LATST-180 Introduction to Latina/o Studies: Structural Inequalities
The course is an overview of the social conditions of Latinx people within the US. It addresses laws, policies and institutions that shape the complexity of Latinxes' social location and activism as well as legal constructions of race, citizenship, nomenclature, border politics, public health, education, and labor. We will consider the intersections of class, gender and sexuality as well as inequality in relation to other persons of color. Students will develop a firm sense of the importance and breadth of the Latinx political agenda and acquire skills to think across social issues. The course may include a Community Based Learning (CBL) Mentor.
LATST-250 Special Topics in Latina/o Studies
LATST-250BR Special Topics in Latina/o Studies: 'Borderlands Literature and Film'
In Borderlands/La Frontera, Gloria Anzaldúa asserts that material change is impossible without changing the cultural imagery in our minds. Latinx Borderlands artists have effected such change through their cultural production. This course will introduce students to Borderlands literature and film, and will provide an overview of Mexican American, Chicanx, and other Latinx artistic production from the U.S- Mexico border region. The course will closely examine how these texts reflect borderland folklore, social issues, and "fronterizo" identities. Students will read multiple registers of artistic production, including fiction, non-fiction, poetry, drama, testimonio, and folk song lyrics.
LATST-250FD Special Topics in Latina/o Studies: 'U.S. Latinx Foodways'
This interdisciplinary seminar explores the relationship between food, race, and migration for Latinx populations in the U.S. We will draw upon readings from the social sciences and the humanities to investigate processes of racial formation embedded in the production, labor, and consumption of foods and how these processes affect Latinx populations. What can Latinx foodstuffs and foodways reveal about U.S. racial and migration dynamics, landscapes, and politics? What social worlds and power relations emerge at the nexus of food, race, and migration? The course is organized thematically and anchored in selected case studies.
LATST-250LR Special Topics in Latina/o Studies: 'Latina/o/x Urbanism'
This course examines the relationship between the urban and Latina/o/x placemaking, identities and culture(s). Urban scholars have long studied the "evolving" city-this course explores the changing city in relation to Latina/o/x populations and urban social change movements. We examine historical and contemporary conditions and cover a broad range of topics including: urbanization, urban planning, "new urbanism," placemaking, gentrification, migration/immigration, segregation, and more. The readings in this course aim to provoke a consideration of the dynamic between space and place, as well as how urban life, culture, and form impacts Latina/o/x populations and vice versa.
LATST-250MT Special Topics in Latina/o Studies: 'Multicultural Theater and Latina/o Experience'
This course examines the landscape of American theater and its relationship to the politics of diversity in the United States. We will study the theater work of Latina/os in the U.S. to broaden our understanding of multicultural theater. In addition to studying dramatic texts, we will consider the political implications of the work and its relationship to social activism. We will look at theater companies whose primary missions are to produce Latino/a theater and at the history of the representation of Latinos on stage in this country. We will draw upon theory from fields such as cultural studies, feminist studies and dramatic criticism as we think and write about the creative work in this course.
LATST-250NY Special Topics in Latina/o Studies: 'Nueva York'
This course will explore the history of Latina/o/x populations in New York City. Students will learn about histories of migration and settlement, urban inequality, community building, and urban transformation with particular focus on the Puerto Rican population in New York City. The course will examine the many ways Latinas/os/x have transformed New York City and built vibrant communities.
LATST-250PB Special Topics in Latina/o Studies: 'The Politics of Borders'
This course interrogates the normative construction and meaning of nation-state borders. We do so from the United States/Mexico border, and utilize a comparative approach, relating Latinx Studies to critical Indigenous feminist perspectives. While focused mainly on the United States landmass the course also critically foregrounds Native/Indigenous land and sovereignty to re-conceptualize the United States as a settler colonial, imperial state. Utilizing the knowledges of Latinx and Indigenous thinkers, students will trace the construction of modern borders and will productively re-frame assumptions around immigration/migration, citizenship, nationalism and indigenismo/Indigeneity.
LATST-250RP Special Topics in Latina/o Studies: 'Race, Racism, and Power'
This course analyzes the concepts of race and racism from an interdisciplinary perspective, with focus on Latinas/os/x in the United States. It explores the sociocultural, political, economic, and historical forces that interact with each other in the production of racial categories. We will focus on structural, systemic, and institutional racism and processes of racialization. The course examines racial inequality from a historical perspective and investigates how racial categories evolve and form across contexts. The analysis that develops will ultimately allow us to think rigorously about social inequality, transformation, and liberation.
