AFS 101 - Introduction to Africana Studies

Course unit(s): 1
Meets GAR: Meets general academic requirement DE.
What is the history of the creation of Blackness and related racial hierarchies that marginalize Black communities? How have Black populations responded to the formation of those hierarchies? How have these hierarchies informed the lived realities of Black people in the United States and across the globe? How have these issues been addressed in higher education? Africana Studies is a scholarly field that answers these questions and many more by interrogating the role of race – and, in particular, Blackness and whiteness – in the structuring of society, identity, culture, power, and history. We will approach our exploration of Africana Studies through an interdisciplinary framework that consists of historical documents, poetry, literary essays, memoir and novel excerpts, short stories, current event pieces, documentary segments, historical and contemporary interview footage, and more. We will begin with the 18th century and move through to our current moment. On our journey to today, we will cover topics as varied as the impact of the public work of Frederick Douglass and the private work of his wife, Anna Murray Douglass; the community activism of the Black Panther Party; natural hair movements across the globe; and the Black Lives Matter Movement. We will conclude by examining the ever-urgent project(s) of Africana Studies today, as we live within the reverberations of centuries of violent anti-Blackness and the vibrant Black traditions of resistance, resilience, and joy formed in spite of, and in the midst of, that violence. While we only have one semester to unpack the legacies of centuries, by the end of our time together, you will be able to explain the significance of Africana Studies; the powerful ways it intertwines scholarship and activism; all that it reveals to us about the world from which we came; and, ultimately, all that it can teach us about the world we hope to build.