Human Rights & Social Justice

Bridging Disciplines Programs allow you to earn an interdisciplinary certificate that integrates area requirements, electives, courses for your major, internships, and research experiences.

The Human Rights & Social Justice BDP introduces you to the interdisciplinary study and practice of human rights at home and around the world. You will learn about the forms of oppression, marginalization, and violence that concern human rights researchers and practitioners. Through coursework drawn from the humanities, social sciences, law, fine arts, and public policy, you will develop your knowledge of the issues and debates that dominate human rights and social justice scholarship today, including an understanding of the regional contexts within which contemporary human rights violations take place. At the same time, you will learn about the historical, theoretical, and institutional underpinnings of international human rights advocacy and social justice movements, from the legacies of colonialism and imperialism to the international institutions that were formed in the wake of World War II. Finally, through the Connecting Experience component of the program, you will have the opportunity to complement your coursework with hands-on experience in an organization working on human rights and social justice concerns.

Upon completion of 18 credit hours from the options listed below, you will earn a certificate in Human Rights & Social Justice.

Note: Course descriptions available here are from a recent offering of the course, and they may not reflect the description for the next offering of the course.

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Foundation Courses   (3 credit hours)

Foundation Courses introduce key methodologies and issues related to Human Rights & Social Justice. All students in the Human Rights & Social Justice BDP are required to take the Human Rights History and Theory Course.

Human Rights History & Theory Course
BDP 319 Human Rights: Theories and Practice
This course will introduce students to the interdisciplinary study and practices of human rights at home and around the world. Drawing on materials from the humanities, social sciences, law, fine arts, and public policy, the course will engage both historical precedents and contemporary debates over the relevance of a human rights discourse to academic inquiry and extracurricular advocacy. Divided into five sections, the syllabus is designed not only to encourage a broad understanding of human rights’ emergence into current public policy and persistent humanitarian narratives, but to facilitate as well the opportunity to research these concerns through specific topical examples, both issue-oriented and regionally-grounded.

Connecting Experiences   (6 credit hours)

Your BDP advisor can help you find internships and research opportunities that connect Human Rights & Social Justice to your major. We call these opportunities “Connecting Experiences” because they play such an important role in integrating your studies. Each Connecting Experience counts for 3 credit hours. At least one of your two required Connecting Experiences must be an internship experience. Your BDP advisor can help you think about possibilities for Connecting Experiences, and you may also visit the Rapoport Center for Human Rights and Justice, which provides resources about internship opportunities and faculty at UT with research interests related to human rights.

For more information and for examples of past Connecting Experiences, visit the BDP website and consult your BDP advisor. BDP students must propose Connecting Experiences to the BDP office. Current BDP students should view the BDP Advising Canvas site for Connecting Experience resources and proposal instructions.

Strand Courses   (9 credit hours)

In addition to your Foundation Courses and Connecting Experiences, you must complete 9 credit hours of Strand Courses. You should work with your BDP advisor to choose Strand Courses that will focus your BDP on your specific interests, provide you with an interdisciplinary perspective on your BDP topic, and at the same time expose you to multiple areas of concern for human rights researchers and practitioners.

In order to create an interdisciplinary experience, you must choose courses from a variety of disciplines. Only one of your Strand Courses may come from your major department(s), or from courses cross-listed with your major department(s).

In designing your concentration, you must choose courses either from more than one of the following Topics categories (e.g. Nationalism, Imperialism, and War; Social Groups and Social Justice; or Theory, Policy, and Institutions), OR from more than one of the Geographic categories (e.g. Regional, US, or Comparative) listed within each Topic.

