Africana Studies
Africana Studies Courses
The list below offers a representative sample of the courses you can expect in the study of Africana studies at 91传媒. From theoretical foundations to practical experiences, these courses provide a full range of educational opportunities at various levels of mastery. For more information about current course offerings or registration details, please consult the Office of the Registrar.
Course Description
(Previously BLST 100, Introduction to Black Studies) Designed as the gateway to Africana Studies, this course is an interdisciplinary exploration of the collective experience of blacks in Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean and the United States. The course seeks to provide students an intellectual framework for engagement in a process of self-discovery and for achieving a more global understanding of the unique ways in which Africans and peoples of African descent have constituted our world. The course, which introduces important theoretical approaches and builds critical and analytical skills, provides an overview of the historical, socio-economic and cultural dynamics of black life.
Distribution Area
Social Science-or-Power Privilege and Diversity
Credits
1 course
Course Description
Designed as the gateway to Africana Studies, this course is an interdisciplinary exploration of the collective experience of blacks in Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean and the United States. The course seeks to provide students an intellectual framework for engagement in a process of self-discovery and for achieving a more global understanding of the unique ways in which Africans and peoples of African descent have constituted our world. The course, which introduces important theoretical approaches and builds critical and analytical skills, provides an overview of the historical, socio-economic and cultural dynamics of black life. This course will encourage the logical development of argument, clear and precise diction, and a coherent prose style; the development of expository writing skills as they apply to Africana Studies; and the responsible, appropriate, and effective use of sources and special or technical language.
Distribution Area
Social Science-or-Power Privilege and Diversity
Credits
1 course
Course Description
Winter or May Term off-campus course.
Credits
0.5 course
Course Description
A seminar focused on a theme in Africana Studies. Open only to first-year students.
Credits
1 course
Course Description
This course explores the literary expressions of Africans and peoples of African descent as they are found in the Caribbean, Latin America and the United States. Works by such writers as Achebe, Ngugi, Kincaid, Walcott, Guillen, Morejon, Reed and Morrison may be included. Cross-listed with ENG 255.
Distribution Area
Arts and Humanities-or-Global Learning
Credits
1 course
Course Description
This course explores the literary expressions of Africans and peoples of African descent as they are found in the Caribbean, Latin America and the United States. Works by such writers as Achebe, Ngugi, Kincaid, Walcott, Guillen, Morejon, Reed and Morrison may be included.聽This course will encourage the logical development of argument, clear and precise diction, and a coherent prose style; the development of expository writing skills as they apply to Africana Studies; and the responsible, appropriate, and effective use of sources and special or technical language. Cross-listed with ENG 255.
Distribution Area
Arts and Humanities-or-Global Learning
Credits
1 course
Course Description
An exploration of the historical foundations and the development of black life in Africa and its later diffusion in the Black Diaspora. Its purview will range from pre-colonial dynamics to the more contemporary manifestations of global Black History in North America, Europe, the Caribbean, Central America, Latin America and Melanesia. Topics may include: African cultures before European contact, the slave trade and its impact on Africa and the Atlantic economy, the middle passage, internal migration in Africa and case studies of the creation of diasporic communities and cultures. Cross-listed with HIST 281.
Distribution Area
Social Science-or-Power Privilege and Diversity
Credits
1 course
Course Description
This course explores some issue, theme or period related to Africana Studies. May be repeated for credit with different topics.
Credits
1 course
Course Description
This course explores some issue, theme or period related to Africana Studies. It will encourage the logical development of argument, clear and precise diction, and a coherent prose style; the development of expository writing skills as they apply to Africana Studies; and the responsible, appropriate, and effective use of sources and special or technical language. May be repeated for credit with different topics.
Credits
1 course
Course Description
This course examines cultural differences and political activities of reference groups, specifically African Americans in the United States. Identity groups (for example, ethnic, gender, and racial groups) are groups that create and sustain a sense of political identity. They are frequently pushed to the margins of social, political, civic, and economic life. Many of these groups experience profound levels of inequality through systemic racism. The course explores the processes of marginalization and potential remedies that marginalized groups have deployed to address being pushed to the margins. We will devote a significant amount of attention to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and its impact on these groups.
Distribution Area
Social Science-or-Power Privilege and Diversity
Credits
1 course
Course Description
An interdisciplinary study of some significant issue, theme or period relevant to Africana Studies. May be repeated for credit with different topics.
Credits
1 course
Course Description
An interdisciplinary study of some significant issue, theme or period relevant to Africana Studies. May be repeated for credit with different topics.
Credits
1 course
Course Description
Students work with the director of Africana Studies or a faculty member who teaches in the program to complete a major project or paper that focuses on some aspect of the Africana experience.
