Pennsylvania State University-Penn State Berks · Courses
AMST
90 courses with the subject AMST, each shown exactly as we captured it from the college's catalog, with every element we hold. Where the wording looks broken, that is our reading of the catalog, not the college's text.
AMST 100Introduction to American Studies3
AMST 100 offers a broad-ranging introduction to American cultural history and the discipline of American Studies. The course examines what "America" means and what it means to be "American" within the context of specific topics that may include Social Class and American Dream, Nature and Wilderness, Consumer Culture, Holidays and Festivals, Childhood and Education, Youth Culture, Popular Amusements, Racial Identity, and the Immigrant Experience. All iterations of the course employ the interdisciplinary method of American Studies to explore the chosen topic in a holistic way. Students study not only history but also art, literature, politics, folklife, and film. American Studies 100 is a requirement for the American Studies major and minor, and offers students valuable experience in critical thinking and writing. Non-American Studies majors and minors may use this course to fulfill General Education or Bachelor of Arts requirements. The course also serves as preparation for more advanced courses in American Studies, American Literature, and American History.
A study of selected attempts to identify and interpret movements and patterns in American culture. AMST100Y Introduction to American Studies (3) (GH)(BA) This course meets the Bachelor of Arts degree requirements. AMST 100 is a broad-ranging introduction to American culture. While specific topics may vary from class to class, the course examines what "America" means and what it means to be "American." These issues will be examined form a variety of perspectives: literature, history, politics, film, race, gender, and geography. The course is often broken down into discussion sections to facilitate student discussion of the material and the lecture. Requirements generally include community service projects, and students will be evaluated on essay tests, papers, journal entries and attendance. AMST 100 (or AMST 105) is a requirement for the American Studies major and minor, and offers students valuable experience in critical thinking, analysis, and writing. Non-American Studies majors and minors may use this course to fulfill a general education or Bachelor of Arts-Humanities credits. The course offers students a broad introduction to American culture, also serves as preparation for more advanced courses in American studies, American literature, and American history, in particular.
Introduction to aspects of masculinities and manhood in America. This course examines aspects of masculinities and manhood in America from a variety of perspectives. It views American manhood through the lens of gender, and presents ideas on the ways that issues of masculinity and sexuality enter, or have entered, discourses of politics, literature, and medicine, among others. It takes up discussion of the varieties of masculinities in American experience across historical periods, regions, racial groups, and ethnicities. Students will view these forms of masculinities in different media, including film, art, folklore, media, advertising, and literature.
Selected aspects of the role of women in United States history and culture from colonial to modern times. AMST 104 / WMNST 104 Women and the American Experience (3) (GH;US)(BA) This course meets the Bachelor of Arts degree requirements. AMST 104 / WMNST 104 is a broad-ranging introduction to women in American history and culture from colonial to modern times. While specific topics may vary from class to class, this survey course examines the history of American women, paying particular attention to issues of race and diversity and examining how American women's cultural, political, and economic roles have changed over time. Major themes and topics might include: work and the sexual division of labor; civic activities and the political dimensions of women's historical experience; political power and processes in American history; the role of family and personal life; women as active makers of history in the full range of national experience; the influences of art, literature, popular culture, technology, geography, regionalism, religion, immigration, and other sociological and cultural factors. This course offers students valuable experience in critical thinking, analysis, and writing and a broad introduction to American women's issues, and so serves as preparation for more advanced courses in American studies, American literature, American women's history, and women's and gender studies. AMST 104 / WMNST 104 counts towards the American Studies major and minor and the Women's Studies major and minor.
AMST 105 / ENGL 105 offers a survey of popular culture and folklife in America's past and present. The course synthesizes a broad scope of materials from areas such as literature, movies, television, sports, amusement parks, music, media, and advertising. While selected topics for readings, lectures, and discussion vary from class to class, all courses focus on a critical examination of a variety of popular and folk cultures in order to produce an enriched understanding of America, its past, its diverse cultures, its evolving values and traditions, and its inhabitants. To meet this goal, popular and folk cultures will be examined from a variety of perspectives, including race, gender, and class. AMST 105 may be taken by students pursuing the American Studies major; for them, the course provides preparation for more advanced courses in American folklore, American literature, and American cultural history. Non-American Studies students may use this course to fulfill the general education requirement (GH). Students will receive the US designation for this course, and it meets the Bachelor of Arts degree requirements.
