Difference and Justice in the World
Last updated: July 10, 2019 at 1:42 PM
Objectives
As part of the global engagement requirement, difference and justice in the world courses will allow students to focus on the social, cultural, political, environmental and economic diversity of human experience within the global/transnational context. Looking beyond singular or dominant understandings of the world, students will engage in the study of peoples outside the U.S., their histories, arts, cultures, politics, economies, environments, and religions.
Requirement Beginning Fall 2019
For students entering Brandeis beginning fall 2019, students will complete one semester course that satisfies the difference and justice in the world requirement. Courses that satisfy the requirement in a particular semester are designated "djw" in the Schedule of Classes for that semester.
There is no difference and justice in the world requirement for students entering Brandeis prior to fall 2019.
Courses of Instruction
(1-99) Primarily for Undergraduate Students
AAAS/ENG
80a
Black Looks: The Promise and Perils of Photography
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Formerly offered as ENG 80a.
Explores photography and Africans, African-Americans and Caribbean people, from the mid-nineteenth century to the present. This course will examine fiction that refers to the photograph; various photographic archives; and theorists on photography and looking. Usually offered every third year.
ANTH
1a
Introduction to the Comparative Study of Human Societies
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Examines the ways human beings construct their lives in a variety of societies. Includes the study of the concept of culture, kinship, and social organization, political economy, gender and sexuality, religion and ritual, symbols and language, social inequalities and social change, and globalization. Consideration of anthropological research methods and approaches to cross-cultural analysis. Usually offered every semester.
COML/ENG
70b
Environmental Film, Environmental Justice
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Examines films that address nature, environmental crisis, and green activism. Asks how world cinema can best advance the goals of social and environmental justice. Includes films by major directors and festival award winners. Usually offered every third year.
ECON
23a
Latin American Economic Development
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Prerequisite: ECON 2a or ECON 10a.
Introductory survey of the economic, financial, and institutional forces that drive Latin American economic development. The course combines economic theory, empirical evidence, and a historical approach to develop students' ability to analyze these forces. Topics include poverty and inequality, human capital, geographical determinants, institutions, debt crises and the macroeconomy. Usually offered every second year.
ECON
65b
Governance, Bureaucracy and Economic Development
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Prerequisite: ECON 2a or ECON 10a.
Analyzes the role of institutions, governance, and bureaucracy in economic development. Topics include transaction costs, role of institutions, governance performance indicators, causes and consequences of corruption, anti-corruption policies, principal-agent theory and bureaucratic behavior. The course also includes a detailed case study on the role of governance and bureaucratic reforms in China's economic success since 1980. Usually offered every second year.
ENG
12a
Decolonizing Tongues: Language in African Literature
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A comparative exploration of the politics of language in postcolonial African Literature and its impact on literary production. It locates the language question in anglophone and francophone African Literature within the context political independence. Usually offered every third year.
ENG
20a
Bollywood: Popular Film, Genre, and Society
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An introduction to popular Hindi cinema through a survey of the most important Bollywood films from the 1950s until today. Topics include melodrama, song and dance, love and sex, stardom, nationalism, religion, diasporic migration, and globalization. Usually offered every third year.
ENG
32a
21st-Century Global Fiction: A Basic Course
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Offers an introduction to 21st-century global fiction in English. What is fiction and how does it illuminate contemporary issues such as migration, terrorism, and climate change? Authors include Zadie Smith, Amitav Ghosh, Chimamanda Adichie, Mohsin Hamid, J.M. Coetzee and others. Usually offered every third year.
ENG
43b
Medieval Play: Drama, LARP, and Video Games
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Works with a selection of medieval mystery plays, medieval-themed video games and participatory live-action role play to explore: play structures and design; alternative-world creation by way of immersion; the significance of gender, race, disability, and sexuality in performance. Usually offered every third year.
ENG
52a
Refugee Stories, Refugee Lives
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Examines the functions of storytelling in the refugee crisis. Its main objective is to further students' understanding of the political dimensions of storytelling. The course explores how reworking of reality enable people to question State and social structures. Usually offered every third year.
ENG
62b
Contemporary African Literature, Global Perspectives
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What is "African" in African literature when the majority of writers are somehow removed from the African societies they portray? How do expatriate writers represent African subjectivities and cultures at the intersection of Diaspora and globalization? Who reads the works produced by these writers? Usually offered every third year.
ENG
66b
Contemporary Global Dystopias
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Explores the sources, moods, and effects of dystopian fiction from around the world. Usually offered every third year.
ENVS
25a
Environmental Dimensions of Sustainable Development in Puerto Rico
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Delves into the analysis of the environmental aspects most linked to the objectives of sustainable development. Topics related to energy, resource depletion, environmental pollution, among others, are studied. The course incorporates research exercises and immersion activities, and invites the student to actively reflect on the environmental dimensions of their environment in Puerto Rico and the Caribbean. In addition, it stimulates knowledge of successful international environmental protection experiences and the management of solutions that incorporate elements of design, entrepreneurship, data analysis, and technology. Usually offered every second year.
ENVS
49a
Conservation Politics
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Examines theories and practices of nature conservation from interdisciplinary social science and humanistic perspectives. Surveys a range of moral, political, cultural and economic dilemmas facing conservationists. Explores ways to balance competing ethical imperatives to protect biodiversity and respect human rights. Usually offered every year.
FA
33b
Islamic Art and Architecture
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Through case studies of cities, sites, and monuments, the course presents an overview of the art and the architecture of the Islamic world beginning from the seventh century up to the present. Some of the themes include, but are not limited to, Islamic material culture, orientalist imaginations, systems of governance and the colonial present, search for the local identity, urban modernity and nationalism, and globalization. Usually offered every second year.
FA
77b
Twentieth-Century and Contemporary Latin American Art
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This course is a selective survey of the outstanding figures and movements that have made significant contributions to the history of Latin American art. Special focus will be on Mexican, Argentinean, Brazilian, Venezuelan and Cuban artists. Usually offered every second year.
FA/NEJS
43a
Middle Eastern Cities: Navigating the Transition from Empires to Nation-States and the Globalized Wo
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Offers an integrated exploration of Middle Eastern literature, urbanism, and architecture. It delves into the vibrant urban heritage of the Middle East, spanning from ancient metropolises like Cairo, Damascus, Istanbul, Jerusalem, and Baghdad. By engaging in a comprehensive examination of Middle Eastern cities, students will acquire profound insights into the region's multifaceted histories, including the impacts of colonialism, imperialism, nation-state formation, and the dynamics within our increasingly globalized world. Usually offered every second year.
HISP
85a
Introduction to U.S. Latinx Literatures and Cultures
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Introduces students to U.S. Latinx cultural productions and to the interdisciplinary questions that concern U.S. Latinx communities. Latinxs have played a vital role in the history, politics, and cultures of the United States. U.S. Latinx literary works, in particular, have established important socio-historical and aesthetic networks that highlight Latinx expression and lived experiences, engaging with issues including biculturalism, language, citizenship, systems of value, and intersectional identity. Though the Latinx literary tradition spans more than 400 years, this course will focus on 20th and 21st century texts that decolonize nationalist approaches to Latinidad(es) and therefore challenge existing Latinx literary 'canons.' Taught in English. Usually offered every year.
HIST
56b
Rethinking World History (to 1960)
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An introductory survey of world history, from the dawn of "civilization" to c.1960. Topics include the establishment and rivalry of political communities, the development of material life, and the historical formation of cultural identities. Usually offered every year.
HIST
66a
History of South Asia (2500 BCE - 1971)
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Introduces South Asian history from the earliest civilizations to the independence of India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. Surveys the formation of religious traditions, the establishment of kingdoms and empires, colonialism and its consequences, and post-independence political and economic development. Usually offered every second year.
HIST
71a
Latin American and Caribbean History I: Colonialism, Slavery, Freedom
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Studies colonialism in Latin America and Caribbean, focusing on coerced labor and struggles for freedom as defining features of the period: conquest; Indigenous, African, and Asian labor; colonial institutions and economics; Independence and revolutionary movements. Usually offered every year.
HIST
71b
Latin American and Caribbean History II: Modernity, Medicine, Sexuality
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Studies the idea of "modernity" in Latin America and Caribbean, centered on roles of health and human reproduction in definitions of the "modern" citizen: post-slavery labor, race and national identity; modern politics and economics; transnational relations. Usually offered every year.
HIST
80a
Introduction to East Asian Civilization
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A selective introduction to the development of forms of thought, social and political institutions, and distinctive cultural contributions of China and Japan from early times to the beginning of the nineteenth century. Usually offered every year.
HUM
7a
Challenges of Power and the Self: Visual Arts and Literature
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Enrollment limited to Humanities Fellows.
Uses visual art and literature to consider how ideas of the "self" and the "other" are reformulated during decolonization, the cold war, and the world order that followed. Using the breakdown of the British Empire and the consolidation of American reach from World War II onward, the course will examine gender, race, identity, colonization, postcoloniality, and sexuality in/as representation and narrative. This course will examine the text and image as separate, parallel, and yet conjoined and overlapping threads of cultural production. How does literature and art create and reflect the image, the moment, the individual or history? How is art narrative and how does the novel or the poem evoke an image, a scene, or a sequence of events? Usually offered every second year.
IGS
10a
Introduction to International and Global Studies
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"Globalization" touches us more every day. Introduces the challenges of globalization to national and international governance, economic success, individual and group identities, cultural diversity, the environment, and inequalities within and between nations, regions of the globe, gender, and race. Usually offered every year.
NEJS
26b
Jewish Environmental Ethics
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Explores the ways in which Jewish ethics can inform contemporary discussion of environmental issues, teaches how to read texts from a regularly distant and unfamiliar past in light of burning questions today, and in so doing offers an overview of Jewish Ethics as a whole. The readings will be a mix of primary sources (e.g., Bible, philosophers), and secondary readings by contemporary scholars and thinkers. Among the contemporary issues we will deal with are the consumption, biodiversity, animals, environmental justice, and how we can hopefully add Jewish ideas and historical experience to our toolkit. Usually offered every second year.
