The course analyses the historical, political, business, social and anthropological elements at work in the “import” and “export” of the Spain brand and its assets, as well as in the review of Spain’s main industries and businesses, leveraging the legacy and the opportunities that are at stake in recent and immediate contemporary contexts. The goal of the course is a descriptive and critical reflection on the notion of Spanish brands and their equity exploits across the globe; their distinctive traits, the diversity of mixed cultures, identities and realities the country portrays and how the communications world has shaped and can still shape the competitiveness of the potential and capabilities at hand. The course questions Spain’s unique attributes; moreover it aims at debating around the symbols and the strategic brand discourses of Spanish businesses and institutions. The course is best suitable for advertising, public relations and communications students, as well as for humanities, business and economics and political sciences majors.

Keywords: Spain, Spanish identity, "Spanish-ness", identities, historical and cultural processes.

El análisis de redes sociales es una aproximación transdisciplinar desde la que estudiar la sociedad con una nueva mirada. Las redes como estructuras de relaciones están en la base de múltiples fenómenos: estructuras de gobernanza, co-autorías científicas, estructuras semánticas, pases de pelota en un equipo de futbol, inversiones entre empresas, colaboraciones entre actores de la sociedad civil, mafias, organizaciones de los movimientos sociales que comparten miembros, usuarios que comparten posts, virus que se transmiten, twitteros que se retwittean. El análisis de redes permite conocer las propiedades de estos sistemas complejos. El curso empieza con la presentación del análisis de redes sociales, sus principales conceptos, bases teóricas, premisas y formas en que se ha desarrollado en las ciencias sociales. Además el curso tiene una parte práctica que contribuye a dotar al alumnado de las competencias y herramientas técnicas necesarias para la investigación empírica. Asimismo, se presentarán técnicas para el análisis y la caracterización de las redes. Para ello, se utilizará software como Egonet, SocioViz y Visone.

Keywords: análisis de redes, forma, estructura y composición de una red, capital social, social media, redes semánticas, métodos de análisis, proyecto de investigación.

The goal of this course is to provide students with an introduction to documentary film making. Special attention will be given to the renewal of the Spanish and the Catalan film scene in the last 15 years. 
The course consists of both theoretical and practical sessions. During lecture classes the professor will present the history of Spanish and Catalan Documentary and will set the theoretical basis for the production of a Documentary. 

During practical sessions students will develop a project of a documentary where they can express their particular way of seeing the Spanish reality. Students will work in small teams to produce a 15 minute film, from the conception of the idea to the final editing, including the writing of the script and the shooting.

Keywords: Barcelona, film making, documentary, contemporary documentaries.

El curso es una  introducción genérica al manejo de grandes volúmenes de datos mediante el aprendizaje automático y sus aplicaciones en diversas áreas como la educación, la salud y las finanzas. Asimismo, se estudiará el impacto del manejo de datos en social media y todos los desafíos que su uso plantea en temas tan diversos como el sesgo de los datos, su transparencia, la fiabilidad de los algoritmos, la pérdida de la privacidad y los nuevos dilemas éticos que los algoritmos generan.

Keywords: Big data, inteligencia artificial, aprendizaje automático, social media, e-Health.

The course aims to introduce the main concepts of blockchain in a city environment using an applied approach. It consists of 3 modules. The first module comprises the basic technological definition and analyses some examples on methodologies and solutions shaping urban environments. The second module consists of an analysis of the different activity areas shaping our cities (i.e policies, planning, regulations and standards). This second module includes innovation-discovery workshops to identify relevant cases that students might use as projects. The last module focuses on the specifics of cryptourbanomics, a term identifying the role of cryptoeconomics in the urban context. In this module, students work on a specific project and are given the opportunity to discuss it with city representatives in a real institutional context. To that end, a set of visits to city councils will be planned.

Keywords: Blockchain, smart cities, city management, ethereum, bitcoin, public administration, cryptourbanomics.

