Contacts | Program of Study | Program Requirements | BA Thesis/Capstone Project | Summary of Requirements for the Major | Honors | Minor in Race, Diaspora, and Indigeneity | Grading | Courses
Program of Study
Race, Diaspora, and Indigeneity (RDI) is a revision to the Critical Race and Ethnic Studies (CRES) program. Students in the Classes of 2024 and 2025 have the option to pursue either RDI or CRES. The CRES program of study and course requirements can be found on the archived catalog page.
Coursework in the Department of Race, Diaspora, and Indigeneity enables students to rigorously study race, diaspora, and indigeneity—categories that constitute human identity through claims of particularity, origins and continuity, and mobility and dispersal, in order to enact power within the modern world. These meanings can be seen in how unequal status, exploited and extracted condition, and disproportionate violence and harm inform the histories of peoples comprising these categories. Yet they are also evident in the ingenious, intersecting identities and affinities enacted by those same peoples—ones that imbue art, cultures, politics, and collectives with transformational and emancipating power. Through teaching, mentorship, and collaborations of various kinds, we explore with students how to think through these multifaceted and contradictory experiences, equitably and empathically.
This study and practice provide our students with a rigorous critical lens that serves them well in diverse fields. Whether our graduates are interested in media or policy, medicine or social work, organizing or entrepreneurship, or graduate study in a variety of disciplines, they benefit from their ability to understand the social formations that shape our world and navigate complex and sometimes contradictory concepts that others may find challenging or uncomfortable, through historic and analytic lenses.
Ours is a broad curriculum generated within a thoroughly multidisciplinary department. Students work with acclaimed experts in literature, creative writing, anthropology, political science, sociology, social work, linguistics, visual arts, history, urban studies, and cinema and media studies, among other fields. Several core approaches tie together the range of interests across our community. These sustain rigorous inquiry that incorporates knowledge created beyond the boundaries of academia, while also cautioning that those who claim to advance knowledge must account for the benefits and costs that result from ideas’ impact upon the world. Among our core approaches are intersectionality and critical theory, and the recognition of both identities and power structures originating through complex co-creation; dedication to utilizing multiple methodologies within the humanities and social sciences; and a willingness to take seriously and value ideas beyond the classroom and campus.
Program Requirements
The major requires 13 courses: three introductory critical concepts courses, four courses distributed across the foundational categories, four RDIN electives, and two courses related to the thesis/capstone project. Students opting to not complete a BA thesis or capstone project must replace the two courses related to the thesis/capstone project with two RDIN electives.
Students have the option of combining RDI with any major or minor in any division or school of the University.
Critical Concepts
These introductory courses are meant to introduce students to the central texts and key debates that inform the study of the department’s three core concepts. Courses on each term will be offered annually by a rotating group of faculty in the department. After taking these courses, students will be able to identify the intellectual genealogies in which these concepts are situated and have a basic understanding of the central axes of debate.
- RDIN 12100 Racial Formations: The course introduces students to the idea of race as a concept and racialization as a process. Students will be introduced to the diversity of meanings the concept of “race” has held, the uses to which it has been put, and how it has been both contested and mobilized by those who have been racialized. The “Racial Formations” course will, furthermore, include discussion of the history and relation of the terms race, caste, and ethnicity. The goal of the course is, in other words, to oblige students to question their everyday understandings of the term and acquire the tools needed to identify and analyze racial formations.
- RDIN 12200 Diaspora(s): This course will introduce students to the concept of diaspora understood simultaneously as global processes of migration and dispersal, and as political and cultural practices of meaning-making. Students will think through the distinctive and overlapping experiences of various diasporic communities—organized around race (i.e., African diaspora), regions (i.e., Asian diaspora), religion (i.e., Jewish diaspora), etc. From an exploration of these histories, students will explore diasporas as an alternative deterritorialized and transnational frames of political imagination (in contradistinction to, say, the nation-state).
- RDIN 12300 Formations of Indigeneity: In this course, students will consider Indigenous conceptions of peoplehood and the processes of settler colonialism as well as other forms of social formation. Taking a comparative and transnational approach, students will examine the triad of indigeneity, land, and sovereignty as they are refracted through specific political and cultural settings. Students will also consider contexts where the idea of indigeneity has been fraught and failed to translate, as well as its tense incorporation within the legal framework of multiculturalism or liberal democracy.
Foundational Courses
The Foundational courses are designed to expand students’ knowledge in the field of RDI and its diverse methodologies. Rather than set ones, these courses are offered regularly by faculty who designated to fulfill these requirements. Approved courses for each category can be found on the RDIN Foundational Courses List.
- Theories: These courses will elaborate the training offered in the Critical Concepts course by highlighting specific intellectual traditions (such as Black Feminist Thought or Caribbean Studies) or taking up more specific conceptual anchors (such as intersectionality or decolonization).
- Practices: These courses will cover European imperial expansions, including settler and exploitation colonies; slavery and its aftermath; intellectual histories of key terms and the social science disciplines that created or furthered them; diasporas and other migrations; postcolonial societies; Civil Rights and Black Power Movements; abolition; anti-imperialism; Intersectional movements.
- Structures: These courses will focus on institutions and practices of domination. Topics to be covered include racial capitalism; race and space; comparative colonialisms; legal constructs and social dynamics of segregation; apartheid; science and technology; media.
- Aesthetics and Expressive Cultures: This will include courses on literary, visual, sonic, and other modes of expressive cultures, and highlight how cultural productions reshape and resignify our central conceptual anchors. Students will also develop analyses attuned to form, genre, circulation, and reception of aesthetic materials.
Electives
Any RDIN or CRES course may be an elective. In exceptional circumstances, students can petition the director of undergraduate studies to count no more than two non-CRES/RDIN courses toward the major electives. If students did not take the Colonizations sequence to fulfill their general education requirement in civilization studies, they will be allowed to count it among their electives. Students may petition to count other potentially relevant civilization sequences (i.e., African, Latin American, Asian) for major credit (again, only if they did not take those sequences to fulfill their civilization requirement).
BA Thesis/Capstone Project
Students majoring in RDI may, if they wish, write a BA thesis or complete a capstone project. Students who choose to do so are eligible for departmental honors, though completing a thesis or project does not guarantee honors. A recommendation of the faculty advisor is required for honors, and students should have a discussion in advance with their advisor to ensure a mutual understanding of expectations for what would constitute an honors-level project.
The BA thesis enables students to apply theoretical or empirical concepts gleaned from their coursework and conduct independent inquiry toward the development of original, critical research on a topic of their choice.
The capstone project offers a chance to apply ideas and skills developed in the major to a variety of settings and media, such as a conference or symposium, an internship, a performance, an art installation, a podcast or film, among many options. This project can be carried out individually or in collaboration with other graduating students.
Students pursuing a thesis or capstone project must identify an RDI faculty member who can supervise their project or paper, with the option of securing a second reader outside of the department. Students then submit a short proposal, which should reflect feedback from the faculty advisor, to the director of undergraduate studies by the end of Winter Quarter of their third year.
Students completing a thesis/project must enroll in RDIN 29800 BA Thesis/Capstone Seminar, a course led by the department’s preceptor(s) designed to introduce students to a range of research methods and to help determine which method(s) would fit a research thesis or capstone project focusing on topics related to race, diaspora, and/or indigeneity. Students will attend this seminar in Spring Quarter of their third year and Autumn Quarter of their fourth year. In Spring, the seminar meets weekly. In Autumn, the seminar meets every other week. Students register for RDIN 29800 in either of those quarters, but must attend both.
Students completing a BA thesis/project must also register for RDIN 29900 BA Essay / Capstone Project, a reading and research course under the supervision of their faculty advisor. The final grade on the thesis/project will be assigned to the RDIN 29900 registration.
BA theses and capstone projects are due by Friday of the fifth week of the student's quarter of graduation. Students will present their work at a departmental symposium.
Summary of Requirements for the Major
Three Critical Concepts Courses | 300 | |
Racial Formations | ||
Diaspora(s) | ||
Formations of Indigeneity | ||
Four Foundational Courses: One course from each list | 400 | |
Theories | ||
Practices | ||
Structures | ||
Aesthetics and Expressive Cultures | ||
Four RDIN Electives | 400 | |
RDIN 29800 | BA Thesis/Capstone Seminar | 100 |
or one RDIN elective | ||
RDIN 29900 | BA Essay / Capstone Project | 100 |
or one RDIN elective | ||
Total Units | 1300 |
Honors
To be eligible for honors, students must earn a 3.25 major GPA, complete a BA thesis or capstone project, and receive a recommendation for honors from their faculty advisor.
Minor in Race, Diaspora, and Indigeneity
The RDI minor consists of five courses: three courses on Critical Concepts (Indigeneity, Diaspora, and Racial Formations), and two additional RDIN courses. These courses may not be (1) double-counted with the student’s major(s) or with other minors and (2) may not be counted toward general education requirements.
Three Critical Concepts Courses | 300 | |
Racial Formations | ||
Diaspora(s) | ||
Formations of Indigeneity | ||
Two RDIN Electives | 200 | |
Total Units | 500 |
Grading
Students may take up to two courses in the major on a P/F basis. All courses in the minor must be taken for a quality grade.
Race, Diaspora, and Indigeneity Courses
RDIN 10408. The African American Novel: Satire and Critique. 100 Units.
This course will explore the centrality of satire to the African American novel. By examining the genre of satire in general and in a set of African American novels and short stories, we will attend to how narrative fiction can critique the category of race and attempt to effect social change. Focusing on the relationship between racism and capitalism, we will integrate readings in literary criticism, critical theory, and social history to inform our study of fictional works. Fiction writers may include Percival Everett, George Schuyler, Langston Hughes, Cord Jefferson, Zora Neale Hurston, and Ishmael Reed. Critical writers may include M.M. Bakhtin, W.E.B. Du Bois, Ralph Ellison, Barbara Fields, David Levering Lewis, Adolph Reed, Judith Stein, and Kenneth Warren. (Fiction, 1830-1990, Theory)
Instructor(s): Christopher Gortmaker Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): AMER 10408, ENGL 10408
RDIN 12100. Racial Formations. 100 Units.
Race is arguably the most significant social category shaping the fabric and trajectory of American life-and yet, it is also one of the most poorly understood and eagerly avoided topics in our public consciousness. In this course, we will examine paradigms for understanding race in both academic and popular contexts. Using theoretical constructs, historical case studies, contemporary topics in politics and culture, and empirical research on racial attitudes and disparities, this course explores questions such as: what are the racial boundaries that shape our lives? Where did they come from, how have they changed over time, and how are they continuing to evolve? Whose interests do they serve? We will also draw on news and current events to observe and analyze the ways that racial boundaries and the social meaning of race impact public policy and public debate.
Instructor(s): Cathy Cohen Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): None
Equivalent Course(s): CRES 12600
RDIN 12200. Diaspora(s) 100 Units.
This class will orient students to the practices, frameworks, and geographies of diasporic communities from the early modern period to the present. The term's initial origins in Jewish experiences of forced dispersal and migration underscores how its meaning is shaped by histories of collective displacement and loss, as well as invention and heritage. The discourse of diaspora remains foundational for several interdisciplinary fields, including Black studies, Asian American studies, Indigenous studies, Latinx studies, and more. Within these intellectual orientations, diasporic identities are notably expansive and unfixed. As observed by the late cultural theorist Stuart Hall, "diaspora identities are those which are constantly producing and reproducing themselves anew, through transformation and difference," bridging old and new traditions of worldmaking, resistance, and solidarities within and across distinct diasporic sensibilities." Students in this class will work with scholarly, literary, sonic, and visual materials demonstrating how use of diaspora alternately mobilizes and roots people, in ways that claim pasts and futures at once.
Instructor(s): Adom Getachew Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 12706, GLST 22700, CRES 12700, PLSC 22200
RDIN 12300. Formations of Indigeneity. 100 Units.
Whose land are we on? What does it mean to be Indigenous, for generations past and in the twenty-first century? From debates over claims of Indigenous ancestry by political actors to the struggles of sacred lands protection against natural resource extraction, understanding the stakes of these concerns for Indigenous peoples and nations is more relevant than ever. This seminar-part of the sequence for majors in the Department of Race, Diaspora, and Indigeneity-introduces students to core texts and concepts in the field of Native American and Indigenous Studies (NAIS). Topics will include sovereignty and governance, settler colonialism, citizenship and nationhood, blood quantum and racialization, diasporas and urban indigeneity, and relationships to land and environment. Course activities may include engagement with Indigenous films, dialogues with visiting Indigenous scholars, and field trips to Chicago-area cultural institutions.
Instructor(s): Matthew Kruer Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): CRES 12800, ANTH 12800, HIST 17800, CHST 12300
RDIN 13580. Introduction to Asian American Literatures. 100 Units.
This is a survey course that introduces students to the complex and uneven history of Asians in American from within a transnational context. As a class, we will look at Asian American texts and films while working together to create a lexicon of multilingual, immigrant realities. Through theoretical works that will help us define keywords in the field and a wide range of genres (novels, films, plays, and graphic novels), we will examine how Asia and Asians have been represented in the literatures and popular medias of America. Some of the assigned authors include, but are not limited to, Carlos Bulosan, Maxine Hong Kingston, Joy Kogawa, Fae Myenne Ng, Nora Okja Keller, Cathy Park Hong, Ted Chiang, and Yoko Tawada.
Instructor(s): Mee-Ju Ro Terms Offered: TBD
Equivalent Course(s): CRES 13580, ENGL 13580
RDIN 16100. Introduction to Latin American Civilization I. 100 Units.
Autumn Quarter examines the origins of civilizations in Latin America with a focus on the political, social, and cultural features of the major pre-Columbian civilizations of the Maya, Inca, and Aztec. The quarter concludes with an analysis of the Spanish and Portuguese conquest, and the construction of colonial societies in Latin America. The courses in this sequence may be taken in any order.
