From the campus classroom to the appealing city of Bloomington to Latin America and Europe—majoring in Spanish and Portuguese can be a once-in-a-life-time experience, both academically and personally.
Our small-sized classes are in Spanish or Portuguese-only, with an emphasis on discussions and interaction. This allows you to practice and develop your language skills, get to know your classmates, and work closely with our faculty.
Bloomington is a fun and exciting place to spend your college years, offering cultural events, festivals, music, and lots of dining options. Find out what makes our town so special.
On campus and in the Bloomington community there are plenty of opportunities to use your Spanish or Portuguese in a variety of ways beyond the classroom—through lectures, social coffee-hours, festivals, film series, student organizations, theater, and volunteering.
Our program offers an intensive language sequence, an honors curriculum option, a service-learning component, as well as a number of extracurricular activities, including movie series, talks, theater performances, poetry readings, and a weekly conversation table.
Many extracurricular activities are available in both Spanish and Portuguese.
The department sponsors weekly, informal group conversation sessions in Spanish, Portuguese, and Catalan. Come to develop your oral proficiency and listening comprehension skills in a fun, casual open environment.
Inquiries about these conversation cafés may be seen here.
Join Brasa, the IU Brazilian Association, or Grupo Ñ, a Spanish club. Participate in theatre with Teatro VIDA or make music with your peers in our annual Spanish and Portuguese Song Festival.
The Office of International Services sponsors Conversation Club/Coffee Hours that give you an opportunity to interact with native speakers of Spanish from different countries. This is a good place to find a conversation partner with whom you can plan other activities.
La Casa, the Latino Cultural Center, sponsors activities both on campus and in the community. These give you many opportunities to practice Spanish in a variety of settings.
One.IU features a link under the IU Bloomington Classifieds called “Activity Partners.” You can check to see if there is someone looking for a conversation exchange, or you can post your own ad.
Service learning projects are available. You may be able to earn 1-2 credits towards your Portuguese major or minor. Ask the academic advisor about registering for HISP-X272: Experiential Learning in Portuguese.
If your focus is education, you may want to join Beta Phi, the IU chapter of Phi Lambda Beta, the Portuguese Collegiate Honor Society of the American Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese.
Our program hosts special events featuring representatives of Luso-Brazilian culture. In recent years, these have included Portuguese film director Pedro Costa, and Brazilian film directors Nelson Pereira dos Santos, Walter Salles, and Kleber Mendonça Filho. Brazilian writers João Almino, Cícero Sandroni, Adriana Lisboa, João Ubaldo Ribeiro, Conceição Evaristo, João Paulo Cuenca, Luiz Ruffato, Lucia Bettencourt, and Claudia Nina have also visited our department.
Each fall, the Department of Spanish and Portuguese invites a distinguished alum of the department to visit Bloomington, speak to the department’s faculty and students, and reconnect with his or her roots as a part of the Merle E. Simmons Distinguished Alumni (MESDA) Lecture.
When studying a foreign language, nothing can inspire fluency and comprehension like taking classes abroad. We encourage all of our students to take advantage of overseas language learning opportunities. You are typically eligible for these when in your second or third year as an undergraduate.
Our department cooperates with the Global Living-Learning Community to offer residential options for students with an interest in languages and cultures. You may request a roommate who speaks Spanish or Portuguese and live among other students in the Global LLC who speak that language as well.
In the Global LLC, students share their linguistic and cultural interests to use and develop language skills. Activities include language clusters that meet regularly for conversation and language-focused events. You have access to an on-site computer lab for language practice and the university’s cable television service, which includes a number of international channels.
The Global LLC aims to expand student knowledge of foreign languages, world cultures, and world affairs; develop mutual understanding and appreciation of other cultures; prepare students for study abroad; and assist students with accessing Indiana University's international resources.
My Spanish education led me to become involved within the Bloomington community off campus as well. In August 2016, Mayor John Hamilton appointed me to the coveted position of Commissioner for the Commission on Hispanic and Latino Affairs. The commission works to address the challenges of the Hispanic and Latino community in Bloomington regarding education, health, employment, and public safety issues. The seven appointed commissioners work with local organizations to facilitate events and programs in order to improve the lives of the members of the Bloomington community.
Shannon Lemajeur, B.A. ’17
The College of Arts