NEJS
85a
Defining Status in the Modern State: Citizens, Nationals and Refugees
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Examines terms like 'citizen,' 'national,' 'refugee,' 'stateless,' and 'indigenous' using theory, law, and historic case studies to understand the different relationships between states and people. From voting, to travel, to social security, our basic rights are determined by how a state views our legal status. In the current era of border control, refugee crises, and resurgent nationalism, a critical study of citizenship is more relevant than ever. This course will help students understand the legal terms used to categorize humanity and appreciate the complexities and limitations of those definitions in practice. Special one-time offering, spring 2021.
WGS
6b
Sexuality and Queer Studies
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May not be taken for credit by students who took SQS 6b in prior years.
Examines cross-cultural and historical perspectives on sexual meanings, experiences, representations, and activist movements within a framework forged by contemporary critical theories of gender and sexuality. Usually offered every year.
(100-199) For Both Undergraduate and Graduate Students
AAAS
104a
Colorism in Paradise
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Introduces the concept of colorism, its relationship to racism, and consider the prevalence of color over race as a preferred identity and socio-political category across Latin America and the Caribbean. The course requires students to read interdisciplinary academic texts and utilize critical race and social praxeology theory to interrogate specific, national contexts within the Latin American and Caribbean region. Special one-time offering, Fall 2021.
AAAS
115a
Introduction to African History
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Explores the history of African societies from their earliest beginnings to the present era. Topics include African participation in antiquity as well as early Christianity and preindustrial political, economic, and cultural developments. Usually offered every year.
AAAS
120a
African History in Real Time
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This information literacy-driven course equips students with the skills to place current events in Africa in their historical context. Collectively the class builds 5-6 distinct course modules which entail sourcing and evaluating current news stories from a range of media outlets, selecting those that merit in-depth historical analysis, and developing a syllabus for each one. Usually offered every second year.
AAAS
127a
African Refugees
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An in-depth study of African refugees in dynamic contexts, and their centrality to the understanding and analysis of key issues in the politics, history, and international relations of African States. Usually offered every year.
AAAS
128b
Contemporary Africa
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A broad synopsis of the dynamic character of contemporary Africa and key current issues dominating the continent. Designed for students from all disciplines, the course will emphasize the utilization of critical thinking skills to consider the place and future of Africa in today's highly globalized world. Usually offered every second year.
AAAS
131b
African Women's and Gender Studies
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Introduction to the genealogy, epistemology, and pedagogy of African Women's and Gender Studies. Students examine a range of gendered experiences in Africa by applying interdisciplinary frames from feminist theory, history, queer studies, development studies, political science, economics, peace studies, literary, art and performance studies, and so on. Students critically evaluate scholarship that deconstructs static notions about women and gender in Africa by centering decolonial perspectives on the topics covered. Usually offered every second year.
AAAS
134b
Novel and Film of the African Diaspora
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Writers and filmmakers, who are usually examined separately under national or regional canonical categories such as "(North) American," "Latin American," "African," "British," or "Caribbean," are brought together here to examine transnational identities and investments in "authentic," "African," or "black" identities. Usually offered every third year.
AAAS
145b
The Transformative Life and Politics of Malcolm X
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How did the world shape Malcolm X and his radical political philosophy? In asking this question, we will study how Malcolm X's transformation from a hustler to a prisoner to a Black Muslim significantly shaped his revolutionary vision for liberation. His life experience gave him an understanding that Black liberation in the United States is entangled with Third World. For Malcolm, Islam became the link between Africa and Asia, and between those subjected to racial violence domestically and globally. As a class, we will situate Malcolm X within this complex history of anticolonialism and Civil Rights to learn how Malcolm X transformed himself to transform the world. Usually offered every year.
AAAS/WGS
122a
Carceral Arts
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With more than 10 million people imprisoned around the world in jails, detention centers, refuge camps, for-profit prisons, the effects of a carceral state are evident in many ways. Modern democratic societies often rely upon practices of incarceration, detention, and surveillance to demonstrate the power of a rule of law. This course will be an introductory study covering the social costs of the practice of incarceration across geographies and global communities. Special one-time offering, fall 2021.
AAPI/ANT
155a
Political Violence in the Philippines and Filipinx America
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Examines mass-scale political violence through an anthropological lens, with the Philippines as the main focus of study. Topics to be explored include: anthropological approaches to political violence and genocide; Spanish, Japanese, and US colonial regimes in the Philippines and Transpacific; the dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos; the “war on terror” in the Philippines and President Duterte’s “war on drugs;” COVID authoritarianism and environmental political violence; and how the colonial experiences of Philippine peoples—under the Spanish, US, and Japanese empires—have impacted and informed the lives of Filipinx Americans. Sources will include anthropological ethnographies, historical and theoretical texts, novels, media sources, and art works. Special one-time offering, fall 2024.
AAPI/ENG
102a
Science and Fiction of the Transpacific
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Taking as its start in the Cold War, when the fear of Communist ideology and scientific advances reached its feverish peak, and ending with today’s increasing amalgamation of machine and humanity, this course opens a field of cultural inquiry into more than half a century of Transpacific imaginations of technological progress and its shadow of social retrogression. We will think capaciously about issues of colonialism and extraction in the name of science in the Pacific, transnational racialized labor and its post-apocalyptic life, techno-orientalism and the fantasy of Asiatic cyborgs, artificial intelligence and its affective concerns, as well as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch and what it has to teach us about the human condition. In the wake of the highly racialized Covid-19 pandemic and its thorny questions regarding the health of the body politic, this course will introduce students to some of the most prominent examples of science fiction by diasporic Asian writers who have been inspired by the vast and multitudinous Transpacific as a space not only of conquest and competition but also of promise and possibility. Usually offered every third year.
AAPI/ENG
142a
Vietnam War Literature
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What we have come to call the Vietnam War fundamentally changed the histories of Vietnam and the U.S. through the Cold War to the present day. Taking a transnational approach, this course will examine various understandings of the war through major U.S., Vietnamese, and Vietnamese American literary texts and films from the mid-twentieth century to the present day. All course materials are in English; no Vietnamese language knowledge is required. Usually offered every third year.
AAPI/HIS
171a
The United States in the Pacific World
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How have U.S. imperial ventures—cultural, military, political, and economic—reconfigured local societies and geographies? What are the afterlives of those ventures and how have they reverberated between American society and the Pacific World? To answer these questions, this course explores the history of American incursion into places such as China, Hawai’i, the Philippines, Guam, Japan, Korea, Vietnam, and Sāmoa from the nineteenth century to present. We explore issues such as militarism and empire, labor and commerce, race and inequality, intimacy and sex, as well as migration, culture, and identity both in and across the Pacific Ocean. In focusing on the lasting legacies and human consequences of this contact, this course will allow students to: (1) think critically about US power (or what many scholars have called US empire) in the world, (2) deepen their understandings of the multiracial history and character of the United States, and (3) place the American experience within a larger global context. Usually offered every second year.
AAPI/HIS
186b
Legacies of the Korean War
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The Korean War is often called “The Forgotten War” within U.S. historical memory. But to Koreans, the war was too brutal to be forgotten—resulting in nearly 3 million civilian casualties, mass movement, national division, and the unprecedented militarization of North and South Korean society. Today, Koreans and Americans alike are living with the consequences of a war that is still ongoing. Through insightful and accessible scholarship, media and news reports, oral histories, memoir, and other cultural productions, this class explores the social memory, lasting legacies, and human consequences of the Korean War in a transnational context. Usually offered every second year.
AAPI/WGS
130a
Critical Adoption Studies
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Although adoption has a storied past spanning a range of diverse cultural, geographic, and temporal settings, the adopting of children across national boundaries is a relatively new phenomenon—one that emerged in tandem with America’s postwar expansion into Asia. Today, international adoption is a normalized and accepted institution that helps to express dominant US ideologies of humanitarianism, internationalism, and multiculturalism. But American’s sudden and unprecedented desire to adopt children from abroad was anything but natural, informed instead by the dynamic geopolitical imperatives of the early Cold War years. Since then, the discourse surrounding international adoption in the United States has been dominated by American social workers and adoptive parents, rather than adoptees themselves or those who lose children in adoption. This course interrogates the knowledge production about international adoption that has historically privileged perspectives from the receiving country or that of adoptive parents in particular. Instead, we investigate the cultural, ethnic, and racial experiences of transnationally, transracially adopted individuals as well as their birth families long overlooked in adoption studies. Usually offered every year.
AAS/AAPI
129b
The Spirit of Bandung: Afro-Asian Insurgency and Solidarity
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Examines the racial conflicts between Black and Asian American communities and develops an understanding of how the Afro-Asia political project is an insurgent coalitional project. To do this, we will explore the historical and contemporary struggles, insurgencies, and solidarities of Black and Asian peoples. We will learn together how Afro-Asia serves as an insurgent site of critique, resistance, and revolutionary aesthetics that connects distant geographies, diasporas, and Black and Asian peoples to a global anti-racist, anti-imperialist, and anti-colonial political imaginary. Usually offered every year.
AMST/LGLS
141b
Juvenile Justice: From Cradle to Custody
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After an overview of the basics of juvenile justice in the United States, this course examines the realities and remedies for the cradle-to-prison pipeline, analyzing this pattern from the perspectives of law, society, and economics, tracing the child's experience along that path, and exploring creative public solutions. Usually offered every second year.
ANTH
107a
Value, Wealth, and Power in a World without Money
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Examines the relationships of value, wealth, power, and authority in the Aztec Empire, Inka Empire and Classic period Maya kingdoms of the Prehispanic Americas. In so doing it raises questions about the origins of these relationships in modern states. Usually offered every third year.
