The roles of phonetics (e.g., Jun 1995, Holt 1997, Steriade 2001) and Articulatory Phonology (AP, Browman and Goldstein 1986, et seq.) in both the diachronic evolution of and synchronic analyses for phonological processes are relatively recent incorporations into Optimality Theory (OT) (Prince and Smolensky 1993/2004, McCarthy and Prince 1993/2001). I continue this line of inquiry by offering an AP-based OT proposal of three fricative-vowel assimilations in Latin American Spanish: /f/>[x] velarization (fui [xui] "I went"), /f/>[phi] bilabialization (fumo "I smoke") and /x/>[ç] palatalization (gente [çente] "people"). In this dissertation, I pursue three main objectives: to update and clarify via empirical study and spectral analysis the available data; to account for the crosslinguistically recurrent phonological patterns that affect fricative-vowel sequences; and to explain the above processes' genesis and diffusion in Latin American Spanish by integrating the first two goals into an Optimality Theoretic framework. Concerning the first task, data for the three processes are culled primarily from sociolinguistic corpora (Perissinotto 1975, Resnick 1975, Sanicky 1988, inter alia). Lacking from these accounts are detailed phonetic analyses. To fill this gap, I report on a four-part perception and production study designed to update the descriptive facts and provide spectral analyses for the allophonic variants. Regarding the second goal, I show that fricatives are susceptible to regressive consonant-vowel assimilation given the recurrence of assimilatory patterns nearly identical to the Spanish processes under investigation in disparate languages throughout the world. I argue that articulatory and acoustic facts conspire to render place features in (non-sibilant) fricatives difficult to recover given the vast interspeaker, intraspeaker and crosslinguistic variability in production (e.g., Ladefoged and Maddieson 1996) and the greater reliance on fricative-vowel transitional cues as opposed to cues internal to the frication on the part of the hearer (e.g., Manrique and Massone 1981, Feijóo and Fernández 2003). To that end, I argue that the sound changes originate(d) with the hearer's misperception of a speaker's extremely coarticulated target (Baker, Archangeli and Mielke 2011, inter alia). The dissertation concludes with a proposal adapting Jun (1995) that encodes the above articulatory and acoustic facts into an AP-based, typologically-minded OT approach that accounts both diachronically and synchronically for /f/ velarization, /f/ bilabialization and /x/ palatalization in Spanish (updating previous analyses by Lipski 1995 and Mazzaro 2005, 2011).

The significant cultural impact of HIV/AIDS has led to the production of an impressive amount of scholarship in the US and Northern Europe since the outbreak of the epidemic in 1980. In contrast, the study of the cultural representations of HIV/AIDS has been largely overlooked in the realm of Spanish literary criticism. The purpose of my dissertation is to address that void through the analysis of a representative corpus of texts and artistic works from different periods and genres that acknowledge the impact of the epidemic in Spain. More particularly, this dissertation analyzes Spanish literary and artistic representations of HIV/AIDS through a critical comparison with other written materials produced in the 16th and 17th centuries as a reaction to the syphilis epidemic that hit Europe at the time, also known as the Great Pox. The corpus of texts used in this dissertation includes Francisco Delicado’s La Lozana andaluza (1528); two short novels by Miguel de Cervantes (1547-1616); individual poems and collections of poetry by authors such as Francisco de Quevedo (1580-1645), Anastasio Pantaleón de Ribera (1600-1629), Aníbal Núñez (1944-1987), or Galician-language poet Lois Pereiro (1958-1996); as well as artistic works and performances by AIDS activist Pepe Espaliú (1955-1993). I explore this corpus through an interdisciplinary approach bringing into play, among others, historical and medical discourses, biopolitics, sociology of literature, semiology, as well as theories about violence and empathy. In my comparative examination of these authors’ representations of disease, I argue that contemporary writers approached HIV/AIDS using a framework inspired on the aesthetic and epistemic strategies developed in the 16th and 17th centuries in the context of the emergence of the Baroque. This framework allowed modern authors to confront the uncertainties caused by Post-Modernity and HIV/AIDS, and inspired them to depict the pandemic by means of metaphor and indirectness. The ultimate goal of my research is to uncover variables that will help to enlighten the well-documented historical trend to stigmatize sexual transmitted and infectious diseases. My work also sheds light on the reasons behind the slow emergence of epidemic diseases as objects of cultural debate in Spain, as well as on the social, political and ethical consequences of this slowness. Finally, I argue that there are some specifically artistic and literary responses to the Great Pox and HIV/AIDS that can help to understand the nature of these diseases and to distinguish discriminatory usages of these phenomena.

