Courses

The listing of a course description here does not guarantee a course’s being offered in a particular semester. Please refer to the published schedule of classes on the Student Link for confirmation a