Mass communications in the United States: organization, role, content, and effects of newspapers, magazines, television, radio, books, and films. The Mass Media and Society is an overview of the interaction between mass media and society. By drawing from selected topics, the course pays particular attention to the social influences (e.g., economics, politics, technology, law and culture) that shape media messages. Among others, the course examines the nature of media controllers as well as the character of users and consumers of media products. By so doing, students are informed about the overall structure and scope of the mass media and led to understand the power and influences associated with media messages and practices. By the end of the semester, each student should have a better understanding of the dynamic nature of the mass media in an information society.
This course provides an interdisciplinary introduction to the study of Latinas and Latinos in the United States. The course includes a historical overview of the major events in the U.S. Southwest, Mexico, the Caribbean, and Central and South America that led to the creation of Latina/o communities in this country. Students will examine the formation of racial and class hierarchies within U.S. Latina/o communities; the processes of (international and regional) migration; gendered hierarchies and responses to sexism; and the complexities of U.S. Latina/o identity.
ENGL 134 serves as a survey of and introduction to strands of American comedy and satire from its eighteenth- and nineteenth-century roots through its many directions in the twentieth century. Students will read works from multiple literary genres-poetry, novel, short story, drama, and essay, for instance. The course will help students to understand how both formal and contextual considerations shape American comedy through the centuries. Authors under consideration will vary from class to class, but selected texts will represent many variations of comedy embodied in American literature and present across an evolving media landscape. ENGL 134 is a General Education course in the General Humanities domain. ENGL 134 can also be used as a requirement for the English major and minor.
AMST 135Alternative Voices in American Literature3
English 135 considers literature from diverse backgrounds (for example, Latinato, African-American, Asian-American, Native-American, Jewish, Muslim, working-class, lesbian, gay, or women's literature, or any other configuration that expresses an alternative literary heritage to traditionally canonized texts). Course content will subsequently vary.
The course aims to cast light on contemporary religious life in the United States by looking at the history of American religion. The course will provide students with a broad overview of American religious life from the colonial era to the present, focusing on the diversity and vitality of American religious traditions, as well as areas of intersection and conflict around race, ethnicity, gender, class, and sexuality. The course will also ask students to consider how aspects of these histories continue to shape religious belief, practice, and public discourse in contemporary life. Students will consider important religious and philosophical writings, as well a popular/mass cultural, ethnographic, or other documentary sources that shed light on both the intellectual and lived history of religious life and thought in the United States.
This course provides a chronological survey of the creation, evolution, and impact of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). The CIA's origins begin with its World War II forerunner, the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), followed by the Agency's formal creation in 1947, at the commencement of the Cold War. In subsequent decades, American presidents deployed the CIA to bolster the cause of containment. Like its predecessor, the OSS, the CIA embraced the dual missions of conducting espionage and engaging in covert actions to promote America's Cold War priorities. The Agency's secret efforts to secure U.S. global interests often conflicted with the country's stated democratic ideals and students will learn how this history fostered negative perceptions of American power in many areas of the world. During the Cold War, the CIA's clandestine campaigns in other countries included covert payments to political parties, labor unions and front groups. In some non-western countries, it also utilized violent methods, supporting efforts to overthrow left-wing governments and at times even sponsoring assassination attempts. Revelations of these activities spurred efforts to limit the agency's activities in the 1970s, but renewed controversy emerged after 9/11 and in response to the CIA's role in the War on Terror.
This course offers an introduction to the history of the United States in the 1960s. The dual goals of this course are to instill a particular body of knowledge - in this case, America in the 1960s, and to provide students with tools that will help formulate interpretations of this crucial period in U.S. history. Topics covered will include the leadership of John Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, and Richard Nixon; the struggle for civil rights for people of color; the emergence of student movements across the country; the steady escalation of US involvement in Vietnam; shifting relations across gender lines, and particularly the rise of the modern feminist movement; and, finally, the growing influence of popular culture, such as music, literature, and film.
