Catalog
American Studies
Professor Rice-DeFosse (French and Francophone Studies); Associate Professors Beasley (American Studies, chair), Chapman (Music) and Osucha (English); Lecturers Barnett (Anthropology), Rubin (Anthropology), and Salter (English)
What does it mean to be “an American?” How does our understanding of American culture, and our relation to it, differ depending on historical context, social position, and the interpretive and ideological perspectives we bring to bear? American studies pursues these questions using a variety of interdisciplinary approaches, texts, performance, and material culture as points of departure for a wide-ranging exploration of American culture. While it focuses on the United States, American studies situates the United States in a wider transnational context. In particular, American studies explores the various ways that institutions, values and practices shape, maintain, and challenge relations of power. American studies courses are designed to elucidate what has been rendered socially invisible.
Such discussions interrogate realities and discourses that have been deemed natural in order to expose their socially contingent character. Through their critical engagement with race, gender, sexuality, social class, disability, and other sites of identity, and with their own relation to them, students interrogate the meaning of belonging, privilege, and exclusion. Current American studies courses focus on cultural geography and cultural politics, borderlands, diasporas, film and media, gender, history, literature, music, performance, queer theory, and race theory.
More information on the American cultural studies program is available on the website (bates.edu/american-studies/).
Major Requirements for the Class of 2022 and beyond
The major in American studies requires ten courses and a senior thesis. The requirements are as follows:
1) Required courses:
AA/AM 119. Cultural Politics.
AMST 200. American Studies. (Formerly ACS 100. Introduction to American Cultural Studies.)
INDS 250. Interdisciplinary Studies: Modes and Methods of Inquiry.
2) One 300-level or 400-level course in American studies, or crosslisted in American studies,
including but not limited to:
INDS 305. Art, Power, and Politics.
INDS 352. Preserving the Vibration: Digitizing the Legacy of Vertamae Smart-
Grosvenor.
AM/GS 353. Critical Theory/Critical Acts.
AM/EN 395B. Privacy, Intimacy, and Identity.
3) Six additional courses drawn from the following lists, with the approval of the faculty advisor. These lists indicate various themes (Performance, Power, Identity, and Material Culture) that characterize the work of American studies. Students are urged to take courses from several of these lists while also pursuing coursework relevant to their eventual thesis work.
Performance
These courses use performance as a lens through which to understand culture and the production of social meanings. Performance here is understood as comprising aesthetic practices such as theatrical performances, musical concerts, or performance art, but also food culture, sporting events, religious ritual, fashion, and the enactment of culture in everyday life. The interdisciplinary study of performance becomes a site for interrogating the dynamics of race, gender, sexuality, disability, and their intersections.
AA/DN 252. Contemporary Issues in Dance.
AA/MU 249. African American Popular Music.
AA/RF 162. White Redemption: Cinema and the Co-optation of African American History.
AN/RE 134. Myth, Folklore, and Popular Culture.
DANC 250. Early Modern Dance History.
DN/ED s29. Tour, Teach, Perform.
FYS 393. DiY and Mash-up Culture.
MUS 212. How Music Performs Culture: Introduction to Ethnomusicology.
MUS 247. History of Jazz.
MUS 248. Music in Contemporary Popular Culture.
MUS 266. Miles Davis.
RFSS 260. Lesbian and Gay Images in Film.
RFSS 265. The Rhetoric of Women's Rights.
RFSS 391A. The Rhetoric of Alien Abduction.
RFSS 391B. Presidential Campaign Rhetoric.
RFSS 391E. The Interracial Buddy Film.
INDS s19. Food, Culture, and Performance.
AMST s31. Broad/Turns: Print, Protest, Performance.
Power
These courses address the ways in which we create, maintain, and contest institutional and ideological formations of power, in contexts ranging from the analysis of governmental and juridical institutions to the study of movements for social justice. These courses devote particular attention given to the ways that feminist thought, queer theory, and critical engagement with race can be brought to bear on the analysis of power and its production.
AA/GS 201. Race, Ethnicity, and Feminist Thought.
ANTH 103. Introduction to Archaeology.
ANTH 333. Culture and Interpretation.