Social Groups & Social Justice - Comparative
AAS 330I ASIAN DIAS ON INDIGENOUS LANDS
Explore Indigenous and Asian entanglements and solidarities on Turtle Island (North America) and the Pacific. Examine settler colonialism, racial capitalism, war and militarism, racism and power, and environmental change.
ADV 378 GEO HEALTH EQUITY CLIM CHNG-WB
This course will examine how communities and their partners use advertising and public relations to influence decisions about geohealth in their communities for equitable solutions to the impact of climate change, natural hazards, and natural resource management on the health of their communities. Class members will work in groups to develop alternative advertising and public relations solutions for the communities to tell their stories to influence local, state, and national climate and geohealth policymakers.
AFR 315R Diaspora: Race/Nation/Resistnc
This course offers students a comparative study in the makings and meanings of diaspora. We begin by defining the differences and similarities between diaspora and related concepts such as race, nation and cultural identity. While we focus specifically on black peoples in the Americas, we will explore how different African diasporic groups have understood themselves, and their relationships to other African descendent peoples, their place within the nation, and how a sense of their ties to one another has fostered alternative ways of being. In turn, how those in the African diaspora have responded to their place within various nation-states (the United States, Haiti, Brazil, Dominican Republic, England, etc.) has entailed various forms of resistance and responses to those larger societies. Along these lines, we will explore how African diasporic populations have responded to slavery, colonialism, racial oppression, and modernity as they articulated notions of democracy that challenged dominant structures of society. We explore these ideas through looking at slave revolts, anticolonial and Afro-Asian liberation struggles, Black/Third World Feminism, globalization, and the sexual politics of diaspora. Across each of these themes, we view the diaspora as an open and fluid space through which black people “make our world anew.”
AFR 351U RACE CAPITALISM ENVIRONMENT
This course offers an introduction to environmental politics through the fields of political ecology, critical race studies and eco-feminism. We will examine environmental contestations to understand how humans relate to nature in the context of global racial capitalism and the possibilities for creating a more sustainable world. We will explore how racism is foundational to environmental exploitation and consider why global struggles for racial justice are crucial for protecting both people and the earth. Reflecting principles of environmental justice, Image courtesy of North Caroline Environmental Justice Network the course material respects the lived experiences, leadership and intellectual insights of racialized peoples as a vital source of knowledge
AFR 374E Frm Ferguson to The Favelas
This course will explore the range of black political mobilization in the Americas. It will begin by comparing the different racial orders developed in the U.S. and Latin America, and analyze the way in which black populations throughout the Americas have mobilized to escape slavery, to gain rights from the state, and to protect black life and resist various forms of dehumanization. In particular the course will focus on how blacks have responded to moments of racial terror, including lynching in the U.S. in the twentieth century, current protests against police violence that have crystallized in the Black Lives Matter movement, and analogous mobilization against “black genocide” in Brazil and other parts of Latin America. The course will also pay special attention to gender and sexuality, and to how black women and queer black folks have historically participated in and shaped black political movements even as they faced stigma as a result of misogyny and homophobia.
AMS 311S PRISON ART LIT PROTEST-WB
In this course we will focus on the art, music, and literature of incarcerated people, formerly incarcerated people, and prisoner rights activists in late 20th and early 21st century America. We will explore questions about the nature of resistance, the relationship between art and protest, and the ways in which the work of incarcerated people challenge our conceptions of prison, circularity, and “the deserving prisoner.” What does it mean to be a prison artist? Is prison art and writing by nature political protest? What can we learn from incarcerated people? Our texts will primarily focus on the experiences of incarcerated people of color, incarcerated trans people, and incarcerated women. We will not discuss “guilt” or crime, but will focus on the cultural production and intellectual work of incarcerated people. We will also explore the material conditions of cultural production, the relationship between social movement history and prison arts (Civil Rights, Black Power, etc), and the Prison Arts Movement.
ANT 324G ENVIRONMENTAL ANTHROPOLOGY
What is the relationship between culture and ecology? How can environments produce inequalities? Is there such a thing as wilderness? Where is the boundary between the human and the non-human? How is “nature” understood in different communities? How do people around the world live with toxicity, climate change, and other forms environmental degradation? And how what are the possible meanings of “environmental justice”? Environmental Anthropology explores the answers to these questions and more. The course is designed around a set of key questions and challenges in the anthropological study of the environment. Its purpose is not to provide a survey of the field, but rather to introduce students to a set of questions and analytic tools and invite them to quickly move towards applying them to real-world cases.
ANT 324L Black Women and the State
This course surveys Black women’s experiences living with and confronting state oppression around the world. From North America, Central America, South America and the Caribbean, black women experience similar patterns of political, social, and economic inequality. Transnationally, racism, sexism, patriarchy, homophobia, and classism affect the quality of life of black women, particularly within nation-states with legacies of slavery and colonialism. This course takes an historical, social, and theoretical look at the roots of this inequality and how black women have chosen to respond to it locally and globally and students will explore the following questions: How have interlocking forms of oppression affected Black women’s citizenship within the modern nation-state? How have Black women, in turn, sought to organize themselves in response to this oppression? What does it mean to resist?
ANT 324L DECOLONIAL INTERSECTIONALTY-WB
This course adopts the concept of intersectionality within feminist thinking to stage conversations about gender, race, and indigeneity in the context of ongoing colonial formations. Intersectionality is a way to think about the interconnections of ideas, events, identities, and relations. Initially meant to bring gender-thinking and race-thinking together, the concept has grown to include other key vectors of power including class, sexuality, ability, religion, and more. While even within critical feminist, gender, and ethnic studies, colonization is often treated only superficially, this course prioritizes it—as an analytic and a structure—by centering Native voices. To this end, the course stages conversations that transit feminist, queer, and critical race theories as well as critical Indigenous theory. We will examine the racialization of indigeneity, the violence of liberal inclusion, and heteropatriarchy as they inform both settler and Indigenous subject formations. Other course topics include Native feminisms, African indigeneities, Black Indians, Asian settler colonialism in Hawai?i, Two-Spirit politics, queer indigeneities, Native masculinities, and indigeneity as performance, among other topics. By the end of the semester, students will have developed a working knowledge of how colonization, gender, and race intersect and interlock to produce distinct hierarchies and subjectivities that underpin the continued subjugation of Indigenous peoples and demand broader critical attention.
CMS 356C Collective Action
Collective action is a fundamental part of our social behavior and refers to any process whereby groups of people attempt to make decisions and act towards a common good. Collective action covers a vast field and include both collaborative and contentious forms of social action. Two interrelated factors have irrevocably changed how we view collective action: globalization and digitization. In this class, students will obtain insight into how globalization and technology have impacted how we organize and communicate to achieve better collective outcomes about the public good. It will review a range of perspectives on collective action, and examine communicative elements of collective action in a variety of global contexts, focusing on India and New Zealand as global contexts in the last portion of the course.
E 343I IMMIGRATION LITERATURE
We will devote ourselves in this course to the study of late twentieth and early twenty-first century novels about immigration, primarily but not exclusively to the United States, from a diverse range of home countries. We will think about these works of fiction within the contexts of U.S. history and literary history; immigration debates in the U.S. in the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s; 9/11, terrorism, and surveillance; and the immigration policies of the U.S. presidents in the last three decades, for example. Key questions will include how class, education, gender and sexuality, race, and religion shape the content as well as the form of immigration narratives.
F A 371 Producing Art for Social Change
The course offers a hands-on approach to community and participatory art, traditional public art, and collaborative cultural projects that promote social change. Lessons combine the study of social change art taking place internationally, with skill-building exercises to support students’ capacities to conceptualize, design, produce and exhibit their own projects locally. As part of the class, students will learn to create and produce works for UT/Austin communities and to consider how they might make these projects relevant to communities beyond. In general, class meetings offer a combination of lectures; group discussions devoted to readings, video screenings, practical exercises, and student presentations. While case studies are drawn from a wide swath of artistic projects currently being produced internationally, a majority of these efforts emerge from the Americas and Europe.
GEO 371T The Science of Environmental Justice
Environmental Justice (EJ) is the fair treatment and involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income, in the development of environmental policies and regulations. Central to advancing EJ is understanding the physical, chemical, biological, and other environmental processes that lead to the inequitable impacts of environmental degradation. This course explores the scientific basis for understanding these inequitable impacts through lectures and case studies, including field-based investigations focused on water quality in Austin-area communities.
GOV 370S Social Movements: Theory and Practice.
This course is about social movements. Social movements involve groups of people organizing or coalescing around issues. This course is designed to be an introduction to the topic. Groups of people have been organizing together towards joint goals for centuries. People with differing opinions about actions, policies, and behaviors want to have their voice heard about their concerns. Social movements often develop when a large enough number of people with similar problems come together. Some movements are total failures. Some succeed and thrive and others succeed and subside. Still, many others fall somewhere between success and failure. This course plans to introduce broad ideas about social movements, raise important questions, and help students develop a better understanding about them. Every movement is different, but elements within them can be categorized and understood. The analysis of these elements can give you the tools to look at movements or groups within society and make educated guesses about their long term viability. The literature of social movements can be very theoretical and difficult to decipher. The class will only have 1 assigned book for the semester. This book is a compilation of many important articles, papers, and readings regarding social movements.
GRG 320J ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE
This course offers an introduction to environmental justice, the premise that all people have a right to an environment free from hazardous contamination as well as access to resources that sustain health and livelihood. Throughout the semester, we will examine the meaning of environmental justice as a spatial and land-based—that is, a geographical—project. We will also examine the definition and significance of its inverse: environmental racism, meaning unequal access to life-sustaining environment resources along racial lines. We will engage in an ethnic studies approach to together explore the geographies of indigeneity, race, and environmental justice. We will also highlight the relationship between environmental racism to capitalism and ongoing processes of colonialism and exploitation. Last, and importantly, this course highlights the role and importance of local and global movements for environmental justice.
HIS 347N URBAN SLAVERY IN THE AMERICAS
Slavery was prevailing labor institution in the early modern world. It was not associated with race. When the Iberians arrived in the New World, Southern European had slaves of all colors: Greeks, Turks, Moors, Guanches (the natives of the Canary Islands), and Sub-Saharan Africans. This was also true of all Islamic societies in the Mediterranean. The Ottomans and the Mamelukes held white Christians, Russians, and Sub-Saharan Africans as slaves. The word slave, in fact, is a reference to white Slavic captives. Throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries Native Americans became slaves and captives of the Europeans by the hundreds of thousands. Natives themselves enslaved rivals, including Europeans. In this world of generalized, nonracial slavery, however, slaves had some rights to self-manumission and even property. Many slaves could even become powerful, as in the case of the mameluke troops among the Ottomans. Islam and Christianity limited the power and sovereignty of masters held over slaves. Religious institutions could intervene and remove slaves from abusive masters. In the European Mediterranean, blacks were not only considered slaves but also saints, ambassadors, queens, kings, and generals. By the 19th century, this world of slaveries had been completely transformed. Slavery was now associated exclusively with Africans in America. Blacks became chattel with no rights. The constitution of the independent Republic of Texas in 1841, for example, held that any black who was manumitted could not reside in the Republic. It was illegal for blacks to be anything other than slaves. This course explores how in the 1700s slavery became racialized and industrialized, leading to legal regimes the world had never witnessed before. This transformation of slavery also triggered new resistance movements, including abolitionism. By the early 1800, abolitionism, resistance, and revolutions led to the dismantling of the first wave of racialized, industrialized slavery in the Americas and to the end of the Atlantic slave trade. Yet a “Second Slavery” emerged in the 19th century that thrived in the Age of Abolitionism and the ending of the African trade. It was a form of racial slavery that was brutal as the previous one but that no longer relied on slaves from Africa, but from the displacement of salves within the American continent. This slavery powered the industrial revolution and the transformation of the US into a global power. This course explores this massive changes in the history of slaveries in the Americas and focuses particularly in the racialization and industrialization of slavery.
HIS 350L Race, Science, And Racism
This course explores important episodes in the history of biology regarding the classification of human races. For ages, human groups have endured conflicts with one another over racial differences and prejudices. However, according to many biologists and scientists, human races do not even exist. We will discuss how bodily traits such as skin tones have affected how scientists and societies have struggled to understand human differences. We will analyze racism in several contexts, such as the Spanish Inquisition, the history of slavery in the U.S., the history of eugenics, the Civil Rights era, etc. We will discuss how classifications of races have changed over time in the works scientists such as Georges Buffon, Ben Franklin, Johann Blumenbach, Charles Darwin, and others. We will analyze claims from popular books in light of primary historical sources. We will also trace the evolution of categories such as “Black,” “White,” “Asian,” “Hispanic,” etc. We will discuss why such categories have varied in different places. We will especially analyze how racial categories have changed over time in government and institutions, such as the U.S. Census, and Texas public schools and universities.
MAS 364 HIST OF US-MEX BORDERLAND
This course is about the history of the United States-Mexico border, though I have taken an approach to this topic that you will likely find unfamiliar. Today we think about the border as a political space with enormous implications for North American geopolitics, licit and illicit market economies, and humanitarian issues. From this perspective, when we talk about “the border,” we are often referring to economic or immigration policies. This course will shed light on these questions, but the focus will be much more on place than policy. The region through which the contemporary border passes has been inhabited for, perhaps, as long as 21,000 years, though the current international divide is only 174 years old. So, the course is organized accordingly with most of the readings focused on the ancient, colonial, and nineteenth-century history of what is today the border region.
MAS 374 US AND MEXICO RELATIONS
This class is about the history of the relationship between the United States and Mexico. Nearly half the class focuses on the war between the two countries because this was the event that gave the bilateral relationship its first definitive shape and help set the stage for major developments in each country’s history. We will then move through the Porfiriato, the Mexican Revolution, and the World Wars while considering the fundamental questions posed by authoritarian government, foreign direct investment, revolutionary nationalism, and American power. Finally, at the very end of the course, we will study the history of Mexico-U.S. immigration from the point of view of the Mexican government and consider very recent developments border history within a much broader context of bilateral relations. We will read work by both American and Mexican scholars and consider how, or if, their perspectives differ.
RHE 309J When Topic is Appropriate
For topics courses labeled as “When Topic is Appropriate” on a BDP curriculum sheet, please note that all topics for this course number are not automatically approved to count toward your BDP. In advance of registration for a particular semester (and as part of the BDP seat request process), the BDP office will inform current BDP students of the topics for the course number that are approved for their BDP.
RHE 309J RHETORIC OF EXILE
None
RHE 309J RHETORIC OF QUEER LATINIDAD
None
RIM 301 INTRO TO RACE INDIGEN MIGRATN
This course familiarizes students with core concepts—or “key terms”—in the study of Race, Indigeneity and Migration in the modern world, with a specific focus on U.S histories and cultures. The course demonstrates how race, Indigeneity and migration structure modernity itself—how they fundamentally explain capitalism, nation-states, citizenship, labor, land, democracy. The course also provides a review of key periods in the makings and meanings of the United States: settler colonialism, slavery, Reconstruction, Manifest Destiny, the industrial revolution, the Second World War, the Cold War and globalization.
RIM 350 CNTMP ISS RACE INDIGEN MIGRATN
This course, the second in a three-part sequence for RIM majors, explores how race, indigeneity and migration function as ongoing “events” which determine present-day governmental policies, markets and cultural logics. There are four thematic areas through which the course is organized: 1) Criminal Justice; 2) Immigration; 3) Land and the Environment; 4) Social movements. Across each of these six areas, students will analyze how governmental policies, economic decisions and cultural claims (both dominant and subaltern) reflect contemporary societal views on race, indigeneity and migration. Students will also analyze the ways in which gender and sexuality are mutually constituted by race, indigeneity and migration. The course is multidisciplinary, drawing primarily on historical, sociological, geographical and literary texts.
S W 325 Foundations of Social Justice
This course focuses on recognizing injustice and constructing socially conscious responses to inequity using generalist social work practice. You will gain skills to identify and communicate about inequality affecting various identities and social statuses. You will understand different forms of marginalization by dominant groups and how unequal power relations adversely affect individuals, groups, and communities. You will also learn about frameworks that support discourse about inequity, marginalization, injustice, and exclusion, including the cycle of socialization, the tension between private troubles and public issues, systemic oppression, human rights, and strategies for socially conscious change. You will have the opportunity to explore your role in the promotion of social, racial, and economic justice.
SOC 307Q ENVIR INEQUALITY HEALTH
This course will examine the social roots and impacts of environmental contamination and natural disasters, with particular focus on how environmental health inequalities are linked to race, class, gender, and nation, and how residents of areas prone to environmental risks respond to hazards. Throughout the semester, we will explore the interactions between humans and the environment, and discuss factors of human-built systems that create environmental inequalities, and therefore health disparities. We will analyze global and local case studies to examine key areas of environmental inequality, including toxic waste, natural and industrial disasters, food systems, and water and land access. By the end of the semester, students will have a broad understanding of: the social nature of environmental inequalities, the history of the concept of environmental justice, how environmental risks are distributed globally, the role of the state in producing and mitigating environmental health risks, and how social movements frame environmental health issues and environmental inequality.
SOC 335R REPRODUCTIVE JUSTICE & RACE
Access to reproductive care is the most significant indicator of social inequality. The rights to have children, or not, and parent are deeply stratified across societies. And childhood inequalities have persistent, life-long health effects. In this course we will examine reproductive outcomes for women in order to study social justice. Reproductive justice is defined “as the human right to maintain personal bodily autonomy, have children, not have children, and parent the children we have in safe and sustainable communities.” Building from Loretta Ross, SisterSong, and National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum, our working definition of reproduction justice for this course encompasses diverse families’ rights to reproduction, processes of becoming pregnant and giving birth, the right to give birth to a child with disabilities, the right to prenatal care and child care. Taking our cue from reproductive justice activists and scholars, we will consider the complete physical and mental well-being of women (broadly defined), children, and their families which can potentially be achieved when they have the economic, social and political power, and resources to make healthy decisions about their sexuality, and reproduction. Reproductive justice is almost always out of reach because resources are unevenly distributed, based on race, gender, sexuality, abilities/ disabilities, citizenship, and social class. As a result, developing and developed nations are racked with inequalities when it comes to reproductive matters. From slavery, access to birth control, stratified reproduction, sex selective abortions, and new reproductive technologies, this course will focus on difficult topics; but, no answers will be provided. The hope is that you will find answers for yourself about what you mean by reproductive justice, and how you think it can be achieved. My aim is that we will emerge at the end of the semester with an open mind regarding health, and a more complicated, empathetic understanding of what reproductive justice means. You will, hopefully, attempt to make reproductive a part of your worldview and everyday life.
Social Groups & Social Justice - Regional (Non-US)
AFR 374E Racism & Inequality Lat Am
In the course “Race and Inequality in Latin America” we will study primordial issues on ethnic and race relations in modern and contemporary Latin America. As such, the course is divided in four topics: i) Nation-building, eugenics, mestizaje and racial democracy; ii) Patterns of race relation in Latin America; iii) Coloniality, racial inequality and poverty; iv) Multiculturalism and affirmative action. The objective of the course is to allow the students to understand the most relevant theoretical debates about patterns of race relations in Latin America, the similarities and difference across the region and current topics for the study of the region, for example, multicultural constitutions and affirmative actions.
AFR 374E Race and Rights in Latin America
This course is concerned with the role that race has played in the construction and development of human rights in Latin America and the Caribbean. It takes a historical approach to rights development in order to understand the growth of human rights discourse and policy in the 20th and 21st centuries. Human rights practitioners and activists in the region have critiqued the project of rights building as steeped in the old logics of colonialism and have pointed to the problem of racism that lies at the core of contemporary human rights thinking and rhetoric. Ultimately, certain groups’ rights are privileged over those of others and this course is concerned with why. We will first examine how the logic of rights was constructed during the early republican period as excluding black and indigenous peoples. Historically the question of who was a citizen and thus who could claim rights before the state has been a fraught one in the region. 19th and 20th century debates to that effect and the laws that resulted continue to have reverberations in the contemporary moment, especially in discussions about the rights of women, and indigenous and afro-descended groups and individuals. The course is thus concerned with understanding how that logic has come to define and inhibit the possibility of rights for those communities throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. Concurrently, the course will also examine how those communities have pushed against discrimination and legal boundaries to carve out rights for themselves.We will examine particular cases in order to understand how individual nations have treated the rights of historically marginalized groups. Case studies will include the struggle for recognition and rights of Haitians in the Dominican Republic, the current Garifuna struggle for land rights in Honduras, the case of the Awas Tigni in Nicaragua, as well as the impacts of Cold War era dirty war policies on the development of rights in the region.
ANS 361 DEVELOPMENT AND MOVEMENT
This class explores various interpretations, methods, and policies of development mainly focusing on the cases of East and Southeast Asia. We will trace the history of development as a post-war international project that emerged in the context of decolonization since the 1940s. Particular attentions will be given to the state-driven developmentalism in East and Southeast Asia, intertwined with the Cold War geopolitics, decolonization, post-colonial desires, economic development, and the US-led neocolonizing capitalist incorporation of the greater Asia region. Then we will move to practices of development/counter-development/post-development in the era of globalization and neoliberalism. Topics included land, labor and livelihood struggles; race, gender, power; activism and social movements; transnational development and the reinterpretation of foreign aid; and civil society and the future of the state.
