ENROLL

Nancy Cho

This overview of the "interdisciplinary discipline" of American Studies will focus on the ways American Studies engages with and departs from other scholarly fields of inquiry. We will study the stories of those who have been marginalized in the social, political, cultural, and economic life of the United States due to their class, race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, religion, citizenship, and level of ability. We will explore contemporary American Studies concerns like racial and class formation, the production of space and place, the consumption and circulation of culture, and transnational histories.

Sophomore Priority

Waitlist for Juniors and Seniors: AMST 115.WL0 (Synonym 59073)

Elizabeth McKinsey

Through cultural manifestations--literature, painting, movies, radio, historic preservation, and music--we will trace progress from shock and despair to hope in the ‘30s and see how Americans of all races and classes coped with the disruptions and opportunities of economic cataclysm, political shifts, new social programs and expectations, and technology. Materials will include texts on the New Deal, labor, the Great Migration and race relations; fiction, essays, and plays by Steinbeck, Nathaniel West, James Agee, Thornton Wilder, Meridel LeSueur, Hurston, and Wright; popular movies and music; and photography, painting, Art Deco, and the 1939 World’s Fair.

Adriana Estill

As Arlene Dávila points out in Latinos Inc, Latinidad—the term that names a set of presumably common attributes that connects Latinxs in the U.S.—emerges in part from communities but, importantly, is developed heavily by the media, advertising, and other political and social institutions, including academia. In this course we consider how ideas and imaginings of who Latinxs are and what Latinidad is develop within political spaces (the electorate, the census), in local places, and through various media, including television, advertising, and music. We will consider how individual writers and artists contribute to the conversation. Throughout, we will engage with social and cultural theories about racial formation, gender, and sexuality.

Prerequisite: American Studies 115 or instructor consent

David Tompkins, Yansi Perez, Pamela Feldman-Savelsberg,

This course will grapple with the issue of immigration and migration from both global and interdisciplinary perspectives. Through several different case studies (including such regions as the Americas, Africa, Europe, and more), taught by faculty from different departments, students will gain a deeper understanding of one of the burning issues of our time.

George Shuffelton, Austin Mason

As readers, we rarely consider the technologies, practices, and transactions that deliver us our texts. This course introduces students to the material study of writing, manuscripts, books, printing, and digital media. It attends to the processes of copying, revision, editing, and circulation; familiarizes students with the disciplines of descriptive bibliography, paleography, and textual criticism; and introduces the principles of editing, in both print and electronic media. It offers hands-on practice in most of these areas.

Cathy Yandell

Keep up your French while learning about current issues in France, as well as world issues from a French perspective. Class meets once a week for an hour. Requirements include reading specific sections of leading French newspapers, (Le Monde, Libération, etc.) on the internet, and then meeting once a week to exchange ideas over coffee with a small group of students.

Prerequisite: French 204 or instructor approval

Sophomore Priority

Waitlist for Juniors and Seniors: FREN 210.WL0 (Synonym 59280)

Juliane Schicker

What was life like under “actually existing socialism?” What films, books, music, and other media did people in the German Democratic Republic (or East Germany) consume and how did they cope with their country’s dictatorship? How can the experiences of people—particularly women—living in the GDR provide useful context for contemporary socio-political issues in the United States and beyond? We will discuss topics such as gender equality, education, health care, and queer life in the GDR. Taught in German.

Prerequisite: German 204 or equivalent

Susannah Ottaway

Seungjoo Yoon

This survey course of twentieth-century China examines how ordinary people interacted with Mao, the chief architect of Communist China. We will scrutinize social change over time by looking at patterns of contestations and negotiations between Mao and his rivals among peasants, workers, students, women, intellectuals, ethnic minorities, and local cadres. Topics include the operation of the new democracy, social classification and distribution, food and famine politics, the changing meaning of family and education, body and biomedicine, mass science and archaeological projects, and Mao’s exhibition culture. Students will engage with images, memoirs, autobiographies, interviews, oral histories, films, “garbage materials,” and archival sources.

Jennifer L Schaefer

During the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries, immigration to Latin America rapidly increased and immigrant communities responded to and reshaped national identities, cultural production, political movements, and social structures. This course analyzes multiple immigrant experiences, including Eastern European Jewish immigration to Argentina, Japanese immigration to Brazil, and Middle Eastern immigration to Mexico. This course focuses on the experiences produced by the voluntary immigration that increased after the end of the transatlantic slave system and forced migration. It considers how Afro-Latin American identities and the legacies of slavery intersected with narratives around citizenship, nationality, ethnicity, and race.