ANTH s10. Encountering Community: Ethnographic Fieldwork and Community-Engaged Learning.
ANTH s32. Introduction to Archaeological Fieldwork.
AVC 361. Museum Internship.
AVC 374. Methods in the Study of Art and Visual Culture.
DN/ED s29. Tour, Teach, Perform.
ECON 331. Labor Economics.
EDUC 231. Perspectives on Education.
AMST s31. Broad/Turns: Print, Protest, Performance.
ED/SO 242. Race, Cultural Pluralism, and Equality in American Education.
ED/SO 380. Education, Reform, Politics.
GSS 100. Introduction to Gender and Sexuality Studies.
GSS 355. Gender and Technology.
HI/LS 301H. Mexican Revolution.
INDS 211. U.S. Environmental History.
INDS s19. Food, Culture, and Performance.
PLTC 115. American Political Institutions and Processes.
GS/PT 155. Women, Power, and Political Systems.
PLTC 215. Political Participation in the United States.
GS/PT 220. Gender, War, and Peace.
PLTC 230. The U.S. Congress.
PLTC 249. Politics of Latin America.
PLTC 310. Public Opinion.
PLTC 320. Immigrants and Their Homelands.
PLTC 329. American Political Development.
Identity
These courses explore the ways in which the formation of personal and group identities is culturally constructed. Drawing upon literature, music, film, visual culture, and other media as points of departure, these courses examine the development, affirmation, and contestation of subjectivities in a variety of contexts, with particular attention to the ways in which social difference (through constructions of race, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, or social class) functions as key to identity formation.
AA/EN 114. Introduction to African American Literature I: 1600-1910.
AA/EN 253. African American Novel.
AA/EN 259. Contemporary African American Literature.
AA/EN 265. The Writings of Toni Morrison.
AA/EN 269. Narrating Slavery.
AA/HI 301E. African Slavery in the Americas.
EN/GS 121G. Asian American Women Writers.
ENG 142. Early American Literature.
ENG 143. Nineteenth-Century American Literature.
ENG 152. American Writers since 1900.
ENG 241. Fiction in the United States.
FRE 208. Introduction to the Francophone World.
HIST 140. Origins of the New Nation, 1500-1820.
HI/LS 181. Latin American History: From Conquest to the Present.
HIST 241. The Age of the American Revolution, 1763-1789.
HIST 249. Colonial North America.
HI/LS 279. The Age of Independence in Latin America.
HI/LS 282. The City in Latin America.
Material Culture
Courses in this list examine the production, circulation, and critical reception of material culture, as it manifests itself in physical objects, artifacts, architecture, and the built environment. The study of material culture approaches its subject from an interdisciplinary perspective, drawing upon the fields of archaeology, art history, museum studies, anthropology, literary criticism, history, and folklore studies.
AMST 280. The Story of Things: Introduction to Material Culture.
AMST s31. Broad/Turns: Print, Protest, Performance.
ANTH 103. Introduction to Archaeology.
ANTH s32. Introduction to Archaeological Fieldwork.
AV/GS 287. Gender and Visual Culture.
AVC 361. Museum Internship.
AVC 374. Methods in the Study of Art and Visual Culture.
AVC 377A: Picturesque Suburbia.
INDS 305. Art, Power, and Politics.
INDS s19. Food, Culture, and Performance.
REL 270. Religion and American Visual Culture.
4) AMST 457 or 458. Senior Thesis.
Major Requirements for the Classes of 2019, 2020, and 2021
The major in American cultural studies requires ten courses and a senior thesis. The requirements are as follows:1) Required courses:
AAS 100. Introduction to African American Studies.
AMST 200. Introduction to American Studies.
AMST 220. Community Studies.
INDS 250. Interdisciplinary Studies: Methods and Modes of Inquiry.
In the event that AMST 220 is not offered, students may apply another community studies course approved in advance by the Program in American Studies.
2) Six other courses from the list below, which should include:
a) courses should include courses at the 200 and 300 levels;
b) at least one course on the African diaspora outside of the United States;
c) at least one course on gender as an interpretive category;
d) at least one cultural studies course on the Arab American, Asian American, Franco-American, Native American, Canadian, or Latin American experience. The selection and sequence of courses must be discussed with the faculty advisor and approved by the fall semester of the junior year.
