El español es uno de los idiomas de más rápido crecimiento en el mundo. It’s the primary language for about 34 million people in this country alone, making the U. S. the second-largest Spanish-speaking community in the world. Combine this with our proximity to Spanish-speaking Latin America, and it’s clear that a knowledge of Spanish and Hispanic culture are essential to living and working not only internationally, but in the U.S. as well.

The Spanish program offers classes in grammar, culture, and literature for the Hispanic Studies major, as well as for the Foreign Languages major and the Latin American Studies minor. Coursework includes speaking, listening, reading and writing in Spanish, as well as the study of a broad spectrum of literatures, from pre-Columbian Mesoamerican to contemporary U.S. Latino. Knowing Spanish gives students access to nine of Lewis & Clark’s overseas programs: Chile (Santiago and Valparaíso), the Dominican Republic (Santo Domingo and Santiago de los Caballeros), Ecuador (summer and semester programs), Spain (León and Sevilla) and Cuba.

By majoring in Hispanic Studies, students become immersed in one of the oldest and richest Romance languages, in a culture with roots in antiquity, and in a heritage that includes figures such as Miguel de Cervantes, Emiliano Zapata, Frida Kahlo, Ernesto “Che” Guevara, Rigoberta Menchú and Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz.

!Pon el mundo en tus manos con el español!