AMST 150NWestern Pennsylvania Art, Literature, and Culture3
AMST 150N: Western Pennsylvania Art, Literature, and Culture (GA/GH) will survey western Pennsylvania's rich artistic, literary, and cultural heritage from pre-history to the present day. Beginning with the region's indigenous cultures and earliest settlements, the course will examine the important artists, individuals, and organizations that figured in the development of western Pennsylvania's literary and artistic culture, the important role philanthropy and industry played in that development, and how these artists, organizations, and individuals relate to historical movements across the United States. The course will be divided into six units, and each unit will explore a variety of artists and genres, including architecture, literature, music, painting, photography, and sculpture. Individuals and their works to be discussed may include but are not limited to, among others, architects Frederick J. Osterling, Henry Hobson Richardson, and Frank Lloyd Wright, authors Hugh Henry Breckenridge, Rachel Carson, Willa Cather, Annie Dillard, John Edgar Wideman, and August Wilson, musicians Art Blakey, Billy Eckstine, and Stephen Foster, painters John White Alexander, Mary Cassatt, H.O. Tanner, and Andy Warhol, photographers Charles "Teenie" Harris and W. Eugene Smith, and sculptors Glenn Kaino and Thaddeaus Mosley. During the last unit, particular attention all be paid to western Pennsylvania's dynamic contemporary art and literary scenes. The course will also discuss numerous individuals, groups, locations, and organizations that figured prominently in the region's cultural heritage. Topics to be discussed may include, among others, Andrew Carnegie, Martin Delaney, Henry Clay Frick, H. J. Heinz, Andrew Mellon, Henry Phipps, and Jane Grey Swisshelm, the Carnegie Music Hall, Library, and Art Gallery, Pittsburgh's Exposition Hall, the Scalp Level School of painters, the Carnegie International Art Show and directors John Beatty and Homer Saint-Gaudens, the Associated Artists of Pittsburgh, newspapers "The Mystery" and "The Pittsburgh Courier," and the Crawford Grill. Depending upon the individual instructor, students may visit at several regional sites, including but not limited to the Andy Warhol Museum, the Carnegie Art Gallery, the Carrie Furnace, the Frick Museum, the Heinz History Center, the Rachel Carson Homestead, the Mattress Factory, and the Silver Eye Center for Photography. The class is a General Education Interdomain course for GH/GA and United States Cultures (US) course.
AMST 151NTechnology and Society in American History3
This course examines the development of technology in the United States from the colonial period to the present, and places into a historical context the reception and influence of these technological developments on the social, economic, and political life of the United States. The technologies serving American society--past and present--range widely and include, for example, new harvesting techniques, railroads and motor vehicles, assembly-line mass production, and electricity and its multiple dependent technologies. Technologies have always influenced, and been influenced by, human societies; this course examines how technologies and Americans have interacted and influenced each other.
This course examines major developments in the history of modern American business and industry from the colonial period to the present. History 155 introduces students to a number of the main themes, concepts, and events comprising American business history. Although the course has a pronounced big business/large corporation focus, it nonetheless provides a broader perspective than simply one of selected corporate histories. Indeed, the course treats the conduct of business as an integral element of American society and culture. Topics to be discussed include the colonial commitment to commerce, the effects of new technologies, the emergence of modern large-scale industrial production and the changes it brought to business management, and the importance of world events and American businesses.
This course offers an introduction to the history, literature, culture, and social conditions of Asian Americans. It begins with Chinese immigration to the United States in the nineteenth century and proceeds to cover the histories of other groups: Japanese, Korean, Filipino, and Indian Americans. In addition to history, students explore some of the literature of Asian Americans and examine the legal and sociological aspects of the Asian American experience. The course also addresses several central questions: How much have Asian American groups held in common, culturally and historically, with one another? What role did prejudice play in the attempted citizenship and acculturation of different Asian American groups? How did Asian values and traditions shape families and communities over time? How did the experiences of Asian American women differ from those of men? What contributions to American life - food, literature, politics, education, business, science, and physical culture - have Asian Americans made? AM ST 160/AAS 100 is an interdisciplinary course that introduces students the history, society, and cultural achievements of Asian Americans.
AMST 161The Battle of Gettysburg in American Historical Memory3
HIST/AMST 161 examines the history of the Battle of Gettysburg, as well as the political and social factors that have shaped perceptions of the Battle of Gettysburg as one of the Civil War's decisive battle and as a national symbol that has transformed over time. The variety of historical sources used in this course will aid students in learning how to understand and interpret history and in encouraging them to develop a critical method by which to evaluate primary and secondary historical sources.