In addition to American studies courses and courses cross-listed in American studies, the following courses from across the curriculum may be applied to the major:
AA/EN 114. Introduction to African American Literature I: 1600-1910.
AA/RF 162. White Redemption: Cinema and the Co-optation of African American History.
AA/GS 201. Race, Ethnicity, and Feminist Thought.
AA/MU 249. African American Popular Music.
AA/DN 252. Contemporary Issues in Dance.
AA/EN 253. The African American Novel.
AA/EN. 259. Contemporary African American Literature.
AA/EN 265. The Writings of Toni Morrison.
AA/EN 269. Narrating Slavery.
AA/HI 301E. African Slavery in the Americas.
AN/RE 134. Myth, Folklore, and Popular Culture.
ANTH 103. Introduction to Archaeology.
ANTH 333. Culture and Interpretation.
ANTH s10. Encountering Community: Ethnographic Fieldwork and Community-Engaged Learning.
ANTH s32. Introduction to Archaeological Fieldwork.
AV/GS 287. Gender and Visual Culture.
AVC 361. Museum Internship.
AVC 374. Methods in the Study of Art and Visual Culture.
AVC 377A. Picturesque Suburbia.
DANC 250. Early Modern Dance History.
DN/ED s29. Tour, Teach, Perform.
ECON 331. Labor Economics.
EDUC 231. Perspectives on Education.
ED/SO 242. Race, Cultural Pluralism, and Equality in American Education.
ED/SO 380. Education, Reform, and Politics.
EN/GS 121G. Asian American Women Writers.
ENG 142. Early American Literature.
ENG 143. Nineteenth-Century American Literature.
ENG 152. American Writers since 1900.
ENG 241. Fiction in the United States.
ENG 395F. Five American Women Poets.
FYS 271. Into the Woods: Rewriting Walden.
FYS 300. Exploring Education through Narratives.
FYS 381. Visualizing Identities.
FYS 385. Power and Authority in Latin America through Film.
FYS 393. DiY and Mash-up Culture.
FYS 419. Tobacco in History and Culture.
FRE 208. Introduction to the Francophone World.
GSS 100. Introduction to Women and Gender Studies.
GSS 355. Gender and Technology.
GS/SP 323. Gendered Experiences in the Américas Borderlands.
HIST 140. Origins of the New Nation, 1500–1820.
HIST 142. America in the Twentieth Century.
HIST 181. Latin American History: From the Conquest to the Present.
HIST 241. The Age of the American Revolution, 1763–1789.
HIST 249. Colonial North America.
HI/LS 279. The Age of Independence in Latin America.
HI/LS 282. The City in Latin America.
HI/LS 301H. The Mexican Revolution.
INDS 301Y. The Spanish Inquisition.
INDS 321. Afroambiente: Writing a Black Environment.
MUS 212. How Music Performs Culture: Introduction to Ethnomusicology.
MUS 247. History of Jazz.
MUS 248. Music in Contemporary Popular Culture.
MUS 266. Miles Davis.
PLTC 115. American Political Institutions and Processes.
GS/PT 155. Women, Power, and Political Systems.
PLTC 215. Political Participation in the United States.
GS/PT 220. Gender, War, and Peace.
PLTC 230. The U.S. Congress.
PLTC 249. Politics of Latin America.
PLTC 310. Public Opinion.
PLTC 320. Immigrants and Their Homelands.
PLTC 329. American Political Development.
PY/SO 210. Social Psychology.
PY/SO 371. Prejudice and Stereotyping.
PSYC 372. Racial and Ethnic Identity Development.
REL 100. Religion and Film.
REL 216. American Religious History, 1550–1840.
REL 217. American Religious History, 1840–Present.
REL 247. City upon the Hill.
REL 270. Religion and American Visual Culture.
RFSS 260. Lesbian and Gay Images in Film.
RFSS 265. The Rhetoric of Women's Rights.
