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This course offers an interdisciplinary overview of society, culture and politics in Latin America by covering the basic interpretive frameworks that have been used to analyze the complex evolution of Latin American societies from colonial times to our days and to outline the main contemporary challenges in the continent. The course is intended both for students that are approaching Latin America for the first time as well as those who have previous academic or personal knowledge of the area. Some familiarity with political science concepts and terminology is advantageous, although not specifically required. The course is divided into two main parts. The first part (weeks 2 to 7) is chronological and will cover the historical developments in Latin America from the European conquest to the present days. In this brief journey across time, selected national cases will be used either to exemplify more general trends or to underline, if necessary, particularly significant situations. The second part (weeks 9 to 13) is topical and delve deeper into the some of the crucial problems that have characterized the history of the continent and that are key to understand the current developments. Topics include: cycles of political change between authoritarianism, democracy, populism and revolution; economic development and inequality; culture and society, international relations.