacement are represented in the literature and culture of Latin America. We will review key moments of the global history of travel that have affected local identities in Latin American countries: colonial encounters and imperial expansions (1500–1720); the period of exploration and scientific travels outside Europe (1720–1914); modernism and travel (1880–1940); and more contemporary experiences of migration and displacement (1940–2000). Since travel accounts can be located in an intricate network of social and cultural tensions, the approach of this class will be interdisciplinary. We will draw our discussions from a wide array of texts (travel journals, fiction, accounts by missionaries, slaves, and immigrants, scientific treatises, poetry, intellectual essays). We will engage in discussion about key topics related to experiences of travel and other forms of displacement in Latin America: travel writing and gender; travel writing and ethnography, cosmopolitanism, diaspora, tourism, migration and exile. We will study the impact of foreign travelers on Latin American ideas and perceptions of national culture and how the fascination with international travel similarly affected local traditions. Prerequisite: SPAN 321 or equivalent. Generally offered every two years.
This course is a study of how cities are represented in different Latin American cultural manifestations. We will study primarily literary texts, but since the study of cities requires an interdisciplinary approach, our discussions will draw on readings about architecture, urbanism, film, visual arts, popular culture and music. This class seeks to challenge the idea that Latin America is a rural paradise, given that, as authors such as Luis Restrepo state, 70 percent of the population of Latin America lives in cities. Massive immigration from Latin America to the U.S. and Europe challenges historical divisions of city/country, modernity/primitivism and development/underdevelopment. We will focus on four representations of urban space in Latin America: the impressionist and futuristic city of the 1920s and 1930s; migration and urban space during the 1950s and 1960s; and, in more contemporary representations, the "massive" city as depicted in urban chronicles and testimonials, and the postnational metropolis. We will review how cities have come to represent social, political and economic utopias and failed social encounters among their inhabitants. Prerequisite: SPAN 321 or equivalent. Generally offered every two years.
This course offers an opportunity to study on an individual basis an area of special interest — literary, cultural or linguistic — under the regular supervision of a faculty member. It is offered primarily to candidates for honors, to majors and, under special circumstances, to potential majors and minors. Individual study is intended to supplement, not to take the place of, regular courses in the curriculum of each language program. Staff limitations restrict this offering to a very few students. To enroll in an individual study, a student must identify a member of the MLL department willing to direct the project and, in consultation with them, write up a one-page proposal for the IS which must be approved by the department chair before the individual study can go forward. The proposal should specify the schedule of reading and/or writing assignments and the schedule of meeting periods. The amount of work in an IS should approximate that required on average in regular courses of corresponding levels. It is suggested that students begin their planning of an IS well in advance, so that they can devise a proposal and seek departmental approval before the registrar's deadline. Typically, an IS will earn the student 0.25 or 0.50 units of credit. At a minimum, the department expects the student to meet with the instructor one hour per week. Because students must enroll for individual studies by the end of the seventh class day of each semester, they should begin discussion of the proposed individual study preferably the semester before, so that there is time to devise the proposal and seek departmental approval before the registrar’s deadline.
This course examines the impact of globalization on feminist discourses that describe the cross-cultural experiences of women. Transnational feminist theories and methodologies destabilize Western feminisms, challenging notions of subjectivity and place and their connections to experiences of race, class and gender. The course builds on four key concepts: development, democratization, cultural change and colonialism. Because transnational feminisms are represented by the development of women's global movements, the course will consider examples of women's global networks and the ways in which they destabilized concepts such as citizenship and rights. We also will examine how transnational feminisms have influenced women's productions in the fields of literature and art. Key questions include: How does the history of global feminisms affect local women's movements? What specific issues have galvanized women's movements across national and regional borders? How do feminism and critiques of colonialism and imperialism intersect? What role might feminist agendas play in addressing current global concerns? How do transnational feminisms build and sustain communities and connections to further their agendas? This counts toward the diversity and globalization requirement for the major.This course paired with any other .50 unit WGS course counts toward the social science diversification requirement. Prerequisite: Any WGS course or permission of instructor. Offered every other year.
Global and Local Geographies: The (Dis)locations of Contemporary Feminisms. Marta Sierra, Clara Román-Odio, invited editors. Special Issue, Letras Femeninas, XXXIII (1) Summer 2007.
"En tránsito: geografías femeninas y viaje interoceánico en 45 días y 30 marineros de Norah Lange". Viajeras entre dos mundos. Sara Beatriz de la Guardia, editora. Lima, Perú: Centro de Estudios de la Mujer en América Latina. Forthcoming, Spring 2009.
"Geografías imposibles: La poesía 'en bajel' de Luisa Futoransky". Forthcoming, Confluencia, Fall 2008.
"Cuéntame un cuento chino: la estética sin territorio de Luisa Futoransky." Luisa Futoransky y su palabra itinerante. Ester Gimbernat González, editor. Uruguay: Ediciones de Hermes Criollo, 2007. 225-246.
"Los espacios de la crónica en La esquina es mi corazón de Pedro Lemebel." Tras las huellas de una escritura en tránsito: La crónica contemporánea en América Latina. Graciela Falbo, editor. La Plata, Argentina: Editorial de la Universidad Nacional de La Plata, Editorial Al Márgen. Forthcoming, Fall 2007. 89-109.
"Las tierras de la memoria: las estéticas sin territorio de Witold Gombrowicz y Felisberto Hernández". Hispanic Review, 74.1 (2006):59-82.
"Oblique Views: Artistic Doubling, Ironic Mirroring and Photomontage in the Works of Norah Lange and Norah Borges." Revista Canadiense de Estudios Hispánicos. 29.3 (2006): 563-584.
"De caníbales, piratas y polígrafas: escritura, obscenidad y mutilación en Alejandra Pizarnik." Latin American Literary Review, XXXIII.66 (2005):77-94.
"Mundo grúa: las paradojas del cuerpo y la máquina en la sociedad argentina de los años noventa." Argentina en su literatura, Vol VIII. Instituto Interdisciplinario de Literaturas Argentina y Comparadas. Universidad Nacional de Tucumán, 2005. 351-368.
"Máquinas, ficciones y sociedades secretas: Caterva de Juan Filloy y La ciudad ausente de Ricardo Piglia". Revista Iberoamericana, 11 (2005): 521-537.
"Artista, recolección y nostalgia: la figura del artista en la literatura de vanguardia", Confluencia. Colorado: University of Northern Colorado, Volume 18 (Nº 2), Spring 2003.
"Las construcciones de género en la literatura argentina de vanguardia". Revista de estudios hispánicos, Washington University, Winter 2000.
"La pesadilla de lasimágenes: reproducciónmecánica en La invención de Morel". Acta Literaria 24, Universidad de Concepción, Chile, Fall 1999. 121-130.
"La ilustración española en el discurso de El telégrafo Mercantil." La Ilustración y Tucumán a comienzos del siglo XIX, Secretaría de Ciencia y Técnica, Programa de investigación 206, Fac. De Filosofía y Letras, Tucumán, Argentina, 1992. pp.45-67.