Chair, Assistant Professor CRAIG S. WILDER
Advisory Committee: Professor: A. WILLINGHAM. Associate Professor: E. D. BROWN. Assistant Professors: FARRED, MUTONGI*, WILDER. Senior Lecturer: E. GRUDIN***.
The aim of the Program of Afro-American Studies is to allow students to consolidate some of their course elections in the social sciences and humanities focusing on the history, culture, and social experience of Africans and their descendants in the Western Hemisphere.
All students enrolled as concentrators in the Afro-American Studies Program are required to complete a total of five courses in the program, including a culminating senior independent study project (491 or 492) and one winter study project dealing with a subject relevant to the objectives of the program. Winter study projects not offered by the program should be approved by the chair.
Senior projects may be done in the fall or spring semester. They will be evaluated by the project advisor and reviewed by the chair of the program. Students must propose their projects and secure an advisor by no later than the end of registration of the semester in which they are enrolled in 491 or 492. The chair may modify the requirements for the senior project in exceptional circumstances.
Students may select their required courses from the following:
One course in an Afro-American subject:
AAS 200/Political Science 233 Beyond Double Consciousness: Gunnar Myrdal and the Construction of Race as Dilemma
AAS 491 Senior Project
AAS 492 Senior Project
AAS 030 Winter Study
English/American Studies 220 Introduction to African-American Writing
History 261 African-American History Through Emancipation
History 262 African-American History From Reconstruction to the Present
Political Science 213 Theory and Practice of Civil Rights Protest
One course in an African subject:
History 269 A Survey of Modern African History, 1800-Present
History 270 Early African History Through the Era of the Slave Trade
History 325 South Africa and Apartheid
History 373 African Political Thought
Two additional courses selected from those listed above or from the following:
History 104 Slavery in the American South
History 225 The Caribbean from Slavery to Independence: A Comparison of Empires
History 318 The Black Radical Tradition in America
History 360 Civil War and Reconstruction
Music 122 Afro-American Music
Music 130 History of Jazz
Music 212 Jazz Theory and Improvisation
Political Science 239 Political Thinking About Race: Resurrecting the Political in Contemporary Texts on the Black Experience
Political Science 318 The Voting Rights Act and the Voting Rights Movement
Political Science/American Studies 332 Fugitive Identities: Slavery and the Boundaries of American Politics
Theatre/American Studies 211 Topics in African-American Performance: Theatre, Film, and Dance of the Harlem Renaissance
Recommended Elective Courses
Economics 204/Environmental Studies 234 Economic Development in Poor Countries
Economics/Environmental Studies 212 Sustainable Development
Economics 237 The Economics of Inequality and Poverty
Economics 386 The Economics of Inequality
English/Philosophy 109 Blinding Knowledge: The Humanities Reconsidered
English/American Studies 209 American Literature: Origins to 1865
English/American Studies 210 American Literature: 1865-Present
English/American Studies 338 Literature of the American Renaissance
English 342 Postcolonial Literature
English/Literary Studies 355/American Studies 403 Theorizing Whiteness
English 357 Contemporary American Fiction
Greek 405 The Greek Historians: Herodotus
History 105 The Expansion of Europe
History/Environmental Studies 116 Environmental History of Africa
History 222 European Imperialism: The Conquest and Division of the World
History 227 Comparative American Immigration History
History/American Studies 246 Cultural Encounters in the American West
History 248 Twentieth-Century American Politics
History 275/Religion 231 The Origins of Islam: God, Empire and Apocalypse
History 278/Religion 232 Women and Islam
History 301F Faith and Reason: Critical Explorations in American Religious History
History/Environmental Studies 306 Urban Theory
History 307 The French and Haitian Revolutions
History 308 Studies in American Social Change
History 311 History of the Old South
History 312 History of the New South
History 316 Class, Gender and Race in Post-1945 Britain
History 351 Slavery, Capitalism, and Revolution: The Impact of the New World on Europe, 1700-1900
History 355 Comparative Slavery and Race Relations in Latin America
History/American Studies 364 Imagining Urban America, Three Case Studies: Boston, Chicago, and L.A.
History/American Studies 368T The Politics and Rhetoric of Exclusion: Immigration and Its Discontents
History 381 The Ghetto from Venice to Harlem
Literary Studies 111 Introduction to Cultural Studies: Traveling Fictions-Encountering the Other Through Tourism, Time Travel, Exile
Music 111 Popular Music: Revolutions in the History of Rock
Music 114 American Music
Music 125 Music Cultures of the World
Music 131 Gender, Class, and Race in Western Musical Society
Music 209 Music in History III: Musics of the Twentieth Century
Philosophy/Political Science/EXPR 250 The Philosophy and Politics of Higher Education
Political Science 204 (formerly 140) Introduction to Comparative Politics: The Powers of Nationalism
Political Science 209 Poverty in America
Political Science 216 Constitutional Law II: Individual Rights
Political Science 219 Constitutional Law I: Structures of Power
Political Science 230 American Political Thought
Political Science 235 Multiculturalism and Political Theory
Political Science 312 Southern Politics
Political Science 331T Non-Profit Organization and Community Change
Political Science 342 Intolerance and Political Tolerance
Psychology 341 Stereotypes, Prejudice, and Discrimination
Sociology 203 Social Inequality
Sociology 220 Ethnicity
Theatre 210 Multicultural Performance
And the culminating Senior Project (491 or 492)
HONORS PROGRAM IN AFRO-AMERICAN STUDIES
Candidates for honors in Afro-American Studies must maintain at least a B+ average in the concentration and be admitted to candidacy by the program faculty. In addition to the regular requirements for the concentration, candidates for honors are also required to take one course specifically related to their Senior Project (see above). It is also required that honors candidates devote one independent study course (491 or 492) and their senior year winter study to the completion of their Senior Project. That winter study may also serve to fill the regular winter study project requirement for the concentration. honors Senior Projects should demonstrate unusual creativity, depth, and intellectual rigor.
Candidates for honors are permitted and encouraged to pursue non-traditional projects, such as presentations in the performing arts, visual arts, or creative writing, as well as more traditional interdisciplinary studies. Honors Senior Projects will be evaluated by the advisor, and the program faculty will decide whether honors should be conferred. Students wishing to become candidates for honors in Afro-American Studies should inform the chair of the program in writing before spring registration of their junior year.
THE AFRO-AMERICAN STUDIES CONCENTRATION AND THE AMERICAN STUDIES MAJOR
Several courses in Afro-American Studies count for credit in the American Studies major. Therefore, students in American Studies can easily complete requirements for an Afro-American Studies concentration by electing one course in an African subject and by taking Afro-American Studies 491. Another three courses must be chosen which satisfy both American Studies and Afro-American Studies requirements.