Instructor(s): Kourí; Newman; Borges; Brittenham Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 16101, SOSC 26100, CRES 16101, LACS 16100, ANTH 23101
RDIN 16200. Introduction to Latin American Civilization II. 100 Units.
Winter Quarter addresses the evolution of colonial societies, the wars of independence, and the emergence of Latin American nation-states in the changing international context of the nineteenth century.
Instructor(s): Winter: Hicks; Schwartz-Francisco; Tenorio
Autumn: Borges Terms Offered: Autumn
Winter
Equivalent Course(s): LACS 16200, CRES 16102, ANTH 23102, HIST 16102, SOSC 26200
RDIN 17762. Architecture and Colonialism in Algeria and Morocco. 100 Units.
This seminar invites students to examine the intersections of colonialism with architecture in Algeria and Morocco. Throughout the quarter, we will discuss the designs of architects working in these two contexts (Le Corbusier, Fernand Pouillon, Shadrach Woods, etc.) and concepts defining colonialism as a design project (segregation, repression, primitivism, etc.). We will also pay particular attention to modes of opposition pursued by residents and their historical impact toward the region's decolonization. Moments of heightened historical consequence, such as the strategic use of selected architectural spaces by independentist guerrillas, will be thoroughly discussed. The class will progress through a chronological scope, from Orientalism as a 19th century phenomenon to the enmeshment of modernism with colonialism in the 20th century. We will conclude with the emergence of postcolonial modernities.
Instructor(s): J. Huet Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): ARCH 17762, CEGU 17762, ARTH 17762
RDIN 17908. African-American History to 1865. 100 Units.
This introductory undergraduate lecture course examines histories of people of African descent in continental North America from the colonial period to the US Civil War. relationship between slavery and republicanism in the early United States. With an interdisciplinary approach and transnational perspective, it considers the contested role of chattel slavery in the creation of US political systems, market relations, social hierarchies, and cultural productions. We will use primary sources and secondary literature to consider the possibilities and limits of archival research; contingent histories of race-making; the relationship between slavery and capitalism; the workings of domination, agency, and resistance; and black "freedom dreams" in the antebellum United States.
Instructor(s): R. Johnson Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): AMER 17909, DEMS 17908, HIST 17908
RDIN 18405. Histories of Native America. 100 Units.
Modern Americans often think of their history beginning with the European discovery of the "New World." But those Europeans did not "discover" anything. In the Americas, they encountered an Old World filled with diverse Indigenous peoples, cultures, and polities; a world alive with its own dynamic histories. This courses explores the world of Native North America from the evolution of complex city-states in the centuries before European invasion to the seismic changes that Indigenous peoples have navigated in the era of colonization (1492-present). Topics include Native struggles to create a shared world with settlers in the seventeenth century; movements to maintain independence from European empires and the new United States; nineteenth-century experiences of conquest, removal, confinement to reservations, and coercive assimilation; twentieth-century resurgence, battles in the courts, and "Red Power" activism; and twenty-first century struggles for sovereignty, self-determination, and environmental justice. Students will engage with a variety of primary and secondary sources, focusing on texts produced by Native people and centering Native points of view.
Instructor(s): M. Kruer Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 18405
RDIN 18702. Race, Politics, and Sports in the United States. 100 Units.
Kneeling or standing for the national anthem? Breaking the glass ceiling, coming out of the closet, or crossing the color line in sports? This course will take up the question of why sports are so central to American identity and what historic role sports and athletes have played in American political life. Muhammad Ali, Billie Jean King, Jackie Robinson, and Bill Russell are only a few of the athletes who fought for freedom, inclusion, and equality in sports and American life. Through close critical readings of popular and scholarly writing, memoirs, and visual culture (film and television), we will examine the seminal overlapping events in sports history and American history to understand the collision and convergence of our politics and sports culture.
Instructor(s): M. Briones Terms Offered: Winter
Note(s): History in the World courses use history as a valuable tool to help students critically exam our society, culture, and politics. Preference given to 1st- and 2nd-yr students.
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 18702
RDIN 20007. Africa in the Middle East and the Middle East in Africa. 100 Units.
From Mansa Musa's Hajj in 1324 to the contemporary Afrobeats scene in Dubai, African and Middle Eastern societies share long histories of interconnection. This course examines these interconnections from the early modern to the contemporary era through a series of case studies ranging from traditions of exchange on the Swahili Coast, to the Ottoman Scramble for Africa, to the creation of a long-standing Lebanese diaspora in West Africa and a more recent Ethiopian Jewish community in Israel. Students will examine debates that animate this field of scholarship including conversations about race; histories of slavery and its legacies; conceptions of indigeneity, nativism, and settler colonialism; religious encounters; gender and society; shared and divergent experiences of European colonialism and struggles for independence; and transnational collective-building projects such as Pan-Africanism and Pan-Arabism. In addition to scholarship based on textual analysis, students will develop skills to investigate cultural sources such as music, photography, film, fashion, literature, and sports. No prior coursework in Middle Eastern or African studies is required. However, a background in African Civ, Islamic History and Society Civ, or Islamic Thought and Literature Civ is recommended.
Instructor(s): K. Hickerson Terms Offered: Spring
Note(s): Assignments: Short papers; long paper; in-class presentation
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 20007, GNSE 20007
RDIN 20100. Afrofuturism(s) 100 Units.
Despite its explosion in popularity as a term of art in the last ten years, "Afrofuturism" remains a contested term and set of concepts-from debates about its engagement with Black diasporic identities, to the question of how essential notions of the "future" are to Afrofuturism. This course will explore Afrofuturism as a set of ideas still in flux, with repercussions across politics, aesthetics, theory, and artistic interventions, using texts from a wide array of disciplines and media, including sociology, cinema, visual art, critical theory, and literature. This course will be an RDI Community Engaged Course, meaning half of the students will be University of Chicago undergraduates and half will be members of our broader community. To be considered for enrollment in the course, please fill out the form linked below and request instructor consent. https://bit.ly/afrofuturisms2024
Instructor(s): Eve L. Ewing Terms Offered: Winter
RDIN 20140. Qualitative Field Methods. 100 Units.
This course introduces techniques of, and approaches to, ethnographic field research. We emphasize quality of attention and awareness of perspective as foundational aspects of the craft. Students conduct research at a site, compose and share field notes, and produce a final paper distilling sociological insight from the fieldwork.
Instructor(s): O. McRoberts Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): CHDV 20140, SOCI 20140
RDIN 20154. Class, Race and Urban Space: producing the city. 100 Units.
Class and race are through lines in the determinative processes that produce and transform urban space and inform conceptual models of urban growth and change. This lecture course examines historical geographies of class and race relations in crucial arenas of urban life like employment, housing, public space and urgently during the contemporary era, climate change. A recurring theme we will explore is how Chicago's experience has shaped the field of urban studies across a range of thematic and conceptual domains.
Instructor(s): Mary Beth Pudup Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): CHST 20154, CEGU 20154, ANTH 20154, ENST 20154
RDIN 20233. Race in Contemporary American Society. 100 Units.
This survey course in the sociology of race offers a socio-historical investigation of race in American society. We will examine issues of race, ethnic and immigrant settlement in the United States. Also, we shall explore the classic and contemporary literature on race and inter-group dynamics. Our investigative tools will include an analysis of primary and secondary sources, multimedia materials, photographic images, and journaling. While our survey will be broad, we will treat Chicago and its environs as a case study to comprehend the racial, ethnic, and political challenges in the growth and development of a city.
Instructor(s): S. Hicks-Bartlett Terms Offered: Autumn
Spring. Autumn quarter offered at the Undergraduate level only and Spring offered at the Graduate level only
Equivalent Course(s): SOCI 30233, MAPS 30233, SOCI 20233
RDIN 20305. Inequality in Urban Spaces. 100 Units.
The problems confronting urban schools are bound to the social, economic, and political conditions of the urban environments in which schools reside. Thus, this course will explore social, economic, and political issues, with an emphasis on issues of race and class as they have affected the distribution of equal educational opportunities in urban schools. We will focus on the ways in which family, school, and neighborhood characteristics intersect to shape the divergent outcomes of low- and middle-income children residing with any given neighborhood. Students will tackle an important issue affecting the residents and schools in one Chicago neighborhood. This course is part of the College Course Cluster: Urban Design.
Instructor(s): M. Keels Terms Offered: Autumn
Note(s): CHDV Distribution: B; 2*
Equivalent Course(s): EDSO 40315, PBPL 20305, CHDV 30315, CHDV 20305
RDIN 20400. Black Girlhood. 100 Units.
First popularized on social media in 2013, the phrase "Black Girl Magic" has expanded far beyond its initial use as a twitter hashtag. It can be seen on (a bunch of different objects and the cover of many children's books and poetry anthologies). However, the visibility of the phrase did not come without controversy. Some critics argued that rather than being an uplifting rallying cry for positive depictions of black girlhood, it instead reinforced dehumanizing stereotypes of the "strong black woman". This debate leads us to question: How do black girls tend to be depicted both popular media and in literature? How might these depictions differ depending on author, type of media, or social context? What do they say about the ways that black girls experience childhood, gender, and friendship? To engage with these questions, this course will explore literary works including The Bluest Eye, Betsey Brown, and Abeng, along with television shows such as Lovecraft Country to examine 20th and 21st century depictions of black girlhood. We will also think with theoretical works of black feminism and black girlhood studies.
Instructor(s): Danielle Jones Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): ENGL 30422, GNSE 33167, GNSE 23167, RDIN 30400, ENGL 20422
RDIN 20408. Trans Genres. 100 Units.
This course explores genres of writing and cultural production concerned with transgender life and politics. Students will engage genre's relationship to gender, as they will read across memoir, fiction, poetry, and criticism. (Theory).
Instructor(s): C. Riley Snorton Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): GNSE 20133, ENGL 22408
RDIN 20410. Ekspresyon ekri: Kreyòl lakay soti Ayiti rive nan dyaspora a. 100 Units.
This course will provide opportunities to promote deeper knowledge of the Haitian culture while emphasizing the development of writing skills in the Kreyòl language through the use of a variety of authentic texts and cultural experiences. Topics covered in the course will include the Haitian revolution, cuisine, and audio-visual and performing arts. Moreover, students will participate in different cultural exploration outings in the city of Chicago, which will provide additional opportunities to interpret cultural artifacts and reflect on the Haitian culture and its influence on the representation and daily lives of Haitians in the diaspora, particularly in Chicago. In this course, we will: 1) analyze different cultural artifacts in the Haitian cultures through primary and secondary texts, 2) examine the influences of these cultural phenomena on the representation of Haitians and the creation of Haitian identity in the diaspora, and 3) and reflect on the importance of cultural identity in a migration context. Those who will take the course for Kreyòl credits will also develop additional syntactic knowledge in the language through creation of diverse essays. This course will be conducted in two weekly sessions: a common lecture session in English and an additional weekly discussion session in English or Kreyòl.
Instructor(s): Gerdine Ulysse
Prerequisite(s): For those seeking credit in Kreyòl, this course is open to students who have taken KREY 12300 (Kreyòl for Speakers of French II), KREY 12301 (Kreyòl for Speakers of Romance Languages II), or instructor consent. Heritage learners are also welcome.
Note(s): Course not offered in 24-25
Equivalent Course(s): LACS 20401, KREY 20400, CHST 20400
RDIN 20606. New Topics in Asian American Studies. 100 Units.
This course offers an introduction to new critical works of Asian American studies covering critical themes in an interdisciplinary fields including research from anthropology, cultural studies, gender and women studies, history, political science, psychology and sociology. This course will focus on new works published in recent years that showcase recent theoretical innovations and literary styles that will sharpen our analysis of both Asian and Asian American experiences in the United States and globally. We will cover topics as they relate to migration, war and empire, violence, race/class/gender/sexuality, and immigration integration in educational institutions and the labor market.
Instructor(s): K. Hoang Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): SOCI 20606
RDIN 20700. Global Health, Environment, and Indigenous Futures. 100 Units.
The global coronavirus pandemic has made evident the significance of ecological (im)balances for the well-being of societies. The relationship between structural inequalities, changing environments and health, especially for historically and socio-economically marginalized communities, is now well established. At the same time, a growing body of literature links the material conditions of marginalized communities-for instance, spaces of dwelling and conditions of labor-to health status, globally. Based on a set of interdisciplinary literature arranged through anthropological theories, this course will critically engage with notions of health and well-being for indigenous communities, tracing injustices that stem histories of racial, caste- and ethnicity-based, and environmental exclusions. The readings are organized around one central question: What does it mean to be indigenous in a changing planet where social, political, and economic systems are marked by enduring legacies of systemic violence? This graduate and undergraduate level course will introduce contexts within which structural exclusions lead to ill-health and loss of well-being among indigenous communities across the globe. The aim is to develop critical thinking on the political economy and political ecologies of indigenous health as imbricated with issues of social, economic, and environmental justice.
Instructor(s): Sanghamitra Das
Equivalent Course(s): CHDV 30750, SALC 32704, SALC 26501, RDIN 30700, ANTH 20700, CEGU 20700, CHDV 20700, CEGU 30700, ANTH 30700
RDIN 20817. Race, Social Movements and American Politics. 100 Units.
Throughout history it has often been the collective action of the most oppressed groups that has changed political systems and hierarchies in unprecedented ways, providing a vehicle for the participation of the those formally disempowered. It is just such collective political action that we will examine in this course. Throughout the quarter we will concentrate on one particular form of collective resistance-social movements. Given the rise of race-based social movements such as the Immigrant's Rights Movement and the Movement for Black Lives, exploring this form of mobilization, voice and political participation seems especially pertinent to the study of American politics today. Under consideration throughout the quarter will be such questions as: What counts as a social movement? What motivates people to engage in such activity? What are the challenges that movements and their leaders face? What impact do social movements have on the distribution of the lives of marginal communities and the general functioning of the state?