ANT 310L Muslims in Europe
The topic of the course is the complicated politics of ethics and leadership among Muslims in contemporary France and Germany. This class is intended to expose students to ethical issues pertaining to religious identity formation in two different countries of the European Union. Moreover, in an effort to apply ethical reasoning in real-life situations, we will work to grasp the similarities and differences regarding everyday religious politics of ethics and leadership among Muslims living in France and Germany today, especially as these are shaped by historical processes associated with colonialism and nation-state-building, as well as by the power of representations mobilized in a global world. While the perspective of this course will be primarily anthropological, it will also be informed by historical, sociological, and legal approaches in an attempt to engage perspectives across various social science disciplines and the law. Based on the close reading of four recently published ethnographies about Muslim life in France and Germany, we will discuss how a consideration of current debates about religion and the state helps us understand the ethical relationship between the recognition of a lasting Muslim presence, the ways in which the state tries to institutionalize it in an effort of cooptation and control, and the challenges of circulating counter-discourses of European Muslim identity today. Moreover, the course will draw on cinematographic materials that illustrate some of the current debates surrounding Muslim identity formation in Europe.
ANT 324L RACE INDIGINEITY IN PACIFIC
Since the so-called Age of Discovery, the Pacific has been conceptualized as a crossroads between the East and the West. By the twentieth century, places like Hawaii came to be idealized as harmonious multicultural societies. Drawing from works within Indigenous studies, ethnic studies, and critical race studies, students will address themes of sovereignty, settler colonialism, diaspora, and migration in order to interrogate and problematize the concept of the multicultural ‘melting pot’ across time. This course draws upon a number of disciplinary approaches to race, space, power, and culture to address questions that are central to people living across the Pacific and those who seek “R&R” in those “far away” places.
HIS 350L When Topic is Appropriate
None
HIS 365G Women and Social Movements in the Twentieth-Century United States
IN 2018, THE SUBJECT OF WOMEN AND SOCIAL MOVEMENTS is no abstract matter. Recently, in ways few anticipated, unprecedented numbers of women have joined marches, exposed sexual abuse, protested racial violence, organized strikes, and run for office. These movements seem spontaneous, but have deep roots in history, forged by immensely diverse women in myriad contexts, including not just solidarity and victory but clashes and contradictions. Exploring these tangled roots illuminates what is new and not new today and offers insights into current realities. IN THIS UPPER-LEVEL COURSE, we examine both well-known and barely-remembered social movements, from those that explicitly targeted women’s rights, like suffrage, to those that usually did not, like civil rights. Based on lectures, scholarly readings, memoirs, historical documents, and films, we consider not only distinctions and intersections but power relations among groups of women. THE TWIN GOALS OF THE COURSE are for students to deepen their knowledge of this history and to learn how scholars in this field have developed original interpretations by beginning to do so themselves.
LAS 322E Latino Migrations and Asylum
Welcome to Latino Migrations and Asylum! In this undergraduate seminar, we will critically examine the contemporary politics, geographies, and practices of Latina/o migration and asylum in the United States. We will begin our discussion in the first half of the semester by contextualizing experiences of Latina/o migration and asylum within the current global migration crisis and the long historical trajectory of political nativism in the United States. During the second half of the semester, we will narrow our focus by examining root causes of Latina/o migration in relation to U.S. foreign policy as well as the varied challenges confronting migrants, refugees, and asylum seekers in the United States from the mid-twentieth century through the contemporary period. Causes and consequences of Latino/a migration with respect to El Salvador will serve as important case study in this regard.
MAS 364D Latino Migrations and Asylum
Welcome to Latino Migrations and Asylum! In this undergraduate seminar, we will critically examine the contemporary politics, geographies, and practices of Latina/o migration and asylum in the United States. We will begin our discussion in the first half of the semester by contextualizing experiences of Latina/o migration and asylum within the current global migration crisis and the long historical trajectory of political nativism in the United States. During the second half of the semester, we will narrow our focus by examining root causes of Latina/o migration in relation to U.S. foreign policy as well as the varied challenges confronting migrants, refugees, and asylum seekers in the United States from the mid-twentieth century through the contemporary period. Causes and consequences of Latino/a migration with respect to El Salvador will serve as important case study in this regard.
MEL 321 Turks in Europe
In the last century, international markets, political conditions, and the desire for “a better life” have spurred mass migration to “First World” nations, creating a myriad of new socio-cultural and political-economic constellations as well as serious structural challenges. Interactions between Europeans and Turks, for example, are not new, but seem have increased in variety and complexity since the post-World War II era, when European countries began importing Turkish labor. Today over 9 million Turks live, work and study in Europe, some with full citizenship rights, others with permanent or temporary visas; and their presence has impacted not only European economies, but also European politics, media, education systems, social structures, cultural norms, the arts scene, and even language. Students in this course will first examine local and transnational forces that have driven (and continue to drive) Turkish-European interactions, and then focus on key issues that have emerged in the context of 20th century Turkish migration to and settlement in Europe as well as in the context of Turkey’s more recent bid to join the European Union. In addition to texts by sociologists, political scientists and cultural anthropologists, students will analyze Turkish-European literary and cinematic depictions of the distinctive economic, socio-cultural, and political changes associated with the migration of Turks to Europe and their transition from guest worker to transnational citizen. Among the topics to be discussed are: social processes and cultural adaptation; the education of second-, third- and fourth-generation migrants; the relationship of civil society and Islam; ethnic communities and ethnic business; citizenship and political participation; asylum movements and xenophobia; and attitudes toward the European Union. Class sessions will be discussion-based and focus on a critical analysis of the arguments presented in the readings and films. Languages Across the Curriculum Component: Students who have completed the Intermediate Turkish sequence (ie. have earned a grade of C or higher in TUR 320L) are eligible to sign up for an additional credit hour in Turkish language via the “Languages Across the Curriculum Program”. Students taking this credit hour with Dr. Okur will read and discuss short texts in Turkish (and view and discuss additional Turkish films) related to the main course topics.
REE 325 46-QUEER EASTERN EUROPE
Drawing on 20th and 21st century literature and film, this course explores queer stories from Eastern Europe—a broad geographical region that encompasses a diverse set of countries, including Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, Poland, Czech Republic, Romania, Albania, Bulgaria, and the countries of the former Yugoslavia. Frequently constructed in monolithic terms as “backward” and “homophobic” in relation to the more “tolerant” west, the countries of Eastern Europe in fact have their own queer histories and trajectories that both intersect with and diverge from the dominant expressions of queerness in the west. We will explore how contemporary artists and storytellers use sexuality as a lens to look at broader asymmetries of class, gender, and race in the encounter between the east and the west; how they inscribe queer and non-normative desires into the frequently turbulent histories of their own nations and communities; and how queer narratives have worked in tandem with activist movements to challenge heteronormative social structures and to create alternative cultural spaces and political futures
SPN 356D Indigenous Resurgence
This advanced undergraduate course will analyze and discuss the ways in which re- telling, documentation and/or invocation of the past shapes different forms of self- representation by indigenous authors as a response to colonializing processes in late 20th and early 21st century Latin American societies. We will include works by indigenous collectives, historians, poets and writers, filmmakers, visual artists, singers, and musicians, all in the context of what is today called “Latin America,” but what many indigenous movements refer to as Abya Yala, following the Kuna People’s representation of the region. Poetry, novels, essays, testimonios, historical documents, films, and songs will help us to analyze the media, discourses and practices that enable indigenous cultural producers to retell the past within the present, as a strategy to reposition a native sense of history, memory, resurgence, and agency within contemporary settings, as well as to envision decolonized futures.
Social Groups & Social Justice - US
AAS 330D Black and Asians: Race and Social Movements
Asian Americans are the fastest-growing racial group in the United States making up 6% of the American population. With Asians as the largest share of recent immigrants it is important to study the Asian American experience, including Asian interactions with other minority groups. While many Asians are immigrants, people from Asia have a long history in the U.S. The course begins with an overview of Asian and Black history in the U.S. We will trace the historical roots of Asian and Black relations in the U.S. and examine past and present racialization. We will examine key points of collaboration and conflict between Asians and Blacks in American society.
AAS 335 Bridging Community Through Service-Learning
This course is an academic service-learning course in which students will critically examine Asian American contemporary issues and trends and how community-based organizations respond. We will explore questions on who is considered Asian American and why; how do Asian Americans organize around social, economic and environmental issues; and what does Asian American self-empowerment look like. We will do this through structured course meetings, readings by Asian American studies scholars, practitioners, and activists, group discussions, films, guest speakers, field trips, and getting real world experience working on a community service project. Students will participate in a service-learning project under the supervision of the instructor and community-based organization staff. A primary focus of the course will be to examine the relationship between service learner, community and the community organization through a social justice lens.
AFR 315N THE BLACK POWER MOVEMENT
The Black Power movement was a distinct period in African American life from the late 1960s and early 1970s that emphasized racial pride, the creation of black political and cultural institutions, self-reliance, and group unity. The expression of black power ideology ranged from the desire to create an all-black nation-state to the promotion of black economic power. This course will look at the major organizations, key figures, and ideologies of the black power movement.
AFR 317D Community Policing in US
This course will delve into the history of policing in the United States by examining the beginning of American policing including a focus on community policing. Students will have the opportunity to meet area police officers, judges and laypersons representing community policing. The course will incorporate the use of lectures, readings/articles, video, research and extensive class discussions to assist in exploring the impact of community policing in the United States.
AFR 320C POWER PLACE MAKING TX HIST-WB
What are the stories told about Texas’ history? Where are the places that help those stories be told? The State Capitol grounds, the Alamo in San Antonio, the South Mall on UT’s campus, and even the Barbara Jordan statuary at the Austin Bergstrom Airport are but a few examples of the commemorative and memorialized sites that convey accounts of Texas history. This course explores places in the Texas landscape as windows into Texas history and the political and social thinking that have formed our understandings of Texas’s past. It does this by teaching students to interpret Texas sites that convey public history. We will read these sites by delving into the making of the histories behind them, including the historic silences that also form them. At the same time, we will interrogate these places and their meanings for what they reveal about the power relations arrayed along lines of race, culture, gender, and economic status that underlie their creation as memorable and historically meaningful
AFR 324E Racism and Antiracism
Racism is a form of structural power and violence with a long political, social, cultural, and systemic history within the U.S and beyond. It is understood as an ideological tool or systemic apparatus to enable and create injustices, inequalities, hierarchies, and power over some populations. The course will interrogate racism through other interlocking systems of power such as sexism, classism, heteronormativity, colonialism, and nationalism. We will engage topics such as mass incarceration, reproductive justice, digital worlds, environmental violence, and religious intolerance. The course will focus primarily upon the racial relations and anti-racist practices of the African Diaspora. We will also discuss the impact of racism and anti- racism upon varied ethnicities in the U.S. Students will read varied texts in the social sciences including ethnographies.
AFR 351G Black Women in America
AFR 352P FOOD IN THE RACIALIZED CITY
Explore a variety of issues related to producing, accessing, and consuming food in city spaces in the context of racial inequities. Investigate and question constructs such as "food" and "city" as means of exploring different points of view and approaches to studying not only food and cities but also various approaches to food justice.
AFR 352Q BLACK GEOGRAPHIES
This course explores the relationship between Blackness and the production (and imagining) of space and place. Specifically, we will critically examine the tensions and possibilities that emerge when Black people are rendered “ungeographic" as a fundamental component of racial capitalism while they are simultaneously creating spaces of freedom under constant threats to Black life. Thinking with texts that span geography, anthropology, sociology, and fiction, we will read place-specific work from across the African diaspora and analyze different forms of media as we grapple with the following broad questions: How do Black people across the diaspora navigate, experience, and produce space even within/alongside processes and structures of domination that threaten Black life? How do our understandings of what is “geographic” shift when Blackness is at the center of inquiry? What theoretical and methodological ruptures or fractures does this create? What possibilities emerge? Situating Blackness as a geographic imperative that is neither static nor simply confined to the built environment and the “natural” world, this course is designed to destabilize our understandings of “geography” and perhaps even “blackness,” while also building a critical vocabulary and practice of seeing what is sometimes rendered invisible or illegible
AFR 370 RACE AND US SOCIAL POLICY
Race is a critical factor that affects the development and implementation of U.S. social policy. While its influence on public policy can be traced to the early colonization of the United States, its relevance continues to be observed in the contemporary period. The relationship between race and social policy is however multi-dimensional. On one hand, perspectives on racial difference can be used to develop policies that create or reinforce social inequality. On the other hand, public policies can be designed to have ameliorative effects that reduce racial and ethnic inequality. This course, therefore, examines how and why race influences various dimensions of U.S. social policy and how U.S social policy influences racial inequality. It begins by reviewing the origins of the development of racial minority status in the United States. Thereafter, it examines policy issues associated with specific domains of social wellbeing (e.g., housing, employment, wealth, the criminal justice system) that are critical for understanding the disadvantage of African Americans and other racial minorities. Where possible, the course draws insights from other societies to examine whether the implications of race for social policy in the United States are unique. Furthermore, it offers opportunities to students for critically thinking through the process of developing rudimentary policy solutions to everyday social problems.
AFR 372C Black Freedom Movement
It can be said that black people have engaged in a centuries-long, global struggle for freedom. For many, the high tide of this struggle occurred in the United States from the 1950s into the 1970s. Others might look to the national liberation movements in Africa and the Caribbean, which created a series of autonomous black nations, as the watermark of black freedom. More recent commentaries have pointed to the global currency of Black Lives Matter to suggest that the quest for freedom by black people continues. This course explores the history of black people’s twentieth century struggles for freedom, taking as its focus the U.S. Civil Rights and Black Power movements, and anti-colonial movements in Africa and the Caribbean. This course will ask and seek to answer several questions, including: What is freedom? Is there a difference between liberation and freedom? How have black people thought about these concepts? Why have the arts (music, literature, visual arts, film, sports, etc.) been so central to how black people have thought about the possibility of freedom? This course will examine key historical events and figures in the U.S., Africa, Caribbean, and to a lesser extent Europe, with particular attention to intellectual currents, organizational formations, the arts, and mass mobilization. We will also consider how culture, religion, and social deviance inform how we might think about Black freedom.
AFR 372F Urban Unrest
How and when do cities burn? The modern US city has seen its share of urban unrest, typified by street protests (both organized and spontaneous), the destruction of private property, looting and fires. Interpretations of urban unrest are varied: some describe it as aimless rioting, others as political insurrection. Most agree that the matter has something to do with the deepening of racism, poverty and violence in U.S. cities. This course takes a closer look at the roots of urban unrest, exploring a range of origins: joblessness, state violence, white flight, the backlash against civil rights gains, new immigration and interracial strife. Urban unrest is often cast as an intractable struggle between black and white, yet this course examines the ways in which multiple racial groups have entered the fray. Beyond race and class, the course will also explore unrest as a mode of pushing the normative boundaries of gender and sexuality in public space. Course material will draw from film, literature, history, geography and anthropology.
AFR 374D FREEDOM SUMMER
This course examines one of the most radical moments in civil rights history—the 1964 Mississippi Project. Widely known as “Freedom Summer,” this civil rights campaign organized a multi-faceted program that challenged white supremacy in one of the nation’s most racially oppressive and violent states through the development of Freedom Schools, voter registration drives, and an alternative political party called the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party. Even more, Freedom Summer called on Black women and men from the community, many of whom were poor and disenfranchised, to lead their own movement. It was during the Freedom Summer campaign that activists debated the merits of non-violence vs. self-defense; the limits of charismatic male leadership; and the role of white allies in the struggle for Black freedom. In the face of extraordinary violence and economic deprivation, Black Mississippians waged one of the most powerful, yet understudied, movements in civil rights history, and they modeled the maxim that “ordinary people can accomplish extraordinary things.” Using scholarly texts, primary sources, film and music, students will explore the 1964 Freedom Summer Project in order to understand diverse struggles, leadership styles, and competing interpretations of what it means to be free. Borrowing directly from the original Freedom School curriculum, students will contemplate the “myths of society” as well as theoretical and conceptual frameworks necessary for the creation of a just society. This course also seeks to draw connections through a roaming classroom format in which we will gather at various sites in our surrounding community on occasion.
AFR 374D Black Lives Matter
This course will explore the UT Student Movement focusing on the history of student activism on the UT campus as the main unit of the course. The course will incorporate the use of lectures, readings, video, simulation exercises, research and extensive class discussions to assist students as they explore the impact of the UT Student Movement, using The University of Texas at Austin as its case study.
AMS 311S GENDERING ASIAN AMERICA
In this course, students will study representations of gender and sexuality in Asian America from the Chinese Exclusion Era to the 21st century. The course readings and discussions will (re)introduce students to key moments of Asian American history — spanning from Chinese Exclusion, Japanese internment camps, the dropping of the atomic bombs, the Vietnam War, and more — while focusing on how these historical moments were represented to the American public. Rather than taking racial and gender representations at face value, I urge students to ask: how does time, place, gender, and sexuality shape our understandings of Asians in America? How have gender and sexuality been used as a means to marginalize Asians/Asian Americans, and how have individuals themselves engaged with these concepts as tools for subject formation and national belongingness? These are the questions that frame Gender in Asian America, and will guide students as they deconstruct the history of Asians in America. The course content will encourage students to think critically about home, nation, and community as it pertains to Asian Americans. However, the ultimate goal of this class is for you all to be able to apply what you’ve learned throughout the semester outside of the classroom — whether that be in your own communities or families.
AMS 311S GENDERING ASIAN AMERICA
In this course, students will study representations of gender and sexuality in Asian America from the Chinese Exclusion Era to the 21st century. The course readings and discussions will (re)introduce students to key moments of Asian American history — spanning from Chinese Exclusion, Japanese internment camps, the dropping of the atomic bombs, the Vietnam War, and more — while focusing on how these historical moments were represented to the American public. Rather than taking racial and gender representations at face value, I urge students to ask: how does time, place, gender, and sexuality shape our understandings of Asians in America? How have gender and sexuality been used as a means to marginalize Asians/Asian Americans, and how have individuals themselves engaged with these concepts as tools for subject formation and national belongingness? These are the questions that frame Gender in Asian America, and will guide students as they deconstruct the history of Asians in America. The course content will encourage students to think critically about home, nation, and community as it pertains to Asian Americans. However, the ultimate goal of this class is for you all to be able to apply what you’ve learned throughout the semester outside of the classroom — whether that be in your own communities or families.
AMS 311S Environ Justice/Culture/Soc
None
AMS 324G POLICING LATINIDAD
How does the criminal justice system make itself felt in the everyday lives of Latinxs? From border enforcement, to stop and frisk, to the phenomenon of mass incarceration, many Latinxs find themselves and their communities enmeshed within a dense web of surveillance, punishment, and detention. This interdisciplinary course will examine the historical, political, economic, and social factors that have, in many ways, criminalized Latinidad and/or rendered Latinidad illegal. We will examine how race, class, education, gender, sexuality, and citizenship shape the American legal system and impact how Latinxs navigate that system. This course will pay special attention to the troubled and unequal relationship between Latinxs and the criminal justice apparatus in the United States and how it has resulted in the formation of resistant political identities and activist practices.
AMS 327I Religion and Social Justice in the United States-WB
This course examines the material relationships between religion and social justice in the United States. It compares the ways modern religion carries within itself the material possibility of liberated consciousness, radical democracy, and social equality, even as it often postpones these promises to the next life, or the next millennium, and ultimately reinforces the status quo. This course then will take as its topic the grand questions of religious practice and social change: Why is the world the way it is? And how has religion helped make it so? How can we change the world for the better? And does religion help us, or hinder us, in that pursuit? To answer those questions, we will pay particular attention to disruptive religious practices. That is, religions as practiced by those often deemed on the edge of society, outside the mainstream, or in the minority. These will include religious practices constitutive of social movements addressing Human and Civil Rights, including those historically related to the Abolition of Slavery, Anti-Lynching Campaigns, Prisoner Rights, Immigrant Rights, Gay Rights, Sustainable Food Systems, and Racial and Economic Justice.
AMS 370 75-NATIVE AMER WOMEN'S HISTORY
Interdisciplinary seminar on themes of American life. Investigate the histories of Native American women to reaffirm and reclaim their place and role in the history of Native Americans, indigenous people, women, Chicano/xs, Greater Mexico, and the United States. Contemplate how many understandings that center colonization, settler colonization, genocide, race, and environmentalism are essential to examining Native American women's history. Explore the stories, struggles, and ideas of community-building, sovereignty, and liberation as integral to their genders and sexualities as Native American, Indian, First Nation, indigenous, and red and brown women.
ANT 310J THE NEW LATINAS OS XS
Explore the trajectories of various communities many have called new Latinas/os/es by identifying how race, gender, sexuality, class, indigeneity, migration, language, and geography influence the lives, identities, and sociopolitical incorporation of of new Latinas/os/es
ANT 322M Native American Cultures of the Greater Southwest.
This class explores the diverse Native cultures of the Southwest. The class focuses on the philosophical underpinnings and the frameworks of meaning and moral responsibility of indigenous peoples of the American Southwest. The goal is to give students a broader view of the Native peoples of North America and specifically of the Southwest. By focusing on the diverse groups of the Southwest, this course aims to increase knowledge concerning specific Native populations. The course will involve three ethnographies and readings that will orient students to peoples and issues of import in the Southwest. This course pays particular attention to the expressive forms of Native American peoples and cultures of the Southwest as well as political economy.
ANT 322M Mexican Immigratn Cul Hist