In the globalized context, cities have to compete with each other in different matters such as: to attract investment or human talent, to favor exportations, or to position themselves as tourist destinations. This reality advocates the adoption of marketing techniques to manage cities’ positioning since cities are no longer only a container of all the goods that can be consumed within it: the place itself offers symbolism desired by all its audiences. This course provides an overview of the main changes that have motivated the contemporary role of cities. It is focused on the understanding of the new symbolic role of the territory and explore the difficulties to build up a coherent brand that represents the complex offer of places. It also emphasizes on the importance of involving the different stakeholders in the process of branding the city, the challenge to control the impact of tourism activity and its effect on residents lifestyle, and the importance of the communication activity. The case of Barcelona will help students understand the content of the theoretical sessions. Combining lectures and practical sessions, students will study in-depth how Barcelona is represented as the international brand it is today.

Keywords: brand image, place branding, destination branding, online communication, projected image.

The course understands the cultural history of the city as a reflection of the cultural history of contemporary Spain, from the anarchist city to the cosmopolitan capital with international outreach. Focusing on the last two centuries and from a sociological and anthropological point of view, the course will analyse the Barcelona society and its most recent political history through its conflicts and cultural influences. Interviews and on-site visits are foreseen to grasp the testimonies of relevant stakeholders. The course has an interdisciplinary approach at the intersection of urban studies, Catalan history, Hispanic studies, cultural studies, and anthropology.

Keywords: Barcelona, local history, urban studies, cultural studies, hispanic studies.

The course aims at providing an economic analysis of the European Union countries, with a special focus on the Eurozone. It studies how and to what extent the European Union countries have independent economic policies to handle the present economic crisis and to foster economic growth. The course also covers basic historical and critical tools for understanding the construction and integration processes of the European Union after World War II. Moving to the present, students will reflect on different aspects of the European Welfare policies. Special reference will be made to the implications of a Single currency on the economies of the EMU countries. The role of the European Central Bank when facing the danger of deflation will also be studied, along with the asymmetries and economic disparities across the Economic and Monetary Union. Students will  also gain a clearer understanding of the general macroeconomic policies applied across the EU.

Keywords: EU, Eurozone, globalization, economic growth, European integration process.

Popularment s’associa la imatge fotogràfica amb aquella representació que capta l’instant precís en què es pren la fotografía. Tanmateix, la fotografia pot representar la realitat atenent a aspectes temporals molt diversos. El curs té tres objectius entrelligats. El primer consisteix a estudiar característiques del temps des de disciplines com la filosofia i la història de l’art. S’hi presentaran models de temps com el de la naturalesa, el psicològic i el social. Així, s’aprendrà a identificar diverses representacions de temporalitats com l’instant, el moviment, les narratives, la biografia, la memoria urbana, l’èxtasi o la velocitat. El segon objectiu consisteix en aprendre tècniques fotogràfiques per expresar diferents aspectes del temps. Finalment, el tercer objectiu és que  cada estudiant desenvolupi quatre mini-projectes fotogràfics que aprofundeixin en alguns dels conceptes del temps analitzats.

Keywords: art contemporani, teoria de la imatge, estètica i teoria de l'art, història de la fotografia, estudis visuals, fotografia artística contemporània.

El objetivo del curso es estudiar el modo en que los sistemas de protección internacional de los derechos humanos han tenido -o pueden tener- reflejo en otros ámbitos, ya sea en la literatura y el cómic, en el cine y otros medios audiovisuales tales como los  documentales y los podcasts. Para el cierre del curso está programada una visita a la sede de Cruz Roja en Barcelona, con una sesión explicativa de la tarea desarrollada por esta institución y además una entrevista a la directora del centro, con quien los estudiantes podrán debatir las cuestiones analizadas a lo largo de las clases. La asignatura tiene un enfoque práctico y pretende llevar a la práctica nuevos métodos de enseñanza del derecho aplicados a la investigación de los derechos humanos.

