The reading assignments in SPAN 311 covered a wide range of topics and styles, giving me an exposure to the Spanish writing. Eduardo Galeano’s Celebración de la fantasía combined the reality of poverty with imagination, showing how fantasy can illuminate social struggles. Carmen Cecilia Suárez’s three short stories — Inevitable, Los tiempos cambian, and Decepción — captured in just a few lines the emotions of love and the challenges of incompatibility.

Alfonso Cuarón’s Roma revealed the inequalities faced by domestic workers, while Pablo Neruda’s poem Oda a un millonario muerto depicted the purchasing of happiness and the consequences of materialism. Finally, Yaiza Saiz’s article ¿Existe aún el amor verdadero?  analyzed the meaning of relationships in contemporary society.

These readings improved my comprehension of written Spanish by exposing me to diverse vocabulary, sentence structures, and cultural perspectives. They taught me that understanding Spanish texts requires a sensitivity to context, tone, and cultural nuance.