This course examines the history of Americans in China, the experiences of Chinese in America, and 200 years of Sino-American Relations. Starting in the 1840s, dreams of economic opportunity inspired Chinese immigrants as they came to America to prospect for gold, build railroads, or start their own businesses. In the opposite direction, American dreamers have been lured to China for two centuries: from businessmen enchanted by the prospect of millions of customers; to missionaries trying to save souls; to educators, doctors, and engineers hoping to validate American ideas and technology by changing China in their own image. In both cases, the dreamers faced resistance. Chinese immigrants encountered strong racial prejudice in the United States, and American expatriates confronted a China that was sometimes indifferent to their goals. These frustrations notwithstanding, the trans-Pacific exchange of people, goods, ideas, knowledge, and technology vastly impacted both countries in significant ways that continue to resonate in the present day. AM ST 161 examines the history of Americans in China, the experiences of Chinese in America, and 200 years of Sino-American Relations. Starting in the 1840s, dreams of economic opportunity inspired Chinese immigrants as they came to America to prospect for gold, build railroads, or start their own businesses. In the opposite direction, American dreamers have been lured to China for two centuries: from businessmen enchanted by the prospect of millions of customers; to missionaries trying to save souls; to educators, doctors, and engineers hoping to validate American ideas and technology by changing China in their own image. In both cases, the dreamers faced resistance. Chinese immigrants encountered strong racial prejudice in the United States, and American expatriates confronted a China that was sometimes indifferent to their goals. These frustrations notwithstanding, the trans-Pacific exchange of people, goods, ideas, knowledge, and technology vastly impacted both countries in significant ways that continue to resonate in the present day. The course also addresses several central questions. What contributions to American life - food, literature, politics, education, business, science, and physical culture - have Chinese Americans made? What kind of influence did overseas Americans have over Chinese society, education, medicine, public health, sports, and religion? What role did prejudice play in the attempted citizenship and acculturation of Chinese Americans? How did the experiences of Chinese American women differ from those of men? How is American business and commerce affecting China today? AM ST 161 is an interdisciplinary and cross-cultural course that uses methods from both Humanities and the Social Sciences to introduce students to the 200-year-old story of Sino-American cultural, economic, and political interaction and exchange.
This course introduces the verbal and nonverbal genres of folklore that have influenced literature, economics, politics and culture in North America. Approaching folklore as traditional patterns, practices, and performances, the course explains folklore to be fundamental to human cultural life, and therefore an intimate part of the identities and values that Americans express in contemporary society. It will explore these identities and values on various levels: the individual, the family, the community, the region, the nation, and the world. Folklore, you will discover, is not something confined to the past, but all around us in the present, and is continually emerging anew. Students will read and discuss a number of folk genres, including folk speech, narratives, beliefs and religious experiences, use of space, and material culture. Students will learn strategies for researching, "reading," and understanding the verbal and nonverbal folklore of diverse communities. The class may include readings on cultural traditions drawn from Native American, Latinx, African American, and immigrant cultures, as well as other folk groups defined by social identities such as age, occupation, gender, sexuality, or religion. By the end of the course, students will be able to recognize the cultural, political, and historical implications of such traditions. Assignments will include a fieldwork project; involving first-hand interviews, site observations, and archival research; to document, annotate, and analyze oral traditions. Students will be evaluated on the basis of class discussion, oral presentation and group exercises, in-class examinations, and the fieldwork portfolio.
AMST 183NThe Cold War in Literature, Politics, and History3
The course will focus on the history and politics of the Cold War and its depiction in literature and film, especially in British and American literature, but also in that of other countries. Students will read political science and history texts, novels, short stories, and poetry, and view films. Students will analyze the reasons that the Cold War has been and continues to be a major inspiration for literary production and a transformative influence on literary style. Students will be encouraged to explore alternative methodologies for research on cold war topics including the use of primary sources, for ex. documents from the intelligence community archives that have since been declassified. In addition to a class field trip, students will be encouraged to make additional site visits to appropriate institutions in U.S. intelligence history. They'll be making a series of visits to relevant sites.
This course will examine the politics of hip-hop art and culture. To do so, we will place hip-hop in broad historical context and trace its aesthetic and cultural roots from Africa to Jamaica to 1970s New York City and then forward to 1980s gangsta rap and former President Barack Obama's iPod. We will think through the implications of hip-hop's addiction to Italian-American mobsters, bling, and all-things keepin' it real. We will also search for hip-hop's political foundations in funk records, 1960s community organizing, and poetry of the Harlem Renaissance. All the while, we will analyze the varieties of hip-hop politics by paying close attention to how hip-hoppers vie for authenticity, recognition, and power through cultural practices--b-boying/girling, graffiti art, emceeing, djing, e.g.-at odds with the State, inequality, and injustice. We will also situate hip-hop politics within the ongoing history of American social movements. To avoid over-romanticizing, we will equally examine hip-hop's appetite for conspicuous consumption, misogyny, homophobia, trappin', and criminality. A deep understanding of hip-hop politics, then, requires examining its contradictions as well as the ways race, class, gender, sexuality, and geography shape hip-hop--and therefore American-culture, art, and identity. To get at these and other ideas, we will read, listen, and think broadly about why a full understanding of hip-hop truly matters.