Keywords: derecho internacional de los derechos humanos, derecho de la Unión Europea, derecho penal internacional, derecho de la navegación aérea, derecho constitucional de las Naciones Unidas.

Según el enfoque biomédico dominante, los principales responsables de la producción de las enfermedades y la salud son los agentes biológicos y genéticos, los hábitos individuales perjudiciales para la salud, y las deficiencias en el acceso y uso de los servicios sanitarios. Sin embargo, el conocimiento científico disponible ha mostrado que existen causas o factores que tienen un impacto mayor sobre la salud poblacional. En primer lugar, se trata de causas proximales o “finales” originadas en constante interacción con otras causas más distales originades por determinantes sociales como la pobreza, las condiciones de empleo o la vivienda. En segundo lugar, estos determinantes sociales son a su vez producidos, o fuertemente influidos, por causas de tipo político, como las relaciones de poder existentes en cada sociedad, las desigualdades según la clase social, el género, la edad, la etnia, la migración y el territorio. El enfoque biomédico no presta atención a un problema fundamental de salud pública como son las desigualdades en salud. A través de una perspectiva transdisciplinar, este curso examina críticamente los principales hitos de este recorrido, así como los factores sociales y políticos relativos a varios temas fundamentales de la salud colectiva.

Keywords: salud pública, desigualdades en salud, determinantes sociales de la salud, transdisciplinariedad, condiciones de empleo.

Around the world, no place is less safe for women than their own home – almost one in three women have suffered physical and/or sexual violence by an intimate partner and one in four women have suffered psychological violence. The public sphere is neither free from gender-based violence (GBV) either, with sexual violence being a widespread global phenomenon in the workplace, in university campuses, in the streets or in the context of armed conflicts. GBV is one of the main drivers of the production and reproduction of gender inequality. This course examines GBV from an interdisciplinary approach, including sociological, legal, political science and media perspectives. It provides a forum for students to explore contemporary issues in GBV from both a theoretical and practical standpoint (using local and international case studies) through the discussion of ongoing controversies about the causes and effects of such violence. It also analyses the policy responses addressing GBV coming from states, civil society and international actors and assesses the extent to which they are effective (or not). Given that the experiences of GBV and the interactions with institutions vary across groups, the course will pay attention to how gender intersects with race, class, and sexuality.

Keywords: gender power relations in the public and private spheres, gender roles and inequality, intersectionality, gender-based violence, feminism.

El curso ofrece una introducción al cine español desde el inicio de la democracia, en los años setenta, hasta la actualidad, con una atención particular hacia aquellos cineastas que destacan tanto por su valor artístico como por su capacidad para reflejar los rasgos más destacables de la realidad y la cultura española contemporánea. Las diferentes sesiones del curso exponen el imaginario plural del cine español más reciente, a través de la obra de autores como Pedro Almodóvar, Víctor Erice, Julio Médem, Alejandro Amenábar, José Luis Guerín, Pilar Miró, Isabel Coixet, Icíar Bollaín, Judith Colell, entre otros.

Keywords: cine, cine español, cultura española, imaginario cultural, España.

Organized and conducted as a workshop, this course focuses on the contemporary art practices known as interactive media art. Strategically situated at the intersection between the arts, humanities, science, technology and society, interactive media arts offer a privileged field from which our world can be reexamined. The interdisciplinary nature of this subject will allow students from any field to bring their own personal knowledge, skills and perspectives into discussion and class activities and, above all, into their own course project. The expected outcome is a personal project which will be developed, prototyped, presented and evaluated within the three-week course. The process will be structured in the following six interrelated stages: education, research, experimentation, production, dissemination and reception. Evaluation will consider both the creative process and the final presentation. Assessment criteria will be adapted to each particular project, but will contemplate the formal, conceptual, contextual and relational aspects of the interactive art works produced. 