Credits
1 course
Course Description
Students work with the director of Africana Studies or a faculty member who teaches in the program to complete a major project or paper that focuses on some aspect of the Africana experience. This course will help students develop the presentation of logical arguments and refutation; the ability to distinguish and identify important substantive arguments; the ability to skillfully analyze, evaluate, and integrate supporting material; the selection and implementation of effective presentation style; the ability to adapt the manner of delivery to specific audiences and situations; the demonstration of critical listening skills; the demonstration of effective and reflective listening; and the knowledge of the ethical obligations of speakers, discussants, and listeners.
Credits
1 course
Course Description
An in-depth directed study under the guidance of a faculty member associated with the Africana Studies program, using Africana Studies' methodologies and scholarship.
Credits
1 course
Course Description
An in-depth directed study under the guidance of a faculty member associated with the Africana Studies program, using Africana Studies' methodologies and scholarship. This course will help students develop the presentation of logical arguments and refutation; the ability to distinguish and identify important substantive arguments; the ability to skillfully analyze, evaluate, and integrate supporting material; the selection and implementation of effective presentation style; the ability to adapt the manner of delivery to specific audiences and situations; the demonstration of critical listening skills; the demonstration of effective and reflective listening; and the knowledge of the ethical obligations of speakers, discussants, and listeners.
Credits
1 course
Course Description
This course is designed to explore the history, functions, and communities, which encompass religions of the African Diaspora such as Santer'a, Vodou, and Candombl'. Lectures, discussions, films, and a range of ethnographic literature will introduce students to these religious systems. Among the topics and themes to be addressed in relation to religion are issues of identity, ethnicity, gender, performance, and class. Case studies in Brazil, Cuba, and among Latinos in the U.S. will illuminate the multivocality of the religious beliefs and practices found in the African Diaspora.
Distribution Area
Social Science-or-Global Learning
Prerequisites
sophomore standing.
Credits
1 course
Course Description
Explores the ways in which modern literature of peoples of African descent engages with ancient Hellenic and Roman literature. This course may concentrate on African American literature, women writers, or literature of the African Diaspora. Example topics include how the art of Derek Walcott's Omeros, Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man, Toni Morrison's Beloved, and Rita Dove's Mother Love riffs on such works of classical literature as Homer's Odyssey, Euripides' Medea and The Homeric Hymn to Demeter.
Distribution Area
Arts and Humanities-or-Power Privilege and Diversity
Credits
1 course
Course Description
A study of African-American writing, including biographies, essays and polemics as well as drama, fiction and poetry.
Distribution Area
Arts and Humanities-or-Power Privilege and Diversity
Credits
1 course
Course Description
The study of Africa's pre-colonial past has produced a particularly wide variety of views and interpretations. Some writers have asserted, for example, that Africans possessed little political organization in the past, while others celebrate ancient African kingdoms. This course introduces students to the diverse histories of Africa, from the development of early African communities to the late 19th century. The course will offer a broad survey of the history of Africa, including its diverse cultures, belief systems, political complexities, statecraft, and the fluid nature of African societies. We will examine pre-colonial texts, ideas, cultures, institutions, geography, communities, arts, technologies, and commercial systems to explain the major dynamics of economic, social, and political change in Africa. The purpose of this course is to help students make their own judgments about competing claims and conflicting interpretations of the African past. We will acquaint ourselves with the various methodologies and sources that historians of pre-colonial Africa use in their craft, including archaeology, linguistics, oral traditions, historical anthropology, environmental history, and documentary evidence.鈥疉s we will see, one of the most exciting aspects of African historical study is that it draws upon kinds of evidence which historians in other parts of the world rarely use, and so gives us an unusual perspective on the human past.
Distribution Area
Arts and Humanities
Credits
1 course
Course Description
This course introduces students to the history of the African continent from the 1880s (the eve of colonial rule) to the late twentieth century. The central themes the course considers include European scramble for Africa and the African responses; Colonial rule, economic policies, and colonial health policies; the development of African nationalism; colonial legacies and the struggle to achieve justice, freedom, economic opportunities, and democracy; and the challenges of postcolonial Africa. The first section of the course focuses on the European conquest of Africa and the effects of colonial rule on African politics, economies, cultures, and communities. The second section looks at the rise of African nationalism and the methods liberation movements used to fight colonial rule. The third section examines the challenges of postcolonial Africa - economic, social, and political challenges. The course will provide students with a historical framework for analyzing and assessing the legacies of colonialism to help them critically think about the postcolonial challenges African countries face today.