ANTH
109a
Children, Parenting, and Education in Cross-Cultural Perspective
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Examines childcare techniques, beliefs about childhood and adolescence, and the objectives of school systems in different areas of the world, in order to illuminate cross-cultural similarities and differences in conceptions of personhood, identity, gender, class, race, nation, and the relationship between the individual and society. Usually offered every third year.
ANTH
111a
Aging in Cross-Cultural Perspective
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Examines the meanings and social arrangements given to aging in a diversity of societies, including the U.S., India, Japan and China. Key themes include: the diverse ways people envision and organize the life course, scholarly and popular models of successful aging, the medicalization of aging in the U.S., cultural perspectives on dementia, and the ways national aging policies and laws are profoundly influenced by particular cultural models. Usually offered every second year.
ANTH
119a
Conquests, Resistance, and Cultural Transformation in Mexico and Central America
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Examines the continuing negotiation of identity and power that were at the heart of tragedy and triumph for indigenous peoples in colonial Mexico and Central America, and which continue in the modern states of Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, and Honduras. Usually offered every second year.
ANTH
123b
Lost Voices: The Historical Archaeology of Oppression and Exploitation
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Historical archaeology utilizes written records and oral traditions to contextualize places, things (cultural materials), and critical dialogues, past and present. This course introduces the primary tools and techniques historical archaeology uses to analyze past histories and material culture through a social lens, connecting archaeology with an exploration of the complex relationships between colonialism, consumerism, capitalism, slavery, race and freedom, structural racism, and the past, present, and future. Usually offered every three years.
ANTH
127a
Medicine, Body, and Culture
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Examines main areas of inquiry in medical anthropology, including medicine as a sociocultural construct, political and economic dimensions of suffering and health, patients and healers in comparative medical systems. Usually offered every year.
ANTH
130a
Filming Culture: Ethnographic and Documentary Filmmaking
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Introduces the history, theory and production of ethnographic and documentary filmmaking. This course traces how ethnographic and culturally-inflected filmmakers have sought to depict cultural difference, social organization, and lived experiences. Students will learn the basics of non-fiction film production. Usually offered every second year.
ANTH
131b
Latin America in Ethnographic Perspective
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Anthropology and LACLS majors and minors have priority for enrollment.
Examines issues in contemporary Latin America and the Spanish Caribbean from the perspective of sociocultural anthropology, based primarily on books and articles drawing on long-term ethnographic research. Topics may include: the Zapatista Rebellion in Mexico; tin mining and religion in Bolivia; mortuary cannibalism in the Amazon; the role of the Virgin of Guadalupe in Mexican national identity; love and marriage among young migrants from Mexico and the United States; weaving, beauty pageants, and jokes in Guatemala; and daily life in revolutionary Cuba. Usually offered every second year.
ANTH
134a
Contemporary South Asia
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Explores contemporary life in a region called South Asia (including India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal) through divergent histories, cultures, and concepts. Explores not just the region’s histories and cultures, but also a string of concepts and debates that simultaneously make and unmake the region as both a stable object of study as well as place on a map—including caste, Partition, ethnic conflict, religion, nationalism, gender, kinship, liberalization, postcoloniality, development, diaspora, and queerness. Usually offered every third year.
ANTH
140a
Human Rights in Global Perspective
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Explores a range of debates about human rights as a concept as well as the practice of human rights work. The human rights movement seeks the recognition of universal norms that transcend political and cultural difference while anthropology seeks to explore and analyze the great diversity of human life. To what extent can these two goals--advocating for universal norms and respecting cultural difference--be reconciled? The course examines cases from various parts of the world concerning: indigenous peoples, environment, health, gender, genocide/violence/nation-states and globalization. Usually offered every third year.
ANTH
140b
Critical Perspectives in Global Health
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What value systems and other sociocultural factors underlie global public health policy? How can anthropology shed light on debates about the best ways to improve health outcomes? This course examines issues from malaria to HIV/AIDS, from tobacco cessation to immunization. Usually offered every third year.
ANTH
142b
Global Pandemics: History, Society, and Policy
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Takes a biosocial approach to pandemics like HIV/AIDS, SARS, Ebola, and COVID-19 as shaped by culture, economics, politics, and history. Discussion focuses on how gender, sexuality, religion, and folk practices shape pandemic situations. Usually offered every fourth year.
ANTH
144a
The Anthropology of Gender
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Anthropology majors have priority for enrollment.
Explores gender, sexuality, and cultural systems from a comparative perspective. Topics may include rituals of masculinity and femininity, the vexing question of the universality of women's subordination, culturally-specific classifications of sexual orientation and gender identity, transnational feminisms, sex work, migrant labor, reproductive rights, and much more. Usually offered every year.
ANTH
147b
Archaeology of Indigenous Mesoamerica
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Traces the development of social complexity in pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, from initial colonization in the Late Pleistocene to the Spanish conquest in the sixteenth century. Reviews major societal transformations like food production, the role of competitive generosity and warfare in promoting social inequalities, and the rise of urban societies. It also examines indigenous social movements against Spanish colonialism, and considers the legacies and role of indigenous peoples in the contemporary nations of Middle America. Usually offered every third year.
ANTH
150a
Environmental Justice in Global Perspective
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Explores anthropological and humanistic approaches to understanding human-environment interactions, the global climate crisis, and environmental justice and climate justice movements highlighting how ecological crises have disproportionately impacted the poor, women and children, and Black, Indigenous, and other people of color. Key themes include: cultural understandings of “nature” and the “environment;” the cultural politics of race, indigeneity, and nature; militarism, empire, and the environment; feminist, queer and decolonial ecologies; Asian American and Pacific Islander environmental justice movements; and perspectives on the global climate crisis and the Anthropocene from the Global South. Usually offered every second year.
ANTH
155b
Psychological Anthropology
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An examination of the relationship between sociocultural systems and individual psychological processes with a critical evaluation of selected theories and studies bearing on this problem. Usually offered every second year.
ANTH
163a
Work and Labor in Global Context
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Takes an ethnographic approach to the study of work and labor in the context of the global economy. By looking at various industries and work cultures, we will explore the changing nature of labor and unpack how global processes affect workers in different economic sectors and regions of the world. Usually offered every second year.
ANTH
163b
Economies and Culture
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Prerequisite: ANTH 1a, ECON 2a, ECON 10a, or permission of the instructor.
We read in newspapers and books and hear in everyday discussion about "the economy," an identifiably separate sphere of human life with its own rules and principles and its own scholarly discipline (economics). The class starts with the premise that this "common sense" idea of the economy is only one among a number of possible perspectives on the ways people use resources to meet their basic and not-so-basic human needs. In the course, we draw on cross-cultural examples, and take a look at the cultural aspects of finance, corporations, and markets. Usually offered every second year.
ANTH
164a
Medicine and Religion
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djw
nw
ss
]
Considers the convergence of two cultural spheres that are normally treated as separate: medicine and religion. The course will examine their overlap, such as in healing and dying, as well as points of contention through historical and contemporary global ethnographies. Usually offered every second year.
ANTH
164b
Cancer and Community
[
djw
oc
ss
]
Addresses the biophysical and sociocultural dimensions of cancer: how can this dreaded disease be both alienating and associated with new forms of solidarity and social connection? We also consider how vulnerability to cancer is mediated by structures of social inequality. Usually offered every second year.
ANTH
165b
Anthropology of Death and Dying
[
djw
nw
ss
wi
]
Explores how different societies, including our own, conceptualize death and dying. Topics include the cultural construction of death, the effects of death on the social fabric, mourning and bereavement, and medical issues relating to the end of life. Usually offered every second year.
ANTH
166b
Queer Anthropology: Sexualities and Genders in Cross-Cultural Perspective
[
djw
oc
ss
]
When held together, “Queer Anthropology” might name something akin to a systematic way of cross-culturally studying human sexuality, gender, and desire that runs against the grain of dominant, socially held beliefs of normalcy (or what we now call normative/heteronormative). Sitting with this definition, we will chart the different worlds that Queer Anthropology might enable us to see and imagine. From transfeminine women who claim to experience pregnancy to sex between straight white Frat brothers to lesbian women finding community through anonymous love letters, this course moves between different scales and registers for talking about sexuality, gender, bodies, and difference. Together, we will trace Queer Anthropology's origins, examine its present moments, and speculate on its potential futures. Usually offered every second year.
ANTH
184b
Art in the Ancient World
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djw
nw
ss
]
A cross-cultural and diachronic exploration of art, focusing on the communicative aspects of visual aesthetics. The survey takes a broad view of how human societies deploy images and objects to foster identities, lure into consumption, generate political propaganda, engage in ritual, render sacred propositions tangible, and chart the character of the cosmos. Usually offered every second year.
ANTH/WGS
176a
Queer/Trans Theories from Elsewhere
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deis-us
djw
ss
]
Centers the notion of 'elsewhere' in relationship to studies of gender, sexuality, power, and desire. 'Elsewhere' refers not only to place, but also to body and method. While terms like 'queer' and 'transgender' have become useful analytics for exploring gender, sexuality, feeling, space, place, relationality, and time, the academic theories that focus on these categories have remained mostly within white, US- and European academic spaces. We invite students to trouble these analytics - that is, the categories themselves, the bodies that these analytics center, and the methods deployed in relation to these analytics - by reading diverse approaches to gender and sexuality. The semester's engagement with 'elsewhere' is divided into three units: body, place, and method. Our objective is to teach students to cultivate new ways of seeing and ultimately new theories of gender and sexuality through engaging with non-canonical perspectives. Usually offered every third year.
CAST
110b
Dance and Migration
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ca
deis-us
djw
nw
]
Highlights the aesthetic, political, social, and spiritual potency of dance forms and practices as they travel, transform, and are accorded meaning both domestically and transnationally, especially in situations (or in the aftermath) of extreme violence and cultural dislocation. Usually offered every third year.