Keywords: contemporary art, virtual reality, interactive communication, augmented reality, socially engaged art, art as research, digital arts, art as resistance, robotic art, learning by doing.

En 2015 se aprobó la Agenda 2030 de las Naciones Unidas para el Desarrollo Sostenible y los 17 Objetivos de Desarrollo Sostenible (ODS) son los que guían su implementación. Las temáticas que abordan estos objetivos son muchas y diversas: la pobreza, el hambre, la paz, la salud, la educación, las desigualdades, la inclusión, la prosperidad económica, la protección del planeta, la lucha contra el cambio climático, las ciudades y los territorios, la energía, el consumo y la producción sostenibles. Este curso busca capacitar al estudiantado para pensar críticamente sobre estos acuerdos analizando las posiciones éticas y políticas que representan, y formarlo en los diferentes ámbitos que están relacionados con estos objetivos.

Keywords: ética, moral, justicia global, sostenibilidad, política, democracia, derecho, economía, medicina, comunicación, mercado laboral.

Law is more than a set of rules as it carries its own culture and memory.  This course provides tools for understanding the interaction between legal discourses and the past. It analyses how law (re)constructs the past and certain episodes of history which are still present such as Nazism and Francoism. The course focuses on the cultural and political dimension of legal experiences related with the past. The approach  is  therefore multidisciplinary, combining anthropology, sociology and legal theory.

Keywords: legal history, transitional justice, memory studies, global history, dictatorship.

The goal of this course is to introduce biology students to the mathematical modeling of living processes from a systems perspective. According to this perspective, biological processes emerge from the interaction between different elements, be them genes and proteins in the case of cellular processes;  cells in the case of tissues; organs in the case of organisms and organisms in the case of ecosystems. We will learn how to represent these interactions mathematically, how to simulate them in a computer, and how to generate predictions that can be compared with reality.

Keywords: genetic circuits, population dynamics, differential equations, computational biology, non linear dynamical systems, synthetic biology.

Over the recent years, R has become the leading software tool for statistical computing and graphics. The software is greatly enhanced by numerous contributed packages submitted by users. The majority of computing in the leading applied statistical journals is done in R, and R is used almost exclusively in some of the leading-edge applications, such as in genetics and data mining. The purpose of this course is to set a foundation for full exploitation and creative use of the statistical language for computing and graphics R. The course introduces students to the syntax and inner workings of R, to become proficient in everyday computational tasks with datasets of all kinds, skilled in applications of elementary statistical methods, with emphasis on (initial) data exploration and simple graphics. Focus is also placed on opportunities to enhance the learning experience in other statistical courses by illustrating and applying basic statistical concepts in R.

Keywords: R, statistics, methodology, statistical computing, statistical methods.

This course has been developed to provide students with the skills and abilities needed to thrive in the increasingly multidisciplinary research environment of archaeology, where theoretical and methodological approaches from the humanities, social sciences, geosciences, biosciences and digital sciences are all brought together. The course is constructed to develop research and applicative skills giving access to both academic and professional settings (e.g. professional that want to acquire deeper understanding of post-excavation analyses). A key feature of the course is its hands-on research training in multiple areas within archaeology. Students will also be given extensive training in research skill and engage directly with and learn from outstanding local and international researchers.

Keywords: archaeology, ethnoarchaeology, environmental archaeology, archaeobotany, landscape archaeology, earth observation, gis, social dynamics, resilience, traditional agriculture, traditional ecologic knowledge.

The world is faced with serious and complex social and environmental problems that require a deep understanding of the systems where they occur in order to find innovative solutions. This course introduces students to the concepts, strategies and processes of social innovation and social change. It examines the state of the world from a social economic perspective focusing on how social innovation can help solve existing and future problems. The course also explores how social entrepreneurship, with its challenges and opportunities, functions as the vehicle for social innovation. From this standpoint discussions will be raised on whether innovation and entrepreneurship require a non-deterministic mentality, in order to deal with uncertainty and complexity.