This course seeks to develop a student's understanding of the history of Mexican immigration to the U.S. It will provide an overview of migratory patterns dating back to the late pre-historic period through contemporary times. The focus of the course, however, will be current immigration issues dealing with: 1) causes of Mexican immigration: globalization, Mexican politics, agribusiness, 2) U.S. Law, 3) incorporation, and 4) citizenship.
ANT 322P MEXICAN IMMIGRATION CULTURAL HISTORY
This course seeks to develop a student's understanding of the history of Mexican immigration to the United States. It will provide an overview of migratory patterns dating back to the late pre-historic period through contemporary times. The focus of the course, however, will be immigration issues dealing with: 1) causes of Mexican immigration: globalization, Mexican politics, agribusiness, 2) U.S. Law, 3) incorporation, and 4) citizenship. The course will meet on-line (Zoom) and the lecture recordings will be available by the end of the day of each session. All details for the class are contained in this syllabus and are also available online in Canvas. The Canvas Home Page for this class is the Syllabus Page which has links to the syllabus, modules (course units), films, essay assignment, and exams. On a weekly basis I will contact students via Canvas Announcements and provide remainders of exams, essay assignment, and a brief outline for the upcoming lectures.
ANT 325U AUSTIN JEWS CVL RIGHTS ERA
In this course, we will examine a small piece of Austin’s historical development, thinking critically about how history is researched, written and presented to public audiences. With a focus on campus and community social justice activism in the Austin Jewish community of the 1960s and ‘70s, we will chronicle stories of activism in a multi-media digital storytelling map that we hope will become a foundation for UT’s continuing interdisciplinary and cross-racial research on this era in Austin’s civil right’s history.
ANT 325U AUSTIN JEWS CVL RIGHTS ERA
This season marks the 50th anniversary of a pivotal moment on college campuses and civil rights activism around the nation and across the globe. Austin Jews in the Civil Rights Era asks the question: What role did Longhorn and Austin Jews play in the social changes of the 1960s and early 70s—both on campus and beyond? Revolution was in the air on college campuses in the 1960s and early 70s – UT included. De-segregation sit-ins, free love, anti-war protests, feminism, flower power, counter-culture were the (dis)order of the day. Were UT Jews allies or activists? Greeks or geeks? Feminists or Princesses? And what was the relationship between the campus and the wider Austin community? What about Austin’s Jewish merchants, bankers, lawyers, businessmen, synagogue leaders, and artist/entertainers? How were they involved in the movements for equity, justice and peace? Students will learn the art of oral history and digital storytelling to uncover the untold tales of Austin’s Jewish community in the Age of Aquarius. In this course, we will examine a small piece of Austin’s historical development, thinking critically about how history is researched, written and presented to public audiences. With a focus on civil rights activism in the Austin Jewish community of the 1960s and ‘70s, we will document stories of inclusion in a multi-media digital storytelling map that we hope will become a foundation for UT’s interdisciplinary and cross-racial research on this era in Austin’s civil right’s history. In the process, we will explore not only the impact of national civil rights struggles on UT’s campus and the wider Austin Jewish community, but also the involvement of Austin Jews in the struggle and the resistance. Our job will be to uncover some of the ways in which national protest marches, sitins, and other strategies for direct action catalyzed local action here in Austin, and the ways that local strategies became models for national movements. As a class we will research and discuss the legacy of these milestones and commemorations, build connections with individuals and organizations that continue to be involved in activism, and then work as a team to share our findings with the larger Austin community.
ANT 328C CONT ISS NATV AM INDIG STUDIES
The experiences of Indigenous peoples colonized by settler states are stories of struggle and survival. To understand the contemporary issues impacting Indigenous peoples who remain subjugated within western, patriarchal, capitalist settler societies this course examines the ways in which settler colonization "is a structure and not an event" (Wolfe 2006) and how Indigenous peoples continue to resist those structures. Contrary to popular misconceptions, colonization is not a thing of the past and, in many parts of the world, continues through assertions of military power, imperialist ideologies, neoliberal governance, capitalism, heteropatriarchy, misogyny, and white supremacy. Themes covered in this upper division course will include federal Indian law and treaty histories, racialization of Indigenous peoples, multiculturalism and cultural appropriation, federal and cultural (mis)recognition, resistance and Native resurgence, tribal sovereignty, decolonization, and more. Some of the contemporary issues we will explore include the Indigenous defense of water and land through direct community political actions against the Dakota Access Pipeline at Standing Rock; the protection movement at the summit of Mauna Kea where young people are combating a giant telescope from being developed at a sacred site; the organized actions of the Tohono O'odham to stop construction of the border wall; the legacies of violence inherent to DNA sciences and commercial gnomic testing; #MMIWG (missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls) and how gender and sexual violence as tools of colonization; and more. Centering narrative practices, the course prioritizes Indigenous voices and the allies who stand against colonization in its myriad and persistent forms.
E 342M Life and Literature of the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands
Through collective study, we will examine how Chicanx, Latinx, and other writers narrate, imagine, theorize, and reshape the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands as a geographic region and discursive construction. Through class discussions and close readings of short stories, novels, plays, poetry, and films, we will consider how the texts contend with questions of race, class, gender, sexuality, geopolitics, genre, and other concerns. We will consider various critical approaches in an effort to deepen our understanding of the texts and the sociohistorical conditions that characterize this liminal, dynamic region
E 360S Literature of Islamophobia
This class will consider how fiction from the post-9/11 era (widely called the “Global War on Terror”) has produced a particular vision of Islam and Muslims that both reproduces and challenges the ideology of Islamophobia and refines and critiques prior understandings of Muslims. The class will be divided into roughly two parts: Islamophilia in the Cold War (pre-9/11) and Islamophobia during the “Global War on Terror.” We will be interested in thinking about the deployment of Islam in political rhetoric; depictions of Islam and Muslims in popular culture; debates about Islam that have entered national life in the US; and novelistic representations of Islam over the last decade. We will be particularly interested in understanding how ideas about religion intersect but do not overlap with ideas about race, and how the question of opportunities for Muslim women has become a contemporary preoccupation. Assigned readings will be supplemented with short videos and images that have become a part of the Islamophobic archive.
E 376M Writing Slavery
This course proposes two primary objectives rooted in past and present literary representations of slavery. Thematizing “the trope of the talking book,” (Henry Louis Gates, Jr.’s The Signifying Monkey), the course first examines seminal slave narratives, e.g. the literature of the enslaved as discursive strategies, from self-actualization and resistance to early formations of a black literary discourse. The course then explores how slavery is (re)written, controversially in a presentist context by contemporary authors, particularly in historical fiction or neo-slave narratives that seek to restore agency and reclaim subjectivity for enslaved individuals. Ultimately, the course engages larger issues about the different venues that writings about slavery offer for academic disciplines, literary instruction and/or pedagogy.
GOV 371D Race, Policing & Incarceration
In a number of American states, almost 25% of black men are not allowed to vote due to a felony conviction. Researchers have estimated that almost 70% of young black men will, at some point in their lives, spend at least one night behind bars. Decades after the height of the Civil Rights Movement, we are confronted by glaring inequalities between black Americans and white Americans that can be observed over a myriad of indicators that cover health, employment, income, education, and incarceration. We will explore racial gaps through the numbers, considering their origins and their social and political consequences. In particular, the course will focus on the criminal justice system (from everyday police patrols to the death penalty) both historically and as it operates today. A major goal is to understand how inequalities in criminal justice influence elections and alter the state of representation in Congress and other representative bodies in the United States.
GOV 371M African-American Women’s Political Activism
This course explores how Black feminism, as a guiding ideology, helps to explain how Black women have navigated the U.S. political system. In particular, this course dissects the roles of race, gender, and class (and their intersection) in shaping African-American women’s orientation towards politics and political participation. In doing so, the course begins with a brief historical overview of the unique political, social, and economic position occupied by Black women in America, followed by an examination of the historical writings of early Black female activists. We will then critically examine the definition of “citizenship” as it relates to American politics and how stereotypes of Black women’s sexuality have historically prevented them from wholly benefiting from full citizenship and equal protection under the law. Next, we explore the impact of Black women’s activism in the areas of criminal justice and the fight against sexual and domestic violence. Lastly, we shift our focus to how these persistent stereotypes influence current policy debates and restrict Black women’s opportunities in electoral politics.
GRG 356 RACE, SOCIAL JUST & THE CITY
This class looks at some of the major forces—especially economic and political—shaping the culture of American cities from their colonial beginnings, through the industrial era, to the post-industrial, "creative" cities of today. We will be paying special attention to how the building and rebuilding of US cities affected different groups differently, and how marginalized people have contested dominant elites and attempted to make cities more democratic and equitable. We'll draw on examples from cities around the country but also focus on how we can see these dynamics right here in Austin.
H S 347E SUSTAINABILITY EQUITY HEALTH
HIS 317L Introduction to African American History
The course is a survey of African-American history from the slave trade to the recent past. It is an introductory examination of the black experience and is designed to bring to life the voices and history of African Americans. The class is organized chronologically, with an emphasis on the ideas, actors, and organizations that contributed to the African American experience. By the end of the semester, students should have a basic understanding of how African Americans have contributed to the making of America, the problems that they face, and how African Americans have defined themselves, their history and culture, and their struggle for equality.
HIS 317L Latinx Histories
This course focuses on the lived experiences of Latinx peoples in the United States. Those who are called, or call themselves, Latinx comprise myriad communities, with distinctive histories, languages, political and social concerns, languages, cultural practices and cultural products. Thus, in our course we emphasize plurality—histories. Throughout the course, we will ask: What constitutes the category “Latinx”? Who are Latinx? Why does this matter? Our course will proceed through a series of microhistories of Latinx peoples, and we will be attentive to Indigenous, and Afro-Latino peoples being ascribed, claiming, or resisting the category Latinx. Using historical methods, we will ask, to quote photo historian Ken Gonzales-Day: “What is it to be Latinx? How much of it has to be recognized by others? Much of our identities require community, acknowledgment, consensus. The importance of the past, the importance of ancestors, the question of our connection to an ‘other’ are tied to the idea of our being diasporic. Are we displaced? Are we where we should be? Are we a new identity? I believe Latinx people are very much part of U.S. history, yet we continue to be underrepresented at every level.”
HIS 317L Immigration and Ethnicity
Widely considered a wellspring for U.S. greatness, immigration has also been an abiding site of our deepest conflicts. The republican foundations of the United States with its promises of democracy and equality for all seem to strain against ever increasing numbers of immigrants from parts of the world barely conceived of by the Founding Fathers, much less as sources of new citizens. What is the breaking point for the assimilating powers of U.S. democracy and how much does national vitality rely upon continued influxes of a diversity of immigrants with their strenuous ambitions and resourcefulness? Today we remain embattled by such competing beliefs about how immigration shapes our nation’s well-being and to what ends we should constrain whom we admit and in what numbers. This course emphasizes the following themes: the changing population of the United States from colonial times; ethnic cultures, communities, and cuisines; ideologies concerning eligibility for citizenship and for restricting immigration; the development of immigration law as an aspect of sovereign authority; the entwining of immigration policy with international relations; and the evolution of institutions for immigration enforcement.
HIS 317L Introduction to African American History
The course is a survey of African-American history from the slave trade to the recent past. It is an introductory examination of the black experience and is designed to bring to life the voices and history of African Americans. The class is organized chronologically, with an emphasis on the ideas, actors, and organizations that contributed to the African American experience. By the end of the semester, students should have a basic understanding of how African Americans have contributed to the making of America, the problems that they face, and how African Americans have defined themselves, their history and culture, and their struggle for equality.
HIS 317L The Black Power Movement
The Black Power movement was a distinct period in African American life from the late 1960s and early 1970s that emphasized racial pride, the creation of black political and cultural institutions, self-reliance, and group unity. The expression of black power ideology ranged from the desire to create an all-black nation-state to the promotion of black economic power. This course will look at the major organizations, key figures, and ideologies of the black power movement.
HIS 350R MAPPING RACIAL VIOLENCE TX
Mapping Violence: Racial Terror in Texas, 1900 - 1930 is a research project that aims to expose interconnected histories of violence, the legacies of colonization, slavery, and genocide that intersect in Texas. Although often segregated in academic studies, these histories coalesced geographically and temporally. Students in this course will learn interdisciplinary methods combining historical research methods, theories in public history and ethnic studies, and digital humanities methods to rethink the limits and possibilities of archival research, historical narrative, and methods for presenting findings to public audiences. This research intensive seminar will allow students to develop historical research skills and to contribute original research to the Mapping Violence project.
HIS 350R Refugees in 20th Century US
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HIS 350R When Topic is Appropriate
N/A
HIS 350R PRESERVING ATX QUEER HIST-WB
None
HIS 350R Refugees in 20th-Century US
This course explores the history of refugees in the twentieth century, with special attention to the U.S. and its engagement in the international arena of refugee politics. Students will examine how states, non-governmental organizations, private charities, and local communities have come together to address the questions of asylum, displacement, statelessness, and humanitarian concerns. Students will study the causes of particular refugee movements and the reasons why the United States responded to or failed to respond to certain refugee cases. The course will introduce students to how the "problem" of refugees has been framed by, among others, historians and social scientists, policymakers, NGOs, local communities, social workers, and refugees themselves. In doing so, this course will explore how particular cases of refugees have shaped U.S. domestic policies and also the development of the United States and its role in international affairs.
HIS 350R BLACK WOMEN ON TRIAL
This seminar course focuses on the experiences of black women who found themselves embroiled in public legal controversies that not only often threatened their freedom, but the outcomes of which often hinged on social constructions of race, gender, class, and sexuality. This seminar provides an overview of how these constructs shaped these public trials in the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries. The course begins by examining how Elizabeth Freeman successfully used the courts to initiate a freedom claim in 1781 based on Massachusetts’s new state constitution’s assertions that all people were born “free and equal.” From there, students will investigate and discuss the trials of women like Celia, Rosa Lee Ingram, and Angela Davis in the context of their historical moment while also exploring how these women shaped, and were shaped by, contemporaneous definitions of rape, civil disobedience, sexual harassment, and self-defense. Students will examine primary media coverage of the trials along with secondary sources on race and gender to learn how these historical moments shaped and reflected public understandings of womanhood, race, class, sex, justice, and in many cases, criminality.
HIS 350R WOMEN, GENDER AND BLACK POWER
The Black Power movement has not only shaped how we think of American society and race relations, but also how we think about gender roles and gender equality. This course examines the movement through the experiences of African American women activists as well as gender and sexuality constructs that prevailed during the second half of the twentieth century. The class will familiarize students with the history of the Black Power movement and examine scholarship about how femininity, masculinity, and sexuality shaped and were shaped by the struggle. By the end of the course, students will be familiar with the leading female figures of the movement as well as be able to engage in critical debates about the intersection of gender, sexuality, and African American activism.
HIS 350R MAPPING RACIAL VIOLENCE IN TX
Mapping Violence: Racial Terror in Texas, 1900 - 1930 is a research project that aims to expose interconnected histories of violence, the legacies of colonization, slavery, and genocide that intersect in Texas. Although often segregated in academic studies, these histories coalesced geographically and temporally. Students in this course will learn interdisciplinary methods combining historical research methods, theories in public history and ethnic studies, and digital humanities methods to rethink the limits and possibilities of archival research, historical narrative, and methods for presenting findings to public audiences. This research intensive seminar will allow students to develop historical research skills and to contribute original research to the Mapping Violence project.
HIS 356P The United States in the Civil Rights Era
This upper-division lecture course allows students to gain deeper understandings of civil rights movements in the U.S. by placing them alongside significant historical developments from World War II to the 1970s such as postwar urbanization, economic change, new media technologies and more. We reassess well-known narratives of the Civil Rights Movement such as those in Black History Month annual commemorations and social studies textbooks. We reexamine the idea of King and Malcolm X as polar opposites and revisit the Montgomery Bus Boycott by taking a critical look at the identity of Rosa Parks as a seamstress too tired to give up her seat and Dr. King as the planner and leader of the boycott. We also explore lesser-known movements that may have involved more than desegregation and voting rights and we use original documents and oral histories to examine local struggles in Texas. That approach allows us to discern activism and perspectives of women and young people. Although the Black Freedom Movement forms the spine of the course we pay significant attention to Mexican American movements, considering the two on their own and in relation to each other. How many current UT students realize that 50 years ago Black, Mexican American, and white students demanded an end to what they considered racist practices here? By considering not only what people did, but their motivations and perspectives in specific historical contexts, we open possibilities for new understandings of today.
HIS 357C African Amer History to 1860
This upper division course examines the history of African Americans in the United States from the West African Heritage to the Civil War and provides a critical examination on central issues under scholarly debate in the reconstruction of the Black experience in America. The course thus engages the debate on the evolution of African-American slavery as a social, economic and political institution, with special focus on antebellum slavery, including plantation slavery, industrial slavery, and urban slavery in addition to slave culture. Also, the course assesses the institutional development of the free black community, during the age of slavery, with emphasis on free black protest activities, organizations, and leaders. Equally important, information is provided on the business and entrepreneurial activities of both slave and free blacks before the Civil War to underscore the long historic tradition of black economic self-help. Invariably, those slaves who purchased their freedom were slaves involved in various business enterprises. Also emphasized in the course are the various ways in which slave and free black women responded to slavery and racism before the Civil War, giving consideration to gender issues within the intersection of the dynamics of race, class, and sex.
HIS 365G BLACK WOMN MASS INCARCERATION
This undergraduate seminar course examines the history of Black women and mass incarceration in America. Using an intersectional approach for understanding how race, class, and gender have historically influenced the production of crime and unfair criminal justice policies, this course is designed to help students better understand why mass incarceration matters, what its historical legacy is, and how it impacts Black women today. Some of the topics discussed in this course include: the punishment of enslaved women in the plantation South; Black women and convict labor after the Civil War; crime and punishment in the age of Jim Crow; political prisoners and protests during the first movement for Black lives; how the “War on Drugs” became a war on Black women; Black girls and the juvenile (in)justice system; the punishment of pregnancy; and carceral violence against Black women.
HIS 366N 15-ANTI-SEMITISM
Why have Jews been disliked, mistrusted or hated for so long? How, if at all, does judeophobia differ from other types of xenophobia or racism? In which societies have we historically seen intense mistrust and demonization of Jews? Where do we see it today? And where do we see the opposite “Jewcentric” phenomenon: philosemitism, and what some refer to as an encroaching judaization? In this upper-level undergraduate course, we tackle these and related questions. We identify distinct types of judeophobia/antisemitism over 2,500 years, identifying when and where new and discrete layers of antisemitic ideas developed and flourished. Although our primary focus is on antisemitism in contemporary and historical Christian and Muslim societies, we begin in the antisemitic bedrock— Ancient Greece and Rome. We also look at antisemitism in peripheral societies which have had few Jews. Finally, we consider judeophobic “self-hatred” among Jews themselves and, perhaps most disturbing (though sociologists shouldn’t find this surprising), we look at the repeated role of intellectual elites—including those who consider themselves progressive—in generating and justifying new forms of judeophobia, and in so doing, perpetuating this ancient hatred.
LAH 350 31-IMMIGRATION LITERATURE
We will devote ourselves in this course to the study of late twentieth and early twenty-first century novels about immigration, primarily but not exclusively to the United States, from a diverse range of home countries. We will think about these works of fiction within the contexts of U.S. history and literary history; immigration debates in the U.S. in the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s; 9/11, terrorism, and surveillance; and the immigration policies of the U.S. presidents in the last three decades, for example. Key questions will include how class, education, gender and sexuality, race, and religion shape the content as well as the form of immigration narratives.
MAS 311 Ethnicity & Gender: La Chicana
Among the many catalysts that centralized the narratives of Chicanas into the discourse the U.S. Southwest/Mexican Borderlands, the 1971 La Conferencia de Mujeres por la Raza in Houston inspired how Chicanas/Xicanas, xicanindias, afroxicanas, mestizas, indigenous, Mexican American, and brown women defined themselves, asserted their roles and identities, and shared their stories. This course privileges the stories, struggles, contestations, imaginations, writings, and accomplishments of Chicanas in the United States in the mid-twentieth and early twentieth-first centuries. Through a close examination of literature, and attention to historical and theoretical materials, we will create a growing understanding of the significance of gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, class, language, spirituality, and citizenship in affecting the daily lives and social worlds of Chicanas. By end of the semester, we will also gain a complex insight into the importance of how Chicana feminism, Xicanisma, intersectionality, migration, borders, and community are formative in the Chicana experience(s).
MAS 364L LA CAUSA, FARMWORKER MOVMNT
At its core, “La Causa, The Farmworker Movement” seeks to critically examine the significance of farm labor organizing and expressions of solidarity in the United States, both in historical and contemporary contexts. That is, in this course, students will be introduced to the history of the expansion of commercial agriculture and concomitant organizational labor struggles waged by agricultural workers in the continental United States. They will also gain direct experience in understanding and organizing support for current struggles for farmworker justice in the nation.
MAS 374 NATIVE AMER WOMEN'S HISTORY-WB
Without a doubt, the untimely deaths of Native American leaders Marsha Gomez (Choctaw/Chicana) and Ingrid Washinawatok (Menominee), in the late 1990s, accentuates the complexity, globality, and intersectional nature of their labor, activism, and vision that predates and foreshadows current concerns of multifaceted decoloniality and self-determination. Gomez, a sculptor and peace activist, was a founder of Indigenous Women’s Network (IWN) in 1983 and an instrumental organizer of a 1997 multiday gathering of indigenous women, who were community leaders, activists, healers, educators, writers, thinkers, on the grounds of Alma de Mujer. Washinawatok was a human right activist who served as the chair of the NGO Committee on the United Nations International Decade of the World's Indigenous Peoples. Her work embraced a global indigeneity as an approach to advocate, demand, and highlight the human dignity of Natives peoples across the world and challenged the constrictions of geopolitics. This course investigates the histories of Native American women to reaffirm and reclaim their place and role in the histories of Native Americans, indigenous peoples, women, Chican@/xs, Greater Mexico, and the United States. We will use a historical approach to unravel Western paradigms of women’s history that erase and omit the histories of Native American women because it defies the singular lens of gender. Furthermore, we will contemplate how multiplicitous understandings that center colonization, settler colonialism, genocide, race, and environmentalism are essential to examining Native American women’s history. Overall, this class will illuminate the stories, struggles, and ideas of community-building, sovereignty, self-determination, and liberation as integral to their genders and sexualities as Native American, Indian, First Nations, indigenous, and red and brown women.
