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African and African American Studies

I. SURVEY AND EXPERIMENTAL COURSES

7. First Year Seminar

Consult special listings

10. Introduction to African American Studies

11W: 10A 11F: 10

A multidisciplinary investigation into the lives and cultures of people of African descent in the Americas. Topics may include: the African background, religion and the Black church, popular culture, slavery and resistance, morality and literacy, the Civil Rights Movement, Black nationalism, theories of race and race relations. Dist: SOC; WCult: CI. Chaney, Favor.

11. Introduction to African Studies

11W: 11, may also be offered in 12W

Multidisciplinary in scope, the course will survey critical social change in African cultures and civilizations through a study of history, art, literature, religion, economy, and politics, paying particular attention to the cultural impact of colonial rule on contemporary societies and states. Dist: SOC; WCult: NW. Trumbull.

12. Black America to the Civil War (Identical to, and described under, History 16)

Not offered in the period 10F through 12S

Dist: SOC; WCult: W.

13. Black America Since the Civil War (Identical to, and described under, History 17)

12W: 11

Dist: SOC; WCult: W. Rickford.

14. Pre-Colonial African History (Identical to, and described under, History 5.1)

11W: 10

Dist: SOC; WCult: NW. Sackeyfio.

15. History of Africa Since 1800 (Identical to, and described under, History 66)

11S: 2A

Dist: SOC; WCult: NW. Sackeyfio.

16. History, Culture and Society: The Many Faces of Latin America (Identical to Latin American and Caribbean Studies 4)

11W: 10 12W: 10A

The Spanish discovery and conquest of this continent created Latin America and the Caribbean out of the diverse and complex realities of the pre-Columbian world. Since colonial times Latin American and Caribbean cultures have developed against a background of cultural repression, racial conflict, political domination, colonial exploitation, and gender inequality. And yet, in the midst of all this turmoil, Latin America and the Caribbean have produced an extraordinary variety and wealth of artistic creations, ranging from literature to the visual arts, from music to film. In this course we will turn to some of the works by Latin American and Caribbean artists and writers in an attempt to illuminate and explore some of the wonders of the cultural dynamics that shape the many faces of what we call Latin America and the Caribbean. Dist: LIT; WCult: NW. Franconi, Pastor (11W), Buéno, Walker (12W).

17. Slave Resistance in the United States from the Colonial Era to the Civil War (Identical to, and described under, History 39)

Not offered in the period 10F through 12S

Dist: SOC; WCult: W.

19. Africa and the World (Identical to, and described under, History 5.8)

11S: 11 12S: 10

Dist: SOC or INT; WCult: NW. Trumbull.

II. AFRICAN AMERICAN COURSES

23. Caribbean History (Identical to History 86)

Not offered in the period from 10F through 12S

Dist: SOC; WCult: NW.

24. The Black Radical Tradition in America (Identical to, and described under, History 37)

11W: 11 12S: 10A

Dist: SOC; WCult: W. Rickford.

25. Constructing Black Womanhood (Identical to, and described under, Sociology 46 and Women’s and Gender Studies 33)

11W, 12W: 2

Dist: SOC; WCult: CI. King.

26. Toni Morrison (Identical to English 72)

Not offered in 2010-2011, may be offered in 2011-2012

Dist: LIT; WCult: W. Vasquez.

26.2 Black Movements (Identical to English 67)

Not offered in the period 10F through 12S

Dist: LIT; WCult: CI (pending faculty approval). Colbert.

31. Black Theater, U.S.A. (Identical to, and described under, Theater 22)

Not offered in the period 10F through 12S

Dist: ART; WCult: CI. Colbert.

33. The African American Intellectual

Not offered in the period 10F through 12S

A cross-disciplinary study of the contributions and problems of African American intellectuals in the United States. Given time constraints, we will focus primarily on twentieth century figures and scholarship, to understand works by such thinkers as W.E.B. DuBois, Alain Locke, Zora Hurston, Carter Woodson, Ralph Ellison, E. Franklin Frazier, Angela Davis, Stephen Carter, Derrick Bell, Cornel West and Patricia Williams, as well as the social and intellectual contexts in which they found, and continue to find, themselves. Dist: SOC; WCult: CI. Favor.

34. Early Black American Literature (Identical to, and described under, English 43)

10F: 12, may also be offered in 2011-2012

Dist: LIT; WCult: W. Favor.

35. Modern Black American Literature (Identical to, and described under, English 49)

Not offered in the period 10F through 12S

Dist: LIT; WCult: W. Vasquez.

36. African American Fiction Since 1990 (Identical to, and described under, English 67.3)

Not offered in the period 10F through 12S

Dist: LIT. Favor.

37. Introduction to Black Religion in the United States (Identical to Religion 17)

Not offered in the period 10F through 12S

Dist: TMV; WCult: NW.

39. History of Jazz (Identical to, and described under, Music 5)

10F, 11F: 10A

Dist: ART; WCult: W. Haas.

