An interdisciplinary introduction to African American Studies that combines the teaching of core thinkers, concepts, and debates in the field with instruction in critical reading and writing. After exploring the field's institutionalization in US higher education, students engage foundational texts in African American Studies such as works by Frederick Douglass, W.E.B. Du Bois, Toni Morrison, the Combahee River Collective, Malcolm X, Audre Lorde, and James Baldwin. After taking this course, students should emerge with rich and textured insights into African American history, thought, and culture that provides them with critical lenses for analyzing contemporary social issues impacting African Americans.

A comparative study of the history, politics and the arts of Africa and African America. Emphasis will be on the cross-cultural influences between Africans and African-Americans and the influence of the forced dispersal of the African people on American culture.