MAS 374 US IMM POLCY STORIES MIGRTN
The story of racial and ethnic politics in the United States is one of struggle, resistance, and change. While many sought to migrate to the U.S., its doors have not always been open to everyone. Who can enter the United States, and who can become an American is a political and social question that has different answers throughout history. In this course, we will cover the role of immigration policy in defining the face of American politics and society. From Asian exclusion, landmark immigration reform in 1965, the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, to more recent policies like the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigration Responsibility act of 1995 and the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, we will discuss how these policies have impacted migration into the United States and their impact on defining who can become an American. We will combine the history of immigration policy with memoirs of migration, immigration policy, and incorporation, providing a fuller picture of how immigrants are affected by these policies are treated in the United States.
RHE 309J When Topic is Appropriate
For topics courses labeled as “When Topic is Appropriate” on a BDP curriculum sheet, please note that all topics for this course number are not automatically approved to count toward your BDP. In advance of registration for a particular semester (and as part of the BDP seat request process), the BDP office will inform current BDP students of the topics for the course number that are approved for their BDP.
RHE 330D RHE OF LATINX SOCIAL MVMT
This course provides a rhetorical historical survey of Latinx social movement(s) in the Americas from the 19th to the 21st centuries. Although scholarship has recognized forms of resistance, subversion, protest, and re-existence in Latin America since colonization arrived in the Americas in the fifteenth century, this historical survey will use the conceptual lens of social movement(s) to ground our study of the aesthetic and strategic contours of the political (re)imaginings of Latinx persons during the modernity/coloniality era. By analyzing a combination of secondary and primary sources, we will trace and explore the similarities and differences between Latin American social movement rhetorics over time, their poetic (inter)connectedness, and the ways in which (de)coloniality (un)marks their political forms. Although our focus will be on social movement(s) and on their rhetorical (re)configurations over time, we will also put our focus on the institutional(ized) forms of power creating and subtending the conditions of social movement rhetorical actions. That is, throughout the course we will also be attending to the ways in which rhetorics from “below” rub up against rhetorics from “above.” In so doing, we will investigate how Latin American rhetorics create and are in tension with intersecting forces of oppression (i.e., race, sexuality, class, (dis)ability) and how their interanimation have influenced one another throughout history.
RHE 330D RHETORIC OF LGBTQ+ RIGHTS
In many ways, the history of U.S. LGBTQ+ rights rhetoric shows us kairos in action; the “opportune moment” for argument is on display throughout the 20th and 21st centuries as activists/writers/rhetors move from apologia to radical assertion to critical questioning. This course offers a historical survey of the rhetoric of LGBTQ+ rights over the last 120 years or so, beginning with early sexological descriptions of “inverts” and moving through the mid-century homophile movement, liberation discourse in the 1960s and 1970s, ACT-UP and the Lesbian Avengers in the 1980s and 1990s, and the birth of the modern queer and trans rights movements. Looking at a variety of texts (political, personal, and poetic), we will analyze how power, sex, and writing create a generative rhetorical tension that undergirds much current discussion in U.S. (counter)public spheres.
RHE 330E RHET AND GENDER VIOLENCE
This course explores gender violence. Specifically, we will study texts that analyze sexual assault, sexual harassment, intimate partner violence, and sex trafficking from rhetorical, feminist, legal, and sociological frameworks. Our aim is to understand the diverse forms and effects of gender violence and to examine interventions that can reduce its occurrence. We will also consider the intersections of identity that shape societal responses to violence that is gendered as well as racialized and sexualized. Course texts will include legal cases, films, victim impact statements, and influential scholarly works on gender theory, gender violence, restorative justice, and recent social movements such as SlutWalk and #MeToo. The course is also designed to enhance your reading and writing skills. Reading might appear to be a straightforward activity requiring no special training, but the close reading expected in many academic contexts is a skill that must be learned. Likewise, writing analytically is a skill that requires instruction and exercise. These two scholarly activities – close reading and analytical writing – are linked: to write well, you must be able to analyze the substance and structure of other people’s arguments. This course will develop and test your skills in these two vital academic areas.
RTF 323C Screening Race
In this course, we will focus on an ongoing and contemporary development in mainstream U.S. media industries—namely, the turn towards “multicultural” markets, “multicultural” audiences/consumers and “multicultural” programming. Consumers reports such as Nielsen’s Reports are increasingly studying the links between the shifts in the U.S. demographics and the opportunities for market growth and expansion. As mainstream and traditional media industries strategize to compete and profit in an increasingly multi-platform, multi-content media universe, they have embraced a new slogan, “ The multicultural is the new mainstream.” Interestingly, despite the multiplicity indicated in “multicultural,” when it comes to media industries, the multicultural is predominantly imagined as three racial groups—African Americans, U.S. Hispanics and Asian Americans. Hollywood, television and digital media industries are increasingly strategizing ways to target and appeal to these three “multicultural” groups.
SOC 307L Gender/Race/Class Amer Soc
This course examines the intersection of gender, race, class, and sexuality in the United States. Drawing on sociological research and analysis, we investigate how these identities operate not only as ways of categorizing people, but as interrelated structures that shape our experiences, life chances, and social worlds. Inequities and oppressions pertaining to body size, citizen status, religion, ethnicity, and disability are also addressed. Attending to the various ways that social construction rationalizes power imbalances in institutions (e.g., work, family, education, health, media, the carceral system) is a key focus. We conclude with movements for social change.
SOC 335R REPRODUCTIVE JUSTICE & RACE
Access to reproductive care is the most significant indicator of social inequality. The rights to have children, or not, and parent are deeply stratified across societies. And childhood inequalities have persistent, life-long health effects. In this course we will examine reproductive outcomes for women in order to study social justice. Reproductive justice is defined “as the human right to maintain personal bodily autonomy, have children, not have children, and parent the children we have in safe and sustainable communities.” Building from Loretta Ross, SisterSong, and National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum, our working definition of reproduction justice for this course encompasses diverse families’ rights to reproduction, processes of becoming pregnant and giving birth, the right to give birth to a child with disabilities, the right to prenatal care and child care. Taking our cue from reproductive justice activists and scholars, we will consider the complete physical and mental well-being of women (broadly defined), children, and their families which can potentially be achieved when they have the economic, social and political power, and resources to make healthy decisions about their sexuality, and reproduction. Reproductive justice is almost always out of reach because resources are unevenly distributed, based on race, gender, sexuality, abilities/ disabilities, citizenship, and social class. As a result, developing and developed nations are racked with inequalities when it comes to reproductive matters. From slavery, access to birth control, stratified reproduction, sex selective abortions, and new reproductive technologies, this course will focus on difficult topics; but, no answers will be provided. The hope is that you will find answers for yourself about what you mean by reproductive justice, and how you think it can be achieved. My aim is that we will emerge at the end of the semester with an open mind regarding health, and a more complicated, empathetic understanding of what reproductive justice means. You will, hopefully, attempt to make reproductive a part of your worldview and everyday life.
SOC 359 Labor and Labor Movements
This course explores employment relations in the United States. Major themes include sociological theories of work; the impact of globalization on workers around the world; how the social inequalities of race, class, and gender are reproduced in various types of workplaces (low wage and professional); and the labor movement’s efforts to achieve equality, job security, and rights for workers. Students are required to attend all class meetings and complete all reading assignments on time (approximately 75-100 pages per week).
WGS 303 INTRO TO LGBTQ STUDIES-WB
This course explores critical questions of gender and sexuality in society, introducing students to key theoretical, historical, and methodological approaches within LGBTQ+ studies. We will employ a particular lens to examine these issues: namely, we will ask how have LGBTQ+ individuals come to know and explore themselves in and through various media across the twentieth century.
WGS 335 2-LGBTQ OPPRESSION: DIALOG
This fall course is the first half of the Peers for Pride Program and prepares students to become peer facilitators of performance-based workshops designed to address macro and micro constructs of LGBTQIA+ justice, racial justice, and multiculturalism, specifically within the context of power, privilege, and identity. Topics will include, but not limited to race, class, ability, gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation. This semester we build a foundational knowledge of LGBTQIA+ identities, the intersectional systems of oppression that affect LGBTQIA+ people, and approaches to our core question: “What do thriving LGBTQIA+/queer communities look like?” We are also working together to establish our practice of theatre for dialogue, a form of applied theatre in preparation for your facilitation in the spring. This semester you will establish your relationship with each other as an ensemble, you will reflect on your role in collaborative facilitation, and you will work together to propose activating and message scenes to engage audiences in the spring in conversation around LGBTQIA+ justice. Along the way, you will put your work in a relationship with student and community organizers also doing this work. This semester, you will build skills in intersectional analysis of texts, events, and daily life; ensemble performance work; community alliances; and critical reflection in writing, speaking, and performance.
WGS 340 CHICANA FEMINISMS
This course tracks the rise and development of Chicana feminist consciousness in the 1960s and 1970s across the Southwest and Midwestern United States. Drawing on both contemporary scholarship and primary source material from the Chicana por mi Raza Digital Memory Collective, students will learn about the central individuals, organizations, theories, and aesthetic practices that shaped Chicana feminism in its early years and contributed to the development of an intersectional analytic that was later elaborated and expanded on by writers like Gloria Anzaldúa, Cherrie Moraga, Aida Hurtado, Chela Sandoval, and many others. A central methodological theme of this course is how “memory work” (oral history, archival analysis, collaborative knowledge production) shapes our understanding of the past and offers pathways to a more libratory future. Students will emerge from this course with a strong foundation in the history of Chicana feminist thought, an understanding of how Chicana feminism has contributed to contemporary theories of intersectionality, and an appreciation for how the ways we remember can shape our visions for the future.
Nationalism, Imperialism & War - Comparative
AFR 315S LIBERATION IN AFR DIASPORA-WB
This course introduces students to the historical, theoretical, and social question of liberation in the African diaspora from the period of slavery up to the current era. As such, we will take up three major themes: slavery, marronage, and freedom; Pan-Africanism and anti-colonialism; Black Power and national liberation. We will examine how African peoples conceptualized freedom and liberation in these periods, the major organizations and intellectuals who framed them, and how popular activity developed and informed all three (ideas, organizations, and intellectuals). Some of the questions we will take up include: how did enslaved Africans conceptualize freedom? Did their ideas and activities merely extend western notions of liberty and freedom, or develop distinct conceptions of freedom, rights, and humanity? Why in the early Twentieth Century did African peoples around the world, who had little interactions with one another, pursue pan-Africanism as a political philosophy? What limitations have class, nationality, gender, and sexuality posed to such movements? Did national liberation struggles from the 1950s through the 1970s in Africa and the Caribbean bring about fundamental changes to those societies, or merely replicate colonialism’s oppressive regimes? What connections existed between national liberation movements in Africa and the Caribbean, and Civil Rights and Black Power in the United States and England? How does #BlackLivesMatter fit within this history? Alongside these concerns, we will consider what constitutes a diaspora, and what makes Africans and peoples of African descent around the world an African diaspora. Is the African diaspora a racial or geographical designation? Are those people of African descent in the Caribbean and Latin America who identify as something other than “black” part of the African diaspora? What role does national location and citizenship play in how we think about the diaspora? How has the migration/movement of peoples across regional and national boundaries contributed to a sense of diasporic belongings?
AFR 345K Race Against Empire: Americas
This course is concerned with the history of race as an organizing principle of empire. How have ideas of race and racialization provided justification and motivation for imperial formations? In conversation with other parts of the world, this course will focus on empire, race and social movements in the Americas. We will examine how the pursuit and maintenance of empires by Western states was (and is) deeply tied to notions of race, with particular attention to legal thinking. As part of the course, we will also explore various (and contested) critiques of empire, anti-colonial movements and their corresponding “freedom dreams.”
ANT 310L Introduction to Native American and Indigenous Studies
This interdisciplinary course introduces students to issues in Native American and Indigenous Studies, including but not limited to research conducted by affiliate faculty of the Native Ameican and Indigenous Studies program at the University of Texas at Austin. Topics may include indigenous historiography, decolonization, geography, tribal law and policy, education, health, language revitalization, intellectualism, expressive culture, media, and other subjects. This course carries the flag for Cultural Diversity in the United States. Cultural Diversity courses are designed to increase your familiarity with the variety and richness of the American cultural experience. You should therefore expect a substantial portion of your grade to come from assignments covering the practices, beliefs, and histories of at least one U.S. cultural group that has experienced persistent marginalization.
ANT 320L Language Endangerment/Rights
The 21st century, linguists say, could see the “death or doom” of 90 percent of the world’s languages. In response, non-governmental organizations, academics, and activists have responded with campaigns to preserve and revitalize “dying” languages. At the same time, lawyers, legislators, and political theorists have built the groundwork for the recognition of “language rights” as a tool for defending small-scale and minority language communities against the spread of national and global languages. In this course, we examine such efforts in order to ask: why does the idea of language death inspire all of this work and attention? What is “a language” – what properties are seen to inhere in language – that drives these activities? Here we will explore views of language that underpin the anxieties and efforts of the language rights and revitalization movements: from the place of language in the 19th and 20th century politics of national autonomy to the role of language as a repository of worldviews and an emblem of our shared humanity. In the process, we see how “language” and distinct “languages” are situated at the center of imaginations of community and moral anxieties over autonomy, with all of the political and ethical implications that result for people who are recognized as having their own language as well as those who recognize the “languagedness” of others.
ANT 324L Global Indigenous Issues
This course examines theoretical and ethnographic issues facing indigenous peoples in the America. It will critically examine debates surrounding terms often taken for granted, such as such as indigeneity, mestizaje, and multiculturalism. The course will also take a historical and ethnographic approach to analyze the ways in which indigenous peoples have been impacted and continue to respond to forces such as colonialism and capitalism in different geographical regions of the Americas. Drawing on topics such as contact and colonial expansion, self-determination and the nation state, gender, ecologies, social movements, and ontologies, the course will explore the lived realities of different groups of people, examine the influence of European contact, and discuss how indigenous peoples are creatively advancing their life projects in different contexts.
E 360C POSTCOLONIAL LITERATURE
This course introduces students to some of the key writings in postcolonial literature and theory from disparate geographical contexts. It will be divided into three modules: first, on the most well-known critiques of colonial discourse; second, on literature and theories of decolonization and of the formation of postcolonial nation-states; and finally, on globalization, neo-imperialism, and diaspora. In the first module we will read foundational theorists including Frantz Fanon, Edward Said, Gayatri Spivak, and Homi Bhabha. We will bring their theories to bear on Abdulrazak Gurnah’s Afterlives (2020). Our second module will focus on Salman Rushdie’s Shame (1983) with theoretical readings from Benedict Anderson’s Imagined Communities, Bhabha’s Nation and Narration, and others. In our final module we will read Kamila Shamsie’s Home Fire (2017) and Yaa Gyasi’s Homegoing (2016), bringing in theoretical insights by Kwame Anthony Appiah, Mahmood Mamdani, Paul Gilroy, Stuart Hall, Neil Lazarus, Saidiya Hartman, others.
GOV 360R Civil Wars and Ethnic Violence
This course is structured to consider various theoretical approaches in the study of civil wars and their management. Throughout, we will sample from numerous cases of civil war and violence paying close attention to the conflicts in Colombia, South Africa, Rwanda, Uganda, and the former Yugoslavia. The first segment of the course explores the basic dimensions of civil wars and ethnic violence. In particular, we examine the origins and development of ethnic and political identities and how they structure the parameters of conflict. Core questions include: What do we mean by “ethnicity”? Is a given identity inherent in individuals, or is it subject to change? If manipulable, do “instrumental” elites use ethnicity to their advantage? Is there an ethnic dimension to all civil violence? The second section of the course is devoted to the process by which conflict among individuals and groups turns violent, with an emphasis on civil wars in Africa. Key questions include: What political incentives do leaders have to drum up support through violence? How do economic factors such as natural resources affect a group’s opportunity or willingness to engage in violence? What causes internal violence to “spill over” into other countries or regions? The third and final section addresses strategies of conflict management and resolution. We consider some of the following questions: Does a feasible set of preventive solutions to civil wars exist? What is successful conflict management? Which strategies employed by international actors are most successful, and why? What are the obstacles to implementing conflict resolution measures?
GOV 365I Authoritarianism
Authoritarian regimes are political systems in which the few rule the many. In the last century alone, such regimes have taken many forms. The rulers can be military officers or civilians. The government can operate as a hereditary monarchy or maintain republican-style institutions (elections, a legislature). Despite their variations, all authoritarian regimes share two features: they vest a small circle of rulers with the power to redistribute resources and apply violence; they deny the general populace regular influence in these same policy areas. In summary, authoritarian regimes are politically exclusive oligarchies. This course will study the economic, ideological, and political sources of authoritarian regimes and help explain why they persist.
GOV 365N ETHICS OF FOREIGN INTERVENTION
Under what conditions, if any, is it right for an outside power to enter another country and influence the people and government there? Such interventions constitute a substantial component of international politics. Through readings, lectures, and films we will study and debate the morality of foreign interventions by the United States and other governments. The two major cases we will cover are the American War in Vietnam and the US-led war in Afghanistan. In papers and team debates, students will examine interventions by Russia and Saudi Arabia.
GOV 379S REFUGEES AND FORCED MIGRATION
On the last day of 2000, New York Times reporter Barbara Crossette wrote: "The 20th century may have taught the world to deal systematically with vast refugee flows, too many to count precisely, but the 21st century may have to invent new ways of coping with them, as the nature and definition of refugee crises changes." These words were prescient, and remain true. As we approach the year 2018, millions upon millions of refugees remain in limbo, whether as victims of war, economic strife, inequality and dislocation, competing political priorities and social practice, evolving understandings of rights, and environmental and climate-related transformations. Mass migration has become a defining feature of the century, and the repercussions of our decisions about global migration will have enduring effects. We will therefore spend the semester exploring the many dimensions of refugee movement and crises by examining the causes and consequences of mass migration, and the ways that international laws and institutions are attempting to grapple with them. This will be a reading-intensive seminar, with short weekly writing assignment, occasional group projects, and two longer papers. Our readings (supplemented by films and videos) will include histories, personal testimonies, memoirs and fiction based in the refugee experience; political analyses and diplomatic policy documents; and studies of international law and security. Current international crises concerning forced migration and related problems have been caused my many, often countervailing problems. Our goal this semester is not to choose sides, but to endeavor to understand the reasons these problems arise and persist, and the difficulties that individual and collective actors create and/or encounter as they confront them.
HIS 307P A History of Violence, from 1500 to the Present
This course will use violence as an analytic category to study the last 500 years of history. Historians typically use this period to explain the rise of the state, capitalism, modernity, or even the “rise of the West.” Instead, this course deploys this block of time to understand violence, examining how violence acts as a force shaping history. Violence can be difficult to describe and locate, and this course will not propose a closed definition of violence. Instead it uses an interrogative and open-ended approach, one that begins with a tentative understanding of violence as a practice inherent to certain social formations. In this way we approach racism, anti-Semitism, class and gender violence. It will also pay attention to the modern state and its monopolization of violence through the police and law, which reduced violence such as crime. At the same, the modern state unleashed historically unprecedented killing in the world wars and genocides of the twentieth century. The course will also seek to understand violence outside of its physical forms, such as that existing in language and gender norms, as well as the “slow violence” of poverty and environmental degradation. Ultimately, the course seeks to better locate the relationship between violence and power as it reveals itself in history, and to consider the inherent ethical and political problems posed by violence. Thus, political violence and the choice of violence in war, civil wars, revolutions, and revolts will be of particular concern.
HIS 350L When Topic is Appropriate
None
J S 307 INTRO HOLOCAUST GENOCD STUDIES
This course is an introduction to Holocaust and Genocide Studies. This is an expansive academic field that covers global topics and many different disciplines. In this course, we explore the topic of genocide through a variety of perspectives and in different historical contexts. As an introductory class and as the prerequisite course for students minoring in Holocaust and Genocide Studies, the course will familiarize you with important concepts and terms, a selection of historical case studies, and, through a series of micro-perspectives, a deeper understanding of the dynamics of genocides.
LAS 322C Race, Empire, and Modernity
Empires have existed for over two millennia, and have spanned a range of cultures, civilizations, and geographies. It is with European expansion into the Americas that race emerges as a conceptual tool and structure of power replacing older distinctions between civilized and barbarian, human/non-human, and European/non-European, with distinctions based between superior and inferior races and socio-political structures supporting this hierarchy. Rarely is modernity, as a marker of historical progress, scientific discovery, economic development, and democracy, viewed as deeply imbricated with race and empire, nor its structures of slavery, genocide, the carving up of the Americas and Africa, and colonialism. This course approaches race, empire, and modernity as mutually constitutive modes of thought, political structures, and social orderings of the world. The British, French, Spanish, and American empires are well known for their glorious achievements, scientific breakthroughs, and political projects that have shaped the world we live in. Yet it is equally undeniable that these empires also brought about some of most horrific events in history —colonialism, world war, nuclear, genocide, and the Holocaust all reflect the inner-workings of race and empire within modernity. This course begins with the rise of those empires built upon the “discovery” of the Americas and the inauguration of the European slave trade, and makes an inquiry into how slavery, race and racial oppression, genocide, and colonialism have been central to the major leaps in science, industry, and the dawn of democratic governance. We will examine how those subjected to modern empire from within the African diaspora (Africa, the Caribbean, Latin America, Central American, the U.S., and Europe), as well as key Enlightenment thinkers, thought about and debated modernity, empire, racial slavery, what it means to be human, and freedom.