RFSS 391A. The Rhetoric of Alien Abduction.
RFSS 391B. Presidential Campaign Rhetoric.
RFSS 391E. The Interracial Buddy Film.
SOC 250. Privilege, Power, and Inequality.
SOC 270. Sociology of Gender.
SOC 395I. Race, Class, Gender, and Family.
SPAN 224. Protest and Justice.
3) AMST 457 or 458. Senior Thesis.
Pass/Fail Grading Option
Pass/fail may not be applied to the four required courses. There are no restrictions on the use of the pass/fail option for other courses taken for the major.Courses
AA/AM 119. Cultural Politics.
This course examines the relationship of culture to politics. It introduces the study of struggles to acquire, maintain, or resist power and gives particular attention to the role culture plays in reproducing and contesting social divisions of class, race, gender, and sexuality. Lectures and discussion incorporate film, music, and fiction in order to evaluate the connection between cultural practices and politics. Not open to students who have received credit for AA/AC 119. Enrollment limited to 39. Normally offered every year. M. Beasley.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AM/AN 125. Critical Perspectives on Sport and Society.
This course explores the connections between sports and a broad range of anthropological concerns, including colonialism, resistance and domination, race, and gender. Students consider questions such as: Why do we play the sports we do? Why are sporting performances socially significant, and how have groups and political regimes used this significance to suit their needs? What can teams, players, and brands tell us about how we (and others) see the world? Addressing topics from cricket in the Caribbean to boxing in Chicago, students reappraise conventional sporting narratives and use sports to analyze the social and historical conditions in which they occur. In doing so, students think critically about their own sporting experiences and develop a deeper and subtler understanding of the ways that societies make sports and sports make societies. Course crosslisted beginning Winter 2019. Enrollment limited to 39. J. Rubin.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AM/HI 141. America in the Age of the Civil War.
This course surveys United States history from the early nineteenth to the early twentieth century, focusing particularly on the experience of immigrants, women, the plantation South, and the urbanizing North. Special attention is also given to the history of the American Civil War. Not open to students who have received credit for AC/HI 141. Enrollment limited to 48. A. Baker.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AMST 200. Introduction to American Studies.
This course introduces students to the different methods and perspectives of cultural studies within an American context. The course considers the separate evolution of American studies and cultural studies in the academy, and considers how cultural studies provides a lens through which to investigate dynamic American identities, institutions, and communities. Of particular concern is how differences such as race, gender, class, ethnicity, and sexuality are constructed and expressed in diverse settings, and how they connect to the deployment of power. Not open to students who have received credit for ACS 100. Open to first-year students. Enrollment limited to 35. Staff.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AM/AN 207. Race, Racism, and Redress.
Recent events in the United States and around the globe have prompted a re-examination of the role of race in contemporary life. Since its inception, anthropology has been concerned questions of human origins, diversity, and community. In this course, students examine the origins of racial thought, its transformation over time, and the ways race and intersecting identifications shape everyday life. Through ethnographies of global cultures, students explore how race takes form and meaning in different contexts. Throughout, they learn how to think critically about their own identities and beliefs and engage with strategies for redress. Enrollment limited to 29. Normally offered every year. J. Lyon.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
INDC 210. Technology in U.S. History.
Surveys the development, distribution, and use of technology in the United States from colonial roadways to microelectronics, using primary and secondary source material. Subjects treated include sexual and racial divisions of labor, theories of invention and innovation, and the ecological consequences of technological change. Cross-listed in American studies, gender and sexuality studies, and history. Course reinstated beginning Fall 2019. Enrollment limited to 29. R. Herzig.ConcentrationsInterdisciplinary Programs
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
This course counts toward the following Interdisciplinary Program(s)
INDC 211. U.S. Environmental History.
This course explores the relationship between the North American environment and the development and expansion of the United States. Because Americans' efforts (both intentional and not) to define and shape the environment were rooted in their own struggles for power, environmental history offers an important perspective on the nation's social history. Specific topics include Europeans', Africans', and Indians' competing efforts to shape the colonial environment; the impact and changing understanding of disease; the relationship between industrial environments and political power; and the development of environmental movements. Cross-listed in American studies, environmental studies, and history. Open to first-year students. Enrollment limited to 39. J. Hall.ConcentrationsInterdisciplinary Programs
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
This course counts toward the following Interdisciplinary Program(s)
AMST 220. Community Studies.