History of art in the English colonies and the United States from the seventeenth century to the present. AMST 307N / ARTH 307N American Art (3) (GA;US)(GH)(BA) This course meets the Bachelor of Arts degree requirements. American art, from the colonial period to the present, is examined through paintings, sculpture, buildings, prints and photographs, as well as exhibitions and national/world fairs. The class places special emphasis upon the predicament of national identity by examining the ways in which the very notion of the "American" has historically been highly contested. Special points of emphasis include: negotiations between indigenous, colonial and European artistic styles, representations of and by displaced populations (colonial subjects, Native Americans, African Americans), myths of the American landscape, the cult of domesticity and the gendering of American citizenry, later transatlantic experiences of expatriate artists, conflicts between urban and rural conceptualizations of the "typical" American experience, the role of the American avant-garde after World War II, and debates over federal funding for the arts. The course is designed to meet two principal goals. The first is to increase students' powers of visual analysis and help them build a critical vocabulary for discussing an art object's medium, composition, style, and iconography. The second is to foster an understanding of the deep implication of the visual arts in their social and cultural contexts. The course therefore involves significant material relating to political, economic and religious issues. It investigates problems in patronage, function, reception and censorship. It considers such intra- and cross-cultural issues as representations of gender, race, and ethnicity. Requirements include essay exams and at least one paper. As a general education course in the arts, this course provides an introduction to American art to a student of any major. This course has no prerequisite and presumes no prior exposure to fine art. Students will learn both the common vocabulary of art history and method of critical analysis in the field.
History of the architecture of the United States, as well as its Native American and colonial antecedents. AMST / ARTH 308N American Architecture (3) (GA;GH;US)(BA) This course meets the Bachelor of Arts degree requirements. This Art History course (cross-listed with American Studies) will cover the history of American architecture and its historical contexts, from its Native American roots and colonial antecedents, through the formation of the United States, to the present. A sample of the topics that will be covered are the architecture of: Native Americans, Spanish Colonial missions, 17th-century Virginia, Puritan New England, Georgian America, Southern Plantations and Slave Cabins, Thomas Jefferson, the new federal city of Washington, D.C., the Greek Revival, the industrial revolution, utopian religious communities such as the Shakers, Gothic Revival cottages and villas, Victorian Philadelphia, Henry Hobson Richardson, the birth of the skyscraper in New York and Chicago, the City Beautiful Movement, Frank Lloyd Wright, Arts & Crafts California, Henry Ford's Michigan, Art Deco New York, Mies van der Rohe and the glass box, Levittown, Disneyland, Louis I. Kahn, Post-Modernism, Frank Gehry, and Green Buildings. Selected major buildings, architects, ideas, and urban developments will be emphasized. Architecture will be considered within the contexts of religion, politics, philosophy, culture, economics, gender, race, society, technology, engineering, landscape architecture, urban planning and interior design. This introductory survey has no prerequisite and is intended for both students of architecture/art and students unfamiliar with the field. This is an Inter-Domain General Education course exploring American architecture from both the perspectives of the Arts (GA) and Humanities (GH). An exploration of the art, aesthetics and styles of American Architecture will be balanced with using architecture as a vehicle for understanding American history, culture, religion, society, and government.
This course covers American material culture defined as the interconnection of tangible, human-made forms in contexts representing cultural ideas and practices. It investigates the links of genres such as architecture, art, craft, dress, and food to one another in natural and social contexts such as landscapes, communities, and oceans. The spaces examined can be small, such as a desk, and analyzed ethnographically and historically. They can also be larger such as the built environment of suburbia and its symbolic meaning between city and country. Students identify aspects of form, construction, and use in such spaces and the patterns they express, including regional, ethnic, gender, religious, and class associations. The spaces can be "real" such as the house and body, and virtual, such a representation of environments that users build or that appear in video games. The course has a goal of analyzing cultural meanings and influences of material environments people create on human selves and their society.