LATST-250VN Special Topics in Latin American Studies: 'Visualizing Immigrant Narratives: Migration in Film'
This course offers an interrogation of overt and embedded narratives of migrants and the migration process in popular and documentary film, paying specific attention to cinematic representations of non-citizen bodies confronting migration, deportation, labor, acculturation, and anti-immigrant hysteria. Film screenings and class discussions comprise the interpretative lens through which students will examine the aesthetic, cultural, economic, gendered, historical, political, racial and sexual dimensions of cultural texts. The course is supplemented with readings about immigration policies and histories.
LATST-295 Independent Study
LATST-350 Special Topics in Latina/o Studies
LATST-350AC Special Topics in Latina/o Studies: 'Latina/o/x Studies in Action'
Latina/o/x Studies in Action explores university/college-community partnerships and civic engagement with/in Latina/o/x communities in the United States. Drawing from the field of Latina/o/x Studies, the course explores and interrogates "traditional" academic understandings of knowledge production, research, and service learning. Focusing on questions of power, inequality, and social change, this course will examine how university/college-community partnerships can be based on reciprocity, exchange, and the centering of community assets, needs, and voices.
LATST-350FM Special Topics in Latina/o Studies: 'Latina Feminism(s)'
In this seminar, we will explore the relationship between Latina feminist theory and knowledge production. We will examine topics related to positionality, inequality, the body, reproductive justice, representation, and community. Our approach in this class will employ an intersectional approach to feminist theory that understands the interconnectedness between multiple forms of oppression, including race, class, sexuality, and ability. Our goal is to develop a robust understanding of how Latina feminist methodologies and epistemologies can be tools for social change.
LATST-350MC Special Topics in Latina/o Studies: 'Latinas/os/x and Housing: Mi Casa Is Not Su Casa'
Housing is closely tied to quality of life and the health of neighborhoods and communities. As a main goal of the "American Dream," homeownership has important significance on an individual and societal level. For immigrants, this goal is often out of reach as a result of racism and discriminatory housing policies. This interdisciplinary seminar explores Latinas/os/x relationship to housing and homeownership by examining the history of exclusionary housing policies in the United States. By exploring a range of topics (affordability, ownership, gentrification, etc), we will develop a sharper understanding of why housing is one of the most pressing issues for Latinas/os/x today.
LATST-350RF Special Topics in Latina/o Studies: 'Critical Refugee Studies'
Critical Refugee Studies will address a unique and growing portion of the migration flow to the United States -- refugees and asylum seekers. The course will discuss the historical development of persons in flight from their home nations and the U.S.'s ability (and sometimes reluctance) to receive them. The course will address their legal and popular categorization, the various reasons for their displacement abroad, and overt and buried expressions of their identities based on their categorization and displacement.
LATST-350VN Special Topics in Latin American Studies: 'Visualizing Immigrant Narratives: Migration in Film'
This course offers an interrogation of overt and embedded narratives of migrants and the migration process in popular and documentary film, paying specific attention to cinematic representations of non-citizen bodies confronting migration, deportation, labor, acculturation, and anti-immigrant hysteria. Film screenings and class discussions comprise the interpretative lens through which students will examine the aesthetic, cultural, economic, gendered, historical, political, racial and sexual dimensions of cultural texts. The course is supplemented with readings about immigration policies and histories.
LATST-360 Latina/o Immigration
The course provides an historical and topical overview of Latina/o migration to the United States. We will examine the economic, political, and social antecedents to Latin American migration, and the historical impact of the migration process in the U.S. Considering migration from Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean, we will discuss the social construction of race, the gendered nature of migration, migrant labor struggles, Latin American-U.S. Latino relations, immigration policy, and border life and enforcement. Notions of citizenship, race, class, gender, and sexuality will be central to our understanding of the complexity at work in the migration process.
LATST-365 Disposable People: A History of Deportation
Taught in English, the course explores comparative racial and ethnic politics in the U.S. during the 20th century. We will analyze the creation and maintenance of structural inequalities through laws and policies targeted at persons of color in the areas of healthcare, transportation, immigration, labor, racial segregation, and education. Through readings, lectures and films, we will discuss critical histories of community struggle against social inequality, registering the central impact that race, class, gender, sexuality, and citizenship have had on efforts toward social justice.
LATST-395 Independent Study
