Explores the significant roles that women of color have played in American politics and around the world. Begins with the US context, starting in the antebellum era and moving forward by reading biographies/autobiographies that provide voice to the experiences faced by women of color in both traditional and non-traditional political spaces. These include women of color as close confidants to male political figures (first ladies, wives, and mistresses) and as politicians, judges, activists, and revolutionaries. Then shifts to a more global context considering the perspectives of women of color in countries where they have championed gender equality and feminism, and where they have become powerful political actors. (Same as: GOV 1005, GSWS 1007)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2019.

Examines the social, political, and historical evolution of racism as a system and the challenges to studying and eradicating racism in contemporary American society. Investigates the construction of race, the various logics used to justify racial thinking, and the visible and invisible forces that perpetuate racial stratification and inequality in American life. Understands the various political and social debates that complicate and undermine how racism is defined and identified. Explores its impact on individuals, institutions, and cultures in the United States, and the various formal and subversive strategies deployed by individuals and collectives for challenging and combatting it. Emphasis on developing a language for discussing, debating, and writing about race and racism sociologically for public and academic audiences. (Same as: SOC 1010)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2022, Fall 2019.

Interdisciplinary exploration of the rise and fall (and reappearance) of the affirmative action debate that shaped so much of the American culture wars during the 1970s and 2000s. Students primarily study affirmative action in the United States, but comparative analysis of affirmative action systems in societies outside the United States, such as South Africa and India, is also considered. Examines important Supreme Court cases that have shaped the contours of affirmative action, the rise of diversity discourse, and the different ways political and cultural ideologies -- not to mention historical notions of American identity -- have determined when, where, and how affirmative action has existed and whom it benefits. Study of law, economics, sociology, anthropology, history, and political science introduces students to different methodological approaches that inform Africana studies and the field’s examination of the role people of African descent have played in contemporary and historical American society. Writing intensive. Analytical discussions of assigned texts.

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021, Fall 2020.

Explores the representation and life experiences of women who did not fit the cultural norm of suburban motherhood in 1950s America. Focuses on issues of class, race, sexuality, and gender in a decade shaped by fears about nuclear war and communism, and by social and political conformity. Topics include teenage pregnancy, women’s grassroots political leadership, single womanhood, civil rights, emergent feminism, and, finally, the enduring cultural resonance of the apron-clad 1950s mom. Engages a variety of primary and secondary sources. Note: This course is part of the following field(s) of study: United States. (Same as: GSWS 1021, HIST 1001)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2019.

Explores the ways in which the idea of American freedom has been defined both with and against slavery through readings of legal and literary texts. Students come to terms with the intersections between the political, literary, and historical concept of freedom and its relation to competing definitions of American citizenship. (Same as: ENGL 1026)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021, Fall 2020, Fall 2019.

This interdisciplinary course poses the central question of “why are you here” to first-year students with respect to their education at Bowdoin and their broader lives in general, providing tools from Africana traditions to help them develop their own answers. In a moment of moral, ecological, and political uncertainty, it can be difficult to know what it means to be a good person, how to live a good life, and what “the common good” actually is. We begin by studying the genealogy of the particular Western, secular, modern education and the forms of knowledge, culture, and humanity that it has both produced and undermined within Africana societies. After positioning ourselves and our educational tradition in perspective, we explore indigenous and Islamic forms of education and person formation and the various ways that they answer questions such as “who are you?”, “why are you here?”, and “what should you do with your life?”

Previous terms offered: Fall 2020.

Explores how the Black Caribbean scholars transformed race, nation, and class; expanded Blackness as a political stance and identity; and brought together Black radical traditions across the globe. The trans-Atlantic slave trade and capitalist expansion in the Caribbean radically altered notions of race, class, nation, and Blackness. Since then, Caribbean scholars have contributed new social theory through their critique and engagement with race and capitalism, exchange of ideas with Black scholars in the U.S., Europe, and Africa, and commentary on events across the world. Using the Caribbean as a starting point, the class seeks to define, interrogate, and expand what is meant by race, nation, and class through the lens of Blackness and introduces Caribbean scholarship as a site of global political, social, and cultural thought. (Same as: SOC 1018, LACL 1048)

Focuses on major humanities and social science disciplinary and interdisciplinary African American and African diaspora themes in the context of the modern world. The African American experience is addressed in its appropriate historical context, emphasizing its important place in the history of the United States and connections to African diasporic experiences, especially in the construction of the Atlantic world. Material considered chronologically and thematically builds on historically centered accounts of African American, African diaspora, and African experiences. Introduces prospective Africana studies majors and minors to the field; provides an overview of the predominant theoretical and methodological perspectives in this evolving discipline; and establishes historical context for critical analyses of African American experiences in the United States, and their engagement with the African diaspora.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023, Fall 2022, Spring 2022, Fall 2021, Spring 2021, Fall 2020, Spring 2020, Fall 2019.

Introduces the techniques and methods of archaeology through an examination of Egyptian material culture. Emphasis is placed upon understanding the major monuments and artifacts of ancient Egypt from the prehistoric cultures of the Nile Valley through the period of Roman control. Architecture, sculpture, fresco painting, and other “minor arts” are examined at sites such as Saqqara, Giza, Thebes, Dendera, Tanis, and Alexandria. Considers the nature of this archaeological evidence, its context, and the relationship of archaeology to other disciplines such as africana studies, art history, anthropology, history, and classics. Course themes include the origins and development of complex state systems, funerary symbolism, contacts between Africa and the Mediterranean, and the expression of social, political and religious ideologies in art and architecture. Selected readings supplement illustrated presentations of the major archaeological finds of Egypt. Class meetings include artifact sessions in Bowdoin College Museum of Art. (Same as: ARCH 1103)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021.

In conjunction with the fiftieth anniversary of Africana studies at Bowdoin, this yearlong, two-part course will address debates and issues of Africana studies through the lives of black women. In Part I, students will focus on early Africana studies texts, reading works by and about Phillis Wheatley, Sojourner Truth, Frances Harper, Ida B. Wells, and Anna Julia Cooper. We will take up differences and continuities between these thinkers to understand the politics of respectability, work, representation, sexuality, and family across multiple historical contexts. (Same as: ENGL 1301, GSWS 1301)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2019.

In conjunction with the fiftieth anniversary of Africana studies at Bowdoin, this course will address debates and issues of Africana studies through the lives of black women. Students will focus on the twentieth and twenty-first centuries reading works by and about Zora Neale Hurston, Pauli Murray, Nina Simone, Josephine Baker, Angela Davis, and Condoleezza Rice. We will take up differences and continuities between these thinkers to understand the politics of respectability, work, representation, sexuality, and family across multiple historical contexts. Though this course continues the themes of AFRS 1109, students need not take Part I to take Part II. (Same as: ENGL 1302, GSWS 1205)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2020.

Chinese and some African government officials speak of Africa-China relations as a “win-win” partnership, “traditional friendship”, and “brotherhood” predicated on historical, mutual marginalization by the West. Despite this, China and individual African countries remain highly unequal in their economic and political strength and global significance. There is also great diversity among the African Union’s fifty-four states in their responses to and engagement with Beijing. Is it possible in this situation to have symmetrical bilateral relations? How do African leaders shape relations between their nation and China? Is China’s engagement with African countries actually promoting development on the continent? Focusing on three key interaction points—precolonial Africa, the Bandung era (1955-1999), and “Going Out” (1999-present)— students will become acquainted with the actors, institutions, and domestic and global conditions driving engagement between the two regions. (Same as: ASNS 1185)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2020.

Introduces students to the rich and diverse musical traditions of sub-Saharan Africa. Covers traditional and modern musical practices from various regions, and explores their roles in social, cultural, and political contexts from historical and contemporary perspectives. Students learn to identify basic regional musical properties and characteristic musical styles. Case studies may include West African dance-drumming, Ghanaian highlife, musical oral historians, “African Ballets,” South African a cappella, the protest music of Nigerian Fela Kuti and Zimbabwean Thomas Mapfumo, as well as contemporary hip-hop and religious pop music. Based on lectures, readings, performances by visiting artists, discussions, and audio and video sources. No prior musical knowledge necessary. (Same as: MUS 1211)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021.