CAST
125a
Confronting Gender-Based Violence
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ca
deis-us
djw
]
Engaging with multiple forms of creative expression and several different social change frameworks as they address and counter various aspects of gender-based violence in discrete cultural and historical contexts, this course explores gender-based violence as a grave violation of human rights, and the creative, innovative and meaningful methods through which particular communities and individuals counter such violation, including as it intersects with race and socioeconomic status. These methods might range from art installations in galleries or public spaces to formal theatrical productions, from the choreography of street protests to graffiti, films, pop-up concerts and podcasts, many involving survivors of gender-based violence in the creative process. We'll focus in particular on the experiences of those who identify as women, have been assigned to or perceived of as members of that category, or who identify and present as femme. Usually offered every third year.
CLAS
117b
Unmasking Cleopatra: Gender, Power, and A Legacy
[
djw
hum
]
A close examination of the history and world of Cleopatra VII of Egypt and her later reception. Usually offered every third year.
CLAS
140a
Women, Gender, and Sexuality in Greek and Roman Art and Text
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ca
djw
hum
wi
]
An exploration of women, gender, and sexuality in ancient Greece and Rome as the ideological bases of Western attitudes toward sex and gender. Includes, in some fashion, Greek and Roman myth, literature, art, architecture, and archaeological artifacts. Usually offered every third year.
CLAS
144b
Archaeological Ethics, Law and Cultural Heritage
[
djw
hum
]
The material culture of the past is imbued with a multitude of meanings and values for different groups, often at odds with each other. This class explores the ethical and legal context of heritage as well as the conservation, protection, or stewardship of our shared human experience. Usually offered every second year.
CLAS
156b
Living and Dying in Roman and Byzantine Egypt
[
djw
hum
wi
]
Examines the lived experiences of the Roman and Byzantine inhabitants of Egypt from the Nile valley to the desert oases. Topics include bioarchaeology, childhood, education, religious life, papyrology, important archaeological discoveries/collections, colonial archaeology, mortuary arts, and the journey from childhood to death in antiquity. Class will visit area museums to also examine the artifactual evidence of Roman and Byzantine Egypt. Usually offered every second year.
CLAS
157a
Ancient Egypt on the Silver Screen
[
djw
hum
]
Explores the relationship between Egyptian history and archaeology from the silent film era to the modern period. Topics include colonial archaeology, the 1922 discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb, modern Egyptian archaeology, race, and ethnicity in telling the story of Egypt's antiquity. Characters and periods examined include the Pyramid Builders of Giza, Joseph, Moses and the Exodus, Akhenaten and Nefertiti, and Cleopatra. Discussions will also examine how archaeological discoveries impacted design, costumes, and Egypt's power. All films and readings are in English or with English subtitles. Usually offered every third year.
CLAS/ENG
140a
Premodern Disability Studies Across the Mediterranean
[
djw
hum
]
Charts disability in the Mediterranean literary tradition, particularly through the ancient, medieval, and Renaissance periods. Students will learn to identify the literary markers of the disabled body as well as the underlying philosophical and theological idea of the body and soul and their purpose. Students will engage with the figures of alterity through the lens of disability studies. We will consider the concept of disability from a feminist vantage, particularly through the writings of Rosemarie Garland-Thomson and Susan Wendell, and as a shifting theoretical framework through the social, cultural, medical, and religious models of disability. Special one-time offering, fall 2023.
CLAS/ENG
148b
Faking Disability: Gender, Identity, and Performance in the Premodern Mediterranean
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djw
hum
]
Analyzes the intersection between performance, gender, and disability in the premodern Mediterranean. Students will reflect on the cross-purpose between individual bodies and the social history of disability legislation, mendicancy, and literature. Students will analyze representations of “real” and “faked” disability and of perceived identity in Giovanni Boccaccio’s Decameron and contextualize his work with readings from Homer, Marie de France, Heldris de Cornuälle, Chaucer, 1001 Nights, Boiardo, Ariosto, Shakespeare, Montaigne, Bacon, and Arcangela Tarabotti. Special one-time offering, spring 2024.
COML
105a
World Culture and Marxism
[
djw
hum
]
Exploring the linkage between Marxism and global modernity, this course emphasizes the deep entanglement of Marxism with twentieth-century literature and culture in both the so-called 'advanced West' and the vast world of 'underdevelopment' (such as China, Africa, and Latin America). In this course, students will see how Marxism has evolved as a revolutionary praxis in the crisis-fraught capitalist world system, and how it has inspired international literary movements and cultural debates aimed to subvert that system. With case studies drawn from across the world and readings selected from Marx's century all the way to our own, we will study the development of the international cultural left. We will also try to decenter (deprovincialize or de-Westernize) Marxism and understand it as an integral part of the translingual/transnational search for a different world'a world of common good and cultural equality. Usually offered every second year.
COML/ENG
191a
Environmental Aesthetics
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djw
hum
oc
]
Explores major schools of thought about nature, ecology, and art. Usually offered every third year.
EAS
120b
Southeast Asian Literature in English
[
djw
hum
]
Explores a range of Southeast Asian literary productions presented in English from the late nineteenth century to the present day. Materials include influential texts by Western observers (W. Somerset Maugham, Marguerite Duras) during the colonial period as well as major works by prominent postcolonial writers (Tash Aw, Eka Kurniawan, Mai Der Vang). We will consider the complex questions of colonialism, postcoloniality, twentieth-century wars, and regional identity formation under late capitalism through intersectional textual analysis. Usually offered every third year.
ECON
175a
Introduction to the Economics of Development
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djw
ss
]
Prerequisite: ECON 2a or ECON 10a or permission of the instructor. Does not count toward the upper-level elective requirement for the major in economics.
An introduction to various models of economic growth and development and evaluation of these perspectives from the experience of developing and industrial countries. Usually offered every second year.
ECON
176a
Health, Hunger, and the Household in Developing Countries
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djw
nw
ss
]
Prerequisites: ECON 80a and ECON 184b or permission of the instructor.
Examines aspects of poverty and nutrition that are confronted by households in low-income countries. Examines these issues primarily from a microeconomic perspective, although some macroeconomic angles are explored as well. Usually offered every second year.
ENG
102a
Ghosts of Race
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deis-us
djw
hum
]
Examines ghost stories and films from across the African Diasporic. Our discussions will consider a range of phenomena, from ancestral visitations and paranormal ethnography to haunted plantation tours. We will do so in order to highlight a variety of pressing themes within Black film and literatures, including trauma, memory, and xenophobia. Usually offered every third year.
ENG
111b
Postcolonial Theory
[
djw
hum
wi
]
Introduces students to key concepts in postcolonial theory. Traces the consequences of European colonialism for politics, culture and literature around the world, situates these within ongoing contemporary debates, and considers the usefulness of postcolonial theory for understanding the world today. Usually offered every third year.
ENG
127a
The Novel in India
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djw
hum
nw
]
Survey of the novel and short story of the Indian subcontinent, their formal experiments in context of nationalism and postcolonial history. Authors may include Tagore, Anand, Manto, Desani, Narayan, Desai, Devi, Rushdie, Roy, Mistry, and Chaudhuri. Usually offered every second year.
ENG
127b
Migrating Bodies, Migrating Texts
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djw
hum
nw
]
Beginning with the region's representation as a tabula rasa, examines the textual and visual constructions of the Caribbean as colony, homeland, backyard, paradise, and Babylon, and how the region's migrations have prompted ideas about evolution, hedonism, imperialism, nationalism, and diaspora. Usually offered every second year.
ENG
131b
Decolonial Pedagogy
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deis-us
djw
hum
]
Familiarizes students in the humanities, social sciences and public policy with an important strain of pedagogical theory, what Brazilian pedagogue Paulo Freire called 'education as the practice of freedom.' Topics will include diversity, equity and inclusion; embodied teaching and learning; authority, or the lack thereof; grading and assessment; and teaching reading and writing. Special one-time offering, fall 2020.
ENG
137b
Women and War
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djw
dl
hum
nw
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Examines how African women writers and filmmakers use testimony to bear witness to mass violence. How do these writers resist political and sociocultural silencing systems that reduce traumatic experience to silence, denial, and terror? Usually offered every third year.
ENG
142a
Blackness and Horror
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deis-us
djw
hum
]
Cannot be taken by students who previously took ENG 42a.
Examines the tense and transformative place that blackness has within the horror tradition, beginning with the late nineteenth century and moving into the present. In addition to documentaries and critical texts, we will analyze literature, films, and various aspects of material culture that explore the relationship between blackness and horror. Usually offered every third year.
ENG
142b
Black Queer Literatures
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deis-us
djw
hum
]
Examines various works by black queer critics and cultural producers, beginning in the early twentieth century and continuing into the present. While we largely focus upon the attempt to create the shared sense of a world and a tradition in common, we also attend to important divisions brought about by various forms and feelings of difference (including race, gender, class, nation, age and ability). Usually offered every third year.
ENG
143b
Chaucer's "Global and Refugee Canterbury Tales"
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deis-us
djw
dl
hum
]
Focuses on situating Chaucer, and particularly the Canterbury Tales, as a global
work. We will examine black feminist writers, playwrights, and poets of the African diaspora who have revised, adapted, extrapolated, and voiced the Canterbury Tales in Jamaican patois, Nigerian pidgin, and the S. London dialects of Brixton. Usually offered every second year.
ENG
144a
Medieval Travel Writing
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djw
dl
hum
]
Examining medieval travel literature from the Old English period to the early accounts of sixteenth-century explorers in the New World, this class will consider how the area of medieval travel writing exposes how race is framed in relation to gender, disability, multifaith encounters, critical animal studies, and thick mapping. Usually offered every third year.
ENG
152a
Indian Love Stories
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djw
dl
hum
nw
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Introduces students to writings on love, desire and sexuality from ancient India to the present. Topics include ancient eroticism, love in Urdu poetry, Gandhi's sexual asceticism, colonial regulation of sexuality, Bollywood, queer fiction and more. Usually offered every third year.