RHE 309J When Topic is Appropriate
For topics courses labeled as “When Topic is Appropriate” on a BDP curriculum sheet, please note that all topics for this course number are not automatically approved to count toward your BDP. In advance of registration for a particular semester (and as part of the BDP seat request process), the BDP office will inform current BDP students of the topics for the course number that are approved for their BDP.
RHE 309J RHETORIC OF BORDERS
None
Nationalism, Imperialism & War - Regional (Non-US)
AFR 345O DEBT COLONIALISM CARIBBEAN
In this course we will examine the role that debt has played in the formation of colonial and neocolonial practices in the Caribbean region. We will take a broad approach to the concept of debt in order to explore the financial and monetary dynamics of debt, but also the political and cultural implications of debt. In particular we will look at debt as justification and in furtherance of colonialism throughout the Caribbean.
AFR 374E Nationalism in the Caribbean
This course takes a broad view of the concept of nationalism and seeks to trace its manifestations throughout the circum-Caribbean during the 20th century. The term circum-Caribbean is defined broadly in order to include not only the island-nations of the region, but also their diasporic communities within the United States. Throughout the 20th century the region saw episodes of great political upheaval and violent tumult. This course will explore the various factors that led to the growth of revolutionary nationalism in the region as well as the movements that arose as a result of these tensions. We will discuss nationalism from a theoretical and global perspective as well as through case studies of specific Caribbean and diasporic communities. Particular attention will be paid to the role of US hegemony in the rise of nationalist ideology.
ANS 361 GENDER AND MODERN INDIA
This course carries the Global Cultures flag. Global Cultures courses are designed to increase your familiarity with cultural groups outside the United States. You should expect to stretch your mental horizons to comprehend the practices, beliefs, and histories of people who did not think as you do now, and lived in completely different cultures outside the US. You should expect this to be a challenge, especially since NOBODY has learned the details of South Asian histories, events, names and places in their high school curriculum. Only by learning about others unlike ourselves can we better learn to reflect on our own cultures, build our imaginations and empathies, and enhance our skills of critical thinking. (For definitions of ‘Critical Thinking’ and related tips, see FAQs at the end of this syllabus) This is a three-part course. In PART I, students will read about the genesis of South Asian ideas of gender in the historical past stretching over two millennia. They will read poetry, watch clips from films, listen to music that will help them understand the broader social and political structures in which men, women and inter-sexed persons all interacted with each other in specific contexts. In PART II, students will develop a basic understanding of various shifts that occurred in the course of the nineteenth-twentieth century. They will evaluate the contradictory and plural developments of gender histories as inter-sexed bodies were criminalized, suffrage movements of European feminists and anti-colonial political movements all came together in the subcontinent. In Part III students will learn of some of the key economic, legal and political movements that made explicit the contradictions and pressures of the ‘intersectionalities’ of class, caste, sexualities, race, religion and regional identities in postcolonial nation-states.
ANT 322W POWER RESIST PUTIN'S RUSSIA
In their independent research projects, and in class lectures and discussions, we will bring into our conversation Russian local and transnational cultures of protest, such as: ironic anti-parades, art interventions, mutual aid networks, eco-activism, trolling, or copycat social movements. Students may use independent research journals and papers to place Russian protest traditions in the context of other timelines and political movements, such as Eurasian “color revolutions;” digital media-fueled protests in the Middle East and China; or emergent forms of assembly that aim to create new types of sociability, such as the global “occupy” movements, or Tahrir square demonstrations (or any others students find personally compelling).
GSD 360 MEMORIES OF WAR
How do societies remember complex, traumatic and existential events? This course looks at the manifold ways in which the wars of the 20th and 21st century are remembered in Germany and the United States - from poems, novels and films to monuments and the controversial debates about military conflicts that the two countries have been involved in. Based on theories of social memory, concepts of individual and social mourning and more political approaches such as necropolitics we will analyze how individuals, groups and societies remember the events and experiences of war. We will analyze how war affects individual life stories, how societies mourn, how remembering war may have an impact on national identity, and how war memories become a way to make political demands for the future. Every student will have the opportunity to work in-depth and individually on either an event, for example the Vietnam war, or on a genre, for example poems, film or political texts.
HIS 306N Revolution & Decolonization in North Africa
This class addresses the history of anti-colonial struggles in North Africa and paths followed towards decolonization and independence. These struggles gained momentum after World War II, leading to the independence of Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia in the 1950s and 60s. Coursework will seek to explain the various ways independence was achieved, looking at local circumstances as well as the larger regional (Africa, Middle East, and Europe) and global (Cold War, Third World, oil resources) contexts. The course will also present the complex nature of the armed struggle: wars against the colonial powers unleashed a fury of conflicts, or wars within wars, some of which were not immediately tied to the colonial/anti-colonial struggle. The battlefield also came to include civilians in significant ways, even targeting them deliberately. Our study will conclude by highlighting the successes of these revolutions as well as pointing to their problematic legacies, which serve as the backdrop to today’s revolutions in the region. Students will examine all these questions through sources that will include films, photographs, political propaganda texts, and memories.
HIS 310 Introduction to Modern Africa
This course introduces students to the modern history of Africa, beginning from the nineteenth century to the present. The course starts with an overview of the significant changes of the late nineteenth century, notably the partition of the continent. The twentieth century forms the major concern, divided into two phases: the colonial and post-colonial. In the first phase, the imposition of colonial rule, the changes of colonial rule, and decolonization are the three principal themes. The second phase examines a variety of issues dealing with independence, the management of modern states, and the international situation. As most of these issues are new to students, books have been carefully selected, and the lectures are organized in such a way that the students may follow it easily. At regular intervals, films and documentaries will be used as illustrations.
HIS 317L The United States and Africa
This class will examine the history of the political, economic, and cultural relations between the United States and Africa from the early origins of the slave trade to the present. It explores the role of the US in historical global contexts. The class is intended to elucidate historical developments both in the US and on the African continent and should satisfy students with a strong interest in US history as well as those interested in the place of the US in the African Diaspora. The semester is divided into four parts, each covering a major theme. The course aims; (1) to develop a base of African and US history and increase the level of awareness of the African Diaspora in the US; (2) to obtain a well-rounded approach to the political, economic, and cultural connections between the United States and Africa; (3) to reevaluate perceptions of Africa, to recognize the vibrant nature of African culture, and to apply new knowledge to the different cultural agents active in US popular culture, such as music, dance, literature, business and science; (4) to help students understand present-day politics in Africa at a deeper level and to obtain a better understanding of racial conditions in the US; and (5) to learn how to assess historical materials—their relevance to a given interpretative problem, their reliability and their importance—and to determine the biases present within particular scholarship. These include historical documents, literature, and films.
HIS 346K Colonial Latin America
This course examines the history of early modern Latin America, a period in which this region was at the vanguard of global history. It will cover from the late fifteenth century, including pre-conquest Indigenous civilizations and the European expansion toward the Atlantic, to the early nineteenth century and the first republican experiments. We will frame these processes within the larger history of early modern empires and the networks that relocated peoples, plants, animals, pathogens, ideas, and things throughout the globe. We will consider the intersecting history of peoples of Indigenous, African, and European origin, and the ways in which their interactions created enduring social and cultural forms, as well as how they engaged with—and often rebelled against—imperial politics.
HIS 347R Chile: From Revolution to Counterrevolution
Scholars often describe Chile as one of Latin America’s most “exceptional” countries, identifying it as among the region’s richest, most politically stable, and most “modern” nation-states. But Chile’s twentieth century history reveals that such characterizations stand atop a more complicated turbulent past. In 1970, Chile became the first country in the hemisphere to freely elect a socialist government that promised a far- reaching social and economic revolution. Three years later, the country would be ruled by one of the region’s most brutal twentieth-century dictatorships. While the country experienced phenomenal growth during the 1980s and 1990s, Chile also became one of the countries with the worst distribution of income in the world. In this writing-intensive seminar, we will investigate this challenging and often contradictory history by discussing—and most importantly, writing about—some of the key political, social, and economic events that underpin contemporary Chilean society. In so doing, we will also use the case of Chile to explore many of the key issues that were at stake in Latin America during the global Cold War era.
HIS 350L Struggle for Asian Democrcy
None
HIS 350L When Topic is Appropriate
None
HIS 350L 98-PARTITION OF INDIA HIST LIT
The contents of this course cover the short and long-term effects of the partition of British India in 1947 into two nation-states of India and Pakistan. At least a million people died, many millions lost their homes, migrations of unimaginable magnitude occurred within the subcontinent. Since the 1980s, historians have tried to understand the effects of Partition on the lives, health and memories of ordinary people caught up in it. While attempting to follow this scholarly tradition, this course also aims at imparting other skills.
HIS 350L The Partition of India in History and Literature
The contents of this course cover the short and long-term effects of the partition of British India in 1947 into two nation-states of India and Pakistan. At least a million people died, many millions lost their homes, migrations of unimaginable magnitude occurred within the subcontinent. Since the 1980s, historians have tried to understand the effects of Partition on the lives, health and memories of ordinary people caught up in it. While attempting to follow this scholarly tradition, this course also aims at imparting other skills.
HIS 350L 92-UPRISING IN INDIA-1857
The great anti-British uprising of 1857-58 in India was the largest armed uprising against any colonial power through the nineteenth century. It was ultimately suppressed after a long and sanguinary campaign, but has left a mass of historical records behind. Even though these were overwhelmingly produced by the English victors in the struggle, yet they do offer some glimpses of the Indian side as well as the views of insurgents and neutrals caught up in the conflict. The uprising occurred at a time when thousands of literate English people, men and women, lived in India. Their fate sparked vast interest and concern across the Anglophone world, extending even to the USA. The reading public devoured newspapers and magazines that were informed by the newly installed electric telegraph connecting India, Europe and America. In less than a year, personal testimonies, narratives and sermons began to fly off the presses in India and England. Indian testimonies were slower to emerge: many feared being caught up in the savage reprisals that accompanied the suppression of the revolt. But British intelligence officers collected proclamations, manifestos and appeals. These were printed later. A handful of Indians ventured into print as well. Finally, the uprising is still variously remembered and re-enacted in fiction and cinema down to the present. There is as a result, a mass of accessible historical evidence easily available to the Anglophone student. The full text of hundreds of books is readily available for download, and the UT Library holds many in hard copy too. This course introduces students to the practice of history mainly through these resources.
HIS 350L Nigeria: A History of Nation-Building
This course focuses on Nigeria to examine the problems of nation building in developing countries. It is designed to expose students to various materials on (i) the concept of the nation-state; (ii) the complexities of developing formations; (iii) core issues in the nation- building process, notably cultural, political and economic transformations; and (iv) the difficulties of modernization. This course will begin with an overview history of Nigeria. Students are expected to develop an interest in comparative history, theories and ideas of development, culture and nationalism
HIS 350L 84-AFRICAN TRAVEL NARRATIVES
This course examines histories of Africa and travel through eyewitness accounts. Course participants will study journeys Africans have made within and from the continent alongside accounts of travelers visiting Africa from elsewhere. These travelers included migrant laborers, market women, Peace Corps volunteers, enslaved individuals, soldiers, political activists, adopted children, and religious evangelists since the 18th century.
HIS 350L 69-DECOLONIZATN OF BRIT EMPIRE
The British Empire at the end of World War II still extended over one fourth of the world and represented a complex, worldwide system. The seminar will focus on the era of decolonization or, in other words, the decline and fall of the British Empire. This seminar is designed as a reading and research course in modern British history—and in the history of Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean. It is also a class in professional writing. It includes a cartographical component in which students are required to master the geography of the British Empire.
HIS 350L Dictatorship, Dirty War, and Democracy in Latin America
This course explores the breakdown of democratic governments in South America in the 1960s and 1970s and the emergence of bureaucratic authoritarian regimes committed to economic restructuring, political demobilization, and the abrogation of civil liberties. It examines the use of torture, disappearances, and other counterinsurgency methods by Latin American military officials, as well as various forms of resistance, including guerrilla warfare. Finally, it looks at the transition to democratic rule, efforts to reconstruct civil society and forge political reconciliation, and the struggle for justice among the victims and families of victims of human rights abuses. The course focuses on the histories of the nations of the Southern Cone (Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay) and seeks to address a number of questions. Why did some of the most "developed" nations in Latin America succumb to such repressive governments? How did authoritarian regimes legitimize their rule? How do historians make sense of the atrocities committed? In what ways did citizens resist or acquiesce in the policies of military governments? What role did the United States play in offering economic, political, and military assistance to military dictatorships? Which factors spurred the military to relinquish power and what has been the nature of the transition to democratic rule? How can social justice be best achieved in societies that experienced such trauma? How is this period of Latin American history remembered?
HIS 362G Introduction to the Holocaust
This course on the Holocaust examines the mass killing of Jews and other victims in the context of Nazi Germany’s quest for race and space during World War II. Using sources that illuminate victim experiences, perpetrator perspectives, and bystander responses, we investigate the Nazi racial state; the experiments in mass killing; the establishment of a systematic genocidal program; collaboration and complicity; resistance and rescue; as well as the memory of the Holocaust in western culture.
HIS 364Q FRENCH EMP: THE WEST ISLAM
This course examines the political and intellectual relationships between France and Mediterranean Muslim societies across several historical periods into the present. Modern French imperialism advanced its claims to power through a division of the world into two parts. On one hand was Europe or the “West,” and on the other there was “Islam” or the “East.” The former was home to civilization and progress and the later figured in French thought as a backward place in need of regeneration. For their part, Muslims who fell under French domination or influence deployed their own divisions. They reproduced parts of French notions in a complex dialogue with their own history. Muslims reformers sought to set themselves towards a future that was modern, but authentic. The age of French imperialism in the Middle East was characterized by a “civilizing mission” to renew or revitalize society, by force if necessary. Many parts of this thinking have survived the colonial era and mark attitudes in contemporary France and the Middle East. Religion is frequently offered as the decisive category determining these divisions, a so-called “clash of civilizations,” with Muslim societies set off as somehow incompatible with secular Europe, an argument that although pernicious and contrary to the historical evidence, perseveres. Our task in this course will be to critically consider how these cultural and political frontiers developed, and their use in contests for power. The focus will be on modern France and the Middle Eastern countries that fell under French rule or influence, but the course will examine these questions within a broader trans-national context.
HIS 367F SLAVERY SOUTH ASIAN HISTORY
This course carries the Global Cultures flag. Global Cultures courses are designed to increase your familiarity with cultural groups outside the United States. You should therefore expect to stretch your mental horizons to comprehend the coherence of practices, beliefs, and histories of non-US groups. In the case of the Indian subcontinent, these practices and beliefs have specially long and complex histories. In learning about them we will develop skills of critical reflection and writing that enable us to see the limits of our cultural and social locations in the present, and think pluralistically. This is a three-part course. The first two parts use selected case-studies to cover an entire social-political structure between the third century BCE and the late eighteenth century. In the third part of the course, we will study the impact of British colonial abolition from the late eighteenth to the twentieth century. Students will understand the ways in which legal, political and commercial processes, associated with global histories of European empires, contributed to the large-scale shift in slave-using structures, the meanings of slavery and freedom.
J S 365C Multicultural Israel
This multidisciplinary, two-way interactive seminar is designed to foster conversation, research, and creative projects about Israel’s multicultural population between upper-division students with interests in Jewish Studies, Middle Eastern Studies, and Anthropology. What makes this course unique is that much of it is live-streamed from Israel using Zoom and/or video-recorded material using GoPro to observe cultural interaction and capture conversation. This year, we will also enhance the absorption of course texts and materials by teaming up with MA students in International Development at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem who are either members of Israel’s multicultural populations and/or studying marginalized groups within Israel, to join us for discussion, interviews, and exchange of ideas throughout the semester. The aim of these exchanges is to bring Israel’s contemporary populations and the people who study them to Austin, through a new type of Global Classroom, a Global Virtual Exchange. The virtual component of the course is supplemented with in-class meet-ups, during which I lead face-to-face seminars and workshops. The course content is based on the premise that Israel is not only a heterogeneous society but also has the highest proportion of migrants of any country in the world. The notion of absorption—the social and economic integration of Jewish immigrants—has remained an explicit ideal since the founding of the modern state of Israel in 1948. Yet, absorption is also an ideological tool that often runs counter to the contemporary lived experience of citizenship, participation, nation-building, minority rights, and the conflicting interests of Israel’s multicultural publics today. Taking these tensions as a starting point, this course explores the complex social fabric that comprises contemporary Israeli society, and that shapes Israeli identity, practice, and politics. We will focus on the lived experience of Israel’s increasingly diverse population. This includes populations associated with the majority: veteran Ashkenazim and Mizrahim; more recent Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union, Ethiopia, Latin America and France; religious communities such as Haredim and modern-Orthodox. It also includes ethnic and religious minorities such as Palestinian citizens of Israel, Bedouins, Christians, Muslims, Druze, and Black Hebrews, as well as laborers from all over the globe who migrate to Israel and refugees from Sudan and Eritrea. How fluid are the boundaries between these groups? How different are their interests, tastes, desires, and needs? How committed or hostile are various publics to a coherent nation-building project, and to contemporary Zionism? To explore the breadth of multicultural Israel without sacrificing cultural specificity and theoretical depth, the course is organized into three integrated units that cover: 1) Israel’s contemporary social context; 2) Israel’s historical context; 3) ethnographic case studies of Israel-specific multicultural issues and 4) Israel’s citizen-state relationships, identity and belonging, and, and general contemporary multicultural theory.
LAH 351Q Holocaust Aftereffects
LAS 370S Violence in Contemp Mex Cul
This course is devoted to the study of literary texts, art pieces, popular music, journalism, and films dealing with violence in Mexico in recent years. The class will analyze the different forms of representation, and discuss how they can lead us to understand socioeconomic, cultural, and political processes that contextualize violent events. The questions we are going to address are: What are the aesthetic, ethical, and political implications of the representations of violence? How can we understand Mexican society and gender system through the analysis of these narratives? What are the strategies that artistic and literary works suggest for the solution of such difficult reality?
Nationalism, Imperialism & War - US
AFR 350K PUERTO RICO IN CRISIS
This course will provide a history of Puerto Rico’s relationship with the United States focusing in particular on questions of crisis, capitalism, and politics. The course will center around two questions: What is Puerto Rico to the United States? And how did we get to the present moment? In answering these questions, we will focus in particular on the ways that US law and policies have radicalized Puerto Ricans and conceived of them as unprepared and undeserving of rights and full citizenship. This conception has shaped the way that capitalism has worked as a force in shaping the territory’s possibilities throughout the over 120 years of its relationship with the US. While we will engage Puerto Rico’s long history as a US colony, the course will focus, in particular, on the recent history of Puerto Rico. The past decade in Puerto Rico has seen the layered catastrophes of corruption, spiraling debt, hurricanes, earthquakes, and now a global pandemic. As was made glaringly visible when Hurricane Maria hit the territory in September 2017, Puerto Rico’s long-standing colonial relationship with the US continues to have real ramifications for people living there today. Nevertheless, Puerto Ricans have found ways to resist and push back against the constrictions of US colonialism and to try and create the possibilities of a different and better future.
AMS 311S AMERICAN CATASTROPHES
Catastrophes, “events producing…violent, wide-spread change in the order of things,” appear frequently throughout US history and the history of the Americas, especially those created by human beings: a centuries-long system of racial slavery, a civil war, genocide of indigenous peoples, two world wars, the degradation of natural lands, and the mass exploitation of workers are just a few.Because catastrophes affect the lives and consciousnesses of so many people across so much space and time, they invite a plethora of interpretations, from a variety of different vantage points. Historical narrators—and these can be professional historians, but also activists, artists, novelists, poets, elementary school teachers, high school class clowns, parents at a dinner table, etc.—try to make sense of catastrophes by placing them within certain narratives, under certain kinds of critical lenses. In this course, we are going to study a selection of important catastrophes from a variety of historical vantage points that are often given short shrift by dominant and/or popular narrators of history in American culture. In doing so, this course aims to challenge easy notions of progress or decline that tend to dominate popular American political discourse, and instead consider the complex causes and effects of catastrophes without quickly integrating them into narratives which we already “understand” as true.This course will require that we suspend our idea of the United States as a single, unified entity. Instead, we will study these catastrophes as events in which varieties of overlapping groups of people, regions, state and economic powers, and ideas were brought into tumultuous, violent contact with one another, often against their will, rarely on an equal playing field, and almost never with an easy resolution. On the flip side of this focus, this course will also study the some of the social, intellectual, and imaginative creations of those groups most affected by the catastrophes we consider, creations that often offer alternative visions or even manifestations of social life. These “radical histories” of American catastrophe we study here will be as much about the present and the future as they are about the past.
HIS 350R When Topic is Appropriate
N/A
Theory, Policy & Institutions - Comparative
AFR 351U RACE CAPITALISM ENVIRONMENT
This course offers an introduction to environmental politics through the fields of political ecology, critical race studies and eco-feminism. We will examine environmental contestations to understand how humans relate to nature in the context of global racial capitalism and the possibilities for creating a more sustainable world.
AFR 360D Race, Gender, and Surveillance
Race, Gender and Surveillance will provide an overview of theories in the emerging field of Surveillance Studies, with a focus on race and gender. We will examine transformations in social control and the distributions of power in U.S. and global contexts, with a focus on populations within the Black diaspora. As such, this is a Black Studies course. Course topics include: the Trans-Atlantic slave trade; prisons and punishment; reality television; social media; anti-surveillance fashion; airports; biometrics and drones. Students will be encouraged to develop critical reading, writing and analytical skills. Through the use of films, podcasts, videos, and other visual media students will be challenged to better understand how surveillance practices inform modern life.