Too often, students experience college within an academic cocoon, taking for granted their surrounding environment. This course moves beyond the bubble of the academy. After a review of cultural studies methodology, students consider the evolution of the college itself as well as the dynamic history of Lewiston, Maine. Students' understanding of the community is developed in readings on immigration and on practical work in local service-oriented agencies. In addition to community work and weekly assignments prepared for seminar discussions, students produce a research paper relevant to the themes of the course. Not open to students who have received credit for ACS 220. Open to first-year students. Enrollment limited to 12. (Community-Engaged Learning.) Staff.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AM/AN 222. Archaeology and Colonial Entanglements in North America.
An introduction to the archaeology of North America throughout the past 20,000 years and earlier. Students examine current archaeological hypotheses of the "peopling of the Americas," and construct the most likely model based on their command of the literature and an independent critical analysis supporting their own hypothesis. Students review and reconcile the archaeological past with indigenous concepts such as oral histories and origin stories challenging and expanding their world view to include non-Western concepts. The course applies critical theory perspectives, including indigenous-feminist and postcolonial theories, to assess the colonial process that archaeology has at times unwittingly imposed on North American native peoples. Course crosslisted beginning Winter 2019. Not open to students who have received credit for ANTH 222. Open to first-year students. Enrollment limited to 39. K. Barnett.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
INDC 236. Race Matters: Tobacco in North America.
This course explores race and the history of tobacco in North America. With a primary focus on the intersection of tobacco capitalism and African American hsitory, the course introduces students to the impact of tobacco on the formation of racial ideologies and lived experiences through a consideration of economic, cultural, political, and epidemiological history. Recommended background: at least one course in African American studies, African American history, American studies, or gender and sexuality studies. New course beginning Winter 2019. Enrollment limited to 29. One-time offering. M. Plastas.ConcentrationsInterdisciplinary Programs
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
This course counts toward the following Interdisciplinary Program(s)
AM/FR 240I. French in Maine.
An appreciation and analysis of what it means to speak French and to be "French" in the local and regional context. Students examine questions of language, ethnic identity, and cultural expression through novels, short stories, autobiographies, film, and written and oral histories. Visits to local cultural sites enhance students' understanding of the Franco-American community and its heritage as well as other French speakers. Prerequisite(s): FRE 207, 208, or 235. Not open to students who have received credit for AC/FR 240I. Open to first-year students. Enrollment limited to 19. [W2] M. Rice-DeFosse.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AM/HI 244. Native American History.
A survey of Native American peoples from European contact to the present, this course addresses questions of cultural interaction, power, and native peoples' continuing history of colonization. By looking at the ways various First Nations took advantage of and suffered from their new relations with newcomers, students learn that this history is more than one of conquest and disappearance. In addition, they learn that the basic categories of "Indian" and "white" are themselves inadequate for understanding native pasts and presents. Much of this learning depends on careful readings of native writers. Not open to students who have received credit for AC/HI 244. Open to first-year students. Enrollment limited to 39. J. Hall.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AM/EN 247. Contemporary Arab American Literature.
This course studies Arab American literature from 1990 until the present. Students examine novels, short fiction, memoirs, or poetry in an effort to understand the major concerns of contemporary Arab American authors. Students are expected to engage theoretical material and literary criticism to supplement their understanding of the literature. In addition to a discussion of formal literary concerns, this course is animated by the way authors spotlight gender, sexual orientation, politics, and history. Prerequisite(s): one 100-level course in English. Not open to students who have received credit for AC/EN 247. Enrollment limited to 25. T. Pickens.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
INDC 250. Interdisciplinary Studies: Methods and Modes of Inquiry.