ENG
168b
Plotting Inheritance
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djw
dl
hum
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Examines novels published in the last two decades set during slavery and indenture in the British Caribbean, alongside (and as) theorizations of accumulation, inheritance, and freedom. How does fiction account for and plot material, moral and emotional worth? Usually offered every third year.
ENG
171b
African Feminism(s)
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djw
hum
nw
]
Examines African Feminism(s) as a literary and activist movement that underlines the need for centering African women's experiences in the study of African cultures, societies, and histories. Usually offered every third year.
ENVS
111a
Environmental and Climate Justice
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deis-us
djw
ss
]
The consequences of climate change are distributed unequally across different world regions, countries, and different social groups within countries. This course will introduce you to the major concepts and debates related to the unequal effects of climate change, including those of the ongoing efforts to combat climate change. We also explore several proposed programs and reforms meant to contribute to the goals of environmental and climate justice, including the social activists and movements working toward addressing social, economic, and political inequalities within ongoing efforts to address climate change. Usually offered every year.
ENVS
112b
Governing the Environmental Commons
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deis-us
djw
ss
wi
]
Introduction to the diverse meanings, forms, and claims about commons; theories and debates about sustainable governance of the commons. Learn about the histories of dispossessions, and ongoing collective actions and mobilizations to reclaim the commons for environmental & climate justice and ecological stewardship. Usually offered every year.
ENVS
130a
Environmental Politics in Latin America
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djw
ss
]
Provides an overview of socioenvironmental issues in Latin America. Explores the relationship between nature and development, and specifically, what difference climate change makes and to whom in the region. Topics include conservation, colonialism, indigenous rights, gender, socio-environmental movements, and North-South and regional inequalities. Usually offered every year.
ENVS
131b
The Political Economy of Global Climate Governance
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djw
ss
]
Climate finance and investment are usually treated primarily in the field of finance and led by international financial institutions. However, despite the promotion of large-scale investments in climate mitigation, adaptation and loss and damages, the larger political economy of climate governance and social justice implications are largely overlooked, as are perspectives and proposals from the global South. This course will map, compare, and systematize different proposals based on the green economy to public ownership and control over common goods proposals like just transition and buen vivir. Students are encouraged to discuss and apply concepts to their own creative proposals for social interventions, developing their practice and skills for climate activism, engagement, and leadership. Usually offered every year.
FA
166b
Representing Globalism
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ca
djw
nw
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For several decades, artists have been investigating the character and consequences of life under global capitalism. Through examination of writings by artists, theorists, and historians in the context of art since the turn of the millennium, this course seeks to uncover stories of the global present and possible futures. Usually offered every third year.
FA
177b
French Connection in Modern East Asian Art
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ca
djw
]
Examines the encounter of East Asian artists with France, Paris in particular, since the late nineteenth century. It deals with a range of artistic expressions, focusing on painting, but also covering fashion design, architecture, and conceptual art. Usually offered every second year.
FA
194a
Studies in Latin American Art
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ca
djw
oc
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Builds a theoretical foundation and art historical background for discussing art and theories coming from Latin America. The subject matter (specified in the topic that accompanies the title) in this seminar may vary depending on the instructor and year. Examples of topics include: Indigenous Art; Women Artists, Latinx Art, and Colonialism and Geopolitics.Usually offered every third year.
FREN
112b
Anti-Semitism in France from the 1789 Revolution to Today
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djw
fl
hum
oc
]
Prerequisite: FREN 106, or an equivalent course.
Examines how manifestations of anti-Semitism, which concern religious differences as well as economic, social, cultural, and political differences, first appeared in France and have changed in form and context from the 1789 Revolution to today. After contextualizing the notion of anti-Semitism in contemporary France after October 7, 2023, we will focus on three turning points in the history of anti-Semitism ion France: the Revolutionary period when Jews were granted full citizenship rights, the Dreyfus Affair when the place of Jews in the Republic was called into question, and the consequences of the Vichy regime in anti-Semitism in France today. Usually offered every third year.
FREN
113a
Myth and Migration in Francophone North America
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djw
hum
]
Prerequisite: FREN 106b.
Examines the linguistic and geographic ebb and flow between New England and francophone Canada, the multiple pressures on Native American societies, and the rich representations—particularly certain “myth cycles”—that arise from those interactions over time. Tracing the establishment of New France, subsequent waves of Catholic and Protestant immigrants (including the diaspora of Acadians), and indigenous displacement and resistance, the class will rely upon maps, stories, historical objects, memoirs, poems, films, and pictures to flesh out the complexities of anglophone, francophone, and autochtone co-existence. Usually offered every third year.
FREN
161a
The Enigma of Being Oneself: From Du Bellay to Laferrière
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djw
fl
hum
wi
]
Prerequisite: FREN 106b or the equivalent, or permission of the instructor.
Explores the relationship of identity formation and modern individualism in texts by writers working in France, Francophone Africa and Canada. Authors range from modern and contemporary writers Sarah Kofman, Dany Laferrière, Achille Mbembe, Alain Mabanckou, and Edouard Glissant to early-modern writers like Joachim Du Bellay and Michel de Montaigne. Usually offered every year.
GECS
188b
Human/Nature: European Perspectives on the Climate Crisis and What to Do About It
[
djw
hum
oc
wi
]
Open to all students.
Introduces European attitudes towards climate change as reflected in policy, literature, film, and art, with a focus on workable future-oriented alternatives to fossil-fueled capitalism. Usually offered every second year.
GER
106b
Migration, Kultur, Synergie
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djw
dl
fl
hum
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Prerequisite: GER 30a.
Investigates the experience of refugees and immigrants in present-day Germany and discusses processes of social transformation. Through fictional and non-fictional texts and film, we gain an understanding of their cultural, economic, political and artistic contributions and of cross-cultural collaborations. Usually offered every second year.
HBRW
144a
Plays and Drama in Israeli Society
[
ca
djw
fl
hum
oc
wi
]
Prerequisite: Any 30-level Hebrew course or permission of the instructor.
Focuses on critical reading and analysis of authentic and contemporary Israeli short plays and studying the comparison between plays in Israel and those in the U.S. We will examine theories in aspects of drama and implement drama techniques including improvisation, movement, and creative expression. Readings cover topics such as social diversity and justice, as well as human rights and awareness of world identities. The course culminates in the writing of an original scene or one-act play in Hebrew.
HBRW
146a
The Voices of Jerusalem
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djw
fl
hum
wi
]
Prerequisite: Any 30-level Hebrew course or permission of the instructor.
For advanced-intermediate students who wish to enhance their language proficiency and work toward improving fluency and communication through analysis of selected materials covering literature, poetry, history, politics, and art that depict the unique tradition and culture of Jerusalem. Usually offered every fall.
HBRW
164b
Israeli Theater Within the Framework of U.S Cultures
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ca
deis-us
djw
fl
hum
oc
wi
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Prerequisite: Any 30-level Hebrew course or permission of the instructor.
Promotes cultural awareness and global understanding through the reading and analysis of plays. Student creativity develops through participation in acting and creative writing assignments. Usually offered every second year.
HBRW
170a
Take I: Israeli Cinema and American Culture
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deis-us
djw
fl
hum
wi
]
Prerequisite: Any 40-level Hebrew course or permission of the instructor.
Introduces students to various aspects of Israeli society as portrayed in Israeli films and television. In addition to viewing films, students will be asked to read Hebrew background materials, to participate in class discussions, and to write review and criticism about the films. The course prepares students to deepen their analytical skills in order to gain broader understanding and intercultural knowledge as well as transform their personal and global thinking. Usually offered every second year.
HISP
111b
Introduction to Latin American Literature and Culture
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djw
fl
hum
nw
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Prerequisite: HISP 106b, or HISP 108a, or permission of the instructor.
Examines key Latin American texts of different genres (poems, short stories and excerpts from novels, chronicles, comics, screenplays, cyberfiction) and from different time periods from the conquest to modernity. This class places emphasis on problems of cultural definition and identity construction as they are elaborated in literary discourse. Identifying major themes (coloniality and emancipation, modernismo and modernity, indigenismo, hybridity and mestizaje, nationalisms, Pan-Americanism, etc.) we will trace continuities and ruptures throughout Latin American intellectual history. Usually offered every semester.
HISP
121b
Sexualidades disidentes del sur (ensayo, ficción, cine)
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djw
fl
hum
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Prerequisite: HISP 108a, HISP 111b, or instructor approval
We will study cultural texts (fiction, essay, film) to approach issues of gender and sexuality in Latin America. The last three decades have been characterized by the emergence of gender and sexualities as central to the articulation of political and cultural dissent, with profound impact on all aspects of social life. LGBTQ+ and new generation feminist movements, artists, and cultural agents incorporate issues of class, ethnicity, coloniality, and the environment in their interventions and struggles. Usually offered every third year.
HISP
122b
Made in las Americas: Stories about Growing up Latinx
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deis-us
djw
hum
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Examines what it means to grow up Latinx in a multicultural United States through a focus on Latinx young adult literature and Latinx youth culture. Surveying a range of literary works that address the development of Latinx children and adolescents, we will pay special attention to coming-of-age stories that explore how Latinx negotiate ethno-racial identity, find and assert their own voice, and gain a greater understanding about their cultural differences. We will explore what intimate knowledge Latinx youth share and how they make meaning of critical, even ostensibly trivial, life moments to construct their ever-evolving sense of self and their relationship to both Latinx and non-Latinx communities. Usually offered every second year.
HISP
124a
Nature and Ecology in Latin American Culture
[
djw
hum
]
Prerequisite: HISP 111b.
Studies the critical ecological thinking that has been central to Latin American artistic and literary production, as contemporary aesthetic practices are urging us to reconceive the relationship between human and non-human. Indeed, the Americas are an important site for these explorations, as nature was conceived in colonial and modern projects as a promise, as plentiful or exuberant, everlasting, alien albeit at humans' disposal; also as disorderly, in need of domestication, settlement, exploitation. Complimentarily, humans deemed close to nature (Indians, women, children) were considered other than human, even when nature was idealized. Artists and writers have revisited and questioned these inherited constructions along with the ways of conceiving the relationship of modern society with material conditions of planetary life--arguably the existential challenge of our times. Usually offered every third year.
