Department of Hispanic and Italian Studies

Beatriz de Alba-Koch
Department of Hispanic and Italian Studies
University of Victoria
PO Box 3050 STN CSC
Victoria, BC
Canada V8W 3P5

I specialize in colonial and nineteenth-century Mexican literature and culture. More specifically, I have published on:

• Enlightenment thought and sixteenth-century indigenous accounts of the conquest of México, particularly in the work of Francisco Javier Clavijero
• Enlightenment novohispano appropriations of Golden Age genres such as the picaresque
• Female quixotism and satirical allegories in the works of José Joaquín Fernández de Lizardi and his contemporaries
• Mexican liberalism and the construction of a national literature in the works of Ignacio Manuel Altamirano

I currently direct a line of research on technologies of culture for an MCRI project on the Iberoamerican Baroque.

My research focuses on Mexico, but I am also interested in the Andean nations and Brazil.

Various

I coordinate the Latin America Research Group and the Latin American Studies Programs at UVic. I lead the yearly capstone course, LAS 300 "Special Topics in Latin American Studies," where many LARG members have showcased their research.
I also teach, in Spanish, the following undergraduate courses focusing on Latin America:
SPAN 380 "Survey of Spanish American Literature from 1492 to 1900"
SPAN 481A "Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz: Context, Theatre and Prose"
SPAN 481C "Colonial Letters: Literatures of the Conquest"
SPAN 481D "Colonial Letters: The Spanish American Enlightenment"
SPAN 483A "Spanish American Literature of the 19th Century"
In English I teach:
SPAN 4B4C "Colonial Spanish America 1492-1767"
SPAN 484D "From Colony to Republic: Spanish America 1767-1867"
At the graduate level I teach:
SPAN 515 "Colonial Latin American Literature"
SPAN 517 "Latin American Literature of the 19th Century"