Cultura y cine
Cultura y cine: Hispanoamérica hoy, a Spanish-language textbook designed for students at the intermediate/advanced level, explores contemporary Hispanic America through Spanish-language feature films and authentic cultural texts. Topics covered include politics, education, diversity of people and geography, immigration, religion, indigenous traditions, economic issues (both advantages and challenges), music, art, and family life. Each of the eight chapters focuses on a central theme and a high-interest film and includes interviews providing current perspectives on the topic, one or more articles from periodicals, a literary selection, cultural notes, and a variety of activities including many that will appeal to today’s digital-age students. Five Vistazo panorámico sections provide a visual introduction to course fundamentals. Course Instructors: An electronic (PDF only) instructor's manual is available for qualified adopters. If you have adopted the text, request the instructor's manual here.
SKU
27427g
eBook available for $27.00. Click HERE for more information and purchasing options.
Cultura y cine: Hispanoamérica hoy, a Spanish-language textbook designed for students at the intermediate/advanced level, explores contemporary Hispanic America through Spanish-language feature films (click here to see the list of films) and authentic cultural texts. Topics covered include politics, education, diversity of people and geography, immigration, religion, indigenous traditions, economic issues (both advantages and challenges), music, art, and family life. Each of the eight chapters focuses on a central theme and a high-interest film and includes interviews providing current perspectives on the topic, one or more articles from periodicals, a literary selection, cultural notes, and a variety of activities including many that will appeal to today’s digital-age students. Five Vistazo panorámico sections provide a visual introduction to course fundamentals.
Instructor Resources:
Course Instructors: An electronic (PDF only) instructor's manual is available for qualified adopters. If you have adopted the text, request the instructor's manual here.
Additional Student and Instructor Resources:
- Repaso: Multiple-choice review questions are provided for each of the five Vistazos to test comprehension of these sections. Click here to download as a PDF.
- Ch. 8: Celebrando la Navidad en siete países de Hispanoamérica: Further explore the theme of "family" presented in Chapter 8 with these interviews from residents of seven different Latin American countries, describing how their families and countries celebrate Christmas. Following the interviews, questions are provided to test reading comprehension. Click here to download as a PDF.
- PowerPoint Presentation: Sample student presentation, click here to download the PowerPoint.
Reviews:
"An innovative and intelligent text that will captivate the imagination of motivated learners. By using film as a springboard, McVey and Méndez create opportunities for students to draw parallels between their own lives and those of the peoples from different Latin American countries.
"The authors include five "Vistazos panorámicos" that present general information relevant to the entire Latin American world and eight chapters, each of which is centered around a different contemporary film and focuses on a specific country. Each chapter begins with a short introduction that not only presents the film but also suggests very general questions to encourage students to begin thinking about the themes to be discussed. McVey and Méndez then include a well-selected vocabulary list.
"After the film discussion, each chapter contains a Perspectives section and a Press section. While not related to the film per se but rather to the general questions raised, the Perspectives offered are actual interviews with Hispanic Americans, some who live in their native country and some who live in the United States. The Press sections feature contains authentic articles from the Hispanic world.
"Cultura y cine does not include grammatical explanations and is designed for intermediate and advanced students. It is an extremely versatile text that can be used as part of a Spanish, Latin American Studies, or Film Studies curriculum and the chapters can be studied in any order. It effectively targets the four skills of reading, writing, speaking, and listening."
—Viki Zavales Eggert, Goucher College, in Hispania
"Cultura y cine: Hispanoamérica hoy lives up to its title and then some, with eight noteworthy feature films opening the door to a wide cross-section of cultural topics. These range from music and literature to political and social issues, and span a variety of countries, some of which receive less attention in other textbooks. Moreover, Cultura y cine meets the needs of today's learners by providing ample opportunities for meaningful communication in the target language as well as effective use of new technologies. Authors Mary McVey Gill and Teresa Méndez-Faith are to be commended for this welcome addition to the field of intermediate and advanced Spanish language and culture.”
—Laura Dennis, University of the Cumberlands
Films not included, but readily available from numerous vendors.
- Cautiva
- Cinco días sin Nora (Nora's Will)
- Conversaciones con Mamá
- Diarios de motocicleta (The Motorcycle Diaries)
- Entre nos
- La nana (The Maid)
- El silencio de Neto (The Silence of Neto)
- ¡Viva Cuba!
About the Authors:
Mary McVey Gill has authored and co-authored many widely adopted Spanish textbooks and language references, including Cinema for Spanish Conversation and ¡De pelicula! (both available from Hackett's Focus imprint).
Teresa Méndez-Faith, essayist, literary critic, and author of numerous textbooks and literary anthologies in Spanish, teaches Spanish and Latin American literature at Saint Anselm College in New Hampshire.