From the folkloric dance forms to popular and secular dance practices, this course journeys through various islands and countries of the Caribbean to learn about their various histories and cultures, including the music, costumes, and basic rhythms associated with each particular dance form. This in-studio course provides a general introduction to some of the sacred and popular dances of the Caribbean. Although movement is the primary work of this course, what we learn in class may be supplemented by readings and outside research. *Please note that no prior experience or training is required. Grading will not be based on technical skill levels, but on mindful, full-bodied participation that demonstrates comprehension and articulation of course materials. (Same as: DANC 1213)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021, Fall 2019.

This course is an opportunity to engage with the history, heritage, and culture of Latin America, the Caribbean, and Latin American and Caribbean communities in the US through music. We will explore issues of race, identity, religion, and politics from a broad temporal span of around five hundred years—from the sixteenth to the twenty-first century. We will cover a broad variety of regions, contexts, and musical genres from classical, folk, and popular traditions, such as salsa, Cuban son, hip-hop, Latin polyphony, rock, villancicos, protest song, chamber music, reggaeton, vallenato, and more. This course is not meant to be comprehensive but will reflect on the many ways in which music has been used in different cultural and historical contexts, offering a close examination of its characteristics, means, and meanings. (Same as: MUS 1271, LACL 1271)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021, Fall 2020, Fall 2019.

American cities have been historic cauldrons of racial and ethnic conflict. Concentrates on urban violence in American cities since 1898. Students study moments of conflict during the early republic and the nineteenth century. Topics examined include the post-Reconstruction pogroms that overturned interracial democracy; the Red Summer and its historical memory; the ways race and ethnicity shaped urban residential space; the effects of immigration on urban political economy and society, and the conflicts over space, labor, and social relations that arose; and the waves of urban violence that spread across the country in the mid-1960s. Note: This course is part of the following field(s) of study: United States. (Same as: HIST 1320, URBS 1320)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021.

This course is an introduction to Anglophone African Literature through contemporary short stories. It begins with a short study of the main points of the history and culture of Africa and its peoples in order to get the background needed for an informed and sensitive study of the short stories. Students then read four captivating collections of short stories written in the late twentieth century and early twenty-first century by both female and male authors from various parts of the African continent (Bessie Head, Chinua Achebe, Uwem Akpan, and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie). The course focuses on the main theme of identity and explores several related perennial and current themes that help students appreciate what it means to be not only an African but also a global citizen, a human being with agency in a dynamic and changing world. [Note: Beginning with the Class of 2025, this class will fulfill the African American, Asian American, Indigenous, Latinx, multiethnic American, or global literature requirement for English majors.] (Same as: ENGL 1303)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023, Spring 2022.

African peoples are often imagined as victims of history. This course challenges such stereotypes by introducing students to the great civilizations of medieval and early modern Africa. Includes the Nile Valley, Ethiopia, Mali, Oyo, Dahomey, Asante, Kongo, Lunda, Swahili, and Zulu. Various themes include political power and governance; culture and society; trade and economy; women and gender; and youth and generational conflict. Content is explored by reading fiction, poetry, myth, artwork (including art in the Bowdoin College Museum of Art), and historical scholarship. This course is part of the following field(s) of study: Africa. It also meets the non-Euro/US requirement and pre-modern requirements. (Same as: HIST 1461)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2022.

A socio-cultural, historical, and analytical introduction to jazz music from the turn of the twentieth century to around 1950. Includes some concert attendance. (Same as: MUS 1281)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021, Fall 2019.

Examines the impact of race and ethnicity on American politics. Key topics include the impact of race on government, and the development and influence of group identities. Also covers rights, representation, and voting, as well as impacts on education and criminal justice. (Same as: GOV 2052)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2022, Spring 2020, Fall 2019.

Examines the history of African Americans from the origins of slavery in America through the death of slavery during the Civil War. How could anyone (let alone the Founding Fathers) have traded human beings as chattel? How did African-descended people in America come to be both part of and yet perpetually marginalized in America? What does this say about the nature of American democracy and the mythologies of American history? How much agency did African Americans have in crafting their own experience, and what does this say about the nature of both their oppression and their resistance? In what ways have African Americans contributed to the formation of American society? We will be concerned not simply with the important task of reinserting the African American past into our national historical narrative. We will also be interested in understanding the depths to which American society has been predicated on the intersections of race, economy, and society. Note: This course is part of the following field(s) of study: United States. (Same as: HIST 2140)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023, Spring 2021.

Explores the history of African Americans from the end of the Civil War to the present. Issues include the promises and failures of Reconstruction, the Jim Crow era, black leadership and protest institutions, African American cultural styles, industrialization and urbanization, the world wars, the Civil Rights Movement, and conservative retrenchment. Note: This course is part of the following field(s) of study: United States. (Same as: HIST 2141)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021.

This course explores the United States Civil War. Beginning with an overview of causes and ending with prospects for Reconstruction, it focuses on the key issues raised by the war: the relationship between military and political factors, the social changes wrought by war, and the crucial issues of slavery and emancipation. Note: This course is part of the following field(s) of study: United States (Same as: HIST 2145)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2022, Fall 2020.

Seminar. Examines the convergence of politics and spirituality in the musical work of contemporary black women singer-songwriters in the United States. Analyzes material that interrogates and articulates the intersections of gender, race, class, and sexuality generated across a range of religious and spiritual terrains with African diasporic/black Atlantic spiritual moorings, including Christianity, Islam, and Yoruba. Focuses on material that reveals a womanist (black feminist) perspective by considering the ways resistant identities shape and are shaped by artistic production. Employs an interdisciplinary approach by incorporating ethnomusicology, anthropology, literature, history, and performance and social theory. Explores the work of Shirley Caesar, the Clark Sisters, Meshell Ndegeocello, Abby Lincoln, Sweet Honey in the Rock, and Dianne Reeves, among others. (Same as: GSWS 2207, MUS 2291, REL 2201)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2022, Fall 2021.

Intermediate Seminar. How does “race” signify in the English Renaissance, a period that witnessed the emergence of the Atlantic slave trade, intensified urbanization in European capital cities, and the development of new global trade route? Explores a range of literary strategies Renaissance authors use to represent ethnic, religious, and cultural otherness. Considers how literary and dramatic works might critique, justify, and reproduce racial ideologies. Texts include sonnets by Sidney and Shakespeare; plays by Marlowe, Shakespeare, and Middleton; masques by Ben Jonson; poetry by John Donne and William Herbert; and the first English “novel,” Aphra Behn’s “Oroonoko.” Note: Fulfills the pre-1800 literature requirement for English majors. (Same as: ENGL 2015)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2020.

Introduction to the sociological study of race and ethnicity in the contemporary United States. Examines prominent theories pertaining to the social and cultural meanings of race and ethnicity, causes and consequences of structural racism, relationships between race and class, how immigration and assimilation shape and are shaped by social constructions of race and ethnicity, dynamic representations of race and ethnicity in the media, formation and shifts of intra-group and inter-group boundaries, and more. (Same as: SOC 2208, LACL 2708)

Prerequisites: SOC 1101 or AFRS 1101.

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021.

Intermediate seminar. Postwar US cities were considered social, economic, political, and cultural zones of crisis. African Americans -- their families; gender relations; their relationship to urban political economy, politics, and culture -- were at the center of this discourse. Uses David Simon’s epic series “The Wire” as a critical source on postindustrial urban life, politics, conflict, and economics to cover the origins of the urban crisis, the rise of an underclass theory of urban class relations, the evolution of the urban underground economy, and the ways the urban crisis shaped depictions of African Americans in American popular culture. (Same as: URBS 2620)

Prerequisites: AFRS 1101 or EDUC 1101 or GSWS 1101 or SOC 1101.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2022.

Focuses on the ways black people have experienced twentieth-century events. Examines social, economic, and political catalysts for processes of protest music production across genres including gospel, blues, folk, soul, funk, rock, reggae, and rap. Analysis of musical and extra- musical elements includes style, form, production, lyrics, intent, reception, commodification, mass-media, and the Internet. Explores ways in which people experience, identify, and propose solutions to poverty, segregation, oppressive working conditions, incarceration, sexual exploitation, violence, and war. (Same as: ANTH 2227, MUS 2292)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021.