Thabiti Willis

Antony Adler

A two-credit course in which students work with faculty oversight to complete a variety of public history projects with community partners. Students will work on a research project requiring them to identify and analyze primary sources, draw conclusions from the primary source research, and share their research with the appropriate audience in an appropriate form. We meet once a week at Carleton to ensure students maintain professional standards and strong relationships in their work. Potential projects include educational programming, historical society archival work, and a variety of local history opportunities. 

Extra Time Required

George Vrtis

Serena Zabin

In the first years of the United States, men and women of all races had to learn what it meant to live in the nation created by the U.S. Constitution. This class will focus on the American attempts to form a more perfect union, paying close attention to the place of slavery, Native dispossession, sexuality, and politics during the years 1787-1840. Throughout the course we will examine the ways in which the politics and protests of the early Republic continue to shape the current United States.

Mike E Jirik

The development of the modern world through the lens of Black revolutions is the analytical focus of this class. This course challenges eurocentric narratives of the development of the modern world and instead centers critiques of western civilization from what Cedric Robinson calls the Black Radical tradition and its liberatory project. Black resistance to the development of the Americas and the system of racial capitalism was continuous and evolved over time. Using a series of Black revolutions in the Atlantic World during the age of slavery as case studies, we will study historical manifestations of Black radicalism and use them to theorize new forms of knowledge, history, philosophy, and culture.

Victoria Morse

Extra time is required for a one-time map show in the library during 6a which we will schedule at the beginning of term.

Adeeb Khalid

Antony Adler

This course examines the growth of modern science since the Renaissance with an emphasis on the Scientific Revolution, the development of scientific methodology, and the emergence of new scientific disciplines. How might a history of science focused on scientific networks operating within society, rather than on individual scientists, change our understanding of “genius,” “progress,” and “scientific impartiality?” We will consider a range of scientific developments, treating science both as a body of knowledge and as a set of practices, and will gauge the extent to which our knowledge of the natural world is tied to who, when, and where such knowledge has been produced and circulated.

William North

In a series of letters written after the abrupt and violent ending of their sexual relationship, Peter Abelard, a controversial and creative teacher and philosopher, and Heloise, a respected abbess and thinker, explored central questions about the nature of gender roles, love, authority, and the place of reason in human affairs. In other works, Abelard articulated new approaches to ethical judgment (the primacy of intention), the status of universals, and the potential of logical argument to foster interreligious dialogue. Through their use of dialectic, his works modelled new approaches to metaphysics, ontology, anthropology, and the nature and use of authorities. Through close reading and discussion of these works and those of select contemporaries, this course will explore the key philosophical, social, and institutional dynamics of a moment of profound change in medieval thought and culture.

1st 5 weeks

William North

Acknowledged by contemporaries as one of the leading intellects of her time, Christine de Pizan (ca. 1364-ca. 1431) was an author of unusual literary range, resilience, and perceptiveness. In addition to composing romances, poetry, quasi-autobiographical works, royal biography, and political theory, she became one of the most articulate critics of the patriarchy and misogyny of her world and a critical voice in defense of female capability. Using Christine's writings along with other contemporary documents as a foundation, we will explore perceptions of gender, the analysis and resistance to misogyny, the ethics love and personal relations, and the exercise of patriarchal power (and resistance to it) in domestic and public spheres in late medieval France.

Serena Zabin

In the junior year, majors must take this six-credit reading and discussion course taught each year by different members of the department faculty. The course is also required for the History minor. The general purpose of History 298 is to help students reach a more sophisticated understanding of the nature of history as a discipline and of the approaches and methods of historians. A major who is considering off-campus study in the junior year should consult with their adviser on when to take History 298.

Prerequisite: At least two six credit courses in History (excluding HIST 100 and Independents) at Carleton.

Required for History majors and minors

Mike E Jirik

This course examines the historical relationship between Black intellectuals and the university. We will examine the juxtaposition between institutionalized white supremacy in universities and the work of Black students and faculty as well as the radical implications of Black knowledge production. Beginning with the writings of Anna Julia Cooper and W.E.B. Du Bois, the course traces how Black intellectuals have conceptualized the political utility of higher education and its liberatory potential over the course of the twentieth century. Emphases include the significance of Historically Black Colleges and Universities, the advent of Black Studies departments, and the role of Black Studies today and in the future.