Keywords: innovation, systems thinking, complexity science, entrepreneurship, social development.

What is social marketing and to what extent is it useful? Which role does ethics play in marketing? This learning-by-doing course aims to offer an overview of social marketing and ethics in marketing. It proposes a different perspective from traditional marketing courses taught at university level, as it encourages students to critically analyse chosen examples of real marketing strategies and campaigns. The course studies the relationship between marketing and other topics such as social marketing, healthcare and marketing, gender, corporate social responsability, environment or social media, among others. 

Keywords: social marketing, consumer behaviour, social cognition, gender, marketing.

This course is designed to give an overview of fundamental issues in the study of Spanish politics. Its core is the study of the nature and functioning of the Spanish democratic system installed since the mid-seventies, paying special attention to its political processes, institutions, actors, political culture and electoral behavior. The course also introduces the previous Spanish democratic experience (2nd Republic, 1931-1936), its collapse (Civil War, 1936-1939), the dictatorial rule under by Franco, and the Spanish transition to democracy (1975-1978) which has strongly influenced the current features of the Spanish political system.

Keywords: Spain, Spanish politics, electoral behavior, political actors, institutions.

This course studies current artistic practices in Spain, mainly performance, video creation, creative actions, media and net art, music, and photography and their interrelation with other aesthetic practices. The course combines a theoretical approach and the direct contact through visits to museums, galleries, theaters and others.

Keywords: Spain, artistic practices, media art, net art, performance.

Escriure seqüències dialogades és una de les parts del guió que costa més als guionistes principiants i a molts professionals amb anys de carrera. Però dialogar d'una manera natural i efectiva no és especialment difícil si es té una mica d'habilitat lingüística i el domini de certes tècniques. Al “Taller de Diàlegs”, s’intentaran entendre els mecanismes que fan que la comunicació verbal funcioni dramàticament i es provarà de descobrir i aprofundir en alguns dels recursos que fan servir els bons guionistes  basant-se en seqüències exemplars de la història del cinema i de la televisió. Es buscaran maneres d’aplicar bons recursos de diàleg a situacions diverses i s’analitzaran i tractaran de definir alguns mecanismes universals de l’humor verbal.

Keywords: comunicació verbal, diàleg, guió, power-swing, humor verbal.

Science and art are rooted in our perception of the world. The course is aimed at exploring the biology of perception and its implications on how we experience works of art. It is a discussion on beauty and the brain, a discussion on the history of breakthroughs in painting and on the nature of the irresistible attraction of music for humans. The course starts with a general overview of how our senses build up a representation of the world, with particular reference to the visual and auditory systems. We shall discuss the biology underlying great painters’ achievement of the conquest of space and movement on a canvas. Then we do a parallel exercise with music, looking at the biological and evolutionary roots of musical perception. This will lead us to a general discussion on beauty and art the notion of artists as intuitive neuroscientists, the perceptual grammar of art, aesthetic universal and computational aesthetics.

Keywords: neurosciences, computation, art, music, painting, creativity, aesthetics.

This workshop course introduces participants in the world of transmedia narratives. After a general introduction of the distinctive features of this kind of stories, the workshop presents a series of examples of transmedia storytelling experiences (fiction and non-fiction) to understand the logic behind this narrative strategy. During the workshop the participants will develop a transmedia narrative project working in groups of no more than three students. The project may be oriented to fiction or non-fiction narratives. The story to be expanded may be of own creation or it may be worked from an existing story (novel, videogame, film, comic, etc.). Each project should also include a strategy for encouraging and managing user-generated contents. The final objective of the workshop is to make participants "think in transmedia" and apply the basic principles of this narrative strategy.

Keywords: transmedia narratives, ecology of communication, semiotics, narrative theories, narrative design.