A continuation of modern dance principles introduced in Dance 1211 with the addition of African-derived dance movement. The two dance aesthetics are combined to create a new form. Technique classes include center floor exercises, movement combinations across the floor, and movement phrases. Students also attend dance performances in the community. (Same as: DANC 2241, LACL 2396)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2021, Fall 2019.

An introduction to dance as a meaning-making, cultural practice. Using embodiment/performance, writing, and discussion, students will use the gestures embedded within dance cultures as critical tools necessary for analyzing and theorizing aspects of race, sexuality, gender, and nationalism. Accordingly, students will understand the meanings and roles of dance and gesture within larger historical, cultural, social, and theatrical contexts. In sum, this class examines dance forms and dancing bodies, such as Indian classical dance, Puerto Rican bomba, and blackface minstrelsy, to better understand how cultures throughout the globe come to know and understand both themselves and the world at large. (Same as: DANC 2506)

Prerequisites: DANC 1000 or higher or THTR 1000 or higher or AFRS 1000 or higher or GSWS 1000 or higher or ANTH 1000 or higher.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2020.

Students examine the Civil Rights Movement and the Black Power Movement to understand the centrality of race, racism, and political organizing in change-making processes in the U.S. Critical perspectives offered in speeches, biographies, music, and films shed light on the connections between ever-changing notions of Blackness(es), structural and institutional forms of oppression, and the bloody, sweaty, and tearful efforts people engaged in to create change. Analyzes the political and social transformations made possible by changemakers such as Angela Davis, Malcolm X, Ella Baker, Martin Luther King, Jr., Fannie Lou Hamer, the Black Panther Party, SNCC, and the Freedom Riders, providing insight into the diversity of strategies and methods for organizing and resistance that Black peoples and allies used to get free(er). (Same as: HIST 2220)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023, Spring 2022, Spring 2021.

Seminar. Examines black sacred music from its earliest forms, fashioned by enslaved Africans, through current iterations produced by black global actors of a different sort. Explores questions such as: What does bondage sound like? What does emancipation sound like? Can we hear corresponding sounds generated by artists today? In what ways have creators of sacred music embraced, rejected, and re-envisioned the "strange land" over time? Looks at musical and lyrical content and the context in which various music genres developed, such as Negro spirituals, gospel, and sacred blues. Contemporary artists such as Janelle Monáe, Beyoncé, Bob Marley, and Michael Jackson included as well. (Same as: MUS 2261)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023, Spring 2022.

Examines the ways religion, race, and gender shape people’s lives from the nineteenth century into contemporary times in America, with particular focus on black communities. Explores issues of self-representation, memory, material culture, embodiment, and civic and political engagement through autobiographical, historical, literary, anthropological, cinematic, and musical texts. (Same as: GSWS 2270, REL 2271)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2021.

This course examines hip-hop culture's vast array of expressive practices. Focusing primarily on hip-hop dance practices, our study will situate these dances within a larger hip-hop culture, acknowledging hip-hop as both inherently African diasporic and specific to the particular US historical, cultural, and sociopolitical contexts in which—and the communities from whom—these practices emerge. Exploring aesthetics and/as cultural values, we will pay particular attention to the roles of power and inequity, interrogating themes that may include racism, anti-Blackness, white supremacy, globalization, appropriation, community, joy, and agency. We will examine our own positionalities, asking what it can mean to engage responsibly in hip-hop as well as what it can mean to be responsible to the communities of folks who created and continue to create hip-hop culture. Primarily a reading-, writing-, and discussion-based course, our study will be supplemented with physical practice in the studio. (Same as: DANC 2404, MUS 2298)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023.

Dance—an art form whose medium is the body—and ethnography—the study of people and their cultures—are great tools for addressing some of the ways different dancing bodies have been historically policed for “dancing sex(y).” Other tools, such as critical dance and black theories, in addition to queer and feminist approaches, will also be utilized to comprehend the uneven ways these bodies are further racialized, sexualized, and gendered within the Americas. In particular, students will learn about various dances (such as the Brazilian samba to the Cuban rumba, Jamaican Dancehall, and the Trinidadian wine) through readings, lectures, and actual in-studio dancing. Ultimately, the intention here is to understand dancing as both a meaning-making activity and a way of understanding the world. In turn, it is an important lens for critically thinking, talking, researching, and writing about politics of identity (especially regarding nationality, gender, race, and sexuality). (Same as: DANC 2505, GSWS 2505, LACL 2392)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2021.

Intermediate seminar. Africana religions are often described as lived traditions because experience is such a central part of their practice, nature, and structure. As an imaginative window into another lived experience, literature provides a unique opportunity to understand and experience the worldviews of Africana religions and peoples from more of an inside perspective than most academic material can provide. In this course literature written by and about people who come from these traditions will be studied in conjunction with academic sources on Africana religions and religion and literature to provide students with a deeper understanding of Africana worldviews and how they affect every facet of practitioners’ lives. The works studied come from an array of different times, places, linguistic backgrounds, and traditions including the Yoruba religion, Islam, Christianity, Haitian Vodou, Brazilian Candomblé and more in Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, and the United States. (Same as: LACL 2300, REL 2330)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2020.

To master and think critically about classic and contemporary work in critical race theory, especially the work of Derrick Bell, Richard Delgado, Kimberle Crenshaw, and Tommy Curry, we will critically examine such topics as intersectionality, gender and black male studies, social dominance theory, the racial wealth gap, reparations, hate speech, the black/white binary, and revisionist history, among other topics. We will take a distinctively philosophical outlook on these topics: identify value assumption and analyze and evaluate arguments. Finally, we will ponder the relationship of critical race theory (a domain of critical legal studies) to contemporary philosophy of race (a domain of moral and political philosophy). Students will come away with a better understanding of both the conceptual and political issues involved in discussing contemporary issues of race. (Same as: PHIL 2326, LACL 2326)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2020.

Explores higher education in the contemporary United States through a sociological lens, highlighting the ways that colleges and universities both promote social mobility and perpetuate inequality. Examines the functions of higher education for students and society; issues of inequality in college access, financing, campus experiences, and outcomes later in life; the challenges and benefits of diversity and inclusion; and other topics, with special attention across all topics to the case of African Americans. (Same as: SOC 2330, EDUC 2279)

Prerequisites: SOC 1101.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023, Spring 2021.

Surveys history of Africa after conquest by European powers until independence in the 1960s, with a focus on west and central Africa. Includes the global precursors to colonialism, African resistance to European encroachment, and the violence of conquest. The nature of the colonial endeavor, in terms of the type of colonial regime (concessionaire, settler, or trade) is explored alongside the policies of British, French, Belgian, and Portuguese colonists and early resistance to colonialism. Covers the rise of anti-colonial nationalism and decolonization and why European powers quit Africa after only sixty years of formal colonialism. Addresses the diverse hopes and visions of the first independent generation of African leaders, including Kwame Nkrumah, Leopold Sénghor, Nnandi Azikiwe, Julius Nyerere, and Patrice Lumumba. Concludes with colonial legacies in the form of the postcolonial “gatekeeper” state. Within this time frame, considers the politics of gender, race, and class. Note: This course is part of the following field(s) of study: Africa and Colonial Worlds. It fulfills the non Euro/US requirement for history majors and minors. (Same as: HIST 2364)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023, Spring 2021, Spring 2020.

What does it mean to be African? Is the term bound by racial, ethnic, or spatial limitations? Who possesses the rights of access to the cultural products and expressions unique to the continent? This course focuses on how African and African-descended peoples remember and replicate Africa as cognitive object and cultural artifact. The course examines how the concept of Africa, as both home and identity, is recreated and imagined through diasporic perspectives. We will explore questions of home, identity, Afropolitanism, continuity, appropriation, authenticity, historical memory, and creolization, using examples from academic scholars, literary figures, and popular culture on the African continent and throughout its many diasporas. In addition to literature and research, film, music, photography, and artwork will be used to develop a critical understanding of the many contemporary forms used to recreate Africa.

Previous terms offered: Fall 2019.

