(Offered as AMST 387, POSC 397, and LLAS ) This course approaches Abiayala through the lenses of activism and literature. Abiayala, which can be translated as “land in its full maturity” or “land of vital blood,” is how the Kuna peoples (Panama) refer to the continent of the Americas and is increasingly used by Indigenous movements to decolonize epistemologies, or ways of knowing.

(Offered as AMST 368, BLST 368 and ENGL 368) History has long valorized passive, obedient, and long-suffering African American women alongside assertive male protagonists and savants. This course provides an alternative narrative to this representation by exploring the ways in which African American female characters, writers, and artists have challenged ideals of stoicism and submission. Using an interdisciplinary focus, we will critically examine transgression across time and space in diverse twentieth- and early twenty-first century literary, sonic, and visual texts.

(Offered as AMST 361, BLST 361, and ENGL 276) Through a close reading of texts by African American authors, we will critically examine literary form and technique alongside the representation of race, gender, sexuality, and class. Coupled with our explication of poems, short stories, novels, and literary criticism, we will explore the stakes of adaptation in visual culture. Students will analyze the film and television adaptations of twentieth-century fiction. Authors will include Toni Morrison, Lorraine Hansberry, Alice Walker, and Gloria Naylor.

(Offered as AMST 268 and SOCI 268) This course will bring a sociological lens to contemporary race and class relations in rural America. Drawing from social-historical analyses, ethnography, interview-based research, and memoir, we will look at the social forces at the base of shifting rural demographics, as well as how these shifts are being experienced in rural daily life. Central to the course will be an analysis of how place shapes the relationship between race and class, and how these place-based relationships in turn shape individual and collective identity.

In September 2023 the “Boundless” Exhibition will open at the Mead Art Museum featuring Native American artists and books from the Kim-Wait/Eisenberg Native American Literature Collection. This course enables students to learn about Native American literature and art production through the “Boundless” exhibit, and through readings and research related to Native American artistic traditions and literary practices.

(Offered as ENGL 120 and EDST 120) ​​This course considers from many perspectives what it means to read and write and learn and teach both for ourselves and for others. As part of the work of this course, in addition to the usual class hours, students will serve as weekly tutors and classroom assistants in adult basic education centers in nearby towns. Thus this course consciously engages with the obstacles to and the power of education through course readings, through self-reflexive writing about our own varied educational experiences, and through weekly work in the community.

This course examines the experiences of women from diverse backgrounds during the Progressive Era (1890-1920). During this period characterized by rapid industrialization, mass immigration, and contested civil rights, women advocated for reforms of all kinds. But they did not always share the same visions of progress. Course units on labor, settlement work, sexual and racial politics, education, and physical culture will put these competing visions in historical context. Who defined the terms and goals of progress?

[Pre-1900] The United States has inscribed the separation of church and state into its constitutional order, and yet Americans have for two centuries been more deeply committed to religious faith and practice than any other people in the Western world. This course endeavors to explore that paradox.

(Offered as AMST 216 and BLST 240 [CLA/US]) Who is an “Afro-Latino”? Are they Latinos or are they Black? Afro-Latinos are African-descended peoples from Latin America and the Caribbean who reside in the United States. In this course, a focus on Afro-Latinos allows us to study the history of racial ideologies and racial formation in the Americas.

Sports infiltrate American lives.  Whether we are active participants, fans, or only disinterested consumers of media, we cannot escape the influence sport has on American society. Moreover, the world of sports is the place where discussions of major societal issues—racism, gender inequality, labor rights—most prominently arise in the public sphere. Media often point to sport as being emblematic of the most powerful myths about American culture and identity. Yet, few people have an appreciation for how sports in American society and their meaning have evolved over time.