Ethnic Studies

This course examines the dynamics of contemporary racism in France through a knowledge of long history. It traces the genealogy of racism as it is expressed, both in the processes at work and in the debates that run through our society. To achieve this, the seminar focuses in particular, but not exclusively, on the legacy of our colonial past in terms of the expression of racism. This focus is directly linked to the lively debates that have arisen since the late 1990s as French society questions its colonial past. The seminar also develops the ability to reflect on the issues raised in a complex and problematized way.

This course is divided into two parts: civilization and literature. The civilization part covers the history of Australia since the beginning of the 20th century. It studies the major events that shaped Australian identity: the world wars and their impact on Australia's place within the British Empire, the major stages of indigenous activism, and the socio-cultural impact of immigration. The literature part of the course introduces the main paradigmatic change of 1980s Britain: the advent of shifting, plural, unstable identities. Hanif Kureishi’s THE BUDDHA OF SUBURBIA is the perfect introduction to these themes and also, at the time, brought a new light on the political and cultural period. The importance of drama and television writing is also discussed. Additional topics include Thatcher’s Britain, postcolonialism, marketing marginal voices, suburbia, and the pop scene.

In this course students think critically about diversity and inequality and how they are manifest in place, focusing particularly on local scales. Students learn to see the places around them as a product of complex processes that reflect and reinforce social differences. In studying the making and meaning of place students consider themes such as international and internal migration, housing structures and gentrification, neighborhood representations, and place belonging. Students interrogate how social and spatial sorting (or stratification, or segregation) happens along lines of race/ethnicity, class, and age, and who is advantaged and disadvantaged. In this course students work with a variety of types of evidence (data) and be encouraged to appreciate how this can provide deeper and broader interrogations of social phenomena. There is considerable focus on the UK but also examples from elsewhere, and the inherent themes and theories are applicable globally.

This course covers the history of racial inequality in the United States from the arrival of the first African slaves in Virginia in 1619 to the recent emergence of the Black Lives Matter movement. Throughout, it considers how unequal the United States is; where racial inequality comes from; and why it has proved so enduring; how it has changed over time; what role the U.S. government played in this process; how racial inequality influences U.S. politics, economics, and culture; and what solutions have been proposed. The course introduces the multiple facets of racial inequality in the United States today, considers the history of racial inequality in the United States, and develops critical reading and writing skills in assessing and crafting complex arguments.

The German-speaking region was essential for the development of modern antisemitism. While many forms of early Christian and medieval persecution of Jews existed all over Europe, the Protestant reformation in Central Europe, contributed greatly to the proliferation and adaptation of medieval anti-Jewish sentiments into the early modern era. During the Enlightenment and the romantic period, the first major steps towards modernizing anti-Jewish sentiments happened. The class will address important social (middle-class), political (parties), intellectual (race theory) as well as cultural (visual culture) dimensions of the modern antisemitism, primarily during the 19th and early 20th century. Since the 18th century, Jewish Activists and intellectuals engaged in fighting antisemitism which the class will also address. The specific form of Nazi antisemitism will be discussed in its relation to the comprehensive discriminatory policy of the Nazi regime and, later on, the extermination policy during the Holocaust. With the almost complete annihilation of European Jewry, the history of modern antisemitism did not end, but, instead, it caused further fundamental changes in its structure. The final meetings will be devoted to these changes after 1945 and in the contemporary German-speaking world. While the class will insist on studying the specifically German-speaking forms of anti-Judaism and antisemitism, it will also place the ‘German case’ into the wider European context.

This course examines Maori and indigenous peoples’ knowledge in such fields as astronomy, physics, conservation biology, aquaculture, resource management and health sciences. It provides unique perspectives in indigenous knowledge, western science and their overlap, as well as an essential background in cultural awareness and its relationship with today’s New Zealand scientific community.

This course examines social and political issues involving Indigenous Peoples in Canada, historic and contemporary. It covers an examination of the concept and political condition of Indigeneity in relation to questions of knowledge and place; the problem of state power and violence for Indigenous peoples within Canada; and the Indigenous political action as a response to the state projects of incorporation and dispossession.