Interdisciplinarity involves more than a meeting of disciplines. Practitioners stretch methodological norms and reach across disciplinary boundaries. Through examination of a single topic, this course introduces students to interdisciplinary methods of analysis. Students examine what practitioners actually do and work to become practitioners themselves. Cross-listed in African American studies, American studies, and gender and sexuality studies. Prerequisite(s): AAS 100, AMST 200, or GSS 100, and one other course in African American studies, American studies, or gender and sexuality studies. Enrollment limited to 39. Staff.Interdisciplinary Programs
This course counts toward the following Interdisciplinary Program(s)
INDC 267. Blood, Genes, and American Culture.
Places recent popular and scientific discussions of human heredity and genetics in broader social, political, and historical context, focusing on shifting definitions of personhood. Topics include the ownership and exchange of human bodies and body parts, the development of assisted reproductive technologies, and the emergence of new forms of biological citizenship. Recommended background: course work in biology and/or gender and sexuality studies. Cross-listed in African American studies, American studies, and gender and sexuality studies. Open to first-year students. Enrollment limited to 29. R. Herzig.ConcentrationsInterdisciplinary Programs
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
This course counts toward the following Interdisciplinary Program(s)
AM/RE 272. Islam in the Americas.
This course traces the history and sociology of Islam in North and South America, from West African Muslims in Brazil and Syrian immigration via Ellis Island and Buenos Aires to Malcolm X and the civil rights era as well as millennial pop culture and public life. Students explore the stories of Muslims in the Americas as a lens for understanding larger research questions in American political science and comparative law, Atlantic world anthropology and cultural studies, and the history of American social institutions including public education and religion in the public sphere. Not open to students who have received credit for AC/RE 272. Enrollment limited to 39. Staff.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AMST 280. Story of Things: Introduction to Material Culture.
The phrase "material culture" refers to the "things" of our daily lives. Our material lives range from our bodies to the clothes we wear, the specific objects we use, the food we eat, and the places we go. Material culture has been defined from numerous perspectives, most notably anthropology, archaeology, art history, cultural theory, and history. Scholars in these and other disciplines have used material culture as sources of evidence to explore the everyday lives of ordinary citizens. This seminar introduce students to consider how objects are used to reinforce, propagate, and resist cultural hierarchies based on race, class, gender, sexuality, and national identity. Prerequisite(s): AA/AM 119, AMST 200, or ANTH 101. Not open to students who have received credit for ACS 280. Enrollment limited to 29. M. Beasley.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AM/AV 288. Visualizing Race.
This course considers visual constructions of race in art and popular culture, with a focus on the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. General topics include the role of visual culture in creating and sustaining racial stereotypes, racism, white supremacy, and white-skin privilege; the effects upon cultural producers of their own perceived race in terms of both their opportunities and their products; and the relations of constructions of race to those of gender, class, ethnicity, and sexuality. Not open to students who have received credit for AC/AV 288. Open to first-year students. Enrollment limited to 29. [W2] E. Rand.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AM/HI 299. White Supremacy: An American History.
Shaped by early conflicts with native populations and the expansion of African slavery, ideologies of white supremacy have been powerful sociopolitical forces in the making of the United States. At the same time, the concept of "whiteness" has been unstable throughout the nation’s history. It has been challenged by immigration patterns and changing ideas about race, ethnicity, and citizenship. Covering more than three hundred years, this course examines the meaning of whiteness in America and considers the historical and ongoing struggles of those excluded from its privileges. Recommended background: AM/HI 141; HIST 140, 142. Not open to students who have received credit for AC/HI 299. Open to first-year students. Enrollment limited to 39. (Community-Engaged Learning.) A. Baker.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
INDC 301G. Black Resistance from the Civil War to Civil Rights.
From antebellum slavery through twentieth-century struggles for civil rights, black Americans have resisted political violence, economic marginalization, and second-class citizenship using strategies ranging from respectability to radicalism. Engaging with both historical and modern scholarship, literary sources, and other primary documents, this course explores the diverse tactics and ideologies of these resistance movements. By considering the complexities and contradictions of black resistance in American history and conducting source-based research, students develop a deep understanding of the black freedom struggle and reflect on the ways that these legacies continue to shape present-day struggles for racial justice. New course beginning Winter 2019. Enrollment limited to 15. [W2] Normally offered every year. A. Baker.Interdisciplinary Programs
This course counts toward the following Interdisciplinary Program(s)
INDC 302. Black Feminist Activist and Intellectual Traditions.
