The Department of Spanish and Portuguese at Stanford University offers courses focused on the languages, literatures, and cultures of the Iberian Peninsula, Latin America, and Latina/o populations in the United States. The Department balances an emphasis on literary studies with a more diverse, humanistic set of approaches to cultural and social issues.

Our faculty is made up of world-renowned scholars in fields as diverse as contemporary Catalan literature, twentieth-century Spanish poetry, nineteenth-century Spanish fiction, contemporary Latin American literature, Aljamiado and medieval Iberian literature, bilingualism, and Chicana/o culture and literature. In general, the Department's programs are characterized by a highly interdisciplinary focus that combines the study of literature with other intellectual and scholarly concerns.

The Department actively nurtures cooperative relationships with other departments and programs at Stanford, thus facilitating intellectual inquiry in areas such as anthropology, philosophy, history, linguistics, Mediterranean studies, medieval and Renaissance studies, European and Latin American politics, bilingualism, performance, feminist studies, Chicana/o studies, and film studies.

The Department committed to three main educational goals: (1) to provide students with a contextualized knowledge of the literatures and cultures of the Iberian Peninsula from the medieval period to the present, of the Spanish and Portuguese speaking countries of Latin America, and of the Spanish-speaking communities of the United States; (2) to prepare undergraduate students for advanced study in those areas and/or in a range of professional fields; and (3) to provide doctoral students with advanced training as research scholars and teachers, in preparation for careers as university professors or in related roles.

In addition, the Department regularly hosts visiting faculty, including the Ginebre Serra visiting chair in Catalan Studies. Courses are open to all interested students. The Department awards B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees to eligible candidates. For more information, please contact us at span-port@stanford.edu.