This thesis examines the account of the discovery of the Amazon River written by Gaspar de Carvajal in the sixteenth century. In his Relación del descubrimiento del famoso río grande que, desde su nacimiento hasta el mar descubrió el capitán Francisco de Orellana, Carvajal describes the nine-month journey in which Orellana and his men crossed South America from the Andes to the Atlantic Ocean. In makeshift boats, they traveled through the river that we now know as the Amazon. The fact that the river has kept the name of the mythical warriors of European classical culture shows how the Amazon region has been, for the past five centuries, a mixture of legends from the new and the old worlds. Therefore, I analyze how the myth of the Amazons came to be such an intrinsic part of the New World. In order to do so, I trace the origin of the myth in Ancient Greece and how the Amazons made it into the Spanish books of chivalry during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. These books were widely read by the conquistadors, who then thought they had found these mythical warriors in the heart of the unfathomable Amazon jungle. There are two other myths that were of particular importance in Orellana's expedition, the "Cinnamon Country" and "El Dorado," which I also analyze. Finally, I recount the history of the manuscript, which was not known until the nineteenth century, and how Carvajal used a large variety of sources, as well as an amalgam of American indigenous terms, to write his chronicle. In an appendix at the end of this study, I have included my transcription of the manuscript, which is the first semi-paleographic transcription of Carvajal's account.

Este trabajo se centra en la traducción al español del poema de Andrew Kaufman “Signs of the Cross”, que se encuentra en su libro Earth’s Ends. El poema presenta una visión familiar, al mismo tiempo que extranjerizante, de los pueblos latinoamericanos a los que describe. Se tratan en él temas como el cambio constante, la desacralización de lo sagrado, la reescritura de la historia, la resiliencia de algunos de los pueblos latinoamericanos, el peso del pasado sobre ellos, así como la presencia del cristianismo y los símbolos de la cruz presentes en acontecimientos históricos importantes, la religión, la vida cotidiana y la naturaleza. Junto con la traducción del poema, se proporciona un análisis detallado de las nueve partes que lo componen, así como comentarios sobre las principales dificultades de traducción. Se emprendió la tarea de traducir como un ejercicio de back-translation figurativo, mediante el cual se devolvió el poema al idioma de la cultura que lo inspiró: el español, idioma que además ayuda a completar el significado del texto.

<p>Syftet med det här examensarbetet är att komma lite närmare tvåspråkighetens värld och att få en djupare kunskap om detta fascinerande universum. Att lära känna de förhållanden och samspel som skapas mellan individer i det flerspråkiga samhället har blivit allt mer aktuellt och angeläget och därför valde jag det här temat. Forskningsfrågor i detta arbete fokuseras på tvåspråkig inlärning och uppfostran och hur det påverkar individens identitet samt vilka fördelar respektive nackdelar tvåspråkighet innebär. Arbetet är uppbyggt i två delar. Den första baseras på litteratur studier som beskriver tvåspråkighet på ett generellt sätt och den andra på en empirisk studie där jag fokuserar på några av de tvåspråkiga spansktalande barn som bor i Sverige. Som forskningsmetod i den empiriska delen har jag intervjuat 5 tvåspråkiga spansktalande barn mellan 10 och 16 år och deras familjer. Både resultaten från litteraturen och den empiriska studien visade att tvåspråkighet är en tillgång snarare än ett hinder och det också är något helt normalt i majoriteten av världens länder. Människan har alltså kapacitet att lära sig och kommunicera på mer än ett språk och att växla mellan olika språk behöver inte betyda att personen har en fattig vokabulär, det kan vara ett tecken på en välutvecklad språkförmåga. Ett språk är en stor del av en människas identitet och kultur, de människor som har flera språk hittar ofta en jämvikt mellan två olika kulturer och kan se på världen med ett vidare perspektiv. Tvåspråkiga personer är ofta mer öppna och toleranta för meningsskiljaktigheter.</p>

