Notable Alumni | Aaron Kahn Specializes in Golden Age of Spanish Literature

Editor’s Note: The College of Arts & Sciences Notable Alumni Awards honor alumni for broad career accomplishments, commitment to community service, and valuable contributions to 51�� and the College of Arts & Sciences.

Aaron Kahn ’01 Spanish and English HTC

teaches at a university in England and specializes in Miguel de Cervantes (author of Don Quixote) and the Golden Age Spanish literature, that period in the 16th and 17 centuries when Spanish literature blossomed.

He is a Lecturer in Spanish at the University of Sussex Sussex Centre for Language Studies, a post he has held since 2008.

Dr. Aaron Kahn

Kahn earned two degrees from 51��, a BSED in English from the Patton College of Education and a B.A. in Spanish from the Honors Tutorial College in 2001. He then headed to the University of Oxford, where he completed a Ph.D. in Golden Age Spanish Literature in 2005.

“Aaron is married to Dr. Alison Kahn, an anthropologist and documentary filmmaker,” says . Together they founded the Oxford Academy of Documentary Film “to identify, construct and disseminate agendas for ethical and socially responsible broadcasting and filmmaking.”

His research interests include “Golden Age Spanish literature, history and culture, particularly the expression of political thought in various genres of literature. Aaron has just recently published a book on the topic, focusing on pre-Lopean Spanish playwrights of the late 16th century. In addition, he has given numerous papers at international conferences in the U.K. and the U.S. and has published articles in peer-reviewed journals. Other interests include general Spanish and European history and culture, film, religion, politics, and the connection between sport (particularly baseball) and society.”

Cover of Aaron Kahn's book "Connecting Past and Present"

In 2015 he edited a book titled “,”

“In this volume, experts on the Spanish Golden Age from the United Kingdom, Ireland, and the United States offer analyses of contemporary works that have been influenced by the classics from the 16th and 17th centuries. Part of the formation of a sense of national identity, always a problematic concept in Spain, is founded in the recognition and appreciation of what has come beforehand, and no other era in the history of Spanish literature and drama represents the talent and fascination that Spaniards and non-Spaniards alike possess with the artistic legacy of this country. In order to establish properly a context for the study of literature or history, one cannot always study the works, writers, or era in isolation; rather, performing scholarly studies on these topics as a continuation of what has come before reveals that many thoughts, concepts, character types, criticisms, and social issues have been thoroughly explored by our literary ancestors,” .

“This era is referred to as the Golden Age not only because of the voluminous production of art, literature, drama and poetry, but also because writers such as Miguel de Cervantes, Lope de Vega, and Pedro Calderón de la Barca, influenced by the re-birth of the Classical masters, presented the reading and viewing public with genuine human emotions and experiences in a more comprehensive manner than in previous eras.”