Colorado State U. offers Spanish class ‘through the lens of Taylor Swift’

Colorado State University recently offered a Spanish course centered on pop star Taylor Swift, a move one former professor told The College Fix reflects a decline in the humanities.  

CSU’s course titled “Spanish for Swiftie Purposes (Taylor’s Version)” promised students the chance to improve their “Spanish proficiency and cultural knowledge and implications through the lens of Taylor Swift,” according to the description. 

Assignments in the class included analyzing and translating lyrics, comparing Swift’s songs to those of Spanish artists, and exploring Swift’s “global and cultural impact on the Spanish-speaking world.”

Professor Alyssia Miller de Rutte designed the course “to be a fun and interactive experience, utilizing Taylor Swift’s themes and lyrics to enhance language learning.”

It was part of the school’s Summer 2025 online Languages, Literatures, and Cultures program. 

The Fix reached out to CSU and the professor via multiple emails to learn more about the course, but received no reply. 

However, First Things senior editor Mark Bauerlein told The College Fix via email that the course illustrates how far language and literature programs have fallen. 

“There is no better sign of the sad state of the humanities than the effort to appeal to 18-year-olds with the mass culture they imbibe hourly,” Bauerlein said. 

“The departments know that they need to boost enrollments, which have been steadily dropping—foreign language majors of any kind amount to less than one percent of the whole—and they’re going about it in exactly the wrong way,” the former English Professor said. 

Miller de Rutte, on the other hand, believes her approach is an innovative and effective teaching method. 

The professor previously told CSU’s student newspaper, The Collegian, that students in her course analyzed all of Swift’s albums and analyze the most common words or themes.

Miller de Rutte also told The Collegian that her students were unusually enthusiastic about this course.  

“The students were definitely more engaged than some other classes I’ve taught, especially online, because I think they were so interested in the content,” Miller De Rutte said.

“I had so much fun reading and grading because you could hear — even though it’s mostly written — you could hear their excitement,” she said.

She also told the newspaper that educators need to “innovate” and meet “students where they’re at” to help them achieve their goals. 

“You really get to dive into how people think across cultures, and you can’t really get that without knowing the language. I think what’s fun about using lyrics and music is it opens the mind, like a window, to other countries and cultures and other points of view,” the professor said. 

The course also explored pop culture and current events tied to the Swift’s “album eras,” as well as global happenings during her tours across various countries, The Collegian reported.

CSU is not the only school to integrate Taylor Swift into its curriculum.

The University of Cincinnati is currently offering a course titled “Philosophy (Taylor’s Version),” which explores the “themes and questions that she sings about,” according to the course description.

Meanwhile, the University of Kansas offers multiple Swift-themed courses, including “The Academic Lore of Taylor Swift,” “Decoding Taylor Swift: Songcraft, Storytelling, and Branding,” and “The Sociology of Taylor Swift.”

Last year, Harvard Memorial Church hosted an event called “Reading Taylor Swift as a Sacred Text,” The College Fix previously reported.

The event encouraged participants to engage with Taylor Swift’s work using religious reading practices like Lectio Divina.