We live surrounded by folklore. From the jokes and stories we tell, to the ways we cook and eat, work and dress, even how we interact using digital media, much of what we do in our lives involves tradition. This course will provide students with detailed study of American folklore through an in-depth focus on a specific social group or creative genre. Topics covered may include group-based material such as ethnic folklore; the folklore of age groups; folklore, gender and sexuality; and occupational folklore; as well as units on genre categories such as folk narrative (folktale, legend, myth), verbal genres (proverbs, rhymes, jokes), customary forms (parades, festivals, dancing, games), material culture (dress, folk art, foodways), and musical forms (folk song, folk music). At the conclusion of this course, students will be able to explain key concepts in the study of folklore such as tradition, folk group, genre, performance, and practice, as well as how these concepts can be applied in the analysis and interpretation of culture. Students will also develop practical skills in ethnography, including participant observation, interviewing, audio and video recording, field note taking, fieldwork ethics, and folklore archiving. As part of this course, students will undertake a significant ethnographic research project, culminating in a comprehensive portfolio of field materials and an analytical or interpretive paper.
American society and culture during the period of the Revolution and the Early Republic. AMST 401 Revolution and Early Republic 1765-1815 (3) American society and culture during the period of the Revolution and Early Republic. The course satisfies the "area" requirement in history for undergraduate majors in American Studies, and is open to all majors. An objective of the course is for students to understand the significance of this formative period on the emergence of the United States as a nation. Students will examine the mythology of the Revolution as well as its historical record. They will consider the development of social and political institutions in the early years of the new nation, including the creation of pivotal texts of the Declaration of Independence and Constitution.
Examination of social and cultural currents in American life from World War II to 1990. AMST 405 Cold War America (3) Examination of social and cultural currents in American life after World War II to 1990. The course satisfies the "area" requirement in history for undergraduate majors in American Studies, and is open to all majors. Students will analyze the way that the confrontation between communist superpowers and the United States shaped politics, culture, and society. Among the events discussed are the nuclear bomb, space and arms race, Kennedy assassination, Watergate scandal, and Korean and Vietnam wars. The cultural expression of the period in film, television, literature, music, and art will be analyzed.
Examination in depth of various and distinctive American time periods; subtitle expresses specific content. (May be repeated for credit.) AMST 412 American Eras (3) Examination in depth of various and distinctive American time periods. The subtitle expresses specific content. May be repeated for credit. The course satisfies the "area" requirement in history for undergraduate majors in American Studies and is open to all majors. The course covers periods or eras in American history that are not covered or emphasized in other courses. Some eras to be studied are the Great Depression, World War II, and 1960s. In addition to analyzing major events of the period, students will consider social and cultural developments.
AMST 441 / KINES 441 History of Sport in American Society study of the background, establishment, and growth of sport in America from colonial times to the present, and the role of American sports in American culture and society. The course will examine the ways that sports have operated in the United States as the country has developed into a modern, mass society. Issues of national identity, commercialism, race, ethnicity, class, and gender will be discussed in relation to the popularity of sports. Another set of issues will center on language and media; students will employ methods of analysis such as ethnography and rhetorical criticism that emphasize the multiple layers of meaning inherent in sports culture.
Contemporary economic, social, and political aspects of the United States and its role as a world power since 1945. AMST 447 / HIST 447 Recent American History (3)This course covers the history of the United States from the end of World War II to the present. Topics include but are not limited to the Marshall Plan, the Cold War, the Korean War, the rise of television, atomic power, the Eisenhower presidency, the Civil Rights and Women's Movements, the Vietnam War and protests, the space race, Watergate, the Reagan presidency, the two Iraq Wars, the Dot-com revolution, 9-11 and the War on Terror, and the Obama presidency. While addressing major historical movements, the course will also explore the culture of the period - art, literature, music, sports, television, religion, and film. Even though the course covers a relatively short span of years, students will see that American society has undergone dramatic changes in this period as the result of social movements, immigration, wars, political scandal, and technological innovation. The course will close by speculating on the current direction of the United States in light of the serious challenges the nation faces.
The course covers uses of ethnography in American Studies toward an understanding of social and cultural communication and performance. The application of ethnography and concepts of cultural anthropology to complex societies such as the United States is discussed. The course teaches students to use ethnographic methods for research of American society and culture. Attention is given to the ethics and issues of ethnographic fieldwork.
Studies in the works and the interrelationships of writers such as Emerson, Hawthorne, Poe, Thoreau, Whitman, Melville, and Dickinson. The course will cover Transcendentalism and the authors who contributed to this movement, many of whom lived in Concord, MA. Though the class will feature the works of Emerson, Hawthorne, and Thoreau, it can also branch out to address other authors such as Margaret Fuller, Jones Very, and Elizabeth Peabody. Departing from Concord, the course will explore Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson, both of whom read and were inspired by Emerson. Finally, the course will include works by Herman Melville, who formed a friendship with Hawthorne prior to writing Moby-Dick. Though literature constitutes the center piece of this course, iterations of the course may bring in other parts of the cultural, social, and political landscape: slavery, abolitionism, Jacksonian Democracy, western settlement, art, science, and technology.
