Catalog Descriptions of American Studies Courses

050 [006I] First-Year Seminar: American Culture in the Era of Ragtime (3). Interdisciplinary seminar exploring American culture in the first two decades of the 20th century. Material includes film, music, photography, and musical theater as well as fiction and autobiography.

051 [006E] First-Year Seminar: Navigating America (3). Analyze American journeys and destinations, focusing on how resources, technology, transportation, and cultural influences have transformed the navigation and documentation of America. Multimedia documentation of personal journey required.

052 [006E] First-Year Seminar: The Folk Revival: The Singing Left in 20th-Century America (3). Enlisting fiction, film, and recorded music, this course will acquaint first-year students with the cultural and historical contexts of a range of American traditional musics and explore the social, political, and cultural meanings of these musics in a revivalist movement.

053 [006I] First-Year Seminar: The Family and Social Change in America (3). This course uses changes in the American family over the past century as a way of understanding larger processes of social change.

054 [006E] First-Year Seminar: The Indians’ New Worlds: Southeastern Histories from 1200 to 1800 (ANTH 054) (3). This course uses archaeological and historical scholarship to consider the histories of the Southern Indians from the Mississippian period to the end of the 18th century.

055 [006I] First-Year Seminar: Birth and Death in the United States (3). This course explores birth and death as essential human rites of passage that are invested with significance by changing and diverse American historical, cultural, ethnic, and ethical contexts.

056 [006I] First-Year Seminar: Exploring American Memory (3). This course examines the contested and changing role of memory in constructing historical meaning, creating political ideologies and imagining cultural communities.

057 [006E] First-Year Seminar: Access to Higher Education (3). This course explores barriers to access to American colleges and universities. Success in application, admission, matriculation, and graduation requires ability and experience and is also a function of other advantages.

058 [006I] First-Year Seminar: Cultures of Dissent: Radical Social Thought in America since 1880 (3). This course examines the history of radical social thought in American history, focusing in particular on examples from “leftist” and “collectivist” traditions, and emphasizes the many forms radicalism has taken by exploring different radical thinkers’ dissenting critiques of dominant political, economic and social arrangements.

101 [020] The Emergence of Modern America (3). Interdisciplinary examination of two centuries of American culture focusing on moments of change and transformation.

110 [010] Introduction to the Cultures and Histories of Native North America (HIST 110) (3). An interdisciplinary introduction to Native American history and studies. The courses use history, literature, art, and cultural studies to study the Native American experience.

201 [040] Literary Approaches to American Studies (3). A study of interdisciplinary methods and the concept of American studies with an emphasis on the historical context for literary texts.

202 Historical Approaches to Native American Studies (3). A study of interdisciplinary methods and the concept of American studies with an emphasis on historical and cultural analysis.

203 Approaches to American Indian Studies (3). Introduces students to the disciplines comprising American Indian studies and teaches them how to integrate disciplines for a more complete understanding of the experiences of American Indian peoples.

231 [072A] Native American History: The East (HIST 231) (3). Covers the histories of American Indians east of the Mississippi River and before 1840. The approach is ethnohistorical.

233 [072C] Native American History: The West (HIST 233) (3). Deals with the histories of Native Americans living west of the Mississippi River. It begins in the pre-Columbian past and extends to the end of the 19th century.

234 [072D] Native American Tribal Studies (ANTH 234, HIST 234) (3). This course introduces students to a tribally specific body of knowledge. The tribal focus of the course and the instructor changes from term to term.

235 [072E] Native America in the 20th Century (HIST 235) (3). This course deals with the political, economic, social, and cultural issues important to 20th-century Native Americans as they attempt to preserve tribalism in the modern world.

246 Introduction to American Indian Literatures (3). Students will develop a working knowledge of American Indian cultural concepts and historical perspectives utilizing poetry, history, personal account, short stories, films, and novels.

253 [053] A Social History of Jewish Women in America (JWST 253, WMST 253) (3). Course examines the history and culture of Jewish women in America from their arrival in New Amsterdam in 1654 to the present and explores how gender shaped this journey. 255 Mid-20th Century American Thought and Culture (3). This course examines topics in the intellectual and cultural history of the United States in the mid-20th century, including issues of race thinking, mass culture, and gender ideologies.

255 Mid-20th Century American Thought (3).

256 [056] Anti-’50s: Voices of a Counter Decade (3). We remember the 1950s as a period of relative tranquility, happiness, optimism, and contentment. This course will consider a handful of countertexts: voices from literature, politics, and mass culture of the 1950s that for one or another reason found life in the postwar world repressive, empty, frightening, or insane and predicted the social and cultural revolutions that marked the decade that followed.

257 [057] Melville: Culture and Criticism (3). Investigates the significance of Herman Melville as a representative 19th-century American author. Includes issues of biography, historical context, changing reception, cultural iconography, and the politics of the literary marketplace.

258 [058] Captivity and American Cultural Definition (3). Examines how representations of captivity and bondage in American expression worked to construct and transform communal categories of religion, race, class, gender, and nation.

259 [059] Tobacco and America (3). Explores the significance of tobacco from Native American ceremony to the Southern economy by focusing on changing attitudes toward land use, leisure, social style, public health, litigation and global capitalism.

266 [066] The Folk Revival: The Singing Left in Mid-20th- Century America (3). Emphasizing cultural stratification, political dissent and commercialization in American youth and popular movements, this course will map the evolving political and cultural landscape of mid-20th-century America through the lens of the Folk Revival, from its origins in various regionalist, nativist, and socialist traditions of the 1920s to its alliance with the civil rights and antiwar movements of the 1960s.