The study of apartheid in South Africa, the system of racial and ethnic segregation that began in 1948 and ended with the election of Nelson Mandela in 1994. Explores the many different facets of apartheid: how and why it emerged; its social and economic aspects; how people lived under, resisted, and collaborated with apartheid, and its similarities and differences to other forms of racial and identity-based governance, including European colonialism in Africa, US segregation, and Zionism in Israel / Palestine. The readings, lectures, and class discussions focus on the voices of diverse South Africans, activists, youth, workers, artists, soldiers, and students, exploring their different gendered, ethnic, and racial perspectives. NOTE: This course is part of the following field(s) of study: Africa; and Atlantic Worlds. It fulfills the non Euro/US requirement for history majors and minors. (Same as: HIST 2366)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2020.

Religion has been central not only in the lives of members of the Black Atlantic World and also in terms of the formation of this world. This class provides a survey of some of the most prominent Afro-Atlantic diasporic religions such as Haïtian Vodou, Brazilian Candomblé, Trinidadian Shango, and Cuban Santería/Regla de Ocha and also explores the particular dynamics of the Religion has been central not only in the lives of members of the Black Atlantic World but also in terms of the formation of this world. This class provides a survey of some of the most prominent Afro-Atlantic diasporic religions, such as Haïtian Vodou, Brazilian Candomblé, Trinidadian Shango, and Cuban Santería/Regla de Ocha, and also explores the particular dynamics of the African religious diaspora. Complicating common assumptions about relations between diaspora and homeland as well as what constitutes a religion, it addresses issues of authenticity and authority, ancestrality, race, gender, transnationalism, and even problematic (mis)representations in Western society and pop culture. We will also pay close attention to the important and complicated role that the transatlantic slave trade played in the formation of these Atlantic societies and aspects of these religious traditions, such as conceptions of God and divinities, syncretism, divination, and spirit possession. (Same as: LACL 2384, REL 2484)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2021, Fall 2019.

Conducted in English and with all the readings and discussions in English, this course is nonetheless a comparative and multilingual study (English, Spanish, French, Lingala, and Kikongo) of African, African American, Afro-Caribbean, and Afro-Latin American literatures and their intersections with religion. Building on the Gambian historian of religions Lamin Sanneh’s work (Translating the Message: The Missionary Impact on Culture) showing that Christianity is a “translated” religion, the course explores, through the theory of critical translation and the radical imagination of Africana indigeneity, how African, African American, Afro-Caribbean, and Afro-Latin American writers (Mudimbe, Oyono, Ndongo-Bidyogo, Vera, Adichie, Condé, Laferrière, Montero, Zapata Olivella, and Walker) use the polyglossial space of the novel to “conjure” up individual, social, and ecological healing, and thus push the boundaries of the conventional understanding of “religion” and of “Christianity." (Same as: FRS 2387, LACL 2387)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2022, Spring 2022.

African and Afro-diasporic religions have historically been linked with stereotypes of evil superstition or “black magic,” causing a great deal of prejudice and misinformation. These traditions, however, have their own much more complex, fascinating, and powerful traditions of esoteric arts that differ greatly from Western conceptions of “witchcraft.” In this course students will learn about African concepts often translated as “magic,” “witchcraft,” “sorcery,” or “juju,” why they are frequently misunderstood by outsiders, and how they have important implications for issues like gender, politics, resistance to oppression, and ethics. By speaking to real practitioners of these arts and reading accounts of people engaged in them, the course will demonstrate how African-derived esoteric arts have gained salience in the modern era and how they engage with issues that include the emergence of “Blitchcraft” (Black witchcraft) online and African “witchcraft” as an analytical lens for the modern world. (Same as: LACL 2388, REL 2388)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023.

An introduction to the cultures of various French-speaking regions outside of France. Examines the history, politics, customs, cinema, and the arts of the Francophone world, principally Africa and the Caribbean. Increases cultural understanding prior to study abroad in French-speaking regions. (Same as: FRS 2407, LACL 2407)

Prerequisites: FRS 2305 or higher or Placement in FRS 2400 level or Placement in FRS 2305/2400 level.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023, Spring 2022, Spring 2021, Spring 2020.

Examines oral and written traditions of areas where French is spoken in Africa, the Caribbean, Europe, and North America from the Middle Ages to 1848. Through interdisciplinary units, students examine key moments in the history of the francophone world, drawing on folktales, epics, poetry, plays, short stories, essays, and novels. Explores questions of identity, race, colonization, and language in historical and ideological context. Taught in French. (Same as: FRS 2409, LACL 2209)

Prerequisites: FRS 2305 or higher or Placement in FRS 2400 level or Placement in FRS 2305/2400 level.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023, Fall 2022, Spring 2022, Fall 2021, Spring 2021, Fall 2020, Spring 2020, Fall 2019.

This course focuses on sub-Saharan Francophone African texts and postcolonial translation studies. In this advanced seminar, students read major canonical novels and become familiar with translation theory, while also developing a translation practice. Students analyze fictional representations of translators, study the circulation and reception of translations, and consider the politics of translation for certain case studies. Students evaluate different translations of a text, compose their own translation, and write a critical translator’s preface in which they explain their stylistic choices. Students meet with literary translators, publishers, and writers throughout the semester. (Same as: FRS 3227)

Prerequisites: Two of: FRS 2409 (same as AFRS 2409 and LACL 2209) and FRS 2410 (same as AFRS 2412 and LACL 2210).

Continues the themes and issues introduced in American Literature I into the latter part of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In particular, examines the aftermath of the Civil War and slavery, both its material devastation as well as the technological and literary innovation it generated that helped the country prosper for the next five decades. Examines the development of various literary movements including, realism, naturalism, and African American literature through readings of works by William Dean Howells, Henry James, Edith Wharton, W.E.B. DuBois, Charles Chesnutt, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Booker T. Washington, Stephen Crane, Sarah Orne Jewett, Mark Twain, Ida B. Wells, Frank Norris, Pauline Hopkins, and F. Scott Fitzgerald. (Same as: ENGL 2506)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2022, Spring 2021.

Surveys societies and politics in sub-Saharan Africa, seeking to understand the sources of current conditions and the prospects for political stability and economic growth. Looks briefly at pre-colonial society and colonial influence on state-construction in Africa, and concentrates on three broad phases in Africa’s contemporary political development: (1) independence and consolidation of authoritarian rule; (2) economic decline and challenges to authoritarianism; (3) democratization and civil conflict. Presumes no prior knowledge of the region. (Same as: GOV 2530)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021, Fall 2019.

Intermediate seminar. This course examines past and present social movements through the lens of global Black feminist writing and media. By reading and engaging key texts of activist groups and leaders (such as the Combahee River Collective, The Black Panther Party, and the Movement for Black Lives), students will learn about the principles, philosophies, and organizing praxis of Black feminist activists. (Same as: ANTH 2566, GSWS 2566)

Introduces students to the controversial history of reader responses to Harriet Beecher Stowe’s 1852 antislavery novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Students engage with various theoretical approaches—reader response theory, feminist, African Americanist, and historicist—to the novel, then turn to the novel itself and produce their own literary interpretation. In order to do so, students examine the conditions of the novel’s original production. By visiting various historic locations, the Stowe House on Federal Street, the First Parish on Maine Street, Special Collections of the Hawthorne-Longfellow Library, students compare the novel’s original historical context to the history that the novel produced. Aside from reading Stowe’s antislavery fiction, students also read works produced with and against Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Note: Beginning with the Class of 2025, this class will fulfill the African American, Asian American, Indigenous, Latinx, multiethnic American, or global literature requirement for English majors. (Same as: ENGL 2582)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2022, Spring 2020.

: Oil, diamonds, gold. . . riches in the midst of poverty. How can Africa boast so many natural resources and yet remain the poorest continent on earth? What is the “resource curse?” Begins by putting Africa in the context of global resource extraction, oil in particular. Establishes Africa’s long pre-colonial experience with trade in iron, gold, salt, and slaves. The colonial period deepened the reliance of many territories on specific resources, a pattern that continues to the present. Uses Burkina Faso as a specific example of gold extraction, contrasting industrial and artisanal mining. Modern streams of prospectors throughout West Africa echo the California gold rush, but with important distinctions.. A research-based writing seminar in political science, the course will highlight the interplay between national and foreign governments, international and domestic firms, and local and migrant prospectors as they vie for access to valuable resources. Students will gain skills in library research, writing and revision, peer review and oral presentations. (IRBW) (Same as: GOV 2596)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021.

