The LAI is committed to supporting the instruction of Latin American languages as a means of training the next generation of Latin America specialists.
Spanish is the first language of nearly 500 million people worldwide, including 41 million in the US, over 10 million in California, and over 3.5 million in Los Angeles County.
Spanish courses are taught in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese via three different programs. The Spanish for Second-Language Learners Program offers a full range of courses: Elementary (1-3), Intermediate (4-5), and Advanced Composition (25). The student-centered, proficiency-oriented courses are designed to help students achieve communicative competence in listening, speaking, reading and writing, as well as cultural competence. All courses are taught in Spanish.
The Spanish for Heritage Learners Program is specifically designed for those who grew up in an environment in which Spanish was spoken. Three heritage courses are offered: Introductory (7A), Intermediate (7B), and Advanced Composition (27). Heritage learners have the opportunity to further develop their verbal and written communicative abilities, increase their knowledge of grammatical structures, and achieve communicative and cultural competence. Courses focus on the language needs specific to the heritage learner and their interpretive and presentational modes of communication.
Finally, the Spanish for Professional Purposes courses offer students the opportunity to increase their communicative competence while acquiring profession-specific vocabulary and learning pragmatic and sociocultural information essential to effective communication in their field. The department offers Spanish for Special Purposes: Medical (28A) and Spanish for Special Purposes: Business (28B).
For more information, please contact:
Dr. Juliet Falce-Robinson, Ph.D.
Director of the Language Program
Rolfe Hall 4333
jfalce@humnet.ucla.edu