Associated Courses:

Geography 25 Social Justice and the City

Geography 43 Geographies of Latin America

III. AFRICAN COURSES

40. Gender Identities and Politics in Africa (Identical to Women’s and Gender Studies 34.2)

12W: 2A

This interdisciplinary course explores the constructions of gender identities in different African sociocultural contexts. The emphasis is on contemporary Africa, although we will discuss some of the historical frameworks of these identities. We will read historical accounts of gender in some pre-colonial African societies, investigate the impact of colonialism, and examine gender in some anticolonial movements. We will also analyze gender in urban and rural contexts, and address such questions as homosexuality and gay rights. Dist: INT; WCult: CI. Coly.

44. Contemporary Africa: Exploding Myths, Engaging Realities (Identical to, and described under, Anthropology 36)

11S: 2

Dist: SOC; WCult: CI. Igoe.

45. Africa: Ecology and Development (Identical to, and described under, Geography 40)

Not offered in the period 10F through 12S

Dist: SOC or INT; WCult: NW. Freidberg.

46. History of Modern South Africa (Identical to, and described under, History 67)

11W: 12 11F: 10

Dist: SOC; WCult: NW. Sackeyfio.

47. Politics and Political Economies in Africa (Identical to Government 44)

Not offered in the period 10F through 12S

Dist: SOC; WCult: NW.

50. Colonialism, Development and the Environment in Asia and Africa (Identical to, and described under, History 75 and Environmental Studies 45)

10F: 12

Dist: INT or SOC; WCult: NW. Haynes.

51. African Literatures: Masterpieces of Literatures from Africa (Identical to, and described under, Comparative Literature 51 and English 67)

11S: 10A

Dist: LIT or INT; WCult: NW. Coly.

52. The History of North Africa from the Arrival of Islam to the Present (Identical to, and described under, History 68)

12S: 12

Dist:SOC; WCult: NW. Trumbull.

53. Islam in Africa (Identical to, and described under, History 69)

11S: 2 12W: 2A

Dist: SOC; WCult: NW. Trumbull.

54. Topics in African Theater and Performance (Identical to, and described under, Theater 23)

11W: 2A 12W:Arrange

Dist: ART; WCult: NW. Edmondson.

55. African Cinema (Identical to Film and Media Studies 42)

11S: 2A

This course focuses on the cinemas of Francophone Africa. We will begin with an examination of the early Western film representations of Africans as wild savages. We will then proceed to examine how African filmmakers have challenged those images by creating new depictions of their societies. We will explore the social, historical, and political contexts of these films as well as examine each of them closely to better understand their aesthetic and narrative characteristics. Dist: ART; WCult: NW. Coly.

Associated Courses:

Environmental Studies 40, Foreign Study in Environment Problems I

Environmental Studies 42, Foreign Study in Environment Problems II

Geography 16, The Political Economy of Development

IV. AFRICAN DIASPORA AND COMPARATIVE STUDIES

63. Black Atlantic (Identical to English 66)

Not offered in the period 10F through 12S

Dist: LIT; WCult: W.

65. Introduction to Postcolonial Literature (Identical to, and described under, English 58)

Not offered in the period 10F through 11S, may be offered in 2011-2012

Dist: LIT or INT; WCult: NW. Giri.

67. Colonial and Postcolonial Masculinities (Identical to, and described under, Comparative Literature 67, English 63, and Women’s and Gender Studies 52.1)

12S: 2A

Dist: LIT. Coly.

Associated Courses:

French 70, Francophone Literature (If related to the African diaspora)

History 6, Guerrilla Warfare, Counter-Insurgency and Movements of National Liberation in Asia, Africa and Latin America

Music 4, Global Sounds

Music 51, Oral Tradition Musicianship

Sociology 22, The Sociology of International Development

V. SPECIAL TOPICS IN AAAS

80.1 Civil Rights in the United States in the 20th Century (Identical to, and described under, History 6)

11W: 2

Dist: SOC; WCult: W. Rickford.

80.2 Black Brazilian Women Writers

11W: 3B

This course focuses on the contemporary literary production by women of African ancestry in Brazil. The genres covered will be poetry, short story and novel. Students will engage selected literary texts focusing of issues such as slavery and race relations, the construction of family, class divisions and spatial marginality, industrialization, and gender and sexuality politics. Authors will include the likes of Conceição Evaristo and Miriam Alves, two of the most important contemporary Afro-Brazilian literary voices, among others. Salgueiro.

80.3 Blacks in Hollywood Film

11X: 10A

This class is designed to explore the development, treatment and promulgation of created visual images relative to the presentation and representation of Blacks in Hollywood film from the genesis of feature-length film, roughly 1915, to filmic productions of the early 21st century. In so doing, the class will examine critically Hollywood’s cinematic treatment of Blacks focusing on the following: patriarchal masculinity, Black masculinity, Black womanhood, and the Black male/White female paradigm. Tillis.