Explores rich traditions of African American humor in fiction, comics, graphic narratives, and film. Considers strategies of cultural survival and liberation, as well as folkloric sources, trickster storytellers, comic double-voicing, and the lampooning of racial ideologies. Close attention paid to modes of burlesque, satirical deformation, caricature, tragicomedy, and parody in historical and contemporary contexts, including such writers and performers as Charles Chesnutt, Bert Williams, Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Richard Pryor, Ishmael Reed, Aaron McGruder, Dave Chappelle, and Suzan-Lori Parks. (Same as: ENGL 2603)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2020.

Explores creative collaborations and cross currents in African American literary and visual arts over the past century. Considers the problems of minstrelsy, masking, and caricature -- as well as instruments of militant image-making in both literary and visual forms. Topics of special interest include uplift and documentary photography; modernist resistance languages of the Harlem Renaissance; shadows, silhouettes, and invisibility; comic strips and graphic narratives; and contemporary images -- prints, texts, and illustrations -- that introduce alternative socio-political allegories. The course will engage with works held in the Bowdoin College Museum of Art and in Special Collections and Archives. (Same as: ENGL 2604)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2021.

Focuses on the African American literary and cultural call-to-arms of the 1920s. Modernist resistance languages; alliances and betrayals on the left; gender, sexuality, and cultural images; activism and literary journalism; and music and visual culture are of special interest. Note: Beginning with the Class of 2025, this class will fulfill the African American, Asian American, Indigenous, Latinx, multiethnic American, or global literature requirement for English majors. (Same as: ENGL 2605)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2022.

When we perform music on stage, what are we performing? Is it only the “music” or is there something more? When we watch a live musical performance, what are we taking into our bodies? Are we learning lessons about which bodies go with which music or who is allowed on a particular stage and who is “different” in that context? This course investigates lineages of performance practice for what these lineages teach about bodies and genre. For example, how did jazz music created in African American communities and initially replete with women artists in the 1920s turn into a musical community dominated by white middle-class boys and men? We will examine how musical lineages are constructed with particular attention to the history of segregation in post-secondary education in the United States. The course includes a final performance of a musical and/or theatrical nature. Previous music experience is not necessary but is welcomed. (Same as: MUS 2606, GSWS 2208)

Seminar. Close examination of the decade following the Civil War. Explores the events and scholarship of the Union attempt to create a biracial democracy in the South following the war, and the sources of its failure. Topics include wartime Reconstruction, the Ku Klux Klan, Republican politics, and Democratic Redemption. Special attention paid to the deeply conflicted ways historians have approached this period over the years. Note: This course is part of the following field(s) of study: United States. (Same as: HIST 2621)

Prerequisites: HIST 1000 - 2969 or HIST 3000 or higher.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023, Spring 2021.

Intermediate seminar. Covers the history of people of African descent in what becomes New York City from the Dutch colonial period through the present. Students read key books on all major historical themes and periods, such as the early history of slavery and the slave trade; black life and religion during the early republic and gradual emancipation; the Civil War and draft riots; black communal life during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; the Harlem Renaissance; the Great Depression; the civil rights era; the age of urban crisis; the 1980s and the rise of hip-hop; and blacklife since 9-11. Students gain wide exposure to working with primary sources. (Same as: URBS 2626)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023.

Examines the history and contributions of African Americans to United States theater from the early blackface minstrel tradition, to the revolutionary theater of the Black Arts writers, to more recent postmodernist stage spectacles. Among other concerns, such works often dramatize the efforts of African Americans to negotiate ongoing tensions between individual needs and group demands that result from historically changing forms of racial marginalization. A particular goal is to highlight what Kimberly Benston has termed the expressive agency with which black writers and performers have imbued their theatrical presentations. Potential authors include Zora Neale Hurston, Langston Hughes, Lorraine Hansberry, Amiri Baraka, Ron Milner, Adrienne Kennedy, Ntozake Shange, George C. Wolfe, Anna Deavere Smith, Afro Pomo Homos, and August Wilson. (Same as: ENGL 2654, THTR 2854)

In 1845, Frederick Douglass told his white readers: “You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall see how a slave was made a man.” This simple statement effectively describes the enduring paradox of African American male identity: although black and white males share a genital sameness, until the nation elected its first African American president the former has inhabited a culturally subjugated gender identity in a society premised on both white supremacy and patriarchy. But Douglass’s statement also suggests that black maleness is a discursive construction, i.e. that it changes over time. If this is so, how does it change? What are the modes of its production and how have black men over time operated as agents in reshaping their own masculinities? Reading a range of literary and cultural texts, both past and present, students examine the myriad ramifications of, and creative responses to, this ongoing challenge. Beginning with the Class of 2025, this class will fulfill the African American, Asian American, Indigenous, Latinx, multiethnic American, or global literature requirement for English majors. (Same as: ENGL 2650, GSWS 2260)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021.

How does the concept of queerness signify in cultural texts that are ostensibly about the struggle for racial equality? And vice versa, how does the concept of racialization signify in cultural texts that are ostensibly about the struggle for LGBT recognition and justice? While some of this work tends to reduce queer to traditional sexual minorities like lesbigay and trans folk while downplaying racial considerations, others tend to limit the category race to people of color like blacks while downplaying questions about sexuality. Such critical and creative gestures often place queer and race in opposition rather than as intersecting phenomena. Students examine the theoretical and cultural assumptions of such gestures, and their implications, through close readings of selected works in both the LGBT and African American literary traditions. Beginning with the Class of 2025, this class will fulfill the African American, Asian American, Indigenous, Latinx, multiethnic American, or global literature requirement for English majors. (Same as: ENGL 2651, GSWS 2651)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023.

Intermediate Seminar. The struggle against anti-black racism has often required that individual African Americans serve as representative figures of the race. How have twentieth- and twenty-first-century black authors tackled the challenge of having to speak for the collective while also writing narratives that explore the singularity of an individual life? What textual approaches have these authors employed to negotiate this tension between what theorists of the genre broadly call referentiality and subjectivity? Authors include W. E. B. Du Bois, Zora Neale Hurston, Malcolm X, Jamaica Kincaid, Maya Angelou, Samuel Delaney, Barack Obama, among others. Note: Fulfills the literature of the Americas requirement for English majors. (Same as: ENGL 2013)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2020.

Violence and interracial sex have long been conjoined in U.S. literary, televisual, and filmic work. The enduring nature of this conjoining suggests there is some symbolic logic at work in these narratives, such that black/white intimacy functions as a figural stand-in for negative (and sometimes positive) commentary on black/white social conflict. When this happens, what becomes of “sex” as a historically changing phenomenon when it is yoked to the historically unchanging phenomenon of the “interracial”? Although counter-narratives have recently emerged to compete with such symbolic portrayals, i.e. romance novels, popular films and television shows, not all of these works have displaced this earlier figural logic; in some cases, this logic has merely been updated. Explores the broader cultural implications of both types of narratives. Possible authors/texts: Richard Wright, Chester Himes, Ann Petry, Lillian Smith, Jack Kerouac, Frantz Fanon, Kara Walker, Amiri Baraka, Alice Walker, Octavia Butler, John R. Gordon, Kim McLarin, Monster’s Ball, Far From Heaven, and Sex and the City. Note: beginning with the Class of 2025, this class will fulfill the African American, Asian American, Indigenous, Latinx, and multiethnic American or global literature requirement for English majors. (Same as: ENGL 2653, GSWS 2283)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2019.

Intermediate seminar. Close readings of literary and filmic texts that interrogate widespread beliefs in the fixity of racial categories and the broad assumptions these beliefs often engender. Investigates whiteness and blackness as unstable and fractured ideological constructs that become most visible in narratives of racial passing. These are constructs that, while socially and historically produced, are no less real in their tangible effects, whether internal or external. May include works by Nella Larsen, Norman Mailer, John Howard Griffin, Mat Johnson, Toi Derricotte, and Mohsin Hamid. Beginning with the Class of 2025, this class will fulfill the African American, Asian American, Indigenous, Latinx, multiethnic American, or global literature requirement for English majors. (Same as: ENGL 2004, GSWS 2257)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023.