This junior-senior seminar examines the intersections of gender with black racial and ethnic identities as they have been and are constructed, expressed, and lived throughout the African/Black diaspora. Special attention is given to the United States but substantial consideration is given to Africa, the Caribbean, Latin America, Canada, Europe, and Australia. The course combines approaches and methodologies employed in the humanities, social sciences, and arts to structure interdisciplinary analyses. Using Black feminist (womanist), critical-race, and queer theories, students examine African-descended women’s histories, activism, resistance, and contributions to culture, knowledge, and theorizing. Prerequisite(s): one course in African American studies, American studies, or gender and sexuality studies. Crosslisted in African American studies, American studies, and gender and sexuality studies. Enrollment limited to 15. S. Houchins.Interdisciplinary Programs
This course counts toward the following Interdisciplinary Program(s)
INDC 305. Art, Power, and Politics.
An anthropological examination of the relationship among art, power, and politics. What can the artistic works of various societies say about their worlds that other creations cannot? What claims can art make about the workings of power, and what artistic techniques does power itself employ? Students consider these and other questions from a number of different perspectives, including the politics of perception, the place of art in modern life, the artistry of terror, the art of protest and propaganda, and the dream of building a beautiful regime. Recommended background: familiarity with classical social theory, especially Marx, is encouraged but not necessary. Cross-listed in African American studies, American studies, and anthropology. Enrollment limited to 15. J. Rubin.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AM/RE 317. Trauma, the Bible, and American Identity.
This course analyzes colonial hegemony over nations and trauma inflicted on bodies within the Bible and its ancient context and within the legacy of its interpretation in American history. Special attention is paid to the Hebrew Bible within discourses about American slavery, and America as a colonized and colonizing political power. Recommended background: at least one course in American studies or religious studies. New course beginning Winter 2019. Enrollment limited to 15. One-time offering. L. Carlson.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
INDC 352. Preserving the Vibration: Digitizing the Legacy of Vertamae Smart-Grosvenor.
This course introduces public and digital humanities through the life and work of noted journalist, food anthropologist, and public broadcaster Vertamae Grosvenor. Public humanities is concerned with expanding academic discourse beyond academia and facilitating conversations on topics of humanistic inquiry with the community at large. Digital studies provide a plethora of unconventional ways to engage community in public dialogues for the greater good. Drawing from books, operas, NPR audio segments, interviews, cookbooks, and other artifacts of Grosvenor, students create and curate a digital archive. Themes include Gullah culture, African American migration, foodways, memoir, public memory, and monuments. Leading theories and methods of black feminism, material culture, race, food studies, new media and digital humanities are foregrounded. Cross-listed in African American studies, American studies, digital and computational studies, and gender and sexuality studies. Prerequisite(s): one of the following: AA/AM 119; AA/HI 243; AAS 100; AMST 200; AM/AV 340; AM/EN 395B; AV/GS 287; GSS 100; INDS 250 or 267; REL 255 or 270. Enrollment limited to 15. M. Beasley.Interdisciplinary Programs
This course counts toward the following Interdisciplinary Program(s)
AM/GS 353. Critical Theory/Critical Acts.
Critical theory unravels streams of repressive discourses and hierarchies in our contemporary world, and artists have fostered ruptures and fissures in everyday life. This seminar ponders the concept of "cultural worker" and laments the domain of theory by exploring the intersections between critical theory, art, and cultural politics. Students engage in the ruptures, the fragments of knowledge, and making sense of the residue of "social change" while not forgetting the problematization of the aesthetic. They consider U.S.-based interdisciplinary artists such as Thiong'o, Fusco, Ana Mediata, Tania Bruguera, David Hammon, Jay-Z, Pope.L, and Lady Gaga with critical theorists such as Fanon, Butler, Foucault, Phalen, Muñoz, Moten, Adorno, Barthes, Olkowski, and Benjamin. This seminar is based on close readings of theoretical texts and connecting those texts with contemporary cultural politics. Prerequisite(s): AA/AM 119, AMST 200, AM/AV 340, AM/EN 395B, AV/GS 287, GSS 100, or INDS 250 or 267. Not open to students who have received credit for AC/WS 353. Enrollment limited to 15. M. Beasley.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AMST 360. Independent Study.
