AMST BC 3300, "Topics in American Studies" (3 points)
Staffed by both full-time Barnard faculty from across the disciplines and occasional visiting faculty, this occasional course offers students opportunities to work closely with faculty on specific topics related to American Studies. Previous topics include Prof. Sandy Grande's "Pedagogy of the Dispossessed: Indigenous Sovereignty, Democracy and Education in the United States." Prof. Grande was a visiting professor from the University of Connecticut in 2008.

AMST BC 3401, "Cultural Approaches to the American Past" (4 points)
This junior colloquium serves as an introduction to theoretical approaches of American Studies, as well as methods and materials used in the interdisciplinary study of American society.

This seminar examines a number of interrelated questions: what is American Studies? What is "American"? Who speaks for America? What are the conceptual differences between "America" and "the United States"? How are geographic and imaginative borders of the nation-state constructed, enforced and contested? Who "belongs" in America and who does not? Who gets to decide? This course casts a wide investigative net to include, among other things, philosophical essays, novels, films, laws and landscapes in order to understand how culture - mediated by factors including class, race, ethnicity, nation, gender, region and religion - shapes identity and cultural expression in the United States.

Syllabus

AMST BC 3703-3704, Senior Research Seminar in American Studies (8 points)
The Senior Research Seminar is designed to guide American Studies majors through the senior thesis project in a collaborative, organized and stimulating way. In the early weeks of the fall term, students refine their topics in consultations with their thesis advisors. They then devote the remainder of the fall term to establishing a set of primary sources on which their thesis can be based, to exploring the secondary literature on their topic, and to drafting two chapters. Students submit drafts of the remaining chapters of their theses in the early weeks of spring term. Thesis writers work throughout the year, sometimes individually with their advisors, sometimes with their advisor and a peer editor, and sometimes with their entire seminar group. The submitted thesis will be evaluated by two faculty members: the advisor and another professor from the Program in American Studies. The student's grade for the seminar is calculated on the basis of her success in the following: meeting deadlines throughout the year, showing energy and ingenuity in research, contributing to the learning process by serving as an attentive peer in class, and the quality of the thesis itself.

Syllabus