HISP
142b
Literature, Film, and Human Rights in Latin America
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djw
hum
nw
wi
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May be taught in English or Spanish.
Examines literature, film (fiction and non-fiction) and other artistic expressions from Latin America, in conversation with the idea of human rights'from the colonial arguments about slavery and the 'natural rights' of the indigenous, to the advent of human rights in the context of post-conflict truth and reconciliation processes, to the emergence of gender and ethnicity as into the human rights framework, to the current debates about rights of nature in the midst of a global ecological crisis. Usually offered every third year.
HISP
158a
Latina Feminisms
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deis-us
djw
hum
]
Taught in English.
Explores the theoretical frameworks and literary productions of feminisms developed by Latina/xs. It introduces students to a diversity of backgrounds and experiences (Chicana, Dominican American, Cuban American, Salvadoran American, and Puerto Rican authors) as well as a variety of genres (i.e. novel, poetry, short stories, drama). Using intersectionality as a theoretical tool for analyzing oppressions, students will explore the complex politics of gender, sexuality, class, ethnicity, and race in the lives of Latina/xs. They will also explore Latina/x feminists' theoretical and/or practical attempts to transcend socially-constructed categories of identity, while acknowledging existing material inequalities. Usually offered every third year.
HISP
160a
Culture/Media and Social Change in Latin America
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djw
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hum
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Prerequisite: HISP 109b or HISP 111b, or permission of the instructor.
The central topic of this class is the role of the creative arts (creative writing, visual arts, music, film, performance) in their role as fostering political change in Latin America. We will examine key eras of 20th and 21st century cultural production in relation with shifting mass-media landscapes, from the revolutionary impetus of the early 20th century avant-gardes in literature and visual arts, popular music in the 1940s, documentary film during and the 1960s guerrillas, artistic resistance to the dictatorship, to the street art accompanying human rights and grass roots identity movements of the 2000s. Usually offered every second year.
HISP
163b
Narratives of the Borderlands and Border Crossers
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deis-us
djw
fl
hum
]
Prerequisite: HISP 109b or HISP 111b, or permission of the instructor. Taught in Spanish.
Explores the U.S.-Mexico border and the many ways in which it has intimately shaped the experiences of people living in the borderlands and/or moving across the border. It will examine literary works that survey the U.S.-Mexico borderlands in terms of their figurative and material realities, with specific attention to how the borderlands are represented in today's society and how the U.S.-Mexico border might be reimagined. This course will also probe the experiences of migrants and border-crosses through the lens of testimonios. Usually offered every second year.
HISP
165b
The Storyteller: Short Fiction in Latin America
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djw
fl
hum
nw
]
Prerequisite: HISP 109b or HISP 111b, or permission of the instructor.
Through a study of Latin American short stories, some of them by consecrated writers, some of them by less well-known, we will reflect on the power of storytelling and narrative to shape subjectivity and community. We will examine topics that traverse Latin American cultures and are expressed in these stories, such tensions between literacy and oral traditions, hegemonic and minority voices, cultural diversity, ethnicity, class, migration, as well as contemporary concerns around issues of gender and sexuality, and in relation to the natural world. This class has an optional creative writing component, as students will have the chance, if so inclined, to write fiction applying concepts and themes studied in class (instead of critical/analytical assignments). Usually offered every third year.
HIST
109b
A Global History of Sport: Politics, Economy, Race and Culture
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deis-us
djw
nw
oc
ss
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Examines soccer, boxing, baseball, cricket and other sports to reflect on culture, politics, race, and globalization. With a focus on empire, gender, ethnicity, this course considers sport as the battleground for ideological and group contests. Usually offered every second year.
HIST
111b
The Iranian Revolution in Global Context
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djw
dl
nw
ss
]
The 1979 revolution in Iran was the last great revolution of the 20th century that reverberates until today. We examine the roots of that revolution, and the nature of the state and society that resulted from it within a broader global context. The first two units focus on pre-revolutionary and revolutionary Iran, particularly the 1960s and 1970s, examining national and global forces that laid the groundwork for the 1979 revolution. We also analyze the multiple narratives of the revolution itself—as an Islamic movement, an anti-monarchical movement, and an anti-imperialist movement. In the final unit, we look at some of the characteristics of the Islamic Republic and the global tensions that have resulted from its specific historical development. Usually offered every second year.
HIST
113b
Crazy Rich Europeans: Wealth and Inequality in Modern History
[
djw
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Brings together insights from modern European and Asian history, business, economics, and sociology. We will investigate the changing role, power, and composition of social elites in history and how they impacted workers, colonial populations, women, and urban landscapes in the past two centuries. We will study how actors as diverse as fashion models, Russian oligarchs, and powerful bankers gain their status and influence. We will also discuss the origins of global social inequality, including the ‘great divergence’ debate on Chinese and European modernization. How do we get from ‘Crazy Rich Europeans’ to ‘Crazy Rich Asians’? Usually offered every year.
HIST
121a
Breaking the Rules: Deviance and Nonconformity in Premodern Europe
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Explores the ways in which "deviant" behavior was defined and punished by some, but also justified and even celebrated by others in premodern Europe. Topics include vagrancy, popular uprisings, witchcraft, religious heresy, and the status of women. Usually offered every second year.
HIST
135b
Get Up, Stand Up: A Century of Revolutions in the Middle East
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djw
nw
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An examination of the various revolutions that have shaped the modern Middle East since the late 19th century. The course focuses on four different revolutionary moments: The constitutional revolutions of the turn of the century, the anti-colonial revolutions of mid-century, the radical revolutions of the 1970's, and most recently, the Arab Spring revolutions that have affected the region since 2011. Usually offered every second year.
HIST
136b
Global War and Revolutions in the Eighteenth Century
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djw
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Surveys global conflicts and revolutions and examines exchanges of idea, peoples, and goods in the eighteenth-century Atlantic World. Explores the legacies of inter-imperial rivalry and the intellectual borrowings and innovations of the American, French, and Haitian revolutions in comparative perspective. Usually offered every second year.
HIST
147a
Russian Empire: Gender, Minorities, and Globalization
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Examines the processes and problems of modernization--state development, economic growth, social change, cultural achievements, and emergence of revolutionary and terrorist movements. Usually offered every year.
HIST
162a
Writing on the Wall: Histories of Graffiti in the Americas
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djw
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Focuses on the history of graffiti in the U.S. from 1960s forward. Includes the historical role of Caribbean migration, the impact of criminology and economic recession of the 1970s on graffiti culture, and the relationship between private property, public space, and graffiti. Usually offered every second year.
HIST
166a
History of Crises: Europe's Twentieth Century
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djw
nw
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Systematically tackles the main turning points of Western and Eastern Europe’s modern history and their global impact. The focus is on the first half of the twentieth century, and the histories of the First and Second World Wars that still shape contemporary world politics today. We will also touch on the histories of colonialism, totalitarianism, the Ukrainian famine under Stalin, the Holocaust, and "moral panics" around changing gender roles. Analyzes both primary sources and the most recent scholarly debates. Requirements include a book review and a short research paper. Usually offered every year.
HIST
172b
Historicizing the Black Radical Tradition
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djw
ss
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Introduces students to the many ways that people and scholars of African descent have historically struggled against racial oppression by formulating theories, philosophies, and practices of liberation rooted in their experiences and understandings of labor, capitalism, and modernity. Usually offered every second year.
HIST
175b
Resistance and Revolution in Latin America and the Caribbean
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djw
nw
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wi
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Focuses on questions of race, gender and modernity in resistance movements and revolutions in Latin American and Caribbean history. The Haitian Revolution, Tupac Amaru Rebellion, and Vaccination Riots in Brazil are some topics that will be covered. Usually offered every second year.
HIST
176a
Haiti and the Modern Caribbean
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djw
ss
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Studies how Haitian political thought traveled throughout and the Caribbean in the 19th and 20th centuries. Some of the themes we will thus encounter include: race and the formation of nation-states in the 19th century Caribbean; the place of Haiti in the world economy; Haiti-US diplomatic relations; and interactions, antagonisms, and entwined histories of Haiti with other Caribbean societies. Usually offered every second year.
HIST
182b
Modern China
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djw
nw
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Surveys Chinese history from the Ming to Mao, with an emphasis on political, social, cultural, and literary trends; and attention toward ethnic minorities and overseas communities and diaspora. Usually offered every year.
HIST
183a
Empire at the Margins: Borderlands in Late Imperial China
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nw
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Explores Ming and Qing China's frontiers with Japan, Korea, Inner Asia, Vietnam, and the ocean from the fifteenth to nineteenth centuries, examining the role of borderlands in forging the present-day multiethnic Chinese state and East Asian national identities. Usually offered every third year.
HIST
184a
Silk, Silver, and Slaves: China and the Industrial Revolution
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nw
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Examines why industrial capitalism, which underpins the current world order, first developed in Western Europe rather than China. Comparative treatment of commercialization, material culture, cities, political economies, and contingencies on both ends of Eurasia in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Usually offered every second year.
HIST
185a
The China Outside China: Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Diaspora in the Making of Modern China
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Studies the history of Chinese outside Mainland China, from Hong Kong and Taiwan to Siberia and Africa, from fifteenth century to present day. Ambivalence to ancestral and adopted homelands made these communities valuable agents of transnational exchange and embodiments of Chinese modernity. Usually offered every third year.
HIST
185b
Turkey: From Ataturk to Erdogan
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djw
ss
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Examines the history of the Turkish Republic, from its founding in the wake of World War I until the beginning of the 21st century. Through discussions of politics, economics, society and culture, the course studies the forces that shaped and reshaped Turkey. Like the Ottoman Empire from which it emerged, Turkey has attracted the attention of admirers and detractors alike. Meanwhile, it has played key roles and continues to be an important economic, political and cultural hub in the Middle East, Europe, Asia, and the world. Usually offered every second year.