Distribution Area
Arts and Humanities-or-Global Learning
Credits
1 course
Course Description
This course introduces students to the major African issues, debates, and historical patterns of social diversity, Africa's role in the globalizing world, and economic and political developments in Africa in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. The course explores a sequence of significant themes in contemporary Africa, including terrorism; dictatorships, and contested elections in Africa; Africa's position in the global economy; women and the youth's political and economic participation; climate change; health care transformations; the state of the entertainment industry in Africa; social media and everyday life in Africa; Gender and Sexuality; the state of the media in Africa: and the efforts by different ethnic, religious, LGBTQIA+, political, and racial groups to achieve equality, recognition, and constitutional protections. We will examine African governments' and citizens' responses to global issues impacting local economies, governance, cultures, social movements, natural resources management, and civil and political rights. The course will provide students with a historical framework for analyzing and assessing Africa's civil society, cultures, development, economies, and politics to help them critically think about the news and other information they encounter in their everyday life about Africa and Africans.
Distribution Area
Arts and Humanities-or-Global Learning
Credits
1 course
Course Description
A survey of the black experience in the United States focusing on ways African Americans reacted individually and collectively to their condition and how they have contributed to the development of the United States.
Distribution Area
Power Privilege and Diversity
Credits
1 course
Course Description
An exploration of the historical foundations and the development of Black life in Africa and its later diffusion in the Black Diaspora. Its purview will range from pre-colonial dynamics to the more contemporary manifestations of global Black history in North America, Europe, the Caribbean, Central America, Latin America and Melanesia. Topics include: African cultures before European contact, the slave trade and its impact on Africa and the Atlantic economy, the middle passage, internal migration in Africa and case studies of the creation of Diasporic communities and cultures.
Distribution Area
Social Science-or-Power Privilege and Diversity
Credits
1 course
Course Description
From the 1850s to the 1870s, monumental struggles over slavery, race, political authority, economy, the Constitution, and the very dimensions of the United States roiled North America. A bloody sectional war and the emancipation of millions of African Americans catalyzed profound change. A highly contested process to restructure the nation on a continental scale ensued. To comprehend these revolutionary times, we weave together the stories of the freedom seekers and enslavers, soldiers and civilians, the battlefront and the home front. The inspiring potential and tragic limits of what Lincoln called a 'new birth of freedom' drive our inquiry.
Credits
1 course
Course Description
This course is for first-year Management Fellows. Objectives include: enhancing student appreciation for the contribution of a liberal arts education to the development of business leaders, developing a more complete understanding of business and entrepreneurship from an economic and philosophical perspective, advancing critical thinking and communication skills through intellectual engagement, preparing the foundation of life-long networking and community engagement, developing a working knowledge of Microsoft Excel, and developing a deeper insight into the businesses associated with the Management Fellows program. Pedagogies employed include workshops, presentations, seminar-style discussions of various readings (Adam Smith, John Locke, Mao Yushi, J.S. Mill, and others), and networking with alumni.
Credits
0.5 course
Course Description
This course will serves as an introduction to the American political system. The three branches of the national government and the roles of political parties, elections, public opinion, interest groups, and other political actors will be addressed.
Distribution Area
Social Science-or-Power Privilege and Diversity
Credits
1 course
Course Description
This course explores the centrality and significance of race in the modern American political system. The course covers, but is not limited to, the role of race in electoral politics, urban politics, the political and social attitudes of Americans and the debates about the scope and function of the federal government.
Distribution Area
Social Science-or-Power Privilege and Diversity
Credits
1 course
Course Description
An exploration of the relationship between Caribbean religious traditions and culture in the development of Caribbean identity and nationhood. It focuses on how the major world religions were modified through the encounter between peoples of Amerindian, African, European and Asian descent. Further, it studies the impact of slavery, emigration, colonialism, and globalization on the emergence of indigenous Caribbean religious traditions (Vodun, Santeria, Rastafari).
Distribution Area
Arts and Humanities-or-Global Learning
Credits
1 course
Course Description
This course is a close study and analysis of the religious core and communicative rationality in Bob Marley's life and music. It develops the intersections between Caribbean religion and culture based on Marley's affiliation to Rastafari.
Distribution Area
Arts and Humanities-or-Power Privilege and Diversity
Credits
1 course
Course Description
This course explores the origins, changes and possible futures of racial and ethnic relations. It is concerned with both the development of sociological explanations of ethnic and racial conflict, competition and cooperation as well as with practical approaches to improving inter-group relations. The course surveys global and historical patterns of inter-group relations but focuses on late 20th-century and early 21st-century United States.
Distribution Area
Social Science-or-Power Privilege and Diversity
Prerequisites
SOC 100 or sophomore standing.
Credits
1 course
Contact Us
Africana Studies
Leveraging the resources of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, the Africana studies major and minor at 91传媒 are housed in the Department of Africana Studies. This department challenges students to explore issues of race, difference, identity and subject formation and to understand the collective experience of black people in today’s world.
Jamie Stuckey
- jamiepell-stuckey@depauw.edu
- (765) 658-6309
-
100 East Seminary Street
Greencastle, IN 46135