#  PORTUGUESE 077 - Laughter and Disaster 

 





 Semester:   Spring 

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 Year offered:  2026 

 

 

 

This course engages the twin lenses of the comic and the disastrous as modes of studying Portuguese and Brazilian cultures. We will consider how reactions to disastrous events and how creating comic scenarios in written texts and performance are especially significant in understanding cultural trends, historical moments, individual and collective identities, and the limits and freedoms of transgression. We will regularly pay close attention to language, vocabulary, wordplay, malediction, irony, and exaggeration.



 

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##  Instructor 

 



  [### Josiah Blackmore

 ](/people/josiah-blackmore) <jblackmore@fas.harvard.edu>Nancy Clark Smith Professor of the Language and Literature of Portugal

Portuguese Section Leader

Portuguese Undergraduate Advisor

 

 

 Academic Degrees: B.A., M.A., Ohio State Univ., Ph.D., Harvard Univ. ITT International Fellow (Univ. de Lisboa) Research Interests: Medieval and Renaissance Portuguese Literature and Culture; Camões; the Maritime Humanities; Lusophone Imperial/Colonial... 

 

 

      ![Joe](/sites/g/files/omnuum8296/files/styles/hwp_4_5__690x865/public/2025-04/blackmore.jpg?itok=T65WOoGB) 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 



 

 See also:- [ 70-100 ](/class-categories/70-100)
- [ Josiah Blackmore ](/instructor/josiah-blackmore)
- [ Portuguese ](/language/portuguese)
- [ Spring 2026 ](/class/term/spring-2026)