HIST
187b
Unequal Histories: Caste, Religion, and Dissent in India
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Examines the religious, political, and social dimensions of discrimination in India. In order to study caste, power, and representation, we will look at religious texts, historical debates, film, and literature from the Vedic Age to contemporary India. Usually offered every second year.
HIST/IGS
180b
Modern India: From Partition to the Present
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Examines the history, culture, and economy of modern India (1947-2019) with a focus on key concerns, such as the environment, urbanization, gender/sexual relations, and the transformations of democratic politics. Usually offered every second year.
HIST/SOC
170b
Gender and Sexuality in South Asia
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nw
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Prerequisite: Sophomore standing or permission of the instructor.
Explores historical and contemporary debates about gender and sexuality in South Asia; revisits concepts of "woman," "sex," "femininity," "home," "family," "community," "nation," "reform," "protection," and "civilization" across the colonial and postcolonial periods. Usually offered every second year.
HSSP
136a
Comparative Public Health Systems in Latin America
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djw
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Offered through the Brandeis in Mérida: Public Health in the Yucatán Peninsula study abroad program.
Through this course, students gain an introductory knowledge on how public health is addressed in Latin America; the system organization and the main indicators used to produce public policies. What are the social and economic determinants of health in the region? What are the principal issues in the Latin American context? How do different systems across countries address them? The human rights approach in Latin America and North American approach to health challenges. Differences between Latin American and US systems. Social medicine and its contributions. Role of the State, private sector, NGOs and international organizations, and their interrelations. How features of Latin American systems can constitute an input to a global comprehension of public health. Usually offered every year.
IGS
106a
Seminar in Global Health and Development
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Explores the fields of global health and development through the critical debates and theories that frame the field. We examine its discourses and critique its practices through critical engagement with specific areas of the field. Usually offered every year.
IGS
108a
Seminar in Law, Justice, and Human Rights
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Explores international justice and human rights regimes along with concepts and prominent theories that inform the field. We examine specific cases carried out in different national settings and critique the utility and efficacy of international human rights institutions. Usually offered every year.
IGS
136b
Contemporary Chinese Society and Culture
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Introduces students to contemporary Chinese society, with a focus on the rapid transformations that have taken place during the post-Mao era with a focus on family, gender, sexuality, migration, ethnicity, and family planning. Usually offered every third year.
IGS
138a
China in the World
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This course examines China's role on the world stage. Looking at the history of China's interaction with the world, both at home and abroad, we will examine how China has affected, and been affected by, other societies and cultures. Usually offered every second year.
IGS
165a
Revolution, Religion, and Terror: Postcolonial Histories
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nw
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Examines religious conflict, revolutionary violence, and civil war in modern South Asia. It looks at Jihad, Maoist militancy, rising fundamentalism, and political violence. Usually offered every second year.
IGS
171a
The Asian Wave: Global Pop Culture and its Histories
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Asia is not only remaking itself but also exporting images and ideas across the world. This course explores how Asian pop culture shapes global modernity, as countries project their values and aspirations to a global audience through increasing connectivity. Usually offered every second year.
IGS
173a
Asian Gangsters: Contemporary Crime Cinema
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Studies contemporary crime films to examine modern Asian society and politics. Drawing upon film theory, cultural studies, historical and sociological research, this class considers the world's largest media market to understand the continent's rapidly changing socio-political milieu. Usually offered every second year.
IGS
175a
Digital Asia: Democracy in the Internet Age
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Analyzes the transformative potential of the internet as an agent of development and as a mechanism for disrupting social and political orders in Asia, home to the world's largest democracy and also the world's largest authoritarian regime. Usually offered every second year.
JAPN
130a
The Literature of Multicultural Japan
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"Multicultural" may not be an adjective that many associate with Japan, but as we will find in this class, Japan's modern literary and cinematic tradition is rich with works by and about resident Koreans, Ainu, Okinawans, outcasts, and sexual and other marginalized minorities. Why then does the image of a monocultural Japan remain so resilient? Usually offered every third year.
JAPN
145a
The World of Classical Japanese Literature
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A survey of some of the most important works of Japanese literature from its origins to the late sixteenth century, including a wide range of genres: fiction, essays, travelogues, poetry, and drama. All readings are in English. Usually offered every third year.
LGLS
124b
Comparative Law and Development
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Surveys legal systems across the world with special application to countries in the process of political, social, or economic transition. Examines constitutional and rule-of-law principles in the context of developing global networks. Usually offered every second year.
LGLS
126a
Forced Migration Clinic
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Prerequisite: LGLS 123b and instructor permission. May be repeated once for credit.
In the Forced Migration Clinic, students represent migrants who have fled persecution or torture in their home countries and seek refuge in the United States, as well as support immigrant communities in addressing human rights violations in the United States (and abroad), out of our storefront offices in Waltham. Students handle every aspect of representation in cases and causes that determine, for example, whether a client will be granted asylum or face deportation, under the close supervision of faculty. The principal learning model for this course is reflection on planning, experience, and witnessing, so students will have multiple opportunities to try out different forms of the skills, concepts, values, and attitudes required for competent legal representation and effective and accountable social change, but they will also experience how legal systems operate from the inside and so to understand the roles of law in constructing societal conditions and expectations. Students will have the opportunity, but not the obligation, to seek Department of Justice immigration representation accreditation before, during, or after this course. Usually offered every year.
LGLS
129a
Transitional Justice: Global Justice and Societies in Transition
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Introduces transitional justice, a set of practices that arise following a period of conflict that aim directly at confronting past violations of human rights. This course will focus on criminal prosecutions, truth commissions, reparations, memorials, and the contributions of art and culture. Usually offered every year.
NEJS
115a
Gender, Women, and Islam
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hum
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Tracks the evolving histories of women, gender, and sexuality in diverse Muslim societies. Examines how gendered norms and sexual mores were negotiated through law, ethics, and custom. We will compare and contrast these themes in diverse societies, from the Prophet Muhammad’s community in 7th century Arabia to North American Muslim communities in the 21st century. Usually offered every third year.
NEJS
123b
Gender, Species, and Ethnicity in Early Judaism
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Being "human" is defined by distinguishing between and ordering different beings according to race, gender, disability and species. This privileges some in society while diminishing the value of others. This course introduces the main texts of rabbinic literature around fundamental questions of what is a legal "person" and what is not. Usually offered every year.
NEJS
136b
Revenge, Justice, and Reconciliation: Mass Atrocity Trials in the Long Shadow of Nazi Crimes
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Can crimes of the magnitude of the World War II and the Holocaust be redressed by legal means? This course explores the complex history of prosecuting Nazi crimes and how the political contexts and the legal frameworks have changed over time. It also studies the extra-judicial implications of mass atrocity trials: the societal discourse they stir, the educational lessons they teach, and historical records they create. Moreover, the course analyzes how the history of prosecuting Nazi crimes has impacted the legal redress of other gross human rights violations in the more recent past and whether the lessons learned from prosecuting Nazi crimes can be applied to the quest for racial justice in America today. Usually offered every second year.
NEJS
150b
Israeli Civil Society: Diversity, Democracy, and Justice
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hum
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Civil society sustains democracy. It is where alternative futures are imagined, social boundaries are forged and contested, and identities are negotiated. As societies are becoming increasingly diverse and divided, and less stable and safe – civil society is where people organize, dream, and act. The Israeli civil society offers a fascinating case study for understanding the links between identity, organizations, and society. Through the Israeli context, we explore how national, ethnic, gender, cultural, differences are constructed and managed in diverse and divided societies; understand how civic engagement shapes the future of democracy; and learn about the complexity and diversity of Jewish identity, in Israel and the diaspora. Usually offered every second year.
NEJS
157b
Arab-Jewish Modern Thought and Culture
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Against the backdrop of the partition of the 'Jew' from the 'Arab' in the modern national era, this course focuses on the Arab-Jewish borderland cultural world which simultaneously embodies Arab and Jewish histories, traditions, and identities. It traces different manifestations of Arab-Jewish culture from the early 20th century to today and explores the complex relationship between culture and politics in relation to questions of language, identity, nationality, borders, exile and memory. Usually offered every second year.
NEJS
160b
Legal Controversies in Israeli History
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Investigates Israeli history, politics, and culture through the lens of major legal controversies including the tension between "Jewish" and "democratic," the Shoah in Israeli history, the Occupied Territories, legislation of family life and religious practice and more. Usually offered every second year.
NEJS
173a
Trauma and Violence in Israeli Literature and Film
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Taught in Hebrew.
Explores trauma and violence in Israeli Literature, film, and art. Focuses on man-made disasters, war and terrorism, sexual and family violence, and murder and suicide, and examines their relation to nationalism, Zionism, gender, and sexual identity. Usually offered every second year.
NEJS
174a
Minorities and Others in Israeli Literature and Culture
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Taught in Hebrew.
An exploration of poetics and identity in modern Hebrew literature. By offering a feminist and psychoanalytic reading of various Hebrew texts, this seminar explores questions of personal and national identity, otherness, visibility, and marginality in the Israeli context. Usually offered every second year.
NEJS
174b
Israeli Women Writers on War and Peace
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Taught in Hebrew.
An exploration of nationalism and gender in Modern Hebrew literature. By discussing various Hebrew texts and Israeli works of art and film, this course explores women's relationship to Zionism, war, peace, the state, politics, and processes of cultural production. Usually offered every second year.
NEJS
178a
Love, Sex, and Power in Israeli Culture
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Taught in Hebrew. May be repeated for credit.
Explores questions of romance, gender, marriage, and jealousy in the Israeli context by offering a feminist and psychoanalytic reading of Hebrew texts, works of art, and film. Usually offered every third year.
NEJS
180b
Israeli Film, Literature, and Culture
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Taught in English.