Uses historical and contemporary case studies to explore the intersections of sexuality, gender, class, and race in the lives and labors of people African descent. Addresses how the construction of Black identity has been informed by understandings and expressions of transness, masculinity, femininity, and queerness. Examines how Black people mobilize and practice sex and gender to create community, mutual aid, leisure, joy, sexual agency, self-expression, and political struggle. Analyzes the topic through the interdisciplinary study of film, music, art, literature, historical and sociological scholarship, queer-of-color critique, critical race theory, and Black feminist thought. (Same as: GSWS 2280)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023.

Investigates the intersection of African American life and art. Topics include the changing definitions of “African American Art,” the embrace of African cultural production, race and representation in slavery and freedom, art as source of inspiration for social movements, and the politics of exhibition. Our mission is to develop art-historical knowledge about this critical aspect of American art history, while facilitating ways of seeing and writing about art. (Same as: ARTH 1500)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021, Spring 2021, Fall 2019.

This course explores the range of issues inspiring Latinx activism and its diverse expressions across the United States from the turn of the 20th century to the present. It introduces students to the intellectual traditions and analytical approaches that inform both Latinx and Afro-Latinx activism in the US During the course of the semester students will ‘travel’ to U.S. cities (and regions) such as San Antonio and the Texas Borderlands, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Chicago, and the Central Valley in California. As we ‘travel’ to these locations, we will explore diverse expressions of Latinx activism, including labor activism, cultural activism, political activism surrounding citizenship rights, and the struggles for gender and sexuality rights. Students will also learn about the many similarities and differences among Latinx communities in the United States, including Afo-Latinx communities, specifically Afro-Cuban in Miami, and Afro-Puerto Ricans and Afro-Domincans in New York. We will explore how these communities have used and continue to use activist practices ranging from labor strikes to literary texts, to gain visibility and negotiate their rights within the country. This course will also draw connections between Latinx and Afro-Latinx and other activist movements in the US, from civil rights to labor rights and the formation of worker’s unions. Drawing from various disciplines including history, law, literature, sociology, and cultural studies, students will explore how Latinx activism has shaped understandings of race and inclusion, gender, sexuality, and citizenship in the United States. (Same as: LACL 2421, GSWS 2720)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2022.

Afro-Latinx are one of the fastest growing demographic groups in the United States—among the sixty million Latinos in the US, almost one quarter embrace their Blackness and identify as Afro-Latino. The course examines Afro-Latinx communities—African-descended peoples from primarily Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking Latin America and the Caribbean who reside in the United States. The class begins with an overview of Afro-Latin American and Afro-Latinx studies, explores historical perspectives on African enslavement in Latin America, and examines the development of racial ideologies in post-emancipation societies. Next, the class looks at the historical relationship between the US and Latin America and how this has shaped migration. We also examine the spectrum of Black identity through the contemporary experiences of Afro-Latinxs in the US by analyzing the intersections of race, ethnicity, gender, politics, and representation through historical, textual, oral, and visual sources. (Same as: LACL 2422)

Introduction to the historical and ethnographic study of the politics of science, technology, and medicine in African contexts. Offers opportunities to learn about African experiences of science, technology, and medicine. Reconsiders common definitions of science and technology from the perspective of African cultures of expertise. Topics considered include the spiritual and religious dimensions of expert knowledge, environmental management, conservation, archaeology, hunting, metallurgy, healing, genetically modified organisms, pharmaceutical development, epidemiology, and information technology. Science and technology will be considered in relation to precolonial social formations, colonialism, independence struggles, and the postcolonial state. Course materials include historical and ethnographic writing as well as speculative fiction. (Same as: ANTH 2235)

Prerequisites: ANTH 1100 or ANTH 1101 or AFRS 1101.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2020.

How do South Africans remember their past? Begins with the difficulties in developing a conciliatory version of the past during Nelson Mandela’s presidency immediately after apartheid. Then explores the changing historiography and popular memory of diverse historical episodes, including European settlement, the Khoisan “Hottentot Venus” Sara Baartman, Shaka Zulu, the Great Trek, the Anglo-Boer War, the onset of apartheid, and resistance to it. Aims to understand the present-day social, economic, and cultural forces that shape the memories of South Africans and the academic historiography of South Africa. Note: This course is part of the following field(s) of study: Africa. It fulfills the non Euro/US requirement for history majors and minors. (Same as: HIST 2821)

Seminar.The African continent has an unmatched percentage of young people in relation to total population. Over the last sixty years, these youth have driven a continent-wide revolution against an intersection of traditional, gerontocratic, and neo-colonial structures. By studying student activism in apartheid and post-apartheid South Africa, youth movements against colonialism and neocolonialism in central Africa, the “blood diamond” wars of Liberia and Sierra Leone, the child soldiers of the Democratic Republic of Congo, and youth protests against policy brutality in West Africa, this course nuances oft-ascribed youth roles as changemakers and as child soldiers. It considers the gendered and political identities that have emerged through this continental societal revolution. Note: This course is part of the following field(s) of study: Africa. It fulfills the non Euro/US requirement for history majors and minors. (Same as: HIST 2822)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2021.

Seminar. The art of Central Africa inspired European avant-garde artists from Pablo Picasso to Paul Klee. This course explores art as a historical source. What does the production, use, commerce, and display of art reveal about politics, ideology, religion, and aesthetics? Prior to European colonialism, what was the relationship between art and politics in Central Africa? How did art represent power? What does it reveal about gender relations, social divisions, and cultural ideals? The course then turns to the Euro-American scramble for Central African art at the onset of European colonialism. How did the collection of art, its celebration by European artists, and display in European and American museums transform patterns of production, cultural functions and aesthetic styles of Central African art? The course ends with current debates over the repatriation of African art. Note:This course is part of the following field(s) of study: Africa. This course meets the non-European/ US History requirements. (Same as: HIST 2823, ARTH 2390)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2019.

Knowledge of the history of the slave trade to the Americas has grown immensely. This course pivots from viewing the Atlantic World through the lens of the trade in slaves to how a diverse Atlantic World developed through Afro-Portuguese encounters from the age of Henry the Navigator to the formal abolition of slavery in Brazil and the extension of colonization in Portuguese-ruled Africa. How and why did early modern Africans and Portuguese participate in the Atlantic trade? What other forms of commerce, such as ivory and rubber, proliferated? What cultural systems, cosmologies, religions, and identities emerged through these Atlantic World exchanges, including the formation of Afro-Portuguese identities? What are the legacies of the early modern Afro-Portuguese Atlantic world? In exploring these and other questions, this course introduces students to the histories of Portugal, Angola, Mozambique, and Brazil. It fulfills the non-Euro/US and premodern requirements for history majors and minors. (Same as: HIST 2824, LACL 2824)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023.

Seminar. Examines one of the most significant and yet neglected revolutions in history. Between the years 1791-1804, Haitian revolutionaries abolished slavery and ultimately established a free and independent nation. Explores the Revolution’s causes and trajectory and connects Haiti to the broader Atlantic world. Likewise, studies the revolution's aftermath and its impact on world history. This course is part of the following field(s) of study: Latin America, Atlantic Worlds, and Colonial Worlds. It fulfills the premodern and the non-Euro/US requirements for history majors and minors. (Same as: HIST 2862, LACL 2162)

Prerequisites: HIST 1000 - 2969 or LAS 1000 - 2969.

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021.

Seminar. The form of slavery pioneered by Europeans who brought Africans to the New World occupies a unique place in the institution's long story. Examines the rise and demise of New World slavery: its founding, central practices, and long-term consequences. Just as New World slavery deserves to be considered a unique historical practice, so too do the impulses and transformations that led to its ending. Explores slavery as it rose and fell throughout the Atlantic basin, focusing particularly on Brazil, the Caribbean, and mainland North America. Investigates a range of issues: the emergence of market economies, definitions of race attendant to European commercial expansion, the cultures of Africans in the diaspora, slave control and resistance, free black people and the social structure of New World slave societies, and emancipation and its aftermath. Note: This course is part of the following field(s) of study: US, Europe, Atlantic Worlds and Colonial Worlds. (Same as: HIST 2870)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2020.

