Study of Africa and its impact on the culture and life of peoples in the New World. Traces the impact Africans have had on shaping the music, language, dress, art, religion, and culture of the Western world.
This course provides a survey analysis on Africans and their impact on shaping and changing the culture, religion, language, and customs of all the societies impacted by the African Diaspora. It looks at cultural legacies found in African Americans, Afro-Caribbeans, and Africans in other parts of the world. The primary focus of this course is on African Americans and the way they have helped shape American culture. We also explore the degree to which Africa has helped shape what African Americans do.
This course is very important for understanding and linking African Americans to their pre-slavery past. It helps explain the culture, practices, and beliefs of African Americans. It also helps us link our history and heritage to Africans in other parts of the world. This course will trace the way Africa has helped shape the culture, language, and heritage of cultures all over the world.
Study of selected topics or themes in Pan African Studies. Allows for individualized study of specific topics related to Pan African Studies such as music, dance, religion, colonization, slavery, or economic development. May be repeated for a maximum of six credits, but only if different topics are covered.
Looks at the impact of Africans or African Americans on U.S. society. Interdisciplinary course that allows for the study of Africans and their descendants from a variety of perspectives. Focuses primarily on the United States. May be repeated for a maximum of six credits, but only if different topics are covered.
Examines the controversial history and legacy of Hip-Hop culture, and explores how the artistic expression of the American underclass has evolved into worldwide cultural expression. Combines scholarship and theory with considerable audio and video exposure to various Hip-Hop songs and artists. Preq: Sophomore standing.
Seminar in the comparative history of racism and segregation in South Africa and the Americas. Preq: Sophomore standing.
Students conduct research and produce scholarship on academic, social, and historical issues that impact the Black experience in educational settings. Students may also participate in service learning activities to broaden their understanding and apply their knowledge in the community. May be repeated for a maximum of nine credits.
Research/writing seminar on the African American experience. Selected topics and themes from 1900 to present. Preq: PAS 3010; and one of HIST 3110 or HIST 3120 or HIST 3390.
This course looks at African American History from the age of discovery through the reconstruction period. It provides students with a chance to analyze the historical concerns, interest, lives and problems confronting African Americans from their initial contact with Europeans in Africa through their enslavement in the Americas all the way through the Civil War, freedom and reconstruction. This course will also examine the impact African Americans have had on the shape, nature, and direction of the American democracy during the early republic.
This class is very important for anyone who wants to understand American History. African Americans had profoundly shaped this nations history. We will look at the African American community to gain an understanding of slavery, freedom, resistance, abolition and community development. We will also look at how African Americans have shaped the U.S. political, social, and economic landscape through reconstruction.
African American History from 1877 - present provides students with a chance to analyze the historical concerns, interest, and problems confronting African Americans from reconstruction through the modern age. This course will also examine the impact African Americans have had on the nature and direction of American life and culture during the 20th century.
This class is very important for anyone who wishes to understand American History. America is a made up of diverse cultures and anyone who wishes to understand American History must be thoroughly grounded in the history of all those who make up our culture. No other minority group has so profoundly affected American History like African Americans. We will look at the African American community stressing heritage and history, discussing their search and struggle for equality, freedom, justice, human rights, and identity in the United States. We will also look at how African Americans have shaped the U.S. political, social, and economic landscape.
From Conquest to Carnaval, this course is an examination of the changing place of Africans and African cultures in Latin America. Attention will be paid to local religion, self-identification, nationalist thought, and popular culture.
This course is designed to give students a general history of the U.S. from the end of Reconstruction through the modern age. It examines the forces, which worked to create the urban, economic, political, industrial, agricultural and social make up of this nation. It will familiarize the students with the pertinent issues, ideas, and trends, which have occurred. This course emphasizes such concepts as expansion, colonization, freedom, justice, liberty, capitalism, and democracy.
This course is also designed to introduce students to the numerous people and cultures, which have shaped the U.S. We will look at the influence of immigration and migration on shaping the America society. We will also investigate to decipher the difference between the American ideas and the American reality looking at Civil Rights and political self-determination. This course is invaluable to any student who is interested in learning about the various people places and things, which have worked together to create this nation. It takes both a critical and analytical look at this country's history to open student's minds up to the responsibilities of US citizenship.
Rutherford Calhoun, a free black sailor featured in Charles Johnson's novel, Middle Passage, speaks of computers even though Calhoun is supposedly living in the 1850s. What on earth was Johnson getting at? Why would he mix 20th century language into a novel about the slave trade? This course will examine how and why various writers of the 20th century have sought to represent the slave experience. Through the reading of several novels, the viewing of a handful of films, and the consideration of a number of historical and theoretical texts, we will look to how 20th century texts (films, poetry, prose, and fiction) are in conversation with the 19th century texts that preceded them.
NOTE: I would welcome and happily accommodate any student from any department who is ready for an advanced literature class.
Probable Texts: Misc. 19th century poets, Frederick Douglass' Autobiography; Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin; Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl; Morrison's Beloved; Octavia Butler, Kindred; Ishmael Reed, Flight to Canada; Charles Johnson, Middle Passage; Valerie Martin, Property.
Requirements: relentless, sophisticated, and informed participation, a research paper (with *required* drafts to be turned in along the way), a midterm exam, and more than occasional reading quizzes. This is an advanced capstone class in American Literature so be prepared for a meaty and substantial reading load.
Why does knowing about the post-emancipation world prompt writers to reenact slavery and its social, poetic, and cultural implications in ways that seem to demand particular notions of the modern or the post modern? Through the reading of several novels, the viewing of a handful of films, and the consideration of a number of historical and theoretical texts, this seminar shall explore how the systems of enslavement that organized the social world of the Americas, are shaped by artists to speak with contemporary issues in many of these neo-slave novels. How are the notions of “Liberty” for the 20th century dependent upon the notions constructed from experiences of the 19th century? Why do the modern novels turn from the 19th century literary forms of sentimentalism, melodrama, and realism towards pastiche, parody, and surrealism? We will address these questions by attending to, during the early weeks, 19th century productions but during the later weeks of the semester we will concern ourselves solely with 20th century materials.
NOTE: As an interdisciplinary seminar, I would welcome and do my best to accommodate graduate students from other departments.
Probable Texts: Various abolitionist poets, Frederick Douglass' Autobiography; Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin; Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl; Morrison's Beloved; Octavia Butler, Kindred; William Faulkner, Go Down, Moses; Ishmael Reed, Flight to Canada; Gayl Jones, Corregidora; Charles Johnson, Middle Passage; Valerie Martin, Property. Various critical and theoretical essays will be read in conjunction with each creative work.
Requirements: relentless, sophisticated, and informed participation, a major scholarly research paper, an encyclopedia article submission for possible publication, and a class presentation with accompanying written report.