Students, in consultation with a faculty advisor, individually design and plan a course of study or research not offered in the curriculum. Course work includes a reflective component, evaluation, and completion of an agreed-upon product. Sponsorship by a faculty member in the program/department, a course prospectus, and permission of the chair are required. Students may register for no more than one independent study per semester. Normally offered every semester. Staff.AM/EN 395B. Privacy, Intimacy, and Identity.
This seminar explores American concepts of "self" in historical and cultural context, focusing on distinct yet overlapping discourses of privacy, intimacy, and identity, as these are shaped by evolving understandings of race, sexuality, gender, class, and nation. Beginning with a critical investigation of how the nation's Puritan settlers articulated, practiced, and regulated "the self" and concluding with a consideration of how self and identity are presented via social media on platforms such as Facebook, students consider scholarship in American literary and cultural history, critical theory, and primary literary and legal texts. Prerequisite(s): one 100-level English course or one American studies course. Recommended background: GSS 100. Enrollment limited to 15. Instructor permission is required. [W2] E. Osucha.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AMST 457. Senior Thesis.
Under the supervision of a faculty advisor, all majors write an extended essay that utilizes the methods of at least two disciplines. Students register for AMST 457 in the fall semester. Majors writing an honors thesis register for both AMST 457 and 458. [W3] Normally offered every year. Staff.AMST 458. Senior Thesis.
Under the supervision of a faculty advisor, all majors write an extended essay that utilizes the methods of at least two disciplines. Students register for AMST 458 in the winter semester. Majors writing an honors thesis register for both AMST 457 and 458. [W3] Normally offered every year. Staff.AA/AM s16. The Wire: The City and Race in Popular Culture.
This course focuses on the HBO series The Wire. Students discuss the episodes in terms of their narrative structure and content as well as cinematic techniques including shot sequence, lighting, camera angle, editing, and transitional devices. They also explore some of the sociopolitical issues this series examines: poverty, unemployment, the drug trade, public education, the decline of newspapers, and public housing. The intersection of race, gender, sexuality, and class serves as the lens through which they scrutinize these topics. Not open to students who have received credit for AA/AC s16. Enrollment limited to 19. S. Houchins.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AA/AM s31. Broad/Turns: Print, Protest, Performance.
This course explores art and social protest in the context of U.S. history. Grounded in cultural theory of Benjamin and Fanon, who articulated the power of the arts to produce revolutions, the course specifically engages in American cultural politics through the production and dissemination of political posters. Students examine the poster (broadside) from multiple rhetorical dimensions and interrogate the proliferation of the printed political broadside and contemporary movements between analog and digital media (Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, blogs) and platforms. They consider the utilitarian status of the printed poster with the immediacy of digital social platforms. They work with distinguished printmakers, make posters, and curate a show. Prerequisite(s): one of the following: AA/AM 119; AA/HI 243; AAS 100; AMST 200; AM/AV 340; AM/EN 395B; AV/GS 287; GSS 100; INDS 250 or 267; or REL 255 or 270. Not open to students who have received credit for AA/AC s31. Enrollment limited to 10. M. Beasley.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations
AMST s32. Remixing and Remembering: Malaga and the Book.
The story of Malaga Island is a forgotten chapter in Maine’s history. Today the island sits abandoned, but it was once inhabited by a fishing community of black, white, Native American, and mix-raced people. In 1912 they were evicted from their homes by the State of Maine. Using the Malaga story as the topic, this course considers conversations about archiving, the materiality of writing, and the notion of the book, in material and digital form. As student mine the archive, they design, edit, and construct a digital book, attending to the mechanics and the intricacies of making an artists’ book using archival materials. This is a digital humanities course. New course beginning Short Term 2019. Open to first-year students. Enrollment limited to 15. M. Beasley.Concentrations
This course is referenced by the following General Education Concentrations