Thabiti Willis

This course deepens understanding of the causes, manifestations, and implications of warfare in modern Africa by highlighting African perspectives on colonialism's legacies. Drawing from cases in South Africa, Uganda, Kenya, Algeria, and Sudan, the course questions whether Britain's policy of indirect rule, France's direct rule, and South Africa's apartheid rule were variants of despotism and how colonial rule shaped possibilities of resistance, reform, and repression. Students also will learn how different historical actors participated in and experienced war as well as produce an original research paper that thoughtfully uses primary and secondary resources. 

Laurence Cooper, Alan Rubenstein

Laurence Cooper, Alan Rubenstein

Walther Maradiegue

In this course, we will read, discuss, and engage with recent scholarship on colonialism, indigenous and communitarian feminism, and some of the issues and movements of indigenous peoples in the Andean region. We will examine the colonial and twentieth-century origins of the movements for indigenous rights in the Andes and seek an understanding of the varied meanings of indigeneity across time. We will emphasize the comparative study of Indigenous-State relations across the Andean countries, and highlight the role of indigenous women and other gender identities for the development of native agendas for autonomy and sovereign rights. Our primary materials will mainly focus on literature and visual arts authored by indigenous artists. Other readings will draw from scholarship in history, anthropology, and Indigenous Studies. This course will be taught in English.

Yansi Perez

This colloquium will explore specific issues or works in Latin American Studies through discussion of a common reading, public presentation, project, and/or performance that constitute the annual Latin American Forum. Students will be required to attend two meetings during the term to discuss the common reading or other material and must attend, without exception. All events of the Forum which take place during fourth week of spring term (on Friday afternoon and Saturday morning). A short integrative essay or report will be required at the end of the term. Intended as capstone for the Latin American Studies minor.

Kevin Beacham, Andy Flory

This course will consider the musical elements of early of hip-hop. Using guided listening and student responses, we will focus on a single album each week through the term, traversing the entire deace of the 1980s. 

Eddie E O'Byrn

Leaders who face tragedy and violence inspire others with their personal narratives of self-creation and meaning-making. This course invites students to investigate the relationship between the subjective meaning-making experience and various manifestations of the ‘problem of evil’. We will read a variety of texts that highlight narrative experiences of tragedy, self-transformation, and models of leadership as empowerment. The course approaches these topics from a variety of philosophical lenses including: Existentialism, Feminist Philosophy, Africana Philosophy, Queer Studies, Disability Studies, and Religious Studies. The texts of this course will include: Book of Job, Victor Frankl’s Man’s Search For Meaning, Lucy Delaney’s From the Darkness Cometh the Light, Susan Brison’s Aftermath: Violence and the Remaking of the Self, and Eli Clare’s Exile and Pride.

Douglas B Marshall

In this course we aim to understand the metaphysics and the theory of cognition developed by Immanuel Kant in his monumental work, Critique of Pure Reason. Some of the main questions Kant addresses: How does the mind represent the world? Can we distinguish the way things appear to us from the way they are in themselves? What are space and time?  Does every event have a cause? Is it possible to have knowledge independent of experience? We will think about these questions and attempt to shed light on Kant’s systematic answers to them by means of careful reading and interpretation of Kant’s text.  

Anna Moltchanova

Jason Decker

Conspiracy theories hit us where we are intellectually most vulnerable. Like global skeptical scenarios that occupy and perplex philosophers, they suggest a gap between appearance and reality; they suggest that we have formed our beliefs on the basis of massively misleading evidence. Often, they concern possibilities that we have never even considered, let alone properly assessed. The volume of evidence and arguments that conspiracy theorists offer for their theories can be vast and intricate. Yet it seems that, in some cases, we are perfectly within our epistemic rights in dogmatically ignoring or avoiding this volume of evidence and arguments. This won't do as a general policy, though, for history forces us to admit that sometimes conspiracy theorists are right. Theories like Bayesian formal epistemology that seem well-suited to guide us through these difficult waters often make our situation even more puzzling and problematic. To make fresh headway on these issues, this course will look critically at how philosophers, psychologists and political scientists have approached conspiracy theories and conspiracy theorists. We will consider topics such as cognitive dsyfunction and bias, epistemic trust, peer disagreement, the puzzle of misleading evidence, dogmatism, and formal theories of probabilistic reasoning. Along the way we will have occasion to consider many strange and fascinating conspiracy theories---a few of which have turned out to be true.

