Major: Spanish
Minor: Spanish

Related Major & Minors: International Business, International Relations

Program Director: Teresa Parrish Smotherman, Associate Professor of Modern Foreign Languages

Study Abroad | Special Opportunities | Outcomes |  Faculty

Wesleyan’s Foreign Language Department offers both a major and minor in Spanish and courses are offered in language, literature, and culture. Comprehension, reading, speaking, and writing are taught at all levels. The Spanish major is very much in demand in the United States today; it also works well in combination with other majors. Examples include Spanish/business, Spanish/international relations, or Spanish/political science; a Spanish major may be combined with other minors, for example  French, English, or Business. The Spanish major consists of 34 semester hours beyond SPA 101 and 102. For information about specific courses offered, please see our Academic Catalogue.   


Study Abroad

For a student studying the Spanish language, nothing can be more fulfilling that studying in the native country of Spain. Wesleyan College maintains cooperative agreements through the Institute for the International Education of Students (IES) which provides access to a wide range of institutionally approved national and international colleges and universities in popular destinations that include the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Spain, Japan, China, Australia, Austria and Argentina.  Studying Abroad opportunities are available and encouraged for students making this career path. Click here for Study Abroad information.

Special Opportunities

The department encourages internships and volunteer projects which tap the language skills acquired in the classroom. Some of these activities may, at the discretion of a faculty sponsor, be applied for credit in the field studies category.

Wesleyan language students have the opportunity to work as tutors in local schools, volunteer in library reading programs, and intern with multinational businesses.

Students also have the opportunity to be inducted into the Phi Sigma Iota Honor Society.

Outcomes

Students who major or minor in Spanish or French or study German or Chinese often continue graduate and professional studies in education, international business or relations, journalism, medicine, biology or chemistry.  Others immediately enter the workforce.  Find out about student success stories, plus recent trips abroad and other campus activities, in our departmental newsletter.

Many Wesleyan graduates enter the workforce with unique qualifications and have combined major and minor programs in ways that separate them from other job-seeking candidates. Double major combinations which include one of the modern foreign languages are popular among students also studying political science, international relations, and international business. Students graduating with the international business major will have a combined competency in a modern foreign language (Spanish or French) along with economics, finance, marketing, management, accounting, political science, history, ethics and cultural awareness.  Anna Deckert, for example, graduated from Wesleyan College  with a double major in International Business and Spanish. She then began pursuing her master’s degree overseas. Read her story!

Gaye-Leon Williams is a native of Jamaica, fluent in Spanish, and passionate about her extensive laboratory research on crayfish. She is a unique woman with unique interests, so she combined the majors of biology and Spanish. Graduating from an all-girls high school in Kingston, Jamaica, Gaye-Leon knew what to expect from a single-gender campus. But coming to a new country and building a support system of new friends, was a leap of faith. She leapt and landed in the close-knit Wesleyan family, and now feels like she has been given the tools to adapt and survive anywhere her career may take her.  Read her story!

Faculty


Sarah Jacqueline Harrell DeSmet Associate Professor of French and Spanish.  B.A. (French and Spanish) Vanderbilt University 1990; M.A. (French Literature) Indiana University 1993; Ph.D. (Romance Languages) University of Georgia 2001. My professional interests include 18th-century women’s epistolary novels in French, especially Isabelle de Charrière, translation, and foreign language education. Tate 209. sdesmet@wesleyancollege.edu


Teresa Parrish Smotherman Associate Professor of Modern Foreign Languages. B.A. (Spanish) Valdosta State College, 1973; M.A. (Spanish) University of Georgia 1983; Ph.D. (Romance Languages) University of Georgia 1996. My research interests include both contemporary Latin American literature, specifically in the area of Liberation Theology, and Peninsular Spanish poetry, the generation of 1950. I am also interested in second language acquisition and the teaching of applied linguistics. Tate 211. tsmotherman@wesleyancollege.edu

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