Instructor(s): Cathy Cohen and Ramon Garibaldo Valdez Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): RDIN 40817, PLSC 40817, PLSC 20817
RDIN 20900. Violence: Vigilantism, Community Defense, and Armed Resistance. 100 Units.
This course explores extralegal violence primarily in the US, from decolonial struggles to white mobs to self and community defense by marginalized peoples. How do we understand different forms of violence, defense, and resistance in relation to the violence of the state? What role does violence play in struggles for justice and freedom? This seminar surveys a range of social science approaches to these questions. In addition to reading the work of anthropologists, historians, and philosophers, we will also take up these themes as they appear in popular media and current events.
Instructor(s): Maya Singhal Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): ANTH 22547, CRES 22900, RDIN 30900, ANTH 32547, HIST 27907
RDIN 21000. Race & American Public Schools. 100 Units.
This course explores the fundamental role that race and racism have played in the structure, stratification, and social functioning of American public schools, and how schools in turn shape our collective ideas about race in the United States. Working from both a historical perspective and an analysis of contemporary policy, we will use theoretical and empirical texts to explore questions of identity, otherness, and ethics, such as: what can the histories of schooling for Black and Native students reveal about the educational project of the nation? How does the notion of whiteness as property shape public presumptions about what makes a "good" school? How are taken-for-granted ideas about other vectors of identity such as class, disability, and language informed by racialized school policies? Most fundamentally, can schools contribute to creating a more just world, and if so, how?
Instructor(s): Eve L. Ewing
Equivalent Course(s): HMRT 21000, EDSO 21000
RDIN 21150. Psychology of Race and Racism. 100 Units.
This upper-level seminar will focus on the psychology of race and racism. We will discuss both structural and individual level factors that create and maintain racism in the U.S. context. While this course will focus on social psychology, we will also draw from other areas of psychology. We will discuss social structures and institutions that perpetuate racism, policies that shape societal attitudes and behaviors, and psychological frameworks for understanding racism. We will begin the course with a discussion of the origins of race and racism. We will then transition to contemporary expressions of racism. The goals of this course are to analyze structural contexts influencing racist attitudes and behaviors, evaluate the impact of racism on racially minoritized groups, and to examine strategies and interventions to address racism.
Instructor(s): K. Henderson Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): PSYC 31150, RDIN 31150, PSYC 21150
RDIN 21200. African-American History: 1900-2000. 100 Units.
The Black experience in America is one that encompasses a wide variety of walks of life. Within this introductory undergraduate course, we will explore the 20th century experience of African Americans in Jim Crow segregation, migration, labor, medicine, world wars, civil rights, and black power. This course considers racial barriers in the built environment, with a particular emphasis on the city. We will use primary and secondary sources to construct conceptions of political struggle, economic rights, resistance, and freedom in African American life.
Instructor(s): Caine Jordan Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 27420, RDIN 31200, HIST 37420
RDIN 21300. Aftermath: Literature of Reparation, Redress, Refusal, and Change. 100 Units.
What does it mean to address oneself to, or attempt to repair, legacies of violence and harm? What theories, resources, and models of personal, psychoanalytic, legal, political repair are available, and what kinds of possibilities do they enable? Is repair even a possibility, or a useful framework, for change? This course tracks the question of repair through contemporary conversations and historical case studies. Reading works by Sigmund Freud, Melanie Klein, Eve Ensler, Saidiya Hartman, Olúfẹ́mi Táíwò, Eve Tuck and K. Wayne Yang, we will track how the concept of repair and reparation has motivated political action, activism, economic decision-making, artistic creativity and interpersonal ritual. We will read poems, engage performances, and consider other rituals of repair, breaking, and re-making. In addition, we will read literary and activist material pertinent to historical movements for reparations, including works from the Redress Movement for Japanese Internment in Canada and the United States and ongoing projects of the repatriation of Indigenous archival and cultural materials.
Instructor(s): Bellamy Mitchell Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): RDIN 31300, ENGL 31302, ENGL 21302
RDIN 21315. Narratives of American Religious History. 100 Units.
How do we tell the story of religion in America? Is it a story of Protestant dominance? Of religious diversity? Of transnational connections? Of secularization? This course examines how historians have grappled with such questions. We will read the work of scholars who have offered narratives explaining American religious history, including figures like Sydney Ahlstrom, Albert Raboteau, Mark Noll, Ann Braude, Catherine Albanese, and Thomas Tweed. This course will introduce students to key historiographical questions in the study of American religion, as well as to classic texts which have shaped the field's development.
Instructor(s): William Schultz and Curtis Evans Terms Offered: Autumn
Note(s): This course meets the HS or SCSR Committee distribution requirement for Divinity students.
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 21315, KNOW 41315, RDIN 41315, HIST 47304, HIST 27304, HCHR 41315, CRES 22315, AMER 41315, AMER 21315, RAME 41315
RDIN 21400. Black Fun. 100 Units.
This course is an exploration of Black fun and leisure across time in Chicago and beyond. In the context of the course, we will largely focus on the Black American experience, but will have space to consider Black fun globally as well as to draw connections and comparisons across all kinds of leisure activities. The study of Black America is largely oriented towards understanding and analyzing Black oppression and resistance. Very little intellectual attention has been given to Black leisure, fun, joy and play. This course does just that. We will ground our work in a wide range of literature with readings in the sociology of leisure, studies in space and place, Afrofuturism, recreation studies and beyond. We will work to understand and develop critical theoretical and conceptual frameworks for thinking through Black fun and leisure. Three big questions will motivate our work together: 1) These days I see a lot of social media commentary that joy is resistance or fun is resistance. We will ask ourselves: Is it? Does it have to be? Is it possible to separate anything that Black Americans do from our history of oppression and resistance? 2) What do we gain from studying fun and leisure that we can't gain elsewhere? Does it matter? 3) How can the study of fun be meaningful in a world full of despair? The course will be largely based around discussion of assigned materials and include guest speakers and field trips. Assignments will include papers and a final project.
Instructor(s): Joyce Bell Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): SOCI 20613
RDIN 21500. Mourning and Struggle in African, Native American, and Palestinian Narratives. 100 Units.
In this course, we will explore themes spanning three diverse bodies of literature and film, identifying points of connection and difference between expressions of sorrow and resistance in African, Native American, and Palestinian works. We focus on portrayals of mourning and examine how in response to catastrophic experiences and histories of colonialism, writers and filmmakers narrate loss and trauma. We will investigate how these authors renegotiate their identities, how they fashion national and political imaginaries, and how they envision alternative futures. Together, we will analyze source materials related to the themes of violence, memory, gender, and race. Through our weekly assignments and discussions, we will seek to determine the tropes and aesthetic tools that ignite modes of storytelling, and to answer: how do writers and artists employ aesthetic form to portray catastrophes? How might expressions of grief also be mobilized for resistance and struggle? Our class will be organized into three modules, touching upon African, Native American, and Palestinian prose, poetry, and film alongside theoretical works in memory and trauma studies. By the end of the quarter, students will be able to develop their own complex evaluations of these narratives-and recognize how comparisons through artistic expression can be a powerful tool for amplifying a multiplicity of stories about mourning and defiance.
Instructor(s): Stephanie Kraver Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): NEHC 31500, NEHC 21500, CMLT 21505, CMLT 31505, RDIN 31500
RDIN 21600. Histories of Abortion and Forced Sterilization in the United States. 100 Units.
In the United States, the politics of pregnancy and reproductive autonomy have historically been and continue to be categories of significance, meaning, and contention. In this course, we will explore a subsection of these broader categories, examining the relation between abortion and forced sterilization, the state, and women of color. The course will zero in on the experiences of Mexican American and Mexican immigrant women, African American women, Puerto Rican women, and Native American women, considering their struggles against the state and for reproductive justice.
Instructor(s): Caine Jordan Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): RDIN 31600, HIST 27810, GNSE 33181, GNSE 23181
RDIN 21677. Latinxs, Labor, and the Law in the U.S. 100 Units.
Latinidad" is an ethno-racial signifier meant to encompass people of Latin American descent living in the United States. Terms like "Latina," "Hispanic," and most recently, "Latinx/e" are meant to evoke a commonality that crosses nationalities to create political power & social recognition in the United States. Like every other identity term, "Latinidad" is an ever-contested construction with uncertain contours. The history of Latinidad in the U.S. has its origins in a myriad social efforts and forces: political campaigns, immigration policies, community organizing, migrant labor programs, union campaigns, marketing strategies, artistic expressions, & many more. Rather than simplify or ignore these tensions, the purpose of this class is to confront the agonistic aspects of Latinidad head-on. In this course, students will read widely across the social sciences & humanities, delving deep into the making and remaking of "Latinidad" in the U.S. We will be playing foremost attention to the roles that U.S. economic relations & government policies have had in shaping collective understandings of Latinidad, from the making of a "brown collar" labor sector sustaining the American economy to the development of census categories to describe Latinxs. Furthermore, we will look at U.S. Latinxs not merely as objects of policy, but also as subjects of politics, delving into the past and present of U.S. Latinx political life.
Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): PLSC 22677
RDIN 21800. Social Life and Death in the City. 100 Units.
What sustains collective life in a city? What institutionalized and systemic processes disrupt life in the city? How do individuals, groups, and neighborhoods grapple with death and decay? In this course, students will be offered lenses to answer these questions through engagement with interdisciplinary and multimodal texts drawn from sociology, anthropology, history, and urban studies. The goal of the course is to offer an introduction to how urban life and death are shaped by processes such as inequality, segregation, displacement, placemaking, urban governance, infrastructure and built environment, surveillance and policing, migration, and spatial practices of death and dying. The scope of the course will include Chicago-specific readings and field trips as well as national and global perspectives on urban social life and death. The final assignment will involve a group project to produce a podcast-style recorded audio segment that engages with the social and spatial histories of Oak Woods Cemetery that straddles Chicago's Woodlawn and Greater Grand Crossing neighborhoods.
Instructor(s): Pranathi Diwakar Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): SOCI 20610
RDIN 21900. Race, Science and Empire. 100 Units.
The eighteenth century bore witness to the concomitant rise of scientific discovery and a modern sensibility of race hierarchy. Enlightenment pioneers-many with ties to the slave trade-who spearheaded the Age of Discovery also laid the groundwork for the "scientific" study of race. Drawing on the work of botanists, Linnaeus and Blumenbach developed taxonomic models for modern racial classifications. What had been the concern of a tiny group of physicians in the eighteenth expanded into a central focus of Euro-American scientific thought in the next. This shift into the new century marked a transition in inquiry from the origins of racial differences to their implications, accompanied by a shift from skin color to skull/body configurations as determinants of identity. Together, they gave rise to novel scientific practices such as phrenology, craniometry, anthropometry, and eugenics, enabling the quantification, with acute precision, of perceived racial differences. In this symbiosis of racial ideology and scientific method, the global expansion of the European empire found a powerful justification for the institution of slavery and the marginalization of the non-Europeans. By engaging with key texts from thinkers such as Kant, Voltaire, and Gobineau, alongside interdisciplinary critical scholarship on race science, students will examine how scientific racism was deeply intertwined with imperial ambitions and consider its lasting influence into the present day.
Instructor(s): Taimur Reza Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): RDIN 31900, KNOW 31900
RDIN 21905. Latin American Literatures and Cultures: Colonial and 19th-Century. 100 Units.
This course introduces students to the writing produced in Hispanic and Portuguese America during the period marked by the early processes of European colonization in the sixteenth century through the revolutionary movements that, in the nineteenth century, led to the establishment of independent nation-states across the continent. The assigned texts relate to the first encounters between Indigenous, Black, and European populations in the region, to the emergence of distinct ("New World") notions of cultural identity (along with the invention of new racial categories), and to the disputes over the meaning of nationhood that characterized the anti-colonial struggles for independence. Issues covered in this survey include the idea of texts as spaces of cultural and political conflict; the relationships between Christianization, secularization, and practices of racialization; the transatlantic slave trade; the uses of the colonial past in early nationalist projects; and the aesthetic languages through which this production was partly articulated (such as the Barroco de Indias, or "New World baroque," Neoclassicism, Romanticism, and Modernismo, among others). In addition to enhancing your knowledge of Latin American cultural history and improving your close reading and critical thinking skills, this course is designed to continue building on your linguistic competence in Spanish.
Instructor(s): Larissa Brewer-Garcia, Carlos Halaburda Terms Offered: Autumn
Spring
Prerequisite(s): SPAN 20300 or consent of instructor.
Note(s): Taught in Spanish.
Equivalent Course(s): LACS 21900, SPAN 21905
RDIN 22000. Introduction to Black Studies. 100 Units.
This course introduces students to the study of Blackness from multiple perspectives: racial, political, cultural, and intellectual. We will adopt a global perspective to our study that highlights differential histories and experiences of Black people in various areas of the world. Attentive to the origin of the discipline in political struggle, we will constantly question the ties of Black studies scholarship to the communities whose struggle it is founded on. With a consideration of the adjacent histories of racialization and other forms of oppression, this course invites students to consider the relation between Blackness and other social categories such as gender and class. We will ask questions such as: What are the methods and approaches to the study of Blackness? How has the history of African and African diasporic people shaped the contemporary world? How can we build a world founded on freedom for all? Assigned materials include academic texts, fiction, and other media such as film & music. Select topics include the histories of enslavement and colonization, revolution, Black feminism, and Afrofuturism. Students will work on weekly reflections, a mid-term paper and a final team project. For the sake of a collaborative pedagogy anchored in the work of social movements, students are encouraged to imagine together the best form this course can take and to enact course practices and changes that keep us all true to the radical vocation of Black Studies as a discipline.
