2009 Summer Program in Ecuador

Explore Latin American Language and Culture through its Myths, Legends and Oral Traditions.

Fascinating travel to the Andes and the Amazon forest.

May 27th --- June 20 th 2009

Oral Tradition in Ecuador

This is a Spanish and Humanities program that offers students the opportunity to delve into foreign culture through oral tradition and story telling.

          This special topics course entitled Oral tradition in Ecuador (SPAN384) will allow students to experience a foreign culture through the threshold of oral tradition and ancestral story telling. This will not only give them a thorough understanding of the profound relationship between man and his environment, but it will also permit them to interact with the liveliness of popular culture in Latin America.  This course will enhance student’s Spanish skills and offer them a unique angle for foreign travel and cultural immersion. Students will receive an additional 2 credits as Humanities (Hum 195).

We will read and analyze different Latin American oral traditions related to nature and human experience. Through theory and literature we will revise the traditional world vision shaped through this ancestral but nonetheless current cultural trait. The students will do basic field study so as to compile different versions of a tale or topic and they will prepare their findings and conclusions on a specific oral tradition and present for group discussion.

Included in the program fee of $2,900*:

(* for out-of state students: $3100)

• Airfare roundtrip Ticket
• All ground transportation
• All hotels (plus breakfast)
• Excursions to:

• Colonial downtown Quito: churches, museums and monasteries
• Quito Teleferico: Spectacular sight seeing from the skirts of the Ruccu Pichincha
• Otavalo Indigenous market place
• Sanjaloma, Valle de los Chillos in the outskirts of Quito
• Workshop on traditional Herbal medicine
• Spectacular beaches in the Pacific coast.
• Misahualli a fluvial port in the Amazon rainforest
• Canoe and hiking trips through the Amazon rainforest
• Amazon flora and fauna reserves
• Cotopaxi the highest active volcano in Ecuador´s Andes Highlands.
• New Years Eve in Quito with a Salsa dance instructor!

Entrances to museums, galleries, and cathedrals

• Guided tours by UVA-Wise faculty and local experts
• The price of the program includes 5 credits.
• Medical insurance
• Does NOT include the food (apart from breakfast). Student must estimate $15 a day for food.
• The priceless experience of immersion in the traditions of a foreign culture and language!!!!

Director: Rut Román, Assistant Professor of Spanish, The University of Virginia’s College at Wise.

E-mail: rutroman@gmail.com, Phone: (276) 3764663, Office: 123 Zehmer Hall.

Course: Span 384  and Humn 195 (3 Span credits + 2 “Humanities” credits = 5 credits)

For more info and to apply:

International Programs Office,

Darden Hall 105

e-mail: internationalprograms@uvawise.edu

Phone: (276) 328 -0287

You can download your application here.

Applications will be received on a first come, first serve basis until completion of a group of 10 students.

See photos from Winter in Ecuador 2007/8

Course Director:

Prof. Rut Roman, Associate Professor of Spanish, The University of Virginia’s College at Wise.

Phone: (276)376-4663
e-mail: rutroman@gmail.com

For more info and to apply:

International Programs Office,

Darden Hall 105

e-mail: internationalprograms@uvawise.edu

Phone: (276) 328 -0287