Advanced seminar on the criminal justice system in America and the ways African Americans specifically, and racial minorities in general, experience protection and prosecution in it. Students read Harvard Law Professor Randall Kennedy's provocative text of the same title and explore and debate such topics as racial criteria in jury selection, racial disparities and capital punishment, and the rise of mass incarceration in America. Students study key Supreme Court decisions that have considered questions of race and criminal justice. Students conduct research on a specific academic question or policy issue of their choosing and present their findings.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2021.

Advanced Seminar. Explores the rise of American literary realism that occurred following the Civil War and its relationship to the social and political events of the South’s Reconstruction. Studies works by the major figures of the movement such as Charles Chesnutt, Paul Laurence Dunbar, William Dean Howells, Henry James, Sarah Orne Jewett, Mark Twain, and Edith Wharton. Students are required to develop original readings of these literary texts that engage the political and social contexts in which they were produced. All students present their research in written and oral form. Fulfills the advanced seminar requirement for African studies and English majors. (Same as: ENGL 3800)

Prerequisites: AFRS 2000 - 2969 or ENGL 2000 - 2969.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2021.

Advanced Seminar. Explores a spectrum of films produced since 1950 that engage African American cultural experience. Topics may include black-white buddy movies, the L.A. Rebellion, blaxploitation, the hood genre, cult classics, comedy and cross-dressing, and romance dramas. Of special interest will be the documentary impulse in contemporary African American film; gender, sexuality, and cultural images; the politics of interpretation—writers, filmmakers, critics, and audiences; and the urban context and the economics of alienation. Extensive readings in film and cultural theory and criticism. Note: Fulfills the film theory requirement for Cinema Studies minors. Beginning with the Class of 2025, this class will fulfill the African American, Asian American, Indigenous, Latinx, multiethnic American, or global literature requirement for English majors. (Same as: ENGL 3011, CINE 3011)

Prerequisites: ENGL 1000 or higher or AFRS 1000 or higher or FILM 1000 or higher or CINE 1000 or higher.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023, Spring 2020.

Examines the major postwar writings of the controversial African American author and the role his fiction and nonfiction played in challenging that era’s static understandings of racial, gender, and sexual politics. Although Baldwin lived abroad for much of his life, many critics associate the author narrowly with the United States black civil rights and sexual liberation struggles. In recent years, however, Baldwin has increasingly been recognized as a transnational figure and for his invaluable contributions to the discourse of globalization. Indeed, Baldwin’s “geographical imagination,” one informed by critical racial literacy, led him to anticipate many of the central insights of contemporary Queer Studies, Whiteness Studies, as well as Africana philosophical thought. Note: Beginning with the Class of 2025, this class will fulfill the African American, Asian American, Indigenous, Latinx, multiethnic American, or global literature requirement for English majors. (Same as: ENGL 3015, GSWS 3015)

Prerequisites: ENGL 2000 - 2969 or AFRS 2000 - 2969 or GLS 2000 - 2969 or GSWS 2000 - 2969.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2022.

Reading the relationship between “Blackness” and “Americanness” through texts from the African Diaspora, this course takes W.E.B. Du Bois’ concept of “double-consciousness” and places it into a global conversation about Black experiences. “Black” and “American” are frequently viewed as “warring ideals,” implying that they are separate entities. However, they are also simultaneously lived and discussed as interwoven subjectivities that mutually-shape and define the complex experience of being Black American. Using ethnographic, biographical, and fictional texts and media from the U.S., Caribbean, and Africa, the course explores how these broad concepts are defined, represented, and deconstructed. This multi-sited, multi-genre analysis pays close attention to the diversity of lived experiences, cultural representations, and political ideologies that fit under the umbrella of “American Blackness(es),” highlighting the ways the concept is defined from both inside and outside the U.S.

Interdisciplinary examination of ideas and expressions of blackness by black people in the United States from the nineteenth century to the present. Shifts focus from “what” is blackness to “where” and “when” is blackness. Students analyze the fluidity of blackness and the implications for the production of ideologies, discourses, and identities of black people. Materials for analysis may include primary and secondary written texts, film, video, and audio by James Baldwin, Beyoncé, Julie Dash, Martin Luther King Jr., Saidiya Hartman, Nina Simone Hortense Spillers, and Ida B. Wells.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2020.

As the field of Africana studies, and particularly slavery studies, has expanded, scholars raise a plethora of new questions and concerns regarding theories and methods in documentation of Black life and Black archival creation, preservation, and promotion. This advanced seminar explores fundamental questions about the concept of the archive, as well as past and current archival practices. Students will analyze conventional and unconventional scholarly and artistic repositories of Black life. Concepts of witnessing, testimony, (collective) memory, “living” archive, ethics, collection, ownership, and access will be explored. Materials for analysis may include music, film, literature, existing institutional archives, and ongoing digital recovery projects. Scholarly writings may include Michel-Rolph Trouillot, Zora Neale Hurston, James Scott, Jessica Marie Johnson, Saidiya Hartman, and Jacques Derrida.

Prerequisites: Two of: AFRS 1000 - 2969 and AFRS 1000 - 2969.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023.

What are the historical origins of our modern system of mass incarceration? This research seminar explores the relationship between race and justice from the end of the Civil War through the early twentieth century. We will begin by framing our concerns in light of recent scholarship on the phenomenon (such as Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow), and then dig into the archives ourselves to craft 25-30 page research papers on aspects of the problem. Our sources will include Congressional documents, the Department of Justice Peonage Files, records of the NAACP, and other major collections. Students will benefit from prior coursework in African American history or Africana Studies. Note: This course is part of the following field(s) of study: US. (Same as: HIST 3142)

Prerequisites: HIST 1000 - 2969 or AFRS 1000 - 2969 or HIST 3000 or higher or AFRS 3000 or higher.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2022.

Examines African American Music as a multi-genre phenomenon with a focus on music of the 20th and 21st centuries. Of central concern are issues of appropriation, romanticism, lineage, expressive culture, music and identity, and music as an archive. Genres may include soul, funk, disco, hip-hop, jazz, blues, and classical music. Course will culminate with a final capstone project that can have a creative component. (Same as: MUS 3151)

Prerequisites: AFRS 1101 or ANTH 1101.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023.

Examines the politics and poetics of cultural hybridity in the context of select popular music genres in and from Africa, and critically engages with related scholarly, nationalist, and popular discourses. Musical genres covered range from early twentieth-century West African palm wine music to contemporary manifestations of hip hop across the African continent and include musical products of post-independence cultural policies and the transnational marketing niche of “Afropop.” The rise and popularity of these genres is historicized and analyzed in the context of major social, ideological, political, and economic forces that have shaped Africa over the past 100 years, including colonialism, modern urbanization, independence movements, and globalization. Course materials include writings from the fields of ethnomusicology, cultural studies, and postcolonial theory, musical audio and video recordings, and journalistic and promotional sources, as well as film documentaries. (Same as: MUS 3205)

Prerequisites: MUS 2000 - 2969 or AFRS 2000 - 2969 or MUS 3000 or higher or AFRS 3000 or higher.

Previous terms offered: Fall 2020.

Advanced seminar on African women’s studies and peace studies. Given their various stakes, women in African societies have always been peacemakers. In exploring these stakes, this seminar focuses on the lives and writings of six African women intellectuals (Yvonne Vera, Bessie Head, Mariama Bâ, Wangari Maathai, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, and Leymah Gbowee), three of whom have won the Nobel Peace Prize. Students will investigate how these women and the stories they tell reconceptualize feminism and peaceful interactions among themselves and others (women, men, and the environment) in order to bring about individual transformation. By perceptively reading challenging texts, engaging in probing class discussions, keeping a weekly written “Peace Journal,” and working collaboratively on a final group research with oral presentation, students will gain experiential insight into ideals and realities of the African women to reimagine feminism, peace, and relationships amid violence. (Same as: GSWS 3020)

Previous terms offered: Fall 2022, Fall 2021.