Instructor(s): Kevin Irakoze Terms Offered: Spring
RDIN 22100. Disease, Health, and the Environment in Global Context. 100 Units.
Recent concerns about monkeypox, COVID-19, Zika virus, and Ebola have attracted renewed attention to previous disease outbreaks that have significantly shaped human political, social, economic, and environmental history. Such diseases include: smallpox during the 16th-century Columbian exchange; syphilis during the 18th-century exploration and settlement of the Pacific; bubonic plague in the late-19th-century colonization and urbanization of South and East Asia; and yellow fever during America's 20th-century imperial projects across the Caribbean. Through readings, discussions, library visits, and written assignments that culminate in a final project, students in this course will explore how natural and human-induced environmental changes have altered our past experiences with disease and future prospects for health. First, we will examine how early writers understood the relationship between geography, environment, hereditary constitution, race, gender, and human health. We will then analyze the symbiotic relationship among pathogens, human hosts, and their environments. Finally, we will explore how social factors (e.g. migration, gendered divisions of labor, poverty, and segregation) and human interventions (e.g. epidemiology, medical technology, and sanitary engineering) have influenced the distribution of infectious diseases and environmental risks.
Instructor(s): Christopher Kindell Terms Offered: Spring
Note(s): This course counts towards the CEGU/ENST 4th year Capstone requirement. CEGU/ENST 4th years wanting to take this as their Capstone must contact instructor and BA Capstone Director Dr. Evan Carver.
Equivalent Course(s): CEGU 32100, GLST 22101, HLTH 22100, CEGU 22100, HIST 25033, HIPS 22210
RDIN 22203. Caste, Reproduction, and Citizenship in India. 100 Units.
This undergraduate and graduate level seminar will center on caste and reproduction in understanding notions of citizenship in India. The course will systematically engage with ideas of belonging to the post-colonial nation-state, particularly as experienced from following standpoints-gender, caste, indigeneity, and class. Understanding how citizenship is constituted, performed and negotiated in India, especially in relation to the biological and political reproduction of "good citizens", reveals the scopes and limits of citizenship as governance. The course is premised on the centrality of reproduction to governance in the largest democracy of the world. Drawing on a set of interdisciplinary literature, the readings are organized around feminist theorizations of the State, governance, and citizenship to locate the body within the body politic. The aim is to develop critical thinking on how the politics of reproduction is deeply imbricated with the reproduction of democratic politics; a politics that is entangled with knowledge, expertise and constructed human difference. In so doing, the course brings together reproductive governance with articulations of social justice in India.
Equivalent Course(s): GNSE 32207, SALC 35704, CHDV 32203, GNSE 22207, ANTH 32203, RDIN 32203, CHDV 22203
RDIN 22205. Latin American Literatures and Cultures: 20th and 21st Centuries. 100 Units.
This course will survey some of the main literary and cultural tendencies in Latin America from the beginning of the twentieth century to the present. We will pay special attention to their aesthetic dimensions, as well as the socio-historical and political conditions that made them possible, and in which they simultaneously intervened. Questions to be studied might include the innovations of the Modernist and avant-garde movements, fantastic literature, the novel of the so-called "Boom," cultural production associated with revolutionary movements, military dictatorships, and the Cold War, as well as new currents in literary and theatrical practices. Likewise, the course will foreground some of the following concepts relevant to the study of this production: modernity and modernization; development and neoliberalism; neo-colonialism and empire; cultural autonomy and ideas of poetic and cultural renewal; the epic vs. the novel; realism and non-verisimilitude; and performativity, among others. In addition to enhancing your knowledge of Latin American cultural history and improving your close reading and critical thinking skills, this course is designed to continue building on your linguistic competence in Spanish.
Instructor(s): Agnes Lugo-Ortiz, Danielle Roper Terms Offered: Spring
Winter
Prerequisite(s): SPAN 20300 or consent of instructor.
Note(s): Taught in Spanish. This course is the equivalent of SPAN 22003.
Equivalent Course(s): LACS 22005, SPAN 22005
RDIN 22311. Aspirations of Justice. 100 Units.
This class thinks through questions of what justice means, what justice promises, what justice betrays, and what possibilities for politics are opened by aspirations of justice at moments of radical rupture. It does so through a focus on critical conceptual terms that also become the frameworks for praxis and institutionalization after war/violence/trauma/revolution/colonialism/slavery/casteism: terms such as transition, transformation, restoration, reconstruction, and repair. The readings will be comparative but grounded out of South Africa's experience of transition from apartheid, a process that remains frictioned, fractured and far from finished. At the core of the class are two concerns. First: how does one think about non-retributive forms of justice, and what aporias of forgiveness lie at their core? Second, how do these imaginaries and forms of justice get constituted and instituted, out of different histories of foundational violence, different transitional processes, at different moments in time? How, in the process, do histories themselves get rewritten through a process of rewriting wrongs?
Instructor(s): Kaushik Sunder Rajan
Equivalent Course(s): HIPS 26311, CCCT 36311, CRES 22311, ANTH 36311, CHSS 36311, AASR 36311
RDIN 22350. Black Game Theory. 100 Units.
This course explores games created by, for, or about the Black diaspora, though with particular emphasis on the United States. We will analyze mainstream "AAA" games, successful independent and art games, and educational games. Beyond video games, we will take a comparative media studies perspective that juxtaposes video games with novels, films, card games, board games, and tabletop roleplaying games. Readings will be drawn from writing by Frantz Fanon, Noah Wardrip-Fruin, Lindsay Grace, Saidiya Hartman, Sarah Juliet Lauro, Achille Mbembe, Fred Moten, Frank B. Wilderson, and others.
Instructor(s): Patrick Jagoda and Ashlyn Sparrow Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): CMST 32350, CDIN 32350, CMST 22350, RDIN 32350, ENGL 32352, ENGL 22352, MADD 12350
RDIN 22500. Seeing Islam and the Politics of Visual Culture. 100 Units.
From terrorists to "good Muslims," standards in the racial, cultural, and religious representations surrounding Islam have fluctuated across U.S. media. How do we conceptualize the nature of visual perception and reception? The history of colonialism, secular modernity, gender, patriarchy, and the blurred distinctions between religion and racialization have all contributed to a milieu of visual cultures that stage visions of and arguments about Islam. Hostility towards Muslims has not abated as we venture well into the 21st century, and many remain quick to blame an amorphous media for fomenting animosity towards the "real" Islam. We use these terms of engagement as the start of our inquiry: what is the promise of a meaningful image? What processes of secular translation are at work in its creation and consumption? Is there room for resistance, legibility, and representation in U.S. popular culture, and what does representation buy you in this age? We will pair theoretical methods for thinking about imagery, optics, perception, and perspective alongside case studies from film, stage, comedy, streaming content, and television shows, among others. Students will critically engage and analyze these theories in the contexts from which these works emerge and meld into a mobile and diasporic U.S. context. Together, we will reflect on the moral, political, and categorical commitments vested in different forms of media against historical trends of the 20th and 21st century.
Instructor(s): Samah Choudhury Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 27555, ENGL 32505, ENGL 22505, RDIN 32500, CMST 32500, ARTV 20667, CMST 22500, ISLM 37555
RDIN 22561. Justice at the Margins: Religion, Race, and Resistance Ethics. 100 Units.
How does race shape what we think about what is right and wrong, just and unjust? How about religion? Is "justice" a universal idea that stretches across social groups, or do our experiences as members of a religious and/or racial group have fundamentally affect our understanding(s) of justice? We'll begin by examining works by Aristotle, King, Rawls, and Nussbaum, asking what each theorist thinks justice entails and why. Along the way, we'll ask how stated and suppressed understandings of both "race" and "religion" inform their theories, as well as complicate and challenge them. Then we'll set these theories of justice in conversation with works by Francisco de Vitoria, W.E.B. Du Bois, James Baldwin, Cornel West, Traci C. West, and the Movement for Black Lives, each of which offers a protest against injustice in which "race" and "religion" play a prominent role. No previous knowledge required.
Instructor(s): Derek Buyan Terms Offered: Autumn
Note(s): This course counts as an elective course for the "Inequality, Social Problems, and Change" minor and as an approved course for the Democracy Studies minor.
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 25561, HMRT 25561, CRES 22561
RDIN 22600. Race, Justice, and the Assemblage of American Moralities. 100 Units.
This course explores the racial and moral imperatives that are encapsulated within concepts of "Americanness" and the theoretical notions that define the discursive, historical, and sociopolitical boundaries of American identities. How have claims to American identity relied on created religious or religiously-inflected Others? Together, we will consider how the human phenomena of religion and race have developed across our histories in concert with one another. How do racial and moral imperatives the define discursive, historical, and sociopolitical boundaries of American identities? We will examine how these formations have been deployed, defined, and bent to fit particular historical and cultural contexts while continuing to inform each other in a variety of permutations, especially in the United States. How do race and religion also intersect with gender, sexuality, ethnicity, and politics? Our theoretical grounding in migration, encounters, and transnational mobilities will provide insight into how race is imagined on and into differently minoritized people while considering what it means to be participants in the project of racecraft today. Our readings will include historical materials, literary texts, theological reflections, and examples from popular culture that meditate on these topics.
Instructor(s): Samah Choudhury Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): GNSE 22604, AASR 32600, RAME 32600, GNSE 32604, RLST 26337, RDIN 32604, AMER 22600, ISLM 32600
RDIN 22700. Diasporic Literature and Modern Islam in the Imperial Core. 100 Units.
The 19th century enslaved scholar Omar Ibn Said opens his autobiography with the words: "I cannot write my life." This seminar takes this starting point -the thick of chattel slavery, mercantile capitalism, and colonial violence - to investigate literary productions by racialized others dispersed in and by the so-called era of modernity. We will complicate what constitutes the modernity and how Islam, perhaps more than any other tradition, has been configured as its inverse. We will read works ranging from poetry, novels, short stories, comics, & memoirs as they relate to encounters & engagements particularly with Islam as a religious tradition, colonialism, industrialization, & nationalism, even as global understandings of tradition, genre, & form are being contested & rapidly changing. In addition to primary sources, we will theoretically situate these works within larger discussions of racecraft, oral transmission & culture, "folk" vs. "high" literature, Orientalism, politics, gender, sexuality, & identity. We will look at this is articulated in diasporic literary forms written within -and sometimes for- the imperial core. Through in-class discussions, readings, & a final paper, students will strengthen their global literacy, demonstrate knowledge of global historical trends, analyze the shifting and even contradictory interpretations of the role of religion in racial formations, all while identifying, critiquing & assessing these key course themes.
Instructor(s): Samah Choudhury Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 32700, CMLT 22705, RLST 26717, ISLM 36717, RDIN 32700, AASR 36717, GLST 22710
RDIN 22800. An Indigenous People's History of Hawaiʻi. 100 Units.
What you know about Hawai'i is most likely untrue. An archipelago in Oceania's sea of islands, Hawai'i has been locally constructed and globally consumed as a tropical paradise for pleasure and play, attracting tourists, settlers, corporations, and military forces to its shores. It is a fantasized paradise produced through the dispossession, elimination, appropriation, and exploitation of Indigenous people, institutions, worldviews, and practices. This course tells a truer story about Hawai'i. Because ideas and narratives crafted about the history, politics, economics, law, ecology, and society of Hawai'i are dominated and often distorted by non-Indigenous writers, we turn to Kanaka Maoli (Native Hawaiian) scholars to learn from their subjugated knowledge. The course examines interdisciplinary research, from the 19th century to the present, and excavates the truths advanced through it: the development of the Hawaiian Kingdom and its government, political order, economy, and society; the illegal overthrow of the Hawaiian government and US military occupation and annexation of its territory; legal constructions of race and techniques of gender and sexuality in the territorial period; the creation of the State of Hawaii amid World War II and the Cold War; the birth and evolution of the modern Hawaiian sovereignty movement; and contemporary Kanaka Maoli struggles with federal recognition, militourism, and technoscientific development.
Instructor(s): Uahikea Maile Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): GNSE 32806, GNSE 22806, RDIN 32800
RDIN 22900. Intro to Critical Race Theory. 100 Units.
Critical Race Theory (CRT) has recently filled headlines as it has become a hotly debated topic in U.S. political, educational, and media discourse. However, the tenets and thinkers that shape CRT tend to be left out of the conversations that dominate the media. What is this theoretical framework? Who are the thinkers who shape and contribute to these theories of the construction of race? What does CRT say about the relationship between race and institutions, such as the United States' legal system or education? To address these questions, students in this course will read and engage with foundational texts of CRT by scholars including Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, Kimberlé Crenshaw, and Cheryl Harris. In addition to learning the key tenets of this theoretical framework, students will also use it to think across disciplines, institutional structures, and forms of media.
Instructor(s): Danielle Jones Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): CRES 12900, ENGL 22930
RDIN 23000. What is Asian American Studies? 100 Units.
What is Asian American studies? Who is an Asian American? For that matter, what does it mean to be Asian? Or American? Where do we locate Asian America, and what are its relationships to Asian homelands or other diasporas? Where does Asian America fit into the US racial landscape? What does studying Asian Americans or Asian America help us understand? This course is not a traditional introduction to Asian American studies and its more canonical histories and literatures. Rather, in this course, we will interrogate the normative categories, histories, geographies, and approaches of Asian American studies to consider what it means to study Asian American populations, what we gain from these inquiries, and what the future of Asian American studies research might look like.
Instructor(s): Maya Singhal Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 37702, RDIN 33001
RDIN 23001. Censorship in East Asia: The Case of Colonial Korea. 100 Units.
Looking into the intricate workings and profound impact of state publication control in the Japanese Empire during the first half of the twentieth century, this seminar examines how censorship influenced literary and other forms of publication within the Korean colony. Students analyze the manipulation of information and representation by engaging with a diverse array of primary sources, including literature, periodicals, police reports, censors' documents, posters, and postcards, among others. Not only do they seek a nuanced understanding of censorship and its impact on cultural production engaging themselves with the original materials from colonial Korea, but also do they gain a broad historical knowledge of modern Korea under Japanese rule and further East Asia under Japan's dominance and hegemony. Throughout the course, focus is placed upon manuscript ("pre-publication") censorship. [Consent Required; Proficiency in Korean or Japanese is not required.]
Instructor(s): K. Choi Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): EALC 23001, CRES 23001, MADD 16001, EALC 43000
RDIN 23002. Schooling and Identity. 100 Units.
This course examines the dynamic relations between schooling and identity. We will explore how schools both enable and constrain the identities available to students and the consequences of this for academic achievement. We will examine these relations from multiple disciplinary perspectives, applying psychological, anthropological, sociological, and critical theories to understanding how students not only construct identities for themselves within schools, but also negotiate the identities imposed on them by others. Topics will include the role of peer culture, adult expectations, school practices and enduring social structures in shaping processes of identity formation in students and how these processes influence school engagement and achievement. We will consider how these processes unfold at all levels of schooling, from preschool through college, and for students who navigate a range of social identities, from marginalized to privileged.
Instructor(s): Lisa Rosen Terms Offered: Winter. Offered winter 2025
Prerequisite(s): Priority registration will be given to MAPSS students seeking the Education and Society certificate.
Equivalent Course(s): SOCI 30530, EDSO 33002, EDSO 23002, SOCI 20530, RDIN 33002, CHDV 23003
RDIN 23178. The Queer Enemy and the Politics of Homophobia. 100 Units.
How is the queer enemy politically constructed? And what are the uses and effects of this enemy in contemporary politics? This course investigates queer sexuality as a specific kind of threat and homophobia as a specific mode of political antagonism. Key to understanding this specificity is the examination of other kinds of political enemies. Across categories of gender, sexuality, race, religion, and empire, the course theorizes the queer enemy in a comparative perspective. Engaging scholars like Monique Wittig, Simone de Beauvoir, Frantz Fanon, and Jean Paul Sartre, we compare homophobia with other forms of political enmity like misogyny, anti-Black racism, and anti-Semitism. After investigating antagonism across categories of political difference, we delve into the specificities of homophobic antagonism in the second half of the course. Here, we explore how the queer threat is framed: through metaphors of civilizational destruction but also through anti-sodomy and anti-disclosure laws. We also trace how the normalization of the queer enemy has produced new enemies. Through notions of "Pinkwashing" and the "Gay International," we further examine how queer liberation is made to stand in for colonial domination. But we also read critiques of the "gay=colonialism" equation, asking how homophobia mediates anti-colonial politics. Finally, we conclude the course with Michel Foucault's seminal essay and relate the question of the queer enemy to the threat of new human relations.
Instructor(s): Omar Safadi Terms Offered: Winter
Note(s): This course counts as a Concepts course for GNSE majors
Equivalent Course(s): PLSC 23178, GNSE 23178, HMRT 23178
RDIN 23202. Black Religious Protest in the U.S. 100 Units.
This course examines African American religious protest against the American nation for its actual history and its ideals in view of black oppression. The course begins with David Walker's Appeal (1829) and ends with debates around Jeremiah Wright's "God damn America" sermon. The course situates black religious protest amidst discussions of the American Jeremiad, a particular critique of the nation in relation to the divine, American exceptionalism, and racial injustice. We attempt to trace continuity and discontinuity, hope versus pessimism, and visions of a more perfect union in these public critiques of the nation.
Instructor(s): Curtis Evans Terms Offered: Winter
Note(s): This course meets the HS Committee distribution requirement for Divinity students.
Equivalent Course(s): AMER 42202, RLST 22202, HIST 47416, HIST 27416, AMER 22202, RAME 42202, HCHR 42202
RDIN 23210. Urban Core in Paris. 100 Units.
This course is both an introduction to how historians think about cities and a history of cities in France and the French Empire, with a focus on Paris, from the Middle Ages through 1968. The course is chronological in organization, but each class also focuses on a different theme, such as the place of politics, industrial development, migration, culture, and commerce in the transformation of urban forms and experiences.
Instructor(s): L. Auslander Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): Admission to the Paris: Social Sciences Urbanism program
Equivalent Course(s): ARCH 23210, ENST 23210, ANTH 23210, CEGU 23210, HIST 23210
RDIN 23304. Abolitionist Theologies. 100 Units.
How might religions activate the abolitionist imagination? The contemporary abolition movement is not just about dismantling prisons or the police. It is about imagining alternatives to this apparatus of fear, punishment, and scarcity-and experimenting with new modes of living together premised on mutual aid rather than state power. Many abolitionist thinkers thus see abolition as a sacred force interrupting the normalized brutalities of everyday life. This course focuses on Jewish, Christian, and Islamic theologies that interrogate incarceration, capitalism, the war on terror, and the settler colonial state. We will analyze the possibilities and limits of these theologies as revolutionary resources. Our readings will include a variety of genres: scriptural interpretation, spiritual autobiography, and speculative fiction. No prior experience with academic theology or abolition required.
Instructor(s): Olivia Bustion Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 23304, GLST 23304
RDIN 23325. Indigenous Feminisms of Latin America. 100 Units.
This course examines how early modern visual and textual sources partook in the formation of gender and race differences in the Americas. We will explore colonial documents drawing on the work of contemporary Indigenous Feminist thinkers, such as Gloria Anzaldúa, Lorena Cabnal, Silvia Rivera Cusicanqui, Yásnaya Aguilar, among others. Reading the colonial archive while thinking about contemporary Indigenous perspectives can help us bridge the past to the present and discuss issues concerning the underrepresentation of Indigenous women in the archive, language politics, communal identities, and Indigenous epistemologies while being particularly attentive to the rhetorical strategies deployed by colonial texts. Along the way, we will have in perspective how contemporary indigenous women resist, negotiate, and denounce the state, corporate, and patriarchal establishments. In this course, students will engage with primary sources of the colonial period in Latin America as they engage in debates surrounding gender and race in our present moment. Understanding these debates and the history surrounding them is crucial to participating in informed discussion, research, and activism regarding issues of colonialism, race, and gender discrimination of today. Students will participate in class discussions, write weekly responses, lead, and moderate academic-style presentations, and produce a final research paper.
Instructor(s): Andrea Reed-Leal Terms Offered: Winter
Note(s): Taught in Spanish.
Equivalent Course(s): GNSE 12127, SPAN 23325, LACS 23325
RDIN 23367. Panafricanism: Histories, Aesthetics, and Politics. 100 Units.
Pan-Africanism, a concept first theorized during the late nineteenth century, has been widely understood as a political movement claiming solidarity and freedom for African and African diasporic peoples around the world. What are the cultural dimensions of Pan-Africanism's drive for self-determination, civil rights, and political emancipation? What forms and formats have been important vectors for the circulation of Pan-African idea(l)s? How might we differentiate Pan-Africanism from related concepts such as Afropolitanism and Black Internationalism? This course is designed to coincide with the Art Institute exhibition, Project a Black Planet: The Art and Culture of Panafrica (December 15-March 30). There will be at least two class trips to the exhibition and students will also have an opportunity to participate in related programming.
Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): PLSC 23367
RDIN 23507. Power and Responsibility in the Anthropocene. 100 Units.
Humanity's immense impact on Earth's systems has led some scientists to claim that we have entered a new geological epoch: the Anthropocene. Humans' influence on Earth's landscape, climate system, and biodiversity inspires many to ask, in turn, What should be done about humankind's planetary powers? Some scholars and religious leaders claim that people should take responsibility and influence Earth's systems for good ends, while others argue that we should radically scale down such power. Still others suggest that the Anthropocene requires us to entirely revise our ideas of power and responsibility and even develop new religious sensibilities. Through discussions and focused writing assignments, students in this class will explore and evaluate these and additional responses to the Anthropocene, paying specific attention to how Anthropocene ethical thought wrestles with the place of religion on a changing planet. The course culminates in an extended examination of how Anthropocene discourse conceals racial antagonisms and contemporary decolonial struggles.
Instructor(s): Colin Weaver Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): ANTH 23507, CEGU 23507, RLST 23507, GLST 23507
RDIN 23510. The Sociology of Racism. 100 Units.
This course seeks to give students a rigorous introduction to the sociological subfield of the study of race over the last roughly 100 years - with a specific focus on how scholars have theorized racism(s). Moving chronologically, we will begin in the early to mid 20th century with ideas of race relations and race as a social construction, move to ethnic assimilation and racial formation, racial attitudes, and then to racialized social systems and colorblind racism. Alongside this trajectory, we will read critical scholarship that troubles the more mainstream scholarly understandings of racism in each period. We will end by exploring contemporary ways scholars are pushing the subfield forward.
Instructor(s): Cuddy, Maximilian Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): SOCI 30603, RDIN 33510, SOCI 20603, MAPS 33510
RDIN 24000. Soundtrack for Changing the World: Mavis Staples, Chicago, & the Music of the Civil Rights Movement. 100 Units.
Mavis Staples was nine years old in 1948 when she joined her father, Roebuck "Pops' Staples and three siblings to form the Chicago gospel group The Staple Singers. Inspired by the rich musical crosscurrents of the South Side, the Staples fused gospel vocal harmonies with Delta Blues guitar to create a revolutionary form of American music. In the 1960s, the group collaborated with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and traveled the back roads of the South at great personal risk to spread his message. Their music became synonymous with the Civil Rights Movement. A lifelong South Side resident, Mavis Staples continues to blend soul, blues, folk, gospel and rock in her albums and has worked with Bob Dylan, Prince, Public Enemy's Chuck D and Wilco's Jeff Tweedy. Students in this interdisciplinary course will blend journalism, history, biography, and musicology to illuminate the pioneering path mapped out by Mavis Staples and her family. The students will explore how art and activism intertwine, and how popular music sparks democratic change. Students will create research projects grounded in the Staples' epic history by developing oral histories and drawing on recordings, photographs, manuscripts, newspapers, film, and video in archives nationwide. Students will be able to further their work by applying for Summer 2025 travel grants and research fellowships. Guest speakers in the course will include artists who were influenced by or played with Mavis Staples and The Staple Singers.
Instructor(s): Greg Kot, former Chicago Tribune music critic and host of public radio's Sound Opinions; Nora Titone Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): RDIN 34000, HIST 27316, MUSI 34200, PARR 34000
RDIN 24001. Colonizations I: Colonialism, Enslavement and Resistance in the Atlantic World. 100 Units.
This quarter examines the making of the Atlantic world in the aftermath of European colonial expansion. Focusing on the Caribbean, North and South America, and western Africa, we cover the dynamics of invasion, representation of otherness, enslavement, colonial economies and societies, as well as resistance and revolution.
Instructor(s): Staff Terms Offered: Autumn
Spring
Winter
Note(s): This sequence meets the general education requirement in civilization studies. This course is offered every year. These courses can be taken in any sequence.
Equivalent Course(s): SOSC 24001, HIST 18301, ANTH 24001, CRES 24001
RDIN 24002. Colonizations II: Imperial Expansion, Anti-Imperialism, and Nation in Asia. 100 Units.
This quarter covers the histories of modern European and Japanese colonialism in South and East Asia and the Pacific. Themes examined include the logics and dynamics of imperial expansion and rule; Orientalist discourses; uprisings and anti-imperial movements; the rise of nationalisms; and paths to decolonization in the region.
Instructor(s): Staff Terms Offered: Autumn
Spring
Winter
Note(s): This sequence meets the general education requirement in civilization studies. These courses can be taken in any sequence.
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 18302, CRES 24002, SOSC 24002, ANTH 24002, SALC 24002
RDIN 24003. Colonizations III: Decolonization, Revolution, Freedom. 100 Units.
The third quarter considers the processes and consequences of decolonization both in newly independent nations and former colonial powers. Through an engagement with postcolonial studies, we explore the problematics of freedom and sovereignty; anti-colonial movements, thinking and struggles; nation-making and nationalism; and the enduring legacies of colonialism.
Instructor(s): Staff Terms Offered: Autumn
Spring
Winter
Note(s): This sequence meets the general education requirement in civilization studies. These courses can be taken in any sequence.
Equivalent Course(s): ANTH 24003, CRES 24003, HIST 18303, SALC 20702, SOSC 24003
RDIN 24555. Ecological Explorations of the Francophone World. 100 Units.
The environmental humanities - that is, the study of nature through humanistic disciplines such as literature and history - has long been dominated by texts and theories from privileged sections of Europe and North America. However, alternative understandings of our natural world, including the role of living beings within it, have always existed. In this course, we will explore how contemporary francophone literature can renew, expand and complicate our perceptions of the oceans, deserts, mangroves and forests that surround us. Particular attention will be paid to questions of race, gender, language and indigeneity; course material may include theoretical texts, fiction, poetry, songs, podcasts, film, graphic novels and social media material.
Instructor(s): Nikhita Obeegadoo Terms Offered: Winter
Prerequisite(s): For students seeking French credit, FREN 20500 or equivalent.
Note(s): Taught in English or French, based on course composition
Equivalent Course(s): FREN 34555, RDIN 34555, CEGU 24555, CEGU 34555, FREN 24555
RDIN 24599. Historical and Contemporary Issues in U.S. Racial Health Inequality. 100 Units.
This course explores persistent health inequality in the U.S. from the 1900s to the present day. The focus will be on racial gaps in urban health inequality with some discussion of rural communities. Readings will largely cover the research on Black and White gaps in health inequality, with the understanding that most of the issues discussed extend to health inequalities across many racial and ethnic groups. Readings cover the broad range of social determinants of health (socioeconomic status, education, access to health care, homelessness) and how these social determinants are rooted in longstanding legacies of American inequality. A major component of class assignments will be identifying emerging research and innovative policies and programs that point to promising pathways to eliminating health disparities.
Instructor(s): M. Keels Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): Only students with 2nd year standing or above.
Note(s): Fulfills grad requirement: 2,4 and undergrad major requirement B.
Equivalent Course(s): HLTH 24599, AMER 24599, PBPL 24599, CHDV 44599, CHST 24599, CHDV 24599
RDIN 24601. Martin and Malcolm: Life and Belief. 100 Units.
This course examines the religious, social, cultural, political, and personal factors that went into the making of the two most prominent public leaders and public intellectuals emerging from the African American community in the 1950s and 1960s: Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Jr. We will review their autobiographies, the domestic trends within the USA, and the larger international forces operating during their times. Their life stories provide the contexts for the sharp differences and surprising commonalities in their political thought and religious beliefs. At the end of their lives, were they still radical contrasts, sharing the same views, or had their beliefs shifted - did Malcolm become Martin and Martin become Malcolm?
Instructor(s): Dwight Hopkins Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 24601, FNDL 24601, AMER 24601, HIST 27209
RDIN 24770. Sex, Crime and Horror in Argentine Literature. 100 Units.
This course examines the historical evolution of Argentine literature, cinema, and the visual arts through the study of three thematic currents that significantly influenced Argentina's cultural and socio-political experience with nation-building, modernization, and democracy: sex, crime, and horror. The primary objective of the course is to foster a critical exploration of how foundational works of Romanticism and Realism in the Río de la Plata, the Noir genre, and the Gothic tradition accounted for decisive changes in the social fabric of the country. Students will assess the role of sexuality, crime, and horror stories in the representation of momentous events in Argentine history, spanning from the revolutionary era in the nineteenth century to the contemporary period. Topics include the Wars of Independence, gaucho literature, indigenous resistance, the great migratory flows, the rise of the middle classes, Peronismo, Youth culture, military dictatorships, human rights violations, LGBT movements, and economic precarity in neoliberal times. Works by Esteban Echeverría, Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, Juana Manuela Gorriti, José Hernández, Lucio V. and Eduarda Mansilla, Eugenio Cambaceres, Leopoldo Lugones, Roberto Arlt, Jorge Luis Borges, Juan José Saer, Antonio Di Benedetto, Olga Orozco, Alejandra Pizarnik, Juan Gelman, Andrés Rivera, Silvina Ocampo, Horacio Quiroga, Rodolfo Walsh, Manuel Puig, Ricardo Piglia, Mariana Enríquez, Gabriela Cabezón Cámara, María Luisa Bemberg,
Instructor(s): Carlos Halaburda Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): Reading proficiency in Spanish required.
Note(s): Class discussions and reading materials in Spanish.
Equivalent Course(s): GNSE 24770, LACS 34770, LACS 24770, GNSE 34771, RDIN 34770, SPAN 24770, SPAN 34770
RDIN 24960. Creole Genesis and Genetic Linguistics. 100 Units.
In this seminar course we will review the "creole exceptionalism" tradition against the uniformitarian view, according to which creoles have emerged and evolved like other, natural and non-creole languages. We will situate creoles in the context of the plantation settlement colonies that produced them and compare their emergence specifically with that of languages such as English and the Romance languages in Europe. We will also compare these evolutions with those of new colonial varieties of European languages (such as Amish English, mainstream American English varieties, Brazilian Portuguese, and Québécois French) which emerged around the same time but are not considered creoles. Using the comparative approach (in evolutionary theory), we will assess whether the criteria used in the genetic classification of languages have been applied uniformly to creole and non-creole languages. In return, we will explore ways in which genetic creolistics can inform and improve genetic linguistics (including historical dialectology).
Instructor(s): Salikoko Mufwene
Equivalent Course(s): CHDV 34960, CHDV 24960, LING 24960, RDIN 34960, LING 34960
RDIN 25002. Is Religion Bad for Women? 100 Units.
Some scholars working in the study of gender and sexuality view religion as the conservative enemy of progress, irreconcilably antagonistic to the flourishing of any non-normative gender or sexuality. At the same time, some religious practitioners view feminism as a Western or liberal invention, an imposition that attempts to manage the lives of religious subjects. Still others find feminism and religious commitment mutually reinforcing, and have developed feminist, womanist, and queer rituals and theologies. This course examines contemporary texts, ethnographies, memoirs, and films that grapple with these tensions. In so doing, the course also helps students develop familiarity with foundational categories both in religious studies and in the study of gender and sexuality. Further questions to be explored include: Does religion facilitate or oppose the flourishing of women, queers, and people of color? Is religion a guardian of tradition that resists politically progressive aims, or do religions offer resources for interrogating secular liberalism? The course primarily considers Islamic, Christian, and Jewish traditions. Prior coursework in religious studies or gender and sexuality studies is helpful but not necessary.
Instructor(s): Hannah Jones Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): GLST 24002, RLST 24002, GNSE 12130
RDIN 25119. Architecture and Colonialism in Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia. 100 Units.
This seminar invites students to examine the intersections of colonialism with architecture in Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia. Throughout the semester, we will discuss the designs of architects working in the region (Le Corbusier, Fernand Pouillon, Shadrach Woods, etc.) and concepts defining colonialism as a design project (segregation, repression, primitivism, etc.). We will also pay particular attention to modes of opposition pursued by residents and their historical impact toward the region's decolonization. Moments of heightened historical consequence, such as the strategic use of selected architectural spaces by independentist guerrillas, will be thoroughly discussed. The class will progress through a chronological scope, from Orientalism as a 19th century phenomenon to the enmeshment of modernism with colonialism in the 20th century. We will conclude with the emergence of postcolonial modernities.
Instructor(s): Jacobé Huet Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): ARTH 25119, ARTH 35119, ARCH 25119, RDIN 35119
RDIN 25704. Environmental Justice in Chicago. 100 Units.
This course will examine the development of environmental justice theory and practice through social scientific and ethical literature about the subject as well as primary source accounts of environmental injustices. We will focus on environmental justice issues in Chicago including, but not limited to waste disposal, toxic air and water, the Chicago heat wave, and climate change. Particular attention will be paid to environmental racism and the often understudied role of religion in environmental justice theory and practice. Throughout the course we will explore how normative commitments are expressed in different types of literature as well as the basis for normative judgments and the types of authorities authors utilize and claim as they consider environmental justice.
Instructor(s): Sarah Fredericks Terms Offered: Winter
Note(s): Graduate students can enroll with permission of instructor and will have additional requirements.
Equivalent Course(s): AMER 25704, PBPL 25704, ENST 25704, HMRT 25704, KNOW 25704, CHST 25704, RLST 25704, CEGU 25704
RDIN 25800. Black Ownership of Wealth: A Theological Consideration. 100 Units.
Since Africans were brought to the Virginia Colony (August 1619), throughout slavery and segregation until today, black Americans (men and women) have always owned wealth. They have always had human agency. These black families accumulated wealth and offered a concurrent narrative and framing from the mainstream understanding of black Americans as victims. Who are these black families who remain mainly invisible from the dominant black story? What is material, financial wealth? Who has it? And how did they get it?
Instructor(s): Dwight Hopkins Terms Offered: Winter
Note(s): This course meets the CS Committee distribution requirement for Divinity students.
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 37419, RDIN 45800, AMER 45800, THEO 45800, HIST 27419, AMER 25800, RLST 25800
RDIN 26050. Race, Ethnicity, Language, and Citizenship in the United States. 100 Units.
This course is intended to help students make sense of the current discourse on diversity and inclusion/exclusion from a historical perspective. They will be trained to read critically the evolution of political discourse on citizenship in the United States since the American Revolution. They will learn to detect the role of shifting interpretations of race and ethnicity, after that of European nationality, in determining who is (not) a (full) citizen. For instance, who counted as "American" in the early stages of the Republic? Why were Native Americans and (descendants of) forced immigrants from Africa excluded at the outset? How did English become the unofficial language of American citizenship and inclusion? What factors favored its rise and drove to extinction the competing European national languages?
Instructor(s): Salikoko Mufwene Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): LING 26050, LING 36050, CHDV 26050, CHDV 36055
RDIN 26220. Dance, Identity, and Appropriation. 100 Units.
This survey course will look at the ways that dance-across genres, geographies, and histories-has negotiated, challenged, and complicated ideas of identity and authority. Grounded in histories including the 1893 World Columbian Exposition, where Swedish-American Christine Olson performed Turkish dance on the Midway, as well as modern dance pioneer Ruth St. Denis' imitation of the Indianness she encountered on a cigarette ad, we will explore case studies including American minstrel traditions, hip hop dance, the Nutcracker and other classical ballets, dance tourism like Hula and West African forms, viral K-pop dance tutorials, and more. These case studies will be used to discover how dance, and the dancing body, performs and problematizes appropriation. Part seminar/part practicum, assignments will include short written papers and performance projects including dance reconstructions.
Instructor(s): E. Leopold Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): RDIN 36220, TAPS 36220, TAPS 26220
RDIN 26252. The Moment of Raisin. 100 Units.
In conjunction with the Court Theatre's production of Lorraine Hansberry's landmark 1959 play A Raisin the Sun, this course will place Hansberry's play in its literary and historical context to understand more thoroughly the play's success in its historical moment and its ongoing importance. We will also discuss subsequent theatrical and cinematic productions and adaptations. Among the other works we will consider are: James Baldwin's Notes of a Native Son, Paule Marshall's Brown Girl, Brownstones, Gwendolyn Brooks's The Bean Eaters, and Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, and Ann Petry's The Street. Students will be expected to attend the play.
Instructor(s): Kenneth Warren Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): ENGL 26252
RDIN 26290. Mapping Black Social Dance: Hip Hop and House in the Community and Onstage. 100 Units.
This hybrid studio/seminar course offers an overview of the formal techniques, cultural contexts, and social trends that shape current Black social and vernacular dance practices. Modules will be built around Black social culture by looking at key histories and theories around Black dance, music and other cultural aesthetics from hip hop to house. As part of our exploration, we will cover themes such as: the Great Migration, the range of Black social dance forms from blues, jazz, disco, and dancehall that have influenced the evolution of hip hop and house on global scale; and the spectrum of social spaces from clubs to lounges and public events that have been critical to preserving Black cultural heritage and creating safe spaces for belonging and flourishing. Selected readings and viewings will supplement movement practice to give historical, cultural, and political context.
Instructor(s): M. McNeal Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): RDIN 36290, TAPS 26290, MUSI 33620, CHST 26290, TAPS 36290, MUSI 23620
RDIN 26302. Bodies at Work: Art & Civic Responsibility. 100 Units.
Contemporary artists are quickly adapting their practices to be more inclusive, diverse, accessible and physically safe. In particular, the rise of intimacy design and anti-racist work in theatre, film and television has opened up a dialogue about how artists do their work responsibly. Through practice and investigation, this class will dive into the responsibility of artists in contemporary artistic processes. We will explore both how the tools and capacities of artists can transform civic practice and, conversely, how artists are grappling with the civic issues of body safety, anti-racism and accessibility in arts practice. We will explore how centering the body can create respectful engagement in the arts. We will look at the work of Enrich Chicago, Nicole Brewer, Sonya Renee Taylor, Not in Our House and Intimacy Directors & Coordinators among others.
Instructor(s): D. Serna Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): GNSE 26303, MADD 20302, TAPS 26302, CHST 26302
RDIN 26312. Race, Crime, and Justice in the City. 100 Units.
The size and growth of the U.S. jail and prison census, and its deleterious consequences for the poor, and especially for poor black people who reside in the nation's most disadvantaged communities, has been well documented. This course examines some of this work but goes further in addressing how the targets of mass incarceration experience crime control policy, how criminal legal expansion shapes urban, and, in recent years, suburban and rural sociality, and how criminalized people work to bring about change in the laws and policies that regulate their lives.
Equivalent Course(s): RDIN 46312, SSAD 46312, SSAD 26312
RDIN 26380. Indigenous Politics in Latin America. 100 Units.
This course examines the history of Indigenous policies and politics in Latin America from the first encounters with European empires through the 21st Century. Course readings and discussions will consider several key historical moments across the region: European encounters/colonization; the rise of liberalism and capitalist expansion in the 19th century; 20th-century integration policies; and pan-Indigenous and transnational social movements in recent decades. Students will engage with primary and secondary texts that offer interpretations and perspectives both within and across imperial and national boundaries.
Instructor(s): Diana Schwartz Francisco Terms Offered: Course not offered in 24-25
Equivalent Course(s): ANTH 23077, LACS 26380, RDIN 36380, CRES 26380, GLST 26380, LACS 36380, HIST 26318, HIPS 26380
RDIN 26384. Art and the Archive in Greater Latin America. 100 Units.
How and why do artists engage records of the past in their work? What are the politics of both creating archives and culling from them to visually render or represent the past? Focusing on artists, art-making, and archives in Greater Latin America (including the United States), this course will consider the process of collecting and creating in artistic production from the perspectives of both theory and practice. Students in the course will work directly with archival materials in Chicago and collaborate on contemporary artistic projects that consider issues of relevance to people and places of the Western Hemisphere.
Instructor(s): Diana Schwartz-Francisco Terms Offered: Course not offered in 24-25
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 26319, CHST 26384, ARTH 26384, LACS 26384, ARTV 20017
RDIN 26386. Greater Latin America. 100 Units.
What is "Latin America," who are "Latin Americans" and what is the relationship among and between places and people of the region we call Latin America, on the one hand, and the greater Latinx diaspora in the US on the other? This course explores the history of Latin America as an idea, and the cultural, social, political and economic connections among peoples on both sides of the southern and eastern borders of the United States. Students will engage multiple disciplinary perspectives in course readings and assignments and will explore Chicago as a crucial node in the geography of Greater Latin America. Some topics we will consider are: the origin of the concept of "Latin" America, Inter-Americanism and Pan-Americanism, transnational social movements and intellectual exchanges, migration, and racial and ethnic politics.
Instructor(s): Diana Schwartz Francisco Terms Offered: Course not offered in 24-25
Equivalent Course(s): LACS 36386, LACS 26386, CRES 26386, HIST 26321, ANTH 23003, RDIN 36386, SPAN 26386, SPAN 36386
RDIN 26600. Black Women Work: The labor of Black women in communities, families, and institutions. 100 Units.
This multidisciplinary course will explore the labor of Black women in three distinct arenas-communities, families, and institutions. Students will explore these areas through engaging with historical and contemporary narratives, research, and popular media, heavily drawing in a U.S. context, but not exclusively. Through an engagement of Black women in the U.S. labor force, this course will explore three questions. How has the labor of Black women contributed to the sustainability of communities, families, and institutions? What are the choices Black women make to engage and sustain their work? What is the future of the labor of Black women? Is the future one that is liberatory or not? Students will leave this course with an understanding of the ways intersectional experiences of oppression contribute to complex conditions and decision-making, that shape the labor of Black women, the function of certain labor decisions as sites of resistance, as well as the generative resources that support the professional success and well-being of Black women.
Terms Offered: TBD
Equivalent Course(s): GNSE 20127, SSAD 69600, SSAD 29600
RDIN 26635. Liberatory Violence. 100 Units.
From 18th century slave rebellions in the Americas to 20th and 21st century anticolonial revolutions, oppressed peoples' struggles for liberation have often incorporated violent tactics, even against non-combatants. This course examines anticolonial violence in light of the work of the Martiniquan revolutionary Frantz Fanon and some of his interlocutors. We study specific freedom movements: Nat Turner's slave rebellion, the Haitian and Algerian revolutions against French colonialism, Malcolm X and the Black Panthers' mobilization against white supremacy and police violence, and the ongoing Palestinian struggle against Zionist settler colonialism, ethnic cleansing, and apartheid. Throughout, we will pay attention to how revolutionaries evaluated the place of violence in their own movements, including religious criteria for justifiable and unjustifiable use of force.
Instructor(s): Alireza Doostdar Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): Graduate student enrollment by permission only. Please send one or two paragraphs explaining your interest and prior preparation.
Note(s): This course meets the SCSR Committee distribution requirement for Divinity students.
Equivalent Course(s): ANTH 36635, GLST 26635, AASR 46635, RDIN 46635, SSAD 26635, ANTH 26636, RLST 26635
RDIN 26674. The Global Black Panther Party. 100 Units.
In America, the Black Panther Party and its leaders, like Fred Hampton in Chicago, are famous for their revolutionary fight against white supremacy and their violent suppression by US government forces. But what does a Global Studies approach teach us about the Black Panthers? This seminar explores how the Black Panther Party's worldwide networks impacted global understandings of politics, race, and religion. Our readings examine a series of comparative case studies, including the Dalit Panther Party in India, the Mizrahi Black Panther Party in Israel, and the Polynesian Panthers in New Zealand. We analyze primary sources, such as the various Panther Parties' publications, their mainstream press coverage, and their pop cultural representations, like Ta-Nehisi Coates' Black Panther graphic novel and the film Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. In this course, students learn the global Black Panther Parties' roles in reshaping worldwide conceptions of race, caste, and religion through their encounters with the Nation of Islam, Hindu Nationalism, Zionism, and Indigenous rights. No prior knowledge or coursework is required.
Instructor(s): Andrew Kunze Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): ANTH 20537, GLST 26674, RLST 26674
RDIN 26770. Stories of Oceans and Archipelagos. 100 Units.
According to Fijian-Tongan writer Epeli Hau'ofa, "There is a world of difference between viewing the Pacific as 'islands in a far sea' and as 'a sea of islands.'" In this course, we will delve into the "world of difference" that exists between viewing islands as remote and insignificant, and considering them as crucial nodes in an ever-expanding planetary network. Simultaneously, we will consider the stakes of moving away from traditional representations of the ocean as a blank canvas for human movement, to instead consider it as a vibrant material and multispecies space. This course will encourage students to formulate their own approaches to cutting-edge debates in archipelagic theory and critical ocean studies, and to situate those debates within the broader fields of environmental humanities and postcolonial studies. Readings will be drawn from the Pacific Ocean, the Atlantic Ocean (including the Caribbean Sea), and the Indian Ocean.
Instructor(s): Nikhita Obeegadoo Terms Offered: Spring
Prerequisite(s): For students seeking French credit, FREN 20500 or equivalent.
Note(s): Taught in French.
Equivalent Course(s): CEGU 26770, CMLT 26771, FREN 26770
RDIN 26780. Caribbean Music, Performance, and Popular Culture in the Age of Precarity: 1990 to the Present. 100 Units.
This course explores the concept of precarity and its influence on artistic and cultural expressions within contemporary Caribbean popular culture, primarily from the 1990s to the present day. Precarity is broadly defined as the feeling or experience of instability resulting from various social, economic, political, and environmental factors, including structural adjustments, climate change (such as hurricanes and earthquakes), and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, among others. Particular emphasis is placed on the role of art in shaping popular responses to precarity, including significant events like mass protests, the Black Lives Matter and George Floyd protests, uprisings against the deportation of Haitians in the Dominican Republic, as well as interrelated international movements like #LifeinLeggings and #Metoo. The course delves into how Caribbean performance and popular music have engaged with these issues, with a focus on music genres like dancehall, wylers, soca, reggaetón, and the individual artistic works of Caribbean artists such as LaVaughn Belle, Helen Ceballos, Joiri Minaya, and others. These artists use their work to explore themes of precarity and to envision potential alternatives to the contemporary challenges of insecurity, touching on issues related to gender, sexuality, and race.
Instructor(s): Jessica Baker and Danielle Roper Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): SPAN 26780, SPAN 36780, RDIN 36780, MUSI 36780, MUSI 26780
RDIN 26922. Structuring Refuge: U.S. Refugee Policy and Resettlement Practice. 100 Units.
The UN estimates that there are 100 million forcibly displaced people around the world (UNHCR, 2022), with over 27 million refugees among them, but in 2022 only 57,500 refugees were resettled to third countries. Historically the U.S. has been the largest resettlement country, and in the U.S. refugees are entitled to federal, state, and local supports that other immigrants do without. At the same time, refugees in the U.S. are arguably subject to greater scrutiny and social control than most other un-incarcerated domestic populations. This course asks the central questions: How is refugee status politically constructed and experienced by individuals; what are the interrelationships between institutional actors and refugee policies, with what implications for service delivery; what does research tell us about the resettlement outcomes. and what drives these outcomes; and finally, what are the points of intervention for social workers in the resettlement process? We will address these questions by: 1. detangling the web of international and domestic policies that relate to the refugees' political identity, 2. focusing on U.S. resettlement, 3. analyzing resettlement policies and exploring the implications for social work practice targeted at integration, employment, and mental health, and 4. holding the inherent tension that can result from a dual focus on macro issues of scale and policy and micro issues related to the lived experience of human beings.
Equivalent Course(s): CHST 26922, CRES 26922, SSAD 26922, HMRT 46922, SSAD 46922
RDIN 26994. Anticolonial Worlding: Literature, Film, Thought. 100 Units.
This course explores anticolonial worldbuilding through literature, film, art, and philosophy. It focuses on the role of the cultural Cold War in shaping anticolonial aesthetics and politics during the twentieth century as well as its impact on our current political moment. The mid-century was characterized by an expansion of anticolonial festivals, exchanges, and congresses and marked by political crises and coalitional solidarity across Vietnam, Palestine, Cuba, Soviet and US imperial expansion, and the May 1968 student protests. We will explore how Pan-Arab, Pan-African, Non-Aligned/Global South, Marxist-Leninist, indigenous land rights, and racial justice movements mobilized class, gender, and language politics. Exploring anticolonial literature, film, and art across a multilingual and transnational archive we will ask how socialist and speculative realisms, engaged literature, third cinema, agitprop, and other aesthetic movements generated powerful internationalist imaginations and networks of resistance.
Instructor(s): Leah Feldman Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): RDIN 36994, REES 26994, GNSE 36994, ENGL 26994, CMLT 36994, NEHC 26994, CMLT 26994, GNSE 26994, HMRT 26994
RDIN 27543. Black and/or Human: On Humanism and Racialized Being. 100 Units.
What is it to be human and why does it matter? This course invites students to engage the question within the relation between theories of humanism and the histories of dehumanization as pertains to the racialization of Black people. Specific theories of the human have served as foundations of practices of dehumanization, and yet experiences of dehumanization have led to the development of new forms of humanism. In light of histories of enslavement and colonization and the related hierarchies of the human, what is the conceptual basis of the hierarchization within or exclusion from the category of the human? What does it feel like to be dehumanized and how does one adequately respond to such an experience? Some thinkers reject the concept while others reclaim it to inspire new existential outlooks on the world or political struggles. This course will explore the wide literature on these questions, supplementing written texts with other media such as film and music. We will focus on the implications of theories of humanism for the particularly human form of being, the pursuit of the good, and the organization of social life. Engagement in this course will be based on discussion, personal reflection, and the relation of course material to contemporary issues.
Instructor(s): Kevin Irakoze Terms Offered: Winter
Prerequisite(s): Prior coursework on Critical Race Theory or consent of instructor.
Equivalent Course(s): PHIL 27543
RDIN 27544. African Philosophy. 100 Units.
This course is a general survey of African philosophy. We will read a selection of writings from African philosophers, spanning geographical space and historical periods. The tendency for the study of African philosophy is to focus solely on post-colonial writings with texts originally written in French or English. Against this tendency, the course will introduce students to a wider chronology of African philosophy that traverses various historical eras and with an attention to the diversity of the original languages of primary texts (including Ge'ez, Arabic, German, and Latin). In addition to often-studied figures such as Paulin Hountondji and Kwame Gyekye, we will engage with such thinkers as Ahmad Bābā al-Timbukti, Augustine of Hippo, Zara Yaqob, James Africanus Beale Horton, and Anton Wilhelm Amo. Instruction will emphasize the close reading of primary texts within relevant historical contexts. Students will be encouraged to engage African philosophy on its own terms and in conversation with other philosophical traditions.
Instructor(s): Kévin Irakóze Terms Offered: Winter
Prerequisite(s): This course is introductory and does not require any prior coursework in philosophy.
Equivalent Course(s): PHIL 27544
RDIN 27600. Cinema in Africa. 100 Units.
This course examines Africa in film as well as films produced in Africa. It places cinema in Sub Saharan Africa in its social, cultural, and aesthetic contexts ranging from neocolonial to postcolonial, Western to Southern Africa, documentary to fiction, art cinema to TV, and includes films that reflect on the impact of global trends in Africa and local responses, as well as changing racial and gender identifications. We will begin with La Noire de... (1966), by the "father" of African cinema, Ousmane Sembene, contrasted w/ a South African film, African Jim (1960) that more closely resembles African American musical film, and anti-colonial and anti-apartheid films from Lionel Rogosin's Come Back Africa (1959) to Sarah Maldoror's Sambizanga, Sembene's Camp de Thiaroye (1984), and Jean Marie Teno's Afrique, Je te Plumerai (1995). The rest of the course will examine 20th and 21st century films such as I am a not a Witch and The wound (both 2017), which show tensions between urban and rural, traditional and modern life, and the implications of these tensions for women and men, Western and Southern Africa, in fiction, documentary and fiction film. (20th/21st)
Instructor(s): Loren Kruger Terms Offered: Spring
Prerequisite(s): One or more of the following: Intro to Film/ International Cinema AND/OR Intro to African Studies or equivalent
Equivalent Course(s): GNSE 28602, GNSE 48602, CMST 24201, CMLT 42900, ENGL 47600, CMST 34201, CMLT 22900, RDIN 37600, ENGL 27600
RDIN 27685. History Colloquium: Asian/Pacific Islander American History, 1850-2021. 100 Units.
Looking through a broad interdisciplinary lens, this course will examine the trajectory of Asians and Pacific Islanders in America. How did nineteenth- and early twentieth-century "sojourners" become "citizens"? What constituted the public's shift in perception of Asians from unassimilable alien to ostensible "model minority"? We will interrogate not only what it means to have been and to be an Asian in America but also what role APIAs have played in striving for a multiracial democracy. The history of anti-Asian violence will be traced from the mid-nineteenth century to the most recent hate crimes in the age of COVID. Conscious of the tendency to homogenize all Asians in the historical imagination, the course will be explicitly comparative, incorporating the diverse and disparate experiences of East, Southeast, and South Asians, as well as Pacific Islanders in America over time. We will, also, at times, investigate the histories of other ethnic/racial groups and compare their experiences to the Asian American experience.
Instructor(s): M. Briones Terms Offered: Spring
Prerequisite(s): Priority registration is given to History majors.
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 29685
RDIN 27708. Feeling Brown, Feeling Down. 100 Units.
Taking its cue from José Esteban Muñoz's 2006 essay in Signs, this course interrogates negative affective categories as they are expressed in US ethnic literature in the 20th and 21st centuries. As Muñoz argues, "depression has become one of the dominant affective positions addressed within the cultural field of contemporary global capitalism"; this course explores orientations such as depression, shame, sickness, and melancholy to think critically about racial formations amidst capital and how these are posed alongside literary questions. Primary texts may include Larsen, Ozeki, Morrison, and Okada; secondary texts may include Ahmed, Freud, Muñoz, Cheng, and Spillers.
Instructor(s): Megan Tusler Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): MAPH 47708, RDIN 47708, ENGL 27708, ENGL 47708, AMER 47708, AMER 27708
RDIN 28055. Queerness in the Shadow of Empire: Sexualities in the Modern Middle East. 100 Units.
Critics, from both the Right and the Left, claim that liberal sexual regimes are Western, imperial impositions onto Muslim and Middle Eastern societies. On the other hand, LGBTQ+ advocates claim that the restriction of sexuality is itself a colonial legacy. This class will delve into this debate by examining cutting edge empirical and theoretical work on Queer lives in the modern Middle East.
Instructor(s): E. Abelhadi Terms Offered: Autumn. Distribution: C;3
Prerequisite(s): Instructor consent
Note(s): Distribution: C;3
Equivalent Course(s): RDIN 38055, NEHC 38055, GNSE 20141, CHDV 28055, NEHC 28055, GNSE 30141, CHDV 38055
RDIN 28201. Art on My Mind. 100 Units.
A critic who began as an abstract painter, bell hooks (Gloria Watkins) was also a queer woman of color and among the most penetrating cultural observers in recent US history. This course centers on the close reading of hooks' 1995 book, Art on My Mind: Visual Politics, which fearlessly and sympathetically took as its subject a perennial conundrum wherein black artists and critics' relationship to art and aesthetics threatens to be subsumed by their efforts to challenge an art world bent on marginalization and exclusion. By hooks's own account, she designed this collection of essays and interviews to continue discussions of art and aesthetics begun in earlier work-specifically, to further engage the politics of feminism in conjunction with liberatory Black struggle. The result did a great deal more than this already considerable feat of intersectional study. Art on My Mind demonstrates then-new, still-woefully-underutilized means to think about visual art, write about visual art, and create actual spaces for 'dialogue across boundaries.' Art on My Mind, then, remains a model for confronting what addles critical consideration of the work of artists and cultural producers in all groups marginalized by structures of domination. This makes it also a book about transgression, and an excellent object to debate at a moment when generative meetings across boundaries seem increasingly unlikely.
Instructor(s): D. English Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): ARTH 38201, ARTV 38201, ARTV 28201, ARTH 28201, RDIN 38201
RDIN 28300. Poéticas Afrocaribeñas. 100 Units.
En este curso haremos una revisión panorámica de la producción poética afrocaribeña desde sus primeras expresiones conocidas en el siglo XIX hasta el presente. ¿Qué condiciones culturales y políticas han dado cuenta de su surgimiento y desarrollo? ¿Qué sistemas tropológicos y repertorios temáticos la han caracterizado? ¿En qué medida esta poesía ha sido vehículo para pensar las identidades raciales de la zona e instrumento de resistencia en coyunturas de violencia extrema y cuáles han sido sus disidencias? Entre los materiales a estudiar se encuentra la obra de sujetos esclavizados y de afrodescendientes libres victimizados por el colonialismo esclavista (entre ellos Juan Francisco Manzano y Plácido); las experimentaciones vanguardistas de Nicolás Guillén y Luis Palés Matos y de sus seguidores Emilio Ballagas y Manuel del Cabral; y las reformulaciones feministas de esta tradición avanzadas por poetas contemporáneas tales como la cubana Nancy Morejón y la puertorriqueña Mayra Santos Febres.
Instructor(s): Agnes Lugo-Ortiz Terms Offered: Autumn
Note(s): Taught in Spanish.
Equivalent Course(s): LACS 28300, SPAN 28300
RDIN 29000. Cinema and the Speculative Archive: Theory & Practice Seminar. 100 Units.
Recent years have seen the flourishing of work by experimental filmmakers that imaginatively engages with absences in the historical record, especially around the visual history of African Americans. How might scholarship adapt methodologies from these creative practices? How can scholarly methods, in turn, inform art making (as the formation of another kind of history)? Engaging theory and practice, this course investigates these questions through-and against-African American media history's precarious archival condition. Students interested in enrolling should contact Professor Field at anfield@uchicago.edu.
Instructor(s): Allyson Nadia Field & Christopher Harris Terms Offered: Spring
Note(s): Not offered in 2024-25.
Equivalent Course(s): RDIN 39000, CCCT 39000, CMST 39000, CMST 29000, CHST 29000
RDIN 29030. Islam, Race and Decoloniality. 100 Units.
This course explores western perspectives, attitudes and representations of Muslims and Islam from medieval European thought, through liberal colonial encounters to contemporary media and political discourses. Students will examine the intersection of race and religion as it applies to the construction of Muslim identity and alterity in the Western imagination. We will explore the remarkable consistency across centuries of the threatening, menacing, barbaric and uncivilized Muslim "Other". The course centers around these Orientalist constructions and will explore the power structures, colonial modalities, epistemological frameworks, and ideological assumptions that perpetuate the racialization of Islam and Muslims within the United States and abroad. This course ultimately aims to uncover potentials for resistance, recovery and renewal through the politics and praxis of decoloniality. Students will gain familiarity with decolonial theory and practices, as well as the important project of 'epistemic delinking' as it is framed by contemporary scholars intent on challenging, possibly undoing and remapping the Muslim experience within global liberal political modernity.
Instructor(s): Maliha Chishti Terms Offered: Winter
Note(s): This course meets the SCSR Committee distribution requirement for Divinity students.
Equivalent Course(s): RDIN 39030, ANTH 39030, NEHC 39030, KNOW 39030, RLST 29030, ISLM 39030, ANTH 29030, NEHC 29030
RDIN 29108. Atlantic Empires. 100 Units.
This course explores classic and emerging scholarship on European empires and colonies in the early modern Atlantic world (c. 1400s-1800s). We will examine the rise and consolidation of empires and colonies through comparative, trans, and circum-Atlantic approaches. Additionally, the course will pay particular attention to the perspectives of colonized peoples (such as enslaved and freed people of African descent, Creole populations, and Indigenous peoples). Geographically, the course will span the Atlantic World, including regions such as the Caribbean, West Africa, Latin America, and North America. Topics we will cover include the formation of empires and colonial systems; Atlantic slavery; the emergence of Atlantic ideologies of race; gender, and kinship; knowledge formation, environment, and disease; anti-slavery struggles, and the "Age of Revolution."
Instructor(s): Lyons, Deirdre Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 29108, ANTH 39208, MAPS 39108, RDIN 39108, HIST 39108
RDIN 29109. Sex, Gender, and Kinship: Colonial Perspectives. 100 Units.
This course analyzes the contested relationships between gender, sexuality, kinship, and western colonialism from the early modern period through the twentieth century. Drawing on historical case studies, feminist theory, and postcolonial studies, this course will cover a broad range of empires and colonies to explore the mutually constitutive relationship between colonization and ideologies and practices of gender, sex, and kinship. Analyzing case studies predominately from the Atlantic World (with attention to colonies elsewhere), we will explore topics such as the emergence of colonial gender ideologies, gender and colonial governance, family life and kinship strategies, the intersectionality of gender and sexuality with race and class, queerness and queer lives, the politics of sex work and reproduction, and gendered migrations across empires.
Instructor(s): Lyons, Deirdre Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): SOCI 30346, HIST 39109, GNSE 23174, ANTH 39109, GNSE 39109, MAPS 39109, HIST 29109, RDIN 39109, ANTH 29109
RDIN 29117. Theater and Performance in Latin America. 100 Units.
What is performance? How has it been used in Latin America and the Caribbean? This course is an introduction to theatre and performance in Latin America and the Caribbean that will examine the intersection of performance and social life. While we will place particular emphasis on performance art, we will examine some theatrical works. We ask: how have embodied practice, theatre and visual art been used to negotiate ideologies of race, gender and sexuality? What is the role of performance in relation to systems of power? How has it negotiated dictatorship, military rule, and social memory? Ultimately, the aim of this course is to give students an overview of Latin American performance including blackface performance, indigenous performance, as well as performance and activism.
Instructor(s): Danielle Roper Terms Offered: Course not offered in 24-25.
Prerequisite(s): Undergraduates must be in their third or fourth year.
Note(s): Taught in English.
Equivalent Course(s): TAPS 38479, LACS 39117, GNSE 39117, SPAN 29117, TAPS 28479, RDIN 39117, LACS 29117, SPAN 39117, GNSE 29117
RDIN 29427. Fashion, Empire, Capitalism. 100 Units.
Clothing, famously termed the "social skin", mediates the space between individuals and societies. Whether articulating personal taste or reflecting a collective identity, dress can be a powerful symbol-both historically and in the contemporary world. Worn against the skin, clothing is both intimate and connects us to a global, multi-billion-dollar system that employs roughly one in every ten people worldwide. This course addresses the multivalent history of dress from early modern imperial encounters in the Atlantic World, to anti-colonial movements in South Asia, to the nineteen-forties American Zoot Suit Riots-demonstrating the ways that clothes are connected to gendered and racial categories, political projects, and the shape of global capitalism. Students will analyze case studies from Malabar to Manchester, colonial Lima to revolutionary France, nineteenth-century Zanzibar to nineteen-eighties New York. Examining the history of dress and its global interconnections necessitates an interdisciplinary approach; therefore, students will combine historical scholarship with theoretical frameworks from the anthropology of dress and methodologies from material culture studies to analyze sources ranging from museum objects to films, haute couture fashion to flip-flops. Finally, this course sheds light on historic interconnections and the development of fashion systems, asks what ways these continue to animate our contemporary world, and imagines new possibilities for the future.
Instructor(s): K. Hickerson Terms Offered: Autumn
Note(s): Assignments: material analyses, essays, and an original research project.
Equivalent Course(s): GNSE 29427, HIST 29427
RDIN 29634. African Cities and Urbanism. 100 Units.
This course looks at urbanism and urbanization in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries through a focus on selected cities in East, Southern, and West Africa. Beginning with existing trade routes and economic centers onto which some colonial cities were mapped, the course explores waves of migration over different historical periods, infrastructural imaginaries and the policies that shaped them, informal and formal economies, and cultural expressions and representations of life and living in the city. We will draw from a diversity of sources including fiction, non-fiction, architecture, town planning, photography, and the arts to examine political, social, economic, and topographical features and forces that drove the growth and development of each city studied, and also to reflect on commonalities that emerged between cities across different regions of the continent.
Instructor(s): T. Thipe Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): CEGU 29634, HIST 29634
RDIN 29661. Colloquium: Digital Humanities/Digital History. 100 Units.
The modern era has been punctuated by episodes, some lasting centuries, of exploitation, expropriation, and genocide. This course will address how people and institutions have sought to grapple with the legacies of the extreme violence that polities, societies, and individuals have inflicted on each other through the collection and display of the material, documentary, and testimonial fragments left behind. Focusing on the archives and museums dedicated to the genocide of Indigenous peoples, slavery, and the Holocaust, we will discuss the following questions: What is an object of trauma? What makes its way to a depository of traumatic events, what does not, and why? What do archivists and curators hope to accomplish? What stories can be told, given that so many of the voices of victims are irretrievable? What happens to a remnant of trauma once it is in the custody of a museum or an archive? What is the relationship between archives of trauma and their exhibition? We will consider the traumatic remains that have been deposited both in specialized and in general archives and museums. This seminar-style class will involve intensive discussion of primary sources and interdisciplinary scholarship. We will also be going on study trips to archives and museums around Chicago, such as the Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center, the DuSable Black History Museum & Education Center, and The Mitchell Museum of the American Indian.
Instructor(s): L. Auslander & T. Goldsmith Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 29661, JWSC 29661
RDIN 29700. Readings in Race, Diaspora, and Indigeneity. 100 Units.
This is a general reading and research course for independent study not related to the BA thesis/capstone project. To register, students are required to submit the College Reading and Research Course Form. May be taken for P/F grading with consent of instructor. With prior approval, students who are majoring/minoring in RDI may use this course to satisfy program requirements.
Instructor(s): staff Terms Offered: Autumn
Spring
Winter
RDIN 29800. BA Thesis/Capstone Seminar. 100.00 Units.
This course is designed to introduce students to a range of research methods and to help determine which method(s) would fit a research thesis or capstone project focusing on topics related to race, diaspora, and/or indigeneity. The seminar functions as a research workshop in which students identify a research topic, develop a research question and explore a range of methods for their research thesis or capstone project. Class of 2024: Students will attend this seminar both in Autumn and Winter quarters of their fourth-year. In Autumn quarter the seminar meets weekly. In Winter quarter the seminar meets every other week. Class of 2025 and beyond: Students will attend this seminar in Spring of their third-year and Autumn of their fourth-year. In Spring quarter, the seminar meets weekly. In Autumn quarter the seminar meets every other week. In both cases, the seminar spans two quarters, and students may enroll in the course the quarter of their choosing.
Instructor(s): Staff Terms Offered: Autumn
Spring
Winter
Prerequisite(s): Consent of instructor.
Equivalent Course(s): CRES 29800
RDIN 29900. BA Essay / Capstone Project. 100 Units.
Students may register for RDIN 29900 during any quarter of their fourth year. Use the College Reading and Research Course Form to register. Must be taken for a quality grade.
Instructor(s): staff Terms Offered: Autumn
Spring
Winter
RDIN 29943. Exhibiting the Art of the Ancient Americas. 100 Units.
This course will consider the history of exhibiting the art of the ancient Americas from the colonial period until the present. From the European Wunderkammer to the development of the modern museum, we will consider how colonial institutions and categories shaped the reception of visually elaborated objects from past Indigenous cultures. Paying close attention to the choice of objects presented in exhibitions as well as to the museographical decisions that shaped their presentation-to the extent that they can be reconstructed from archival materials-we will explore how exhibitions both reflected and shaped changing understandings of the ancient American past.
Instructor(s): C. Brittenham Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): Consent Only
Equivalent Course(s): ARTH 29943, ARTH 39943, RDIN 39943
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