Surveys the development of Israeli literature and culture over the past 100 years and includes selections of poetry and prose from a wide range of writers. The course aims to illuminate what makes Hebrew literature distinct as well as investigate the themes, symbols, and subject matter that have come to constitute its central concerns since the early 20th century. Usually offered every second year.
NEJS
184b
Disability Cultures: Art, Film and Literature of People with Disabilities
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Explores cultural representations of disability in Israel, Europe, and the US. By focusing on literature, film, dance, and visual art, it explores physical, mental, and emotional disability experiences, and their relations to gender, sexuality, nationalism, and identity politics. Usually offered every second year.
NEJS
186a
Introduction to the Qur'an
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Traces the history of the Qur'an as text, its exegesis, and its role in inter-religious polemics, law, theology, and politics. Examines the role of the Qur'an in Islamic teachings and its global impact. Usually offered every second year.
NEJS
189b
Formative Moments in the Disputed Land of Israel-Palestine
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Examines the history of Israel/Palestine during the 20th century by focusing on several formative moments that took place pre and post 1948. It reexamines key issues that emerged around each of those events and explores the implications they had on the formation of Israeli and Palestinian societies. Usually offered every second year.
NEJS
192a
Islamic Ethics: Theory and Applications
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Explores Islamic thinking and practices related to ethics by examining relevant discussions and debates in Islamic law, theology, Sufism, philosophy, and literary works. We answer broad questions such as the nature of moral obligation, the provenance of moral and ethical norms, and the practical means for living an ethical life. The final month of the course applies these theoretical foundations to practical ethical questions including contemporary debates surrounding economic justice; reproduction, end of life, and abortion; race and racism in Islam; and animal rights and the environment. Special one-time offering, spring 2023.
NEJS
196a
Cultural Contact Zones in Israel-Palestine
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Explores the different ways in which boundaries have been constructed and imagined in the cultural scene in Israel/Palestine from the beginning of the 20th century to the present. It traces different cultural arenas that emerged during this period using examples from literature, cinema, music and visual arts – exploring the Hebrew-Arabic contact zones, religious and secular borderlands, the national divide between Jews and Arabs, and the fluid borderland across the gender divide. Usually offered every second year.
NEJS
197a
Islamic Law: Classical Foundations to Modern Applications
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Examines the development, theories, and debates of Islamic Law, from its classical foundations to its modern applications. The course will present critical understanding of the history and practice of Islamic law while also giving students the framework and resources with which they can engage in modern discussions about Islamic Law. We will begin with the early development of Islamic Law and its interpretive theories, the rise and spread of the classical legal schools, and the emergence of pre-modern legal institutions such as legal schools and courts. We will also delve into the content, morality, and evolving socio-cultural contexts of Islamic law. We will discuss the impact of colonialism and modernity on Islamic legal discourses and institution. We will conclude the course by exploring several case studies of “Islamic law” in action in society and examine its interactions with the American legal system. Usually offered every second year.
NEJS/WGS
110a
Sexual Violence in Film and Culture
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deis-us
djw
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Explores the effects of sexualized violence in society. While exploring representations of gender-based sexual violence in documentaries and features, stand-up comedy, memoirs, poetry, and visual art, this course will offer a critical discussion on Rape Culture in the 21st century, with particular attention to the intersections of gender, race, sexuality, class, and disability in the construction of sexual violence. Usually offered every second year.
NPSY
180a
Social Neuroscience and Culture
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Prerequisites: PSYC 10a, 51a, and 52a, or NBIO 140b/NBIO 240a, or permission of the instructor. May not be taken for credit by students who took PSYC 213a in prior years. Formerly offered as PSYC 180a.
Introduces empirical research on a breadth of social neuroscience topics-- including the self, stereotyping, and moral reasoning--with a more focused coverage of culture. Emphasis will be placed on literature comparing Eastern and Western cultures. Usually offered every second year.
POL
134b
Seminar: The Global Migration Crisis
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Looks at immigration from the perspectives of policy-makers, migrants, and the groups affected by immigration in sender nations as well as destination countries. Introduces students to the history of migration policy, core concepts and facts about migration in the West, and to the theories and disagreements among immigrant scholars. Usually offered every second year.
POL
141a
Seminar: Elections and Electoral Systems in Comparative Perspective
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Introduces students to the scientific study of elections and electoral systems from a comparative standpoint. Students will be exposed to social scientific literature on elections, analyze these processes from a comparative perspective, and learn how to use digital tools, such as ArcGIS and online mapping software (GIS) to analyze electoral processes. Usually offered every year.
POL
144a
Latin American Politics
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nw
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Examines the development and deepening of democracy in Latin America, focusing on the role of political institutions, economic development, the military, and U.S.-Latin American relations. Usually offered every year.
POL
161b
Good Neighbor or Imperial Power: The Contested Evolution of US-Latin American Relations
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Studies the ambivalent and complex relationship between the U.S. and Latin America, focusing on how the exploitative dimension of this relationship has shaped societies across the region, and on how Latin American development can be beneficial for the U.S. Usually offered every year.
POL
163a
Seminar: The United Nations and the United States
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Prerequisite: Sophomore standing.
Investigates the United Nations organization and charter, with an emphasis on the integral role of the United States in its founding and operation. Using archival documents and other digitized materials, explores topics such as UN enforcement actions, the Security Council veto, human rights, and the domestic politics of US commitments to the UN. Usually offered every second year.
POL
184a
Seminar: Global Justice
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Prerequisites: One course in Political Theory or Moral, Social and Political Philosophy.
Explores the development of the topic of global justice and its contents. Issues to be covered include international distributive justice, duties owed to the global poor, humanitarian intervention, the ethics of climate change, and immigration. Usually offered every second year.
RECS
135a
Russian Short Fictions: Where is Justice in This World?
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Open to all students. Conducted in English. Students may choose to do readings either in English translation or in Russian.
Focuses on the great tradition of the short story as practiced by Russian writers and the connection and divisions among them. This genre invites extreme stylistic and narrative experimentation ranging from the comic to the tragic, as well as being a vehicle for striking expressions of complex social, philosophical, and religious themes. Usually offered every second year.
RECS/THA
140a
Russian Theater: Stanislavsky to Present
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ca
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hum
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Throughout its history, Russian theatre has tried to communicate truthfully in a mostly repressive society. This course introduces students to the achievements of theatre artists from Stanislavsky through Post-Modernism. We will examine the work of groundbreaking directors like Meyerhold, Vakhtangov, and Lyubimov. We will read and analyze representative works of major modern and contemporary playwrights. The course load consists of readings, discussions, papers and in-class projects. Usually offered every second year.
SAS
100a
India and Pakistan: Understanding South Asia
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Examines the making and unmaking of modern South Asia as a region, with particular focus on India and Pakistan as well as their connections to Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. Using perspectives from history, politics, anthropology, literature, and film, the course introduces students to key themes in the study of South Asia, such as colonialism and anti-colonial struggles, legacies of empire, caste critique and Dalit thought, gender and sexuality, religion, and popular culture. Usually offered every year. Usually offered every year.
SAS
150b
Love, Sex, and Country: Films from India
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A study of Hindi films made in India since 1947 with a few notable exceptions from regional film, as well as some recent films made in English. Students will read Hindi films as texts/narratives of the nation to probe the occurrence of cultural, religious, historical, political, and social themes. Usually offered every third year.
SAS
165a
Cinemas of India: Caste, Gender, and State
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hum
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The Indian film industry is the largest in the world, catering to spectators within and outside the country. Often, however, the discussion of Indian cinema limits itself to the Hindi film industry or Bollywood. This course attempts to study cinema in India in different languages and genres through the categories of caste, gender, and state. It traces the beginnings of cinema in India, its development in the post-independence period, and contemporary digital cinema, focusing on Marathi, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, and Malayalam and going beyond a Bollywood-centric approach by complicating the discourse on region and nation. It endeavors to unpack the questions of ideology, aesthetics and affect in Indian cinema by examining the powers of caste, gender, and state in the cultural production of the country and how it is being contested in/through cinema. Special one-time offering, fall 2024.
SOC
124a
Gender, Sexuality, and Globalization
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Introduces theories of gender, sexuality, and transnational feminism. Uses sociological research to examine labor, social movements, politics, and culture in global perspective, emphasizing Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Usually offered every second year.
THA
122b
Butoh: Japanese Dance Theater
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ca
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Butoh began in 1960s Japan as a new dance-theater form created by collaborations between Tatsumi Hijikata and Kazuo Ohno and has since become a global phenomenon. This course draws from Butoh training through guided imagery, movement, and structured improvisation. The exercises pull from nature, the mythical, and the unconscious as sources of inspiration. As well as studying the practice of Butoh, students will also learn about the art form's cultural, historical, and philosophical aspects. The course will be a mixture of movement and performance exercises as well as weekly readings and discussions. Students will develop an in-depth understanding of the Butoh through both an academic and embodied approach. Usually offered every year.
THA
126a
Playing for Change - Community Building and Social Change on Stage
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ca
djw
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Examines ways in which theatrical arts can create change in a variety of non-traditional situations. This course is grounded in the discussion/practice of theater activists such as Augusto Boal's Theatre of the Oppressed. For both theater and non-theater students, this course focuses on how and why this collaborative, useful art form can be introduced into sociological, psychological, political, cultural, educational, medical, and historical paradigms. Students will generate work surrounding social issues of importance to them. Usually offered every second year.
THA
146a
Theater and the Holocaust
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ca
djw
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By studying plays and theatrical tools, students can gain insight into the Holocaust and what made it possible as well as its lasting impact. The course will examine how theater has attempted to represent the unimaginable as and communicate about the toxic appeal of antisemitic Nazi ideology, both in the context of the Holocaust and its legacy. Usually offered every third year.
THA
150a
Global Theater: Voices from Asia, Africa, and the Americas
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ca
djw
nw
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Explores dramatic literature and performance traditions from across the globe. Examines the ways various artists have engaged theater to express, represent, and interrogate diversity and complexity of the human condition. Usually offered every year.
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