History has retained the names of great male Caribbean heroes and freedom fighters during slavery such as the Haitians, Mackandal or Toussaint Louverture, the Jamaican, Cudjoe or the Cuban Coba. Enslaved Africans who rebelled against oppression and fled from the plantation system are called maroons and their act, marronage. Except for Queen Nanny of the Jamaican Blue Mountains, only male names have been consecrated as maroons. Yet, enslaved women did fight against slavery and practice marronage. Caribbean writers have made a point of bringing to memory forgotten acts of marronage by women during slavery or shortly thereafter. Proposes to examine the fictional treatment French-speaking Caribbean authors grant to African or Afro-descent women who historically rebelled against slavery and colonization. Literary works studied against the backdrop of douboutism, a conceptual framework derived from the common perception about women in the French Caribbeanwhich means strong woman. Authors studied may include Suzanne Dracius (Martinique), Fabienne Kanor (Martinique), André Schwart-Bart (Guadeloupe), Maryse Condé (Guadeloupe), Evelyn Trouillot (Haiti). Conducted in French. (Same as: FRS 3211, GSWS 3211, LACL 3211)

Prerequisites: Two of: either FRS 2409 (same as AFRS 2409 and LAS 2209) or FRS 2410 (same as AFRS 2412 and LAS 2210) or FRS 3000 or higher and either FRS 2409 (same as AFRS 2409 and LAS 2209) or FRS 2410 (same as AFRS 2412 and LAS 2210) or FRS 3000 or higher.

Previous terms offered: Fall 2021.

Aesthetics -- the critical reflection on art, taste, and culture; as much as beauty, the set of properties of an object that arouses pleasure--are central to all aspects of society-building and human life and relationships. Examines the notions of aesthetics and beauty, from pre-Colonial to contemporary times in cultures of the African and Western civilizations as expressed in various humanities and social sciences texts, as well as the arts, iconography, and the media. Considers the ways Africans and afro-descendants in the New World responded to the Western notions of aesthetics and beauty. Authors studied may include Anténor Firmin, Jean Price Mars, Senghor, Damas, Césaire, Cheick Anta Diop, Fanon, Glissant, Chamoiseau, Gyekye Kwame, Socrates, Plato, Jean-Baptiste du Bos,Diderot, Le père André, Baumgarten, Kant, Schopenhauer, Hegel, Hugo. (Same as: FRS 3213, LACL 3213)

Prerequisites: Two of: either FRS 2409 (same as AFRS 2409 and LAS 2209) or FRS 2410 (same as AFRS 2412 and LAS 2210) or FRS 3000 or higher and either FRS 2409 (same as AFRS 2409 and LAS 2209) or FRS 2410 (same as AFRS 2412 and LAS 2210) or FRS 3000 or higher.

Previous terms offered: Fall 2019.

An introduction to the main contemporary intellectual production emanating from the French Caribbean such as Haitian indigénisme and Martinican Négritude, Antillanité, and Créolité. Examines theoretical and literary texts by Jean Price-Mars, Jacques Roumain, Frantz Fanon, René Maran, Aimé Césaire, Rene Mesnil, Joseph Zobel, Edouard Glissant, or Patrick Chamoiseau. Addresses questions of collective identity, ethnicity, and cultural autonomy. (Same as: FRS 3219, LACL 3259)

Prerequisites: Two of: either FRS 2409 (same as AFRS 2409 and LAS 2209) or FRS 2410 (same as AFRS 2412 and LAS 2210) or FRS 3000 or higher and either FRS 2409 (same as AFRS 2409 and LAS 2209) or FRS 2410 (same as AFRS 2412 and LAS 2210) or FRS 3000 or higher.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2023, Fall 2020.

Deaccessioning—the process of removing a work of art from a museum—brings up important issues in the art world: rethinking provenance or ownership, appropriation, the permanence of collections, and memory. Through that lens, this course explores the current/long-standing debates over the restitution of African art work and the decolonization of museums. The class focuses on how museums shape discourse around colonialism and influence the reception and circulation of African cultural productions. Students will study the history of ethnographic collecting practices, colonial exhibitions, the creation of a foreign market for African art in France, and the postcolonial politics of contemporary museums such as the Quai Branly. Students will study literature, film, and art that reimagine the curatorial space. Students will visit museums and meet with private collectors, artists, and curators. Students will become more informed and critical readers of museum spaces. Conducted in French. (Same as: FRS 3224)

Prerequisites: Two of: FRS 2409 (same as AFRS 2409 and LACL 2209) and FRS 2410 (same as AFRS 2412 and LACL 2210).

Previous terms offered: Fall 2022.

What kind of stories do bodies tell or conceal? How does living in a gendered and racialized body effects the stories told by women? How do bodies and their stories converge with History or complicate historical “truths”? These are some of the questions addressed in this study of contemporary writing by women from the Hispanic Caribbean and the United States Latinx/Chicana communities. Feminists of color frame the analysis of literature, popular culture and film to guide an examination of the relation of bodies and sexuality to social power, and the role of this relation in the shaping of both personal and national identities. Theorists include Alexander, Barriteau, Curiel, Mendez and Segato. Novelists include Álvarez, Buitrago, García, Indiana Hernández, and Santos-Febres. Taught in Spanish with readings in Spanish and English. (Same as: HISP 3226, GSWS 3226, LACL 3226)

Prerequisites: Two of: either HISP 2409 (same as LAS 2409) or HISP 2410 (same as LAS 2410) or HISP 3200 or higher and either HISP 2409 (same as LAS 2409) or HISP 2410 (same as LAS 2410) or HISP 3200 or higher.

Previous terms offered: Fall 2020.

This course fuses Afro-Diasporan aesthetics and cultural concepts with critical dance studies and US modern/post-modern/contemporary concert dance traditions. Students will engage with various Afro-based dance practitioners (such as Jawole Willa Jo Zollar), cultural praxes (such as Sankofa), and improvisational structures (such as Jamaican Dancehall and Haitian Yanvalou) to deepen their ability to create, rehearse, and perform original choreography, specifically for the purposes of advocating for social change and cross-cultural understanding. Using virtual, archival, digital, embodied, and scholarly research, students will learn about and generate performance material that is deeply connected to the histories, spaces, and places that we remember, take-up, and occupy. Students will also be expected to execute collaborations with each other and those within their communities as they create and perform movement for their final dance projects. (Same as: DANC 3242, LACL 3342)

Prerequisites: DANC 1213 (same as AFRS 1213) or DANC 2241 (same as AFRS 2236) or DANC 1000 - 2969 or DANC 3000 or higher.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2022, Fall 2020.

Stories and storytelling have remained one of the most central aspects of Africana cultures across continents and centuries, and these stories often differ in both form and content from modern Western literature. In this course, students will examine the reasons why and purposes for which stories are told, what they teach us about ourselves and the world, and how they display and convey important aspects of Africana societies in culturally specific ways. Literature—including epics, folktales, mythology, and novels—from various places and time periods across the African continent and diaspora will be read alongside related secondary literature. The class will also engage with central themes and issues like orality, differing conceptions of truth, experiential learning, identity, spirituality, and modernity and change, as well as alternative perspectives on time and history.

Prerequisites: AFRS 1000 or higher.

Previous terms offered: Spring 2021, Spring 2020.

States form the foundation of modern politics. Comparative government explores their variation; international relations examine their interaction. States can be instruments of oppression or engines of progress, and recent scholarship has focused on their strength, weakness, and failure. This capstone course explores the processes that produced the early modern state in Europe, then looks at more recent attempts to replicate state development in Latin America, Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. The role of war in state formation and the subject of citizenship receive particular attention. (Same as: GOV 3520)

Previous terms offered: Spring 2021, Spring 2020.

Students enrolled in the Fall 2020 iteration of the course will have the opportunity to produce online content in support of "There Is a Woman in Every Color: Black Women in American Art," a forthcoming exhibition at the Bowdoin College Museum of Art. (Same as: ARTH 3600)

Prerequisites: ARTH 1000 - 2970 or ARTH 3000 or higher or Placement in above ARTH 1100 or AFRS 1000 - 2970 or AFRS 3000 or higher.

Previous terms offered: Fall 2020.

This course explores the African sources of three of Herman Melville's most important books—Benito Cereno, Moby-Dick, and Redburn—that have become central to the canon of American Literature. Students will write short analytical essays as well as complete a final collaborative interdisciplinary project.