Focused study of a particular genre, theme, or problem in American literature. (May be repeated for credit.) ENGL 434 / AMST 472 Topics in American Literature (3) This course will allow faculty and students to focus a semester's study on a particular genre, theme, or problem in American literature. The flexibility of a topics course will allow faculty a forum in which to share current scholarship or to relate issues in American literature to larger school-wide themes in a classroom environment. Because of the potential variety of topics and faculty members, specific evaluation methods will be determined by the instructor and specified in the syllabus. The course will be offered once every two years with an expected enrollment of 25 students. The course satisfies the "area"requirement in culture for American Studies majors.
A particular genre or historical period in the development of Black American literature. ENGL 431 / AMST 475 Black American Writers (3) (US) A study of a particular genre or historical period in the development of Black American literature. This course will allow faculty and students to focus a semester's study on a particular genre, theme, or problem in African-American literature. The flexibility of the course will allow faculty a forum in which to share current scholarship or to relate issues in African-American literature to larger school-wide themes in a classroom environment. Because of the potential variety of topics and faculty members, specific evaluation methods will be determined by the instructor and specified in the syllabus. The course will be offered once every two years with an expected enrollment of 25 students. The course satisfies the "area" requirement in culture for American Studies majors.
A study of selected American women writers. ENGL 492 / AMST 476 / WMNST 491 American Women Writers (3) A study of selected women writers, this course provides the opportunity to study writing by American women from an historical perspective and to explore the views these women have of themselves as artists. The course will concentrate on a careful reading of works by a variety of authors. It will raise the question of the role that gender--as well as other differences such as race, class, and ethnicity--play in the selection of literary forms and the development of character, theme, symbol, and rhetorical strategy. It will also explore the dimensions American women have brought to the American literary tradition. The course satisfies the area requirement in culture for American Studies majors and is open to all majors meeting the prerequisite requirements. The course will be offered once every two years and enrollment is 25.
Examination in depth of various and distinctive American expressive forms; subtitle expresses specific content. (May be repeated for credit.) AMST 479 American Expressive Forms (3) Examination in depth of various and distinctive American expressive forms. The subtitle expresses specific content. May be repeated for credit. The course satisfies the "area" requirement in culture for undergraduate majors in American Studies, and is open to all majors. The course covers periods or eras in American history that are not covered or emphasized in other courses. Some expressive forms to be studied are American essays, American humor, and American films. In addition to analyzing the traditions and patterns of these forms, students will consider the historical, social, and cultural context of these forms in the American experience.
An introduction to the basic purposes, philosophies, and functions of a museum, with emphasis on the problems of museum administration. The course examines applications of American Studies to mechanics of operation and development of core services including exhibits, structured educational programs, and special events. The course places these functions within the philosophy of the "experience economy," whereby museums and historical organizations are challenged to meet the expectations of an increasingly sophisticated audience.
A study of public heritage practices and programs in America. (May be repeated for credit.) AMST 482 Public Heritage (3) A study of public heritage practices and programs, which encompasses interpretation and education projects in American history and culture, disseminated through institutions to the general public. The areas under public heritage include the practices and programs of museums, expositions and fairs, archives, historical and cultural agencies, government bureaus, foundations, community organizations, magazines, films, festivals, and computer sites. The course traces the changes that have occurred in the public heritage movement, especially the ways that American Studies scholarship has been distilled through various public institutions and programs.
This writing-intensive course covers perspectives and approaches of American Studies scholarship regarding themes, issues, and problems in American culture and their applications in society. It serves as a capstone course for American Studies majors who are required to take two sections on different themes, issues, and problems. It is open to other majors seeking exposure to the interdisciplinary methods and concepts of American Studies in addition to interpretative explorations of American society and culture. Examples of themes, issues, and problems that are covered in the course and represent key concepts in American Studies include "The American Dream," "Nature and Wilderness in American Culture," "The American Way of War," and "American Borders and Frontiers in the American Imagination." Methods that are typically covered include rhetorical/symbolic analysis, ethnography of cultural scenes, and comparative analysis of a cultural collection. Concepts include American exceptionalism, colonialism, materialism, individualism, and consumerism in a global context. A variety of evidence is typically used in the course including historical documents, literature, artifacts, oral expressions, photographs and graphics, and popular film and television. The course includes exposure to applications of American Studies knowledge in various institutions and careers such as museums and heritage organizations, government, communications, and education.
This is an advanced topics seminar in folklore studies. It will provide students with a command of the research literature in a specific area of folklore research, based on the topic defined by the instructor.
Investigation of American material culture and folklife, including topics such as traditional design, cultural landscape, architecture, art, craft and food.
This interdisciplinary seminar explores American society and culture during the 18th century, providing graduate students with a comprehensive understanding of the key literature and debates in the field. The course emphasizes intensive reading and critical engagement with historical and cultural studies. Topics include the experiences of European colonists in eastern North America, their interactions with Indigenous peoples, the development of economic systems, and major political events. Additionally, we will investigate the influence of religion, gender, and race on early American society and culture through focused readings and discussions. As the course progresses, students will identify overarching themes within the field of early American Studies and develop research questions that reflect their deepening understanding.
This course examines the complexities of 19th-century America, a period marked by transformative events and enduring tensions. The era reveals both the heights of human aspiration and the depths of human suffering. From the institution of slavery, war, and systemic inequalities to reform movements, acts of courage, and groundbreaking innovations, the century's history defies simple narratives and offers profound insights into the forces that shaped the United States. This interdisciplinary seminar explores American social, cultural, intellectual, and economic life during the 19th century, providing a comprehensive understanding of the key literature and debates in the field. The course emphasizes intensive reading and critical engagement with historical sources. Students will also learn to identify overarching themes within the field of American Studies and develop research questions that reflect their deepening understanding.
AMST 541Ethnography of Technology and Media in the United States3
Applied widely across the humanities and social sciences, ethnographic approaches to the study of culture encompass a wide variety of qualitative research methods that range from intimate personal interviews to participation in large group events. This seminar presents a detailed study of how the integration of technologies into the fabric of everyday life in the United State has both enabled the creation of new cultural forms and redefined existing social and cultural life. Students will engage with foundational and emerging works that apply the theories and methods of ethnography to the close study of technology and media use and culture, as well as works that demonstrate how emerging technologies may be applied in ethnographic research. In addition to presenting the relevant literature, this seminar will provide students with rigorous training in the requisite skills and concepts that define ethnographic practice, and offer opportunities for students to apply these skills and concepts to produce significant field research. Examples of technological forms considered could include video games, 3D printing and maker technologies, genetic technologies, mobile phones and devices, and a variety of internet technologies.
AMST 550Seminar in Museums, Preservation, and Public Memory3
This course explores the literature, methods, and interpretive debates on issues related to historic sites, museums, and other public venues that focus on the American past. It will also consider broader issues relating to memory, inheritance, stewardship, and the production of history. Readings, discussion, lectures, and site visits will address the concepts of public heritage, the interpretation of the past (and present) for diverse audiences, and the application of historical methods to a broad range of projects and institutions.
Contrary to notions about the secularization of American society, a large number of Americans continue to report that religion plays an important role in their everyday lives. At the same time, changing demographic, political, and cultural environments in the United States have contributed to a massive reorganization of the American religious landscape since 1970. Thus religion, it seems, is a timely issue in the study of American culture, one which will doubtless open up new avenues of American Studies research in the future. This seminar is a detailed study of aspects of religious history and culture in the United States. It will offer students an overview of the current engagement of American Studies with the study of religion and ask students to consider new pathways in this research for the future.
Directed readings in selected areas of American Studies. AM ST 579 Readings in American Studies (3-9)This course will cover major readings in a selected area of American Studies. The readings are designed to represent past and current scholarship in an area of research undertaken by a student or students. The selection of readings will be directed by a faculty member in consultation with the student(s). The readings typically cover areas that are not covered in depth within other American Studies offerings. Outcomes of the course include historiographies and theoretical essays, annotated bibliographies, and book reviews.
Formal courses given on a topical or special interest subject which may be offered infrequently; several different topics may be taught in one year or semester.
The goal of the course is to lay out a range of ideas, styles, and techniques that are used in college classrooms, and to encourage you to explore how these might fit into your own approach to teaching. Along the way, you will design and develop your own course, including a syllabus, in-class activities, written assignments, and a grading rubric. You will also teach a portion of a sample class to an audience in the American Studies program. In addition to the practical work you will produce, this course will also serve as a discussion space for us to think together about the importance of teaching humanities, what great teaching means, how to teach American Studies effectively, and how to deal with the everyday work of being an educator.