83.1 Afro-Brazilian Diasporic Literature in the Americas (Identical to, and described under, Latin American and Caribbean Studies 63, and Comparative Literature 52)

10F: 12

Dist: LIT; WCult: CI. Smolin.

83.2 Food and the African World (Identical to Geography 80)

10F: 2A

African plants, cuisines and knowledge have long enriched the world’s diets and agrarian economies, yet in contemporary Africa millions suffer from hunger. This course explores both aspects of Africa’s food history, as well as the connections between them. The topics covered include traditional African foodways and their transatlantic and global spread, modern Africa’s experience of famine and food aid, and questions of race and food rights in the United States. Dist: SOC or INT; WCult: NW. Freidberg.

AAAS 83.3, Slavery and Emancipation in Latin America and the Caribbean,

11S: 11

For over 300 years, Africans were transported to Latin America and the Caribbean to work as enslaved laborers. This course will examine the history of African slavery in the region from the beginning of the Atlantic slave trade to the abolition of slavery in Brazil in 1888. For each class session, students will review primary source documents such as autobiographies, slave codes, plantation journals, visual images, and anti-slavery tracts as well as historical scholarship. Goldthree.

85. Afro-Latin American Literature in Translation

11F: 2-5pm, Wednesday

This course examines the development of Afro-Latin American literature. Texts represent a sampling of the literary production of writers of African ancestry from Cuba, Brazil, the Dominican Republic, Colombia, Uruguay, and Peru. Works will be read as literary artifacts attesting to the history of Blacks in Latin America. The major focus of analysis of literary texts will be socio-cultural and historical in order to offer an interdisciplinary approach to literary studies. Tillis.

86. Nationalism and Revolution in the Caribbean (Identical to Latin American and Caribbean Studies 54 and History 6)

11S: 10A

The islands of the Caribbean have served as the site for two of the most significant revolutionary upheavals of the modern era—the Haitian Revolution and the Cuban Revolution—and have produced anti-colonial luminaries such as José Marti, Frantz Fanon, Marcus Garvey, and Claudia Jones. This course will explore the origin, trajectory, and outcome of nationalist struggles in the Caribbean from the eighteenth-century to the present through primary and secondary materials, memoirs, fiction, and film. Dist: SOC or INT; WCult: NW. Goldthree.

87. Slavery in the Empire: Brazilian Literature in the Nineteenth Century and Beyond (Identical to, and described under, Latin American and Caribbean Studies 61)

11F: 2

Dist: LIT; WCult: NW. Smolin.

88. United States Afro-Latino Literature (Identical to Latino Studies 43 and Comparative Literature 57)

11S:2-5pm, Wednesday

This course proposes to examine literature written by US citizens of African and Spanish- Caribbean ancestry. This growing group of writers represents new perspectives that are challenging while broadening the scope, definition and imaginary conception of “American literature,” specifically in North America. Laden with neo-cartographies of the home-space, the works of writers such as Marta Vega, Loida Maritza Perez, and Nelly Rosario challenge institutionalized notions of space, place, location, home, nation, culture, citizenship and identity. Dist: LIT. Tillis.

89. Independent Study in African and African American Studies

All terms: Arrange

Available to students who wish to independently explore aspects of African and African American Studies which are not included in courses currently offered at Dartmouth. Open to qualified students with permission of the course instructor and the Chair. (Obtain Proposal Form in the program office.) No student may take more than two such courses without the approval of the program. Open to sophomores, juniors, and seniors. The AAAS faculty.

90-96. Senior Seminars in African and African American Studies

90.1 Gender and Race in Latin America (Identical to Latin American and Caribbean Studies 80)

11S: 2

This course looks at how different ideas about gender and race have shaped Latin American politics in the 20th and 21st centuries. We will focus on the evolution of these categories as the basis for political incorporation and representation over time, instances of collective mobilization around gender and race, the creation and impact of law and public policy, and political institutions as they relate to race and gender. Dist: SOC or INT; WCult: NW. Mollett.

90.2 Dave the Potter: Slavery Between Pots and Poems

11F: 11

This course examines the work of David Drake, a South Carolinian slave who made some of the largest ceramic storage vessels of this region, signing them and etching sayings and poems onto them as well. This seminar engages with Drake’s poetry-pottery through critical and historical research, interpretive writing, and our own creative adventures in ceramic handicrafts. As a culminating assignment, students will contribute chapters to a scholarly book on Drake, which the professor shall edit. Chaney.

97. Senior Independent Research in African and African American Studies

All Terms: Arrange

For senior African and African American Studies majors toward the culminating experience, with permission of selected instructor and the Chair. (Obtain Proposal Form in the program office.)

98-99. Honors Thesis in African and African American Studies

Two Terms of Senior Year: Arrange

The honors student will pursue the project under guidance of a selected faculty member and with permission of the Chair. See “A Guide to Honors in African and African American Studies” in the program office.