This dissertation studies the politics of collective identity in the essays of Jesús Colón, Julia Álvarez and Richard Rodriguez. Through their essays I study the different configurations of collective identity (mainly those of Latino people, minorities, diasporic, transnational and national subjects) that these writes evaluate from their social position in the United States. A review of their works reveals important aspects about the problem of identity of a first and second generation of Latinos who try to understand themselves as part of the heterogeneous community in the United States. These three writers focus on the malleability of identity and use it to understand different ideologies and values. In his essays Colón highlights the reality of a subject that is economically marginalized by the historical process of capitalism. In addition, he advocates for the union of transnational workers of the Puerto Rican Diaspora in New York, who face stratification and social isolation. In contrast, Álvarez explores the construction of a diasporic identity that relies on history and on transnationalism. This author places emphasis on her writing as a nation, as a means to reflect and re-write the Dominican transnational identity. Rodriguez, the third essayist I study in this research, promotes the foundation of an American identity and evaluates the ways in which it is obstructed by the practices of communities that identify as minority. The objective of my research is to analyze the development of Latino identity using the models that these authors explore. I rely on their ideas and techniques to study the complicated and conflicting process of the evolution of a collective identity. Throughout the 20th century, these authors developed their own approach to the ideological fragmentation and mestizaje emphasized by postcolonial thought. This fragmentation influences their interpretation of history, ethnic/racial identity, family, language, education, cultural hybridity, representation and nationalism.

Esta tesis es una exploración de la literatura como un mecanismo de recuperar la memoria colectiva de España después de la Guerra Civil. Los textos de Duelo en El Paraíso por Juan Goytisolo, El cuarto de atrás por Carmen Martín Gaite, Soldados de Salamina de Javier Cercas, y Los girasoles ciegos de Alberto Méndez se utilizan como ejemplos de la literatura de la posguerra que se tratan del tema de la memoria como parte faltante de la sociedad de hoy. El análisis de estos cuatro textos muestra las maneras diferentes en que la literatura puede servir como manera de ganar acceso al pasado.

El nacionalcatolicisme franquista, ha sigut substituït per un patriotisme democràtic espanyol? Aquesta tesi explora, mitjançant l'anàlisi del cas espanyol, com els estats establerts promouen i dónen forma a la identitat nacional de llurs ciutadans, i com això es reflecteix al nivell individual. La tesi aprofita la recent transició a la democràcia i les diferències internes del cas com a oportunitats per guanyar possibilitats d'anàlisi de la dinàmica de canvi en la identitat nacional en paral·lel als canvis en el context polític. Al llarg de la tesi s'empra una àmplia varietat de fonts I mètodes de recerca: Anàlisi de fonts documentals i literatura secundària, metodologia Q i anàlisi estadística de dades d'enquesta provinents tant d'enquestes preexistents (ISSP, WVS, CIS) com d'una enquesta pròpia realitzada el gener de 2007. Els resultats mostren com l'evolució dels discursos polítics sobre la nació espanyola han condicionat les actituds dels ciutadans, en un procés de reconstrucció incompleta de la identitat nacional espanyola.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2000. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 152-170).

Thesis (doctoral)--Université de Paris IV, 1977. / Includes indexes. Includes bibliographical references (p. 363-382).