ANT 324L POLITICAL ECOLOGY
Over the past three decades, Political Ecology has emerged as a powerful interdisciplinary critique of ecological change. Simply put, Political Ecology is a strategy for mapping political, economic, and social factors onto questions of environmental degradation and transformation. Political Ecology has been a powerful strategy for reinserting politics into apolitical discussions of ecology and the environment; writing disposed groups—human and non-human—back into discussions about conservation; and unsettling common sense understandings of “the environment” as separate from “the social.” This course will provide an introduction to core tenets of political ecology. Particularly focusing on ethnographic approaches, this course will introduce students to key debates in the field—such as the relationship between environment and violence, the critique of Malthusian and neo-Malthusian notions of scarcity and limits, the links between conservation and dispossession, and more. It will further explore the uses of political ecology in key contemporary debates over social and environmental change—from food production to water management.
ANT 324L 72-DEVLPMENT SECURITY SOCIETY
Explores the linkages between development, security, and, society. Examines a series of recent transformations that have drawn the relationship between international development and various forms of security together. Through an exploration of recent anthropological work, examines subjects such as: human security, the relationship between development and humanitarian intervention, strategies for planning in the face of climate change, disaster management, and new technologies of warfare and security.
ARC 342R RACE AND PLACE
This course introduces students to the ways that historical concepts of race and place have impacted the shape of our built environment. It examines the critical influence of race science on the civilizational narratives that were used to determine the meaning and content of 19th century American architecture It also traces the effects of these racial discourses on domestic interpretations of African, Asian, and Latino building tradition.
CMS 356C Collective Action
Collective action is a fundamental part of our social behavior and refers to any process whereby groups of people attempt to make decisions and act towards a common good. Collective action covers a vast field and include both collaborative and contentious forms of social action. Two interrelated factors have irrevocably changed how we view collective action: globalization and digitization. In this class, students will obtain insight into how globalization and technology have impacted how we organize and communicate to achieve better collective outcomes about the public good. It will review a range of perspectives on collective action, and examine communicative elements of collective action in a variety of global contexts, focusing on India and New Zealand as global contexts in the last portion of the course.
CMS 367I 1-IMMIGRATION COMMUNICATION
Migrants are a heterogeneous group of people (the term “migrants” is used to encompass different immigrant communities). The reasons for relocating to the United States, or another country, the conditions under which they relocate, whether they are authorized to remain in a country, their cultural backgrounds, their ethnic/racial identities, their education level, their gender identity and sexual orientation, and their socio-economic status are merely a few factors that contribute to immigrants’ diverse experiences. Thus, this course will introduce us to different frameworks, research, and practices that can help us understand the important role of communication in different, U.S., migration experiences. On the one hand, communication can help mitigate some of the social and structural barriers that migrants face in the United States and elsewhere. On the other hand, communication can also exacerbate or lead to educational, economic, and health inequities among migrants. We will consider both ways in which communication can function for migrant communities. Overall, migration: (1) is a diverse area of research that can incorporate intrapersonal, interpersonal, community, organizational, institutional, cultural, and policy levels of analysis; (2) is studied using a wide range of methodologies; and (3) is affected by a variety of communication channels. The readings and content of this course primarily focus on the experiences of Latina/o/x immigrant communities in the U.S.
GOV 337M RULE OF LAW, HUMAN RIGHTS, AND VIOLENCE IN LATIN AMERICA
Much of Latin America is afflicted by chronic violence that has eroded citizens' enjoyment of civil and political rights. State institutions charged with upholding the law have often proved incapable of fulfilling their roles—or worse, have actively undermined the rule of law and perpetuated abuse. What are some of the most widespread forms of violence in Latin America? Why have these patterns proven so durable in the region? Can poorly functioning institutions be transformed to protect human rights and promote the rule of law, even as powerful political actors are unaffected by—or even benefit from—from the status quo? This course will use a comparative lens to inquire into dynamics of violence and rights abuses, while also examining potential remedies for pervasive rule of law deficiencies. We will discuss attributes that are broadly shared throughout the region, including acute repression associated with authoritarian rule, the effects of U.S. intervention, the transnational drug trade, and the search for justice in cases of human rights abuses. In addition, we will incorporate country-specific experiences via surveys of four countries: Mexico, Guatemala, Colombia, and Brazil. Throughout, we will balance consideration of actors at multiple different levels: local citizens and communities; national-level armed groups; specific state institutions; national government policies; and international factors, including the influence of the U.S., other foreign governments, and transnational human rights groups. It is impossible to cover the totality of violence in nearly 20 different countries in a single course, but by the end of the semester you should be able to understand how and why violent national histories affect the present; why resistance to accountability for past harms and reform to prevent new ones is so intense; how different criminal organizations alter their forms and activities in response to different incentives; and how citizens mobilize to pressure governments for reform and accountability.
GOV 355M THE POLITICS OF IMMIGRATION
The purpose of this course is to develop a working knowledge of immigration policy in the United States; to understand the institutional development of immigration policy over the US’s history; and to explore the challenges posed for American democracy by immigration enforcement in the contemporary era. Such issues include the use of local police to enforce federal policy, the liminal legal space occupied by immigrants, the complicated relationship between federal, state and local agencies, and the relationship between historical institutional racial exclusion and the current era of mass detention and deportation. Throughout the course of the class, students will develop skills in project management, collaboration, critical analysis and research.
GOV 360F Global Governance
This course examines the forces that shape global stability (and instability). Building on a basic framework outlining how and why actors interact in the international system, this course will explore how states design and agree to international agreements, what those agreements consist of, and how those agreements influence state behavior. The course will also expose students to studies of international law and organizations across several issues areas, including security, international trade, international finance, the environment, and human rights.
GOV 360N International Organizations
This advanced undergraduate course is designed to give the student an in-depth introduction to the theory and practice of international organizations. During the semester, students will learn the history of international organizations from early examples such as the League of Nations to contemporary instances such as the United Nations and the institutions essential to global trade and development. Students will also learn how these organizations are structured, the challenges they face, and their prospects for the future. Finally, students will learn how non-governmental organizations (NGOs) develop, and how they relate both to nation-states and to other international organizations.
GOV 360P International Organization
This undergraduate course is designed to give the student an in-depth introduction to the theory and practice of international organizations. During the course, students will learn the history of key international organizations from global institutions, regional organizations and non-governmental organizations. Students will also learn how these organizations are structured, the challenges they face, and their prospects for the future. Studying in Paris, we will meet with representatives from the leading global institutions to understand how theory is put into practice. We will also consider the development of the European Union and France’s role in sustaining this regional organization. Leading academic experts in Paris will join our class to discuss Paris’ leadership in global efforts.
GOV 365L Rights and the State in South Asia
Politics in modern south Asia are shaped, often dramatically, by contests about the nature of rights, the ways that citizens claim their rights, and the ways that states respond to those claims. Every state in the region contends with popular movements to assert rights, whether through war and insurgencies, experiments with constitutions and the rule of law, or efforts to secure the rights of excluded groups, minorities and the economically disadvantaged. Each state has also tried variously to promote and protect rights – on their own, and with their neighbors and the international community -- and to limit them in order to consolidate power. What do rights have to do with political change? With contemporary cases as our guide, we will explore basic elements of political change in the region by asking how states and societies are meeting the challenges of creating rights-based political orders, and how and why they succeed or fail. The range of potential topics is intriguingly varied and broad; after our introduction to the field and the region, we will focus on topics related to rights and conflict. Using political writings, government documents, laws and regulations, social science analysis, local journalism and reporting from local and international organizations we will dissect the meanings of rights in the region, and strive to understand the different ways that these complex issues affect citizens, states, observers and advocates. In the process, we will examine the tools that are employed to protect rights or limit them, and how reports on rights conditions are developed and used.
GOV 365l Authoritarianism
Authoritarian regimes are political systems in which the few rule the many. In the last century alone, such regimes have taken many forms. The rulers can be military officers or civilians. The government can operate as a hereditary monarchy or maintain republican-style institutions (elections, a legislature). Despite their variations, all authoritarian regimes share two features: they vest a small circle of rulers with the power to redistribute resources and apply violence; they deny the general populace regular influence in these same policy areas. In summary, authoritarian regimes are politically exclusive oligarchies. This course will study the economic, ideological, and political sources of authoritarian regimes and help explain why they persist.
GOV 365N Religious Ethics and Human Rights
Do religions support human rights or conflict with human rights? This course examines the grounds for human rights, and the relations between rights and religions. Can religions reinforce human rights to protect against genocide, torture and disappearances, hate speech, and discrimination? Can religious leadership within religions effectively combat violence against women, even when the violence is upheld by that same religion? Students will study religions as providing grounds for human rights, as sometimes challenging conceptions of human rights, and as needing protections through human rights. With this basis in the relations between religion and human rights, students will study the significance of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the United Nations, and the following application of international human rights since the mid-twentieth century. The course will begin with key formulations of ethics and human rights, and examples in which religion, ethics, and human rights interact. The second unit of the course will study religious support or criticism of human rights by intellectual leaders. The third unit will situate the consideration of religion in a political science treatment of international human rights since 1948.
GOV 365N INTL DEV AND GLOBAL JUSTICE
This course examines the question of global development. The key questions may be summarized as follows: What is global development? How should it be defined and measured? What patterns of development can be discerned across countries, within countries, and through time? What explains variation in development? Is it geography, colonialism, macroeconomic policy and international political economy, agricultural policy, demography, health policy, human capital and education policy, political institutions, culture, some admixture of the above, or something else entirely? What is the impact of development? Does it make people happier, more fulfilled? What is our responsibility vis-à-vis those who are less privileged?
GOV 365W Human Rights and World Politics
Human rights feature prominently in contemporary world politics. Today there exists a large and highly legalized international human rights regime consisting of the United Nations (UN) and several regionally-based human rights systems. Focusing on the UN, this course introduces you to the legal, political, and policy dimensions of international human rights. In so doing, it addresses: (1) legal and institutional infrastructures and processes that exist at domestic and international levels for the promotion and protection of human rights; (2) the main actors involved in human rights advocacy, including states, international organizations, activists, nongovernmental organizations; (3) the interests of these actors as well as the tactics that they employ to advance their interests; and, (4) the challenges of assessing the effectiveness of human rights advocacy and how these challenges can be met by employing basic precepts of quantitative and qualitative political science research.
HIS 306N Indig Perspectvs Global His
The internet age is surpassing previous waves of globalization through connecting humans in space and time on an almost universal scale. This course introduces students to Global Studies through the lens first peoples’ perspectives, and by so doing, affords students the opportunity to develop the ability to imagine, communicate, and live in ways that respect cultural differences and reflect a concern with sustaining the natural environment on which we all depend. In Southern Africa, it is called Ubuntu. Of course, this does not mean first people’s knowledges were or are superior; it just means they have not been sufficiently studied as potential reservoirs of knowledge for solving some of our most pressing contemporary issues today, including immigration and the environment. Through studying first people’s epistemologies, students will learn the importance of integrated rather than compartmentalized learning, i.e., a holistic approach. This course will be of particular interest to students because it incorporates current developments among first peoples around the world. First peoples are using electronic technologies and global institutions such as the United Nations to communicate and assert indigenous rights while also integrating into the global economy and knowledge systems (including the genome project and mental health medicine, to name a few). First peoples are also becoming increasingly visible in global debates about climate change and environmental sustainability. This course, therefore, will consider these contemporary developments in light of historical experiences and equip students with lifelong skills for succeeding in a global arena
J 354F JOUR PRESS FRDM LAT AMER
This course focuses on the situation of journalism in Latin America with an emphasis on the struggle for democracy and press freedom. It includes a country-by-country survey of historical, political, economic, cultural, ethnic and geographical aspects. It also examines the evolution of professional journalism in Latin America, including topics such as the legal framework for freedom of expression, ethical principles, concentration of media ownership and the emergence of digital media. Students will follow current events and press freedom issues in Latin America through the LatAm Journalism Review (LJR), a digital magazine published by Moody College’s Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas, and other online sources. Knowledge of Spanish language is recommended, but not required. Latin America here is understood to be the 20 nations of the Americas that share an Iberian cultural heritage: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Puerto Rico (a U.S. commonwealth), Uruguay and Venezuela.
M E 379M Issues in Humanitarian Engineering
This course examines the opportunities for engineering solutions to positively impact marginalized groups such as low- income communities, disaster areas, and refugee camps. The course will take place in Paris, France and will include visits to various humanitarian and development organizations. A two-day field trip is planned to Geneva where the class will visit the International Federation of the Red Cross and UN Refugee Agency, each of which will provide specialists to talk on a number of different subjects. Topics considered in the class will include the challenges faced in working with marginalized communities, appropriate technology for these communities, key humanitarian organizations and their roles in aiding communities. Class time will be divided between formal lectures by the instructor and guest speakers, field trips, and student presentations on key topics. What will I learn? Main skills and attitudes to be developed: • Awareness and knowledge of how engineering applies to marginalized communities • Awareness and knowledge of challenges faced in working with marginalized communities • Awareness and knowledge of major humanitarian aid organizations • Knowledge of appropriate technology for vulnerable communities • Expertise in literature and web research and evaluation of sources • Experience in making concise and clear presentations
PHL 325J Health and Justice
Mass disparities exist in the health of humans across the globe. It may seem obvious from a moral point of view that if we can do something to alleviate the global and local disparities in health and access to healthcare, that we should do something about it. Once we scratch the surface of this apparent truism, however, we find a number of assumptions in need of defense. What would ground such an obligation after all? Do humans have a right to health? If so, do they also have a right to healthcare? It may seem that these two concepts are intertwined, but consider an analogy. Someone’s right to life makes it impermissible to kill that person (unless you would be justified in doing so, say in a case of genuine self-defense). Nevertheless, the right to life plausibly does not entail that you are obligated to protect or preserve the life of everyone who has such a right. Similarly, if humans have a right to health, then it would be impermissible to undermine their health. But it is a different question whether individuals are obligated to protect and preserve the health of others by, for example, ensuring their access to healthcare. The course will evaluate different frameworks for characterizing health-related injustices given the challenges to rights-based approaches.
RHE 309J When Topic is Appropriate
For topics courses labeled as “When Topic is Appropriate” on a BDP curriculum sheet, please note that all topics for this course number are not automatically approved to count toward your BDP. In advance of registration for a particular semester (and as part of the BDP seat request process), the BDP office will inform current BDP students of the topics for the course number that are approved for their BDP.
RHE 330D Rhetoric of Racism
I’ve long been interested in the notion that rhetoric is the alternative to violence; that is, talking is better than hitting, and a community that can resolve its differences discursively is going to come to better decisions in better ways than one that resorts to violence. But, discourses of racism complicate this simple faith in several ways that relate to the course goals: 1) Sometimes discourse enables violence; sometimes (a troubling number of times) rhetoric is used to persuade members of a community to hate some group, often to the point of exclusion, discrimination, or even genocide; that this group is often entirely a social construct, and the arguments are often dependent on a socially constructed taxonomy (e.g., “race”) doesn’t make the discourse any less real in its impact. The notion of race is a very recent concept (some scholars argue that it is a product of the Enlightenment; others put it in the Middle Ages). As you’ll see in this class, racist discourses are surprisingly unable to define the central concepts (such as “race”) in any kind of consistent way, let alone a way that fits the evidence they present to support their arguments about races. So, one course goal is to ponder: why is this discourse so persuasive? 2) It’s easy enough to see and say that rhetoric enables communities to work things through when the disagreements aren’t very deep, but what about in the really hard disagreements? As you probably know, it’s hard to have a productive conversation about whether something is racist, so, another course goal is to think about: how can we argue productively about whether a text, policy, or discourse is racist? 3) To say that “race is a social construct” is often taken to mean that we can simply ignore it, or that we are no longer troubled by it (we are “post-racial”). But, things like money, market value, nationality, and even gender are also social constructs, and yet our acknowledgement that those are social constructs doesn’t immediately lead to the notion that we can simply do without them. So, another course goal is to think about write about the question: how can we argue about “race” without falling into essentialism or denial? 4) Finally, but not least, this course is about learning to write interpretive arguments about definitions and about arguments that engage informed and intelligent opposition arguments—that is, multiple sides that are taken to be of good faith, even when we’re hurt or angry with one another
RHE 330E Peacemaking Rhetoric
We will use these questions to begin our explorations of the rhetoric of peacemaking, focusing on its exigence, nature, features, functions, and goals. The discipline of rhetoric has an enduring investment in countering injustice and pursuing justice and peace. In this course, we will explore this enduring investment. In specific terms, we will study the (1) relation between rhetoric, violence, and peacemaking, (2) ways in which our rhetorical practices can cause/exacerbate conflict/violence or alternatively guide us to peacemaking, and (3) rhetorical theories, choices, practices, and stances that are consistent with peaceful communication. As we reflect on the rhetoric of peacemaking, we will engage scholarship on the rhetoric of nonviolence, reconciliation, and (human) rights/duty. We will also address discourses critiquing injustice and advocating for justice and peace.
RTF 359S FILM AND SOCIAL CHANGE
Often viewed as a medium of “pure entertainment,” film has also had an essential relationship to evolving social conditions in the United States and the struggle for change. This course will focus those moments where cinema has commented upon, documented, and even arguably had a hand in producing social change. The course aims to acquaint students with the film movements, film authors, production conditions, and audience reception practices that have linked film to broader social movements. It will also teach students basic and essential terminology and style for writing about film, which is increasingly vital for competent citizenship in our media-driven public sphere. In addition, it will introduce students to basic theoretical concepts fundamental to understanding social conditions and social change including, power, ideology, hegemony, institutions, etc. Given the time constraints, the course focuses on American cinema with occasional references to influential cinema movements across the globe to place this American discourse in global perspective.
S W 460K Roots of Social and Economic Justice: An International Perspective
The course is designed to teach the historical roots of the professionalization of helping others and the profession of social work. The course focuses on the governmental social services delivery system and its impact on client populations, and the diverse cultures living in London that provide the context for social services. The course is taught through cultural immersion in ethnic neighborhoods, field visits, and seminars. The purpose of this course is to deepen students’ understanding of the rights and responsibilities of citizenship in an increasingly global society. A further goal is to promote cross-cultural learning, and to expand critical appreciation of the social framework in which we live as it relates to the moral and ethical problems encompassed by social justice.
SOC 321K NGOs Humanitarian Aid/Hlth
The course examines the health aspects of humanitarian aid with particular emphasis on the part of nongovernmental organization (NGOs) in the process. By focusing on NGOs and their work the course is designed to inform students about salient issues within humanitarian aid such as the interplay between aid and politics, conflict-related crises, and the effectiveness of development assistance. We will begin by familiarizing the students with the basic concepts and challenges related to humanitarian aid. We then continue with the health aspects of humanitarian aid, looking at public health and preventive care. Next, we examine these health aspects more closely while focusing on the agents of humanitarian aid implication- the nongovernmental organizations. Here we will study their work by themes, looking at: refugees, preventive care, sustainability of aid, non-state actors, trauma, disease outbreaks, natural disasters, and collaboration with other partners in the field.
Theory, Policy & Institutions - US
AFR 372F No Matter What: Policing in the United States
This course will explore the history of policing in the United States by examining the beginning of American policing.  The course will also include: watch groups; professionalism through reform including community policing and analyzing mass incarceration. The course will incorporate the use of lectures, readings/articles, video, research and extensive class discussions to assist in exploring the impact of policing in the United States. Course Goals: Students enrolled will: Examine the English roots of American policing, Understand watch groups and their evolution including the professionalization of the police through reform, Examine community policing, Analyze mass incarceration
AMS 311S When Topic Is Appropriate
(past topics: American Places of Leisure; Dancing in America) Writing, reading, and discussion on an American studies topic, with emphasis on the evaluation of information, analytical reading, and critical writing. Past Topic - American Places of Leisure - As the 19th century drew to a close, American cities began to give birth to a vibrant new mass culture. Much of this culture manifested itself in new entertainment venues, including amusement parks, zoos, and cinemas. As the century wore on, these entertainment spaces increased in number and complexity, becoming a familiar part of life in America – and in many other countries as well. In this course we will explore the history of these spaces, using them as a lens through which to explore larger currents of cultural change. This course will be divided into three sections. The first will explore the early days of amusement spaces as they arose alongside mass culture in American cities. In the second section of the course we will deal with the new age of amusements that began with the opening of Disneyland in 1955. The final section of the course will deal with the modern era of amusement spaces, an era defined by the globalization of mass amusements. The locations we will be discussing in this class – amusement parks, malls, zoos, and so on – are fun places often understood as frivolous and bereft of meaning. We will be working to peer beneath the surface of these entertaining spaces, uncovering the extremely rich cultural forces that define and drive them and coming to grips with the way they influence American culture. We will touch on a wide range of topics, including race, class, and gender roles, shifting understandings of public and private and man and nature, the rise of globalization, and the emergence of a corporately-driven “convergence culture.” Our ultimate goal is to come to a better understanding of the profound effect seemingly meaningless amusement spaces have on American culture.
