The Uprisings that swept the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region have had a profound impact on the political economy of authoritarian regimes within the region as well as academic frameworks used to explain them. This course examines the economics of the MENA region and asks the following questions: Do the uprisings represent failures of the developmental state, neo-liberalism, or authoritarian regimes? How does human development within MENA compare to other regions in the developing world? To what extent does either religion or oil explain economic outcomes?

This course immerses students in a creative process of hearing, interpreting and performing voices from the past. The voices are of ordinary people, describing their extra-ordinary experiences of living through the partition of India and Pakistan in 1947. Through a combination of creativity and historical inquiry, students explore what it means to 'hear' a voice from a different culture and time. In the first part of the course, students will engage with documentaries and historical writings to contextualize the people's memories of partition.

This course will explore the legal regime in the United States in which citizens and activists work to protect public health and the environment, and various approaches to environmental activism. How does the law help protect us and our environment? What are its shortfalls? Who are the stakeholders in this system? What can you do to make change happen?

Traditionally anthropology has been conceived as the study of non-Western cultures, but contemporary critical approaches focus the ethnographic lens on Europe. This move was accompanied, perhaps even prompted, by an historic shift in anthropology from studying self-contained "communities" to questioning the construction of geographic categories such as "Europe" itself. After exploring this shift, this course examines the on-the-ground effects of recent political, economic, and cultural transformations here and individual roles in these changes.

In the 1970s artist Gil Scott Heron announced, "the revolution will not be televised." In the 1990s critic bell hooks observed a direct relationship between oppressive images via mass media and the maintenance of global white supremacy. And today, professor Jared Ball writes, "all that is popular is fraudulent." This course takes these perspectives into serious consideration while exploring the complex relationship between African Americans and the function of mass media in the United States in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

Abortion rights continue to be contested in the U.S. and throughout the world. Since the legalization of abortion in the U.S. in 1973, there have been significant erosions in abortion rights and access to abortion. Harassment of abortion clinics, providers, and clinic personnel by opponents of abortion is routine, and there have been several instances of deadly violence. This course examines the abortion debate in the U.S., looking historically at the period before legalization up to the present.

In his 1983 essay "Capitalism and Gay Identity," John D'Emilio argued that homosexuality was made possible by the rise of capitalism. Since then, queer scholars have worked to explore more fully the relationship between economics and sexuality. This course will explore debates in queer studies about Marxism; race and class; capital and immigration; neoliberalism and gay rights; labor and queer identity; anti-capitalism and trans politics; among others. We will begin reading selections from Marx's Capital: Vol.

This course will provide an introduction to economics from a political economy perspective. We will examine the historical evolution and structure of the capitalist system, distinguishing it from other economic systems that have preceded it, such as feudalism, and existed alongside it, such as state socialism. Most of the class will be devoted to examining economic theories that have been developed to explain and support the operation of this system.

This course will examine the impact of China's rise on international affairs generally and US-Chinese relations in particular. It will focus especially on issues of contention in US-Chinese relations: Taiwan, North Korea, Iran, energy competition, trade, the environment and so on. Students will be expected to select a particular problem for research in depth.

This course explores Islam, the slave trade and slavery in Africa. The slave trade and slavery is an often-unacknowledged tradition in the 'Islamic world'. We will begin by examining Qur'anic and Islamic jurisprudence regarding slavery. Then, against the backdrop of slavery in early Islamic empires, we will proceed to slavery in East, West and Southern Africa, and the African Diaspora.