The subject area covers cultural-historical, enlightened literary studies, in the context of which Spanish texts from the Middle Ages to the present are treated. Examples include the following areas: Medieval and early modern literature (drama, epic and novella), the Spanish Enlightenment as a central chapter in the history of Spanish identity, cultures of memory in the post-Franco novel in literature and film; social and political worlds of Latin America in literature and film of the last five decades. Training in the professional handling of literature takes place on the levels of text and context. Literary examples are first developed through subject and text description, then placed in historical, cultural-theoretical contexts (history of discourse, media history, history of identity, etc.). The focus is often on the specific nature of literature in the overall cultural context. A particular concern is to illustrate semiotic processes of the creation and stabilization of meaning, not only because these processes themselves can be read in literature on the formal level, but also because literature often reflects these processes on the content level and thus raises awareness of the question of what it means to live in a culture or even to approach a foreign culture.
