The United States and Latin America share a self-conscious preoccupation with recording their unique multi-cultural reality and establishing their “New World” identity, while, at the same time, attempting to respond to and renew their European heritage. The result of this productive struggle is a unique synthesis of the old and the new, of regionalism and universalism, of tradition and innovation. Not surprisingly, in seeking to establish their independent identity, the literatures of the Americas are often marked by a search for new forms of expression. Formal experimentation is seldom, however, an end in itself. On the contrary, these literatures are in many ways “traditional” in their sensitivity to the delicate balance between the individual and the community, their concern for moral values, and their compassionate awareness of the drama of the human condition. This course will focus on the treatment of such issues as the representation of the past and the self, the role of memory and the imagination, the nature of literary language and the questions of alienation, colonialism and post-colonialism, communication versus silence, and fiction versus history in the works of selected writers from North and Latin America. Students will participate actively in class discussion, present one oral report, and write two short papers. The course will conclude with either a final project (interpretive, historical or creative) or a take-home examination.