The new courses created as part of the NEH-funded project “Humanities and the Healing Arts: Puerto Rico and the Caribbean” include courses taught in English, Spanish or both languages:
Aging, the End-of-Life Experience and Death in Literature and Film
A specialized multicultural and interdisciplinary study of literature and films related to themes of aging, the “end-of-life experience” and death. Study of how the literary and cinematic imagination engages with issues of aging through autobiography, ethnography, essays, short stories, poetry, dramatic plays, novels, and films.
Disability Studies and the Humanities
An interdisciplinary course that examines disability through the Humanities, from several cultural perspectives. Study of how the artistic, literary, cinematic and performative imagination engages with disability issues and lived experiences through autobiography, autoethnography, essays, short stories, poetry, dramatic plays, novels, films, dance, photography and other visual arts.
Topics in Medical Humanities and Health, Literature and Cinema [umbrella course-with focus on Bioethics the first time it is taught]
A specialized interdisciplinary topics course reflecting formal trends and critical issues in the study of literature and film, as related to fields of Medical Humanities and Health. Topics vary per semester. The course may be taken up to two times with different themes.
Special Topics in Contemporary Narratives of Trauma, Madness, and Healing [umbrella course-with focus on the Caribbean the first time it is taught]
An interdisciplinary course that studies essays, short stories, poetry, plays, novels, films, popular culture, rhetorical texts, and medical writings that address, from several cultural perspectives, the relationship between trauma, madness, and healing in literature
Narratives of Health and Healing
Exploration of health and healing, including cultural meanings of wellness and illness, through an understanding of narrative, narrative research, and narrative analysis. This exploration will include frequent writing practice in how to tell a story and result in a research-based application of new knowledge about narrative. Emphasis is on storytelling processes that influence and are influenced by health and healthcare contexts within a community and culture.
Teatralidades Médicas [Medical Theatricalities, to be offered in Spanish]
Curso interdisciplinario en el que el teatro y las técnicas actorales permitirán explorar las Humanidades Médicas y de la Salud a fin de desarrollar conocimientos básicos de éstas: empatía y sensibilidad ética en el entorno médico, conciencia corporal, destrezas de comunicación, observación, reflexión, análisis textual y análisis del lenguaje verbal y no verbal.
Interdisciplinary course in which theater and acting techniques are used to explore the Medical Humanities and Health, in order to develop basic knowledge in the following: empathy and an ethical sensibility in the medical context, bodily awareness, communication and observation skills, self-reflection, textual analysis and analysis of verbal and non-verbal language.
El Arte y el Arte de Sanación [Art and the Art of Healing: a discovery through the arts, to be offered in Spanish]
Curso interdisciplinario de artes visuales y su aplicación a las humanidades médicas y práctica con el fin de proveer una percepción sensible sobre la condición humana, el dolor y sufrimiento. Ayudar a desarrollar destrezas de observación, análisis, empatía y auto-reflexión partiendo de las artes visuales.
Interdisciplinary course in the Visual Arts and their applications to the Medical Humanities, with the objective of gaining a sensible perception related to the human condition, pain and suffering. Using methodologies and practices of the Visual Arts, the course develops skills of observation, analysis, empathy and self-reflection.
Literatura y las artes curativas en la Edad Media [Literature and Healing Arts in the Middle Ages, Comparative Literature course to be offered in English and Spanish]
Este curso investigará las prácticas y los discursos literarios y médicos medievales. Enfatizará las representaciones literarias medievales de una variedad de prácticas curativas: médicas, astrológicas, espirituales, y otras. Se contrastará los discursos medievales y modernos de enfermedad y curación para reflexionar sobre los contextos históricos y culturales en torno a los conocimientos y las prácticas médicas de diferentes épocas y culturas.
This course will study literary and medical discourse and practice in the Middle Ages. It will focus on medieval literary representations of a variety of healing practices: medical, astrological, spiritual, and others. Medieval and modern discourses on illness and healing will be contrasted, in order to provoke reflection upon the historical and cultural contexts surrounding medical knowledge and practice of different time periods and cultures.