AMS 311S PRISON ART, LIT, AND PROTEST
In this course we will focus on the art, music, and literature of incarcerated people, formerly incarcerated people, and prisoner rights activists in late 20th and early 21st century America. We will explore questions about the nature of resistance, the relationship between art and protest, and the ways in which the work of incarcerated people challenge our conceptions of prison, circularity, and “the deserving prisoner.” What does it mean to be a prison artist? Is prison art and writing by nature political protest? What can we learn from incarcerated people? Our texts will primarily focus on the experiences of incarcerated people of color, incarcerated trans people, and incarcerated women. We will not discuss “guilt” or crime, but will focus on the cultural production and intellectual work of incarcerated people. We will also explore the material conditions of cultural production, the relationship between social movement history and prison arts (Civil Rights, Black Power, etc), and the Prison Arts Movement.
AMS 311S RACE AND ENVIRONMENTALISMS
None
AMS 315 Rights in Modern America
Whether they used a language of equality, justice, freedom or liberation, an array of social groups in 20th-century America forged struggles and organizations that advocated for recognition of their rights. The meanings of rights, citizenship, and democracy, however, changed over time and were always contested. Even if all referenced the Constitution, should we assume, for instance, that white, Black, and Mexican American women all understood the significance of Woman Suffrage in the same terms in the early part of the 20th century? If not, why not?
ARC 342R RACE AND PLACE
This course introduces students to the ways that historical conceptions of race and place have impacted the shape of our built environment. It examines the critical influence of race science on the civilizational narratives that were used to determine the meaning and content of 19th century American architecture. It also traces the effects of these racial discourses on domestic interpretations of African, Asian, and Latino building traditions. Students will review the tools that American architects have used to represent the social and cultural values of different racial and ethnic groups, from the Victorian houses of New England towns to the campus planning strategies of Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Over the course of the semester, students will complete writing assignments that challenge them to interpret the many ways that the racial politics of the past continues to shape the structure and character of today’s built environment. Despite moving beyond the tenets of scientific racism, the social construction of racial identity still exerts a palpable influence on new patterns of residential segregation, voting districts, land-use patterns, and material investment in (or disinvestment from) in the public sphere.
COM 307 OVERVIEW SOCIAL JUSTICE MEDIA
An introduction to the communication of social justice, especially through the lens of nonfictional and fictional media.
EDU 331 RESTORATIVE PRACTICES
Focus on community engagement and social justice issues related to schooling access and equity. Includes a field-based component that promotes practices needed to implement restorative practices in multiple settings.
GOV 357D Civil Liberties
This course is primarily a course in Constitutional interpretation that focuses on some of the rights and liberties guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution. Most of the attention is given to the First and Fourteenth Amendments, which involve issues of freedom of expression, freedom of religion, equal protection, and fundamental liberties. Little attention is given to other rights. The course is designed to familiarize students with constitutional approaches and concepts related to certain liberties. Presidents, governors, legislators, law enforcement officials, and many others engage in constitutional interpretation. The primary participants for our purposes, however, have been judges; therefore, the course concentrates on what judges have said the Constitution means, and how they came to such conclusions. One objective of the course is for the student to learn what the Supreme Court has said about certain parts of the Constitution and to examine the implications of the rulings for the American polity. Students should become comfortable with legal analysis and doctrine so that they can evaluate intelligently the interpretations of the justices and ask the questions that students of politics should ask. Prominent among such questions are those concerned with the proper role of courts and judges in the American political system. Also, students should begin to develop their own beliefs about the protected liberty. Another objective of this course is to improve reasoning and communication skills. As in most courses, good writing is demanded, but it is also important to develop the capacity to think and speak on one's feet. Engaging in constitutional reasoning can assist in developing intellectual precision and political persuasiveness. Mastering the use of language, orally and in writing, increases the ability to think and communicate clearly. Moving toward such mastery is a vital part of education. The course requires a substantial time commitment. The time required varies greatly over the course of the semester, and it varies for reasons described below. As such, it is hard for one to plan ahead.
GOV 357D CIVIL LIBERTIES-WB
In this seminar, we will attempt to bring together the study of public law, American Government and political theory by exploring the legal and philosophical principles underlying court decisions on civil liberties. For 2020, topics to be covered include: (1) the role of religion in public life; (2) freedom of speech and national security; (3) abortion; (4) sexual orientation; (5) racial and sex discrimination; and (6) affirmative action.
GOV 357G Structure of Individual Liberties
In this class we examine the ways in which the Constitution protects individual rights while accommodating the often competing claims of state, groups and communities. A chronological survey of the work of the Supreme Court would reveal that most of the judicial exploration of the issues falling under the rubric of rights has occurred in the second half of the Court’s history. The one notable exception is the right to property, which, as the original debates over the Constitution reveal, was a right sufficiently important to the founders that it was provided several textually based protections. When even these were found inadequate to the task at hand, the Fourteenth Amendment eventually emerged as a bulwark of solid constitutional defense. How solid is, of course, a matter of considerable contention; the debate raging today is only the most recent incarnation of the historic contest between property rights and the regulatory authority of the state. One of the controversial jurisprudential issues surrounding the work of the modern Court has to do with the role of the judiciary in performing as an occasional counter- majoritarian institution in defense of individual rights. If it is important to defend a right -- for example, privacy – against the intrusive reach of the state, must all rights be so defended with equal vigilance? Is there a principled way to distinguish among rights, say between speech and the right to bear arms, such that the Court would be justified in treating them differently as far as a constitutional defense is concerned? By the end of the course students should have an informed judgment on such questions, which is to say, on the role of the Supreme Court in contemporary American politics. Some of you may have enrolled in this course to test your aptitude for the study of law. This is not, however, a pre-professional law course. It is designed as an important part of a liberal education. Indeed, if we do our jobs right, this course in constitutional law will be nothing less than an extended commentary on the meaning of America -- at least as understood and portrayed by the Supreme Court. Our purpose is to get clear what the Court has said about the Constitution’s meaning, to critically assess what the Court has held, and to identify and assess the underlying social, moral, and political theories that inform the opinions of the Supreme Court.
GOV 357M Civil Liberties
This course is primarily a course in Constitutional interpretation that focuses on some of the rights and liberties guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution. Most of the attention is given to the First and Fourteenth Amendments, which involve issues of freedom of expression, freedom of religion, equal protection, and due process. Some attention is given to other rights. The course is designed to familiarize students with constitutional approaches and concepts related to certain freedoms. Presidents, governors, legislators, law enforcement officials and many others engage in constitutional interpretation. The primary participants for our purposes, however, have been judges; therefore, the course concentrates on what judges have said the Constitution means, and how they came to such conclusions. One objective of the course is for the student to learn what the Supreme Court has said about certain parts of the Constitution and to examine the implications of the rulings for the American polity. The student should become comfortable with relevant legal analysis and doctrine so that he or she can evaluate intelligently the interpretations of the justices and ask the questions that a student of politics should ask. Prominent among such questions are those concerned with the proper role of courts and judges in the American political system.
H S 341 HEALTH AND JUSTICE-WB
Mass disparities exist in the health of humans across the globe. It may seem obvious from a moral point of view that if we can do something to alleviate the global and local disparities in health and access to healthcare, that we should do something about it. Once we scratch the surface of this apparent truism, however, we find a number of assumptions in need of defense. What would ground such an obligation after all? Do humans have a right to health? If so, do they also have a right to healthcare? It may seem that these two concepts are intertwined, but consider an analogy. Someone’s right to life makes it impermissible to kill that person (unless you would be justified in doing so, say in a case of genuine self-defense). Nevertheless, the right to life plausibly does not entail that you are obligated to protect or preserve the life of everyone who has such a right. Similarly, if humans have a right to health, then it would be impermissible to undermine their health. But it is a different question whether individuals are obligated to protect and preserve the health of others by, for example, ensuring their access to healthcare. The course will evaluate different frameworks for characterizing health-related injustices given the challenges to rights-based approaches.
HIS 317L Rights in Modern America
Whether they used a language of equality, justice, freedom or liberation, an array of social groups in 20th-century America forged struggles and organizations that advocated for recognition of their rights. The meanings of rights, citizenship, and democracy, however, changed over time and were always contested. Even if all referenced the Constitution, should we assume, for instance, that white, Black, and Mexican American women all understood the significance of Woman Suffrage in the same terms in the early part of the 20th century? If not, why not? Lectures are supplemented by reading memoirs, studying historical documents, listening to oral histories, and watching videos, in order to gain a richer understanding of the meanings of rights to participants in both well-known and not-so-well-known historical movements, ranging from Woman Suffrage in the early part of the century to struggles that arose at the University of Texas in the 1960s- 1970s. We pay close attention to historical perceptions about identity and place as they influenced understandings of rights by comparing and contrasting unique struggles of different groups and relationships among them.
HIS 317L Rights in Modern America
Whether they used a language of equality, justice, freedom or liberation, an array of social groups in 20th-century America forged struggles and organizations that advocated for recognition of their rights, and yet there was never unanimity about the meaning of rights. This course explores changing and clashing ideas of rights that propelled social movements in different historical periods of working-class people, women, Blacks, Latina/os, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and students, paying close attention to perceptions of race, gender, labor, national identity, sexuality, and place. To better understand these struggles and contested meanings of rights, we also draw on comparative and relational approaches to this history. That is, we strive not only to identify similarities and differences among these groups, but to develop insights into how they influenced each other. Such an approach can lead to surprises; in Austin, for example, African American and Mexican American attorneys filed suit for school desegregation on the same day, with both arguing that the city had violated their rights guaranteed by Brown v. Board of Education. The last unit of the course turns to such struggles over rights at the University of Texas during the 1960s and 1970s, particularly those involving racial justice. Students will have the opportunity to study documents from UT in time period and to listen to interviews with participants.
I 310J INTRO SOCIAL JUSTICE INFORMTCS
In this course, you will "explore the leveraging of data, information, and technology for the greater benefit of society and to help ensure a level playing field for everyone in the information age." This course considers how justice theories can inform how data and evidence, information and communication technologies (ICTs), and communities are shaped by and can respond to implicit and explicit biases against historically excluded populations. It also critically reflects on existing orientations towards social justice with its commitments to punitive sanctions, and examines alternative approaches like restorative and transformative justice, which advocate for systems of accountability. Transformative justice seeks to replace harmful and ineffective institutions by developing social programs and creating alternative structures that center care, accountability, and healing. Organizational challenges include recognizing and proactively addressing racism, gender discrimination, and other forms of inequity in professional and academic environments. Many aspects of discrimination have long and deep histories. They have become structural, or part of a self-reproducing cycle. But it is important to recognize that they are not normal or natural, but instead the result of a history of injustice. While this course, in its singularity, cannot eradicate all systems of oppression, this course seeks to equip students with the knowledge, critical thinking and evaluative skills necessary to better understand how systems of oppression disempower minoritized groups. We will explore human flourishing to counterbalance trauma-laden research and design practices often associated with minoritized groups. This course will help students acknowledge the full humanity of groups that have conventionally been reduced to deficits. The field of informatics - which includes information technology, data, and evidence in all its forms - has an incredible impact on society these days, both explicitly and implicity. The potential benefits are great but so are its risks, especially if not enough attention is paid to its impacts on everyone, irrespective of race, class, gender, religion, geographic location, native language, etc. Discrimination is both a technical, organizational, and systemic challenge. We will attempt to answer questions such as the learning outcomes below by exploring specific steps of the design and implementation process as well as various methodological and theoretical approaches.
I 320J Topics in Social Justice Informatics (When Topic Is Appropirate)
Coming Soon. Official launch date to be determined. Consider as a When Topic Is Appropriate curriculum approval.
R S 346 Religion/Social Justice U.S.
This course examines the material relationships between religion and social justice in the United States. It compares the ways modern religion carries within itself the material possibility of liberated consciousness, radical democracy, and social equality, even as it often postpones these promises to the next life, or the next millennium, and ultimately reinforces the status quo. This course then will take as its topic the grand questions of religious practice and social change: Why is the world the way it is? And how has religion helped make it so? How can we change the world for the better? And does religion help us, or hinder us, in that pursuit? To answer those questions, we will pay particular attention to disruptive religious practices. That is, religions as practiced by those often deemed on the edge of society, outside the mainstream, or in the minority. These will include religious practices constitutive of social movements addressing Human and Civil Rights, including those historically related to the Abolition of Slavery, Anti-Lynching Campaigns, Prisoner Rights, Immigrant Rights, Gay Rights, Sustainable Food Systems, and Racial and Economic Justice.
RHE 309J RHETORIC OF PUBLIC SPACE
None
RHE 309J When Topic is Appropriate
For topics courses labeled as “When Topic is Appropriate” on a BDP curriculum sheet, please note that all topics for this course number are not automatically approved to count toward your BDP. In advance of registration for a particular semester (and as part of the BDP seat request process), the BDP office will inform current BDP students of the topics for the course number that are approved for their BDP.
RHE 328 TECH COMM & SOCIAL JUSTICE
This course introduces students to the theory and practice of technical professional communication through its recent social justice turn. While TPC has traditionally focused on workplace writing, communication about technical and specialized topics (e.g., environmental impact statements), communication using technology (e.g., webpages, social media), and supplying information on how to complete tasks (e.g., instructions), its social justice turn has encouraged researchers and practitioners to identify ineffective or discriminatory communication strategies and design intersectional alternatives that can not only build for the participation of more users but also improve and save lives. The main goals of the course are (1) to ascertain the larger role theories of justice can play in technical and professional communication practice; (2) to consider the role of audience(s) and their purpose(s) in reading and writing technical documents; (3) to integrate research, writing, and design in standard genres of technical communication; (4) to design effective technical documents with attention to text, visuals, and usability; and (5) to work with current technologies for document design.
RHE 330E Rhetoric and the Law
The image of Justice is often represented as a blindfolded woman holding a scale and double-edged sword. How does this figure function rhetorically, and what relation does it have to law? We often hear about the law doing justice, but how is justice done, seen, and understood? And, what happens when we view law as neither blind nor balanced, especially in relation to social differences, such as gender, race, class, ability, and nationality? To address such questions, the course specifically examines the historical and current relationship between women, as gendered subjects, and law, as a man-made system. Drawing on court cases, social movements, legal theory, and history, we analyze representations of justice, claims of democracy, and ongoing tensions within the law. In other words, we study how legal rhetoric and practice constitute both the law and subjects before the law.
S W 360K Adv Social/Economic Justice
This course will focus on contemporary understandings of social and economic justice and analyze a wide variety of policy proposals designed to promote human well-being across the life course. Specific attention will be paid to the ways in which poverty and economic inequality hinder the well-being of families and communities and frustrate American ideals of democracy and opportunity. Upon completion of this course, students will be able to: 1. Understand and analyze the various definitions and understandings of social and economic justice; 2. Understand various historical trends in social welfare and causes of contemporary social and economic problems; 3. Identify and systematically analyze issues related to race, gender, ethnicity, social class, sexual orientation, and other dimensions which are associated with privilege, discrimination, domination, and oppression; 4. Intelligently discuss the limits of research methods upon which social and economic policy is often based; 5. Understand comparative and international perspectives on the promotion of social and economic justice; 6. Understand normative ideals associated with compelling political and ideological stances towards social and economic policy; 7. Understand a broad array of policies, both real and figurative, designed to promote human well-being in general and with regards to specific population groups; and 8. Analyze alternative models, strategies, tactics, and modes of social and political action directed towards the promotion of these goals.
SOC 307T PUNISHMENT AND SOCIETY
This course examines the social construction of crime and U.S. society’s responses to it. The course begins with an overview of sociological approaches to deviance, which is rule- or norm-breaking behavior, and social control, or how society prevents us from breaking rules/norms. These frameworks are applied to various components of the U.S. criminal-punishment system, including criminalization, policing, courts, and incarceration. Resistance and social change are also explored. Special attention is paid to how power operates through punishment and (re)produces inequalities at the intersections of race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, social class, and U.S. citizen status.
SOC 322U US Immigration
Immigration patterns have significantly affected the development of U.S. society. No country accepts more immigrants than the United States; yet, the history of US immigration is dotted with policies to restrict immigration. In the 1990s, the United States experienced a record number of new legal immigrants (9.8 million), primarily from Asia and Latin America (Mexico), breaking the 1900 – 1909 record of 8.2 million, and in 2000-2009 the number of immigrants admitted again set a new record (10.3 million), which increased in the 2010s to 10.6 million. But at the same time, the United States has been deporting record numbers of migrants. This course uses a sociological perspective to gain an understanding of the social forces that drive migration to the United States, how migrants organize their migration, and the development of US immigration policies.
SOC 323C POLICING
Examines the purposes and structure of policing and the shifting roles and powers of police officers. Focuses on several critical issues in modern-day policing, including the effectiveness of various police strategies as well as their legitimacy. Considers limits on the ability of the police to control crime, and the ways in which individuals and communities work to police themselves.
SOC 323D Border Control/Deaths
Since the 1940s, US control of the Southwest border has remained a major challenge in immigration policy. Border control has become one of the most debated topics in the country, including in federal and state legislative bodies. Annually thousands of unauthorized migrants cross the US-Mexico border into the United States to participate in US labor markets and in other social institutions. Thousands of other migrants also appear at the southwest border to seek asylum. One consequence of unauthorized immigration and of the implementation of border control measures for deterrence has been the deaths of hundreds of migrants annually. Over the years, the deaths have added up into the thousands. The social effects of border control and the occurrence of migrant deaths have become topics investigated by sociologists and other researchers to increase knowledge and understanding of international migration and the effects of border policies.
SOC 325L Sociology of Criminal Justice
This course is in two parts. The first will provide an introduction to the American criminal justice system, its policies and procedures. The primary focus will be on how the criminal justice system functions. This will include some discussion of crime and its correlates, policing, the court system, and corrections. The second part – which in my mind is the whole point -- traces where criminal justice policy has been, what it has accomplished, and where it should go in order to effectively prevent crime and promote public safety, and reduce recidivism, victimization, and cost. The primary focus of where we go from here is mainly on fundamentally changing or reinventing policing, pretrial, prosecution, indigent defense, the courts, and sentencing.
SOC 336C American Dilemmas
This course examines critical American social problems that threaten the very fabric of our collective life as a nation. These include problems of the economy and political system, social class and income inequality, racial/ethnic inequality, gender inequality and heterosexism, problems in education, and problems of illness and health care. The course has three main objectives. One involves providing students with the theoretical and methodological tools needed to critically analyze these problems from a sociological perspective. A second involves providing students with current data and other information documenting the seriousness of these problems. The final objective focuses on evaluating social policies addressing these problems (e.g., affirmative action, welfare-to-work programs, pay equity legislation), with special reference to questions of social justice, the common good, as well as public and individual responsibility. Class format will be a mixture of lecture and discussion, with a very strong emphasis on the latter.
SOC 352 Social Movements
Protests and social movements are vital to public life. They are important sources of social change. They may even be prophetic. This course explores why people rebel, demonstrate, riot, occupy public spaces, boycott, sign petitions, organize trade unions, demand equal rights, block abortion clinics. In this course, we will ask what are protests and social movements? Why do people start them and join them? What are protesters motivated by? Are they after material or cultural goals, personal or group rewards? Do protesters act rationally, morally, and/or emotionally? We will review the major sociological theories for explaining the dynamics of protests and social movements. Using these theories, we will try to answer what triggers protests and movements? What structures or shapes them? Do they follow regular patterns of development? And what is the relationship between social movements that overlap in time and space? What affect do protests and movements have on society? Do they provide valuable insights into society? Do they advance social justice? Do they contribute to our social wellbeing? Or do they lead to disorder and exact costs that outweigh benefits? Can they foreshadow the future? We will explore these many questions by looking at a range of important social movements in US history. We will look in greater depth at a handful of movements and blend or retool theoretical approaches to explain them. In short, this course surveys American protests and theories of social movements trying to explain the dynamics of social movements.

Integration Essay

A 3-4 page essay in which you reflect on what you learned and accomplished through your BDP experience.

Important Notes on Fulfilling Your BDP Requirements


For more information on courses, please consult your BDP advisor (bdp@austin.utexas.edu) or the course schedule.