268 [068] American Media and American Culture (3). Examines American film and television production, texts, and reception as instances of American culture. The particular time period, genre, media form, audience, and set of cultural issues may change from year to year.

269 [069] Mating and Marriage in American Culture (3). Interdisciplinary examination of the married condition from colonial times to the present. Themes include courtship and romance, marital power and the egalitarian ideal, challenges to monogamy.

275 Documenting Communities (3). Covers the definition and documentation of communities within North Carolina through research, study, and field work of communities. Each student produces a documentary on a specific community.

277 [077] Nationhood and National Identity (3). How is a nation more than a state? How do rituals, symbols, memorials, and celebrations help to create national identity? What is patriotism? Nationalism? What are alternative notions of nationhood?

285 [064] Access to Work in America (ECON 285) (3). Focus on systemic and individual factors affecting access to work including gender, race, age, disability, transportation, international competition, technological progress, change in labor markets, educational institutions, and public policy.

286 [313] Nature Writing (ENGL 286) (3). Introduction to the field of nature writing surveys historical periods, authors, and a variety of genres; cross-cultural and multidisciplinary; study classics in the field.

290 [060] Topics in American Studies (3). Special topics in American studies.

291 [061] Ethics and American Studies (3). An interdisciplinary seminar in American studies addressing ethical issues in the United States.

292 [062] Historical Seminar in American Studies (3). Topics in American history from the perspective of American studies.

293 [063] American Studies Junior Seminar Aesthetic Perspective (3). Topics in arts and literature from the perspective of American studies.

334 [034H] Defining America I (3). An interdisciplinary seminar that considers the changing understandings of what it meant to be American up through the United States Civil War.

335 [035H] Defining America II (3). An interdisciplinary seminar that investigates the changing meanings of being American since the United States Civil War.

336 [070] Native Americans in Film (3). This course is about Hollywood’s portrayal of Indians in film, how Indian films have depicted Native American history, and why the filmic representation of Indians has changed over time.

338 American Indian Novels: Facing East from Indian Country (3). Investigates the centrality of the Native American novel as the premiere site in which non-native (and most native) audiences explore the topic of American Indian culture.

360 The Jewish Writer in American Life (3).

375 Food in American Culture (FOLK 375) (3). This course will examine the history and meaning of food in American culture and will explore the ways in which food shapes national, regional, and personal identity.

378 Nation Building and National Identity in Australia and the United States (3). This course compares the cultural and social histories of two settler societies: the United States and Australia. Focus on selected topics, including landscape, indigenous peoples, national identity, exploration.

384 [084] Myth and History in American Memory (3). Examines the role of memory in constructing historical meaning and in imagining the boundaries of cultural communities. Explores popular rituals, artifacts, monuments, and public performances.

385 [065] Women and Economics (ECON 385, WMST 385) (3). Survey of women’s time allocation patterns, labor force participation trends, earnings, occupational selection, and economic history. 387 Race and Empire in 20th-Century American Intellectual History (3). This upper-level seminar explores influential 20thcentury writings on race and empire and colonialism by intellectuals from America and around the world.

387 Race and Empire in Twentieth-Century American Intellectual History (3).

390 [080] Seminar in American Studies (3). Seminar in American studies topics with a focus on historical inquiry from interdisciplinary angles.

393 [085] Back to the Future: Chicago, 1893 (3). This course will explore Chicago at the end of the 19th century from the perspective of our own postindustrial, postmodern condition.

394 [094] The University in American Life: The University of North Carolina (3). This team-taught course is for juniors and seniors and is multifaceted in its inquiry into the role of the university in American life. UNC–Chapel Hill is used as the case study. 394L Role of the University (1). Pre- or corequisite, AMST 394. Field laboratory explores UNC–Chapel Hill campus sites and Triangle-area universities. One four-hour laboratory a week.

396 [096] Independent Study in American Studies (3). Permission of the chair. Directed reading under the supervision of a faculty member.

397 [099] Internship (1–3). Permission of the chair and the supervising faculty member. Internship. Variable credit.

398 [098] Service Learning in America (3). Explores history and theory of volunteerism and service learning in America. Includes a weekly academic seminar and placement in a service learning project.

482 [082] Images of the American Landscape (3). This course will consider how real estate speculation, transportation, suburbanization, and consumerism have shaped a landscape whose many representations in art and narrative record our ongoing struggle over cultural meaning.

483 [083] Seeing America: Visual Culture and American Studies (3). Examines the ways in which visual works—paintings, photographs, sculpture, architecture, film, advertising, and other images—communicate the values of American culture and raise questions about American experiences.

486 Shalom Y’all: The Jewish Experience in the American South (JWST 486) (3). This course explores ethnicity in the South and focuses on the history and culture of Jewish southerners from their arrival in the Carolinas in the 17th century to the present day.

499 [150] Advanced Seminar in American Studies (3). Prerequisite, graduate or upper-level undergraduate standing. Examines American civilization by studying social and cultural history, criticism, art, architecture, music, film, popular pastimes, and amusements, among other possible topics.

685 Literature of the Americas (CMPL 685, ENGL 685) (3). Prerequisite, two years of college-level Spanish or the equivalent. Multidisciplinary examination of texts and other media of the Americas, in English and Spanish, from a variety of genres.

691H [090] Honors in American Studies (3). Directed independent research leading to the preparation of an honors thesis and an oral examination on the thesis. Required of candidates for graduation with honors in American studies who enroll in the class once permission to pursue honors is granted.

692H [091] Honors in American Studies (3). Directed independent research leading to the preparation of an honors thesis and an oral examination on the thesis. Required of candidates for graduation with honors in American studies who enroll in the class once permission to pursue honors is granted.