Allison Murphy

What is a good human life? Who is a good person? Virtue ethicists think about these questions in terms of two central ideas. Virtues, such as justice or courage, make us a certain type of person (they give us a certain character). Wisdom (phronesis) enables good judgments about how to act in particular situations. How should we think about the relationship between virtues and wisdom? How does being wise differ from being (merely) intelligent or clever? These will be central questions for us to reflect on as we read several core texts from the contemporary tradition of virtue ethics. We will also spend some time on related concerns, such as what view of human nature, if any, is presupposed by virtue ethics, and how we should understand the relationship between being virtuous and being happy.

Laurence Cooper

Laurence Cooper

This course will be devoted to close study of Tocqueville's Democracy in America, which has plausibly been described as the best book ever written about democracy and the best book every written about America. Tocqueville uncovers the myriad ways in which equality, including especially the passion for equality, determines the character and the possibilities of modern humanity. Tocqueville thereby provides a political education that is also an education toward self-knowledge.

Mihaela Czobor-Lupp

Stoic philosophers saw themselves as citizens of the world (cosmopolitans), a position that Kant enthusiastically revived in the eighteenth century. After the end of the Cold War cosmopolitanism was back in fashion. Even the favorite drink of the girls on TV's Sex and the City was called Cosmopolitan. However, today it seems that nationalism and xenophobia are making a powerful comeback. Is cosmopolitanism dead? This course explores the promises and dangers of globalization, as well as the inexhaustible attraction of nationalism. The attempt is to show that the escape from the unsettling complexity of globalization is not within tribalistic nationalism, but rather in the cosmopolitan transformation of identity, as well as of the sense of being at home and of belonging.

Kristin Bloomer

How can we best understand the role of religion in the world today, and how should we interpret the meaning of religious traditions -- their texts and practices -- in history and culture? This class takes an exciting tour through selected themes and puzzles related to the fascinating and diverse expressions of religion throughout the world. From politics and pop culture, to religious philosophies and spiritual practices, to rituals, scriptures, gender, religious authority, and more, students will explore how these issues emerge in a variety of religions, places, and historical moments in the U.S. and across the globe.

Asuka Sango

Elizabeth F Dolfi

Passions, pleasures, ecstasies, and desires bear on religion and sexuality alike, but intersections and tensions between these two domains are complicated. This course wagers that bringing the hotly contested categories “queer” and “religion” together will illuminate the diverse range of bodies, activities, and identities that inhabit both. The course explores religion and sexuality in Modern Western thought, erotic elements in religious texts and art, and novels and narratives of religious belief and practice in queer lives. The course combines concrete cases with theoretical tools that queer and feminist scholars have used to analyze religious and sexual communities, bodies, and identities.

Elizabeth F Dolfi

The Bible says that “the love of money is the root of all evil,” but the history of Christianity and mammon contains multitudes – voluntary poverty and acquisitive empires, radical utopian communities and the blessings of business, peace movement feasts and prosperity gospels, colonialism and humanitarian neo-liberalism, and commodity fetishism for Christ. This course will use a breadth of historical case studies alongside critical theories of modernity and capitalism to explore Christianity’s relationship with wealth, from pre-modern economic theologies, to faith in modern industrial capitalism and Christianity’s vexed entanglements with late capitalist ideologies and practices.

Caleb S Hendrickson

This class examines the ethical principles that often guide decision-making in health care. It focuses on principles espoused by many religious and humanistic traditions, within the context of a modern, pluralistic society. Using plentiful case studies, we consider a number of issues in bioethics, including assisted suicide; maternal-fetal relations; artificial reproduction, including human cloning; the use of human subjects in research; health care justice and reform; triage and allocation of sparse medical resources; and public health issues surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic.

Kristin Bloomer

Love. Emptiness. Union. Ecstasy. These are some ways that humans have described “mystical experience,” often defined as an immediate encounter with God, ultimate reality, or the absolute—however those may be construed. This course interrogates “mysticism” across traditions, with close attention to issues of gender, sexuality, and race, through studying a number of famous female and male mystics across historical periods. Questions include: What, exactly, is mysticism? Is it gendered? Is it just the firing of a bunch of neurons? What is the role of the body in mystical practice? Are mystics critics of institutionalized religion? Radicals for social justice?

Michael McNally

Michael McNally

Palmar Alvarez-Blanco

Are you interested in talking about current news while practicing your oral skills in Spanish? Have you ever considered participating in a radio program? This course is an excellent way to keep in touch with your Spanish while collaborating with “El Super Barrio Latino” a radio program conducted by the Latinx community of Northfield. In each program we will explore international and domestic news and we will interview people in our community. Relying on international newspapers, students will discuss common topics and themes representing a wide array of regions. (Language of conversation is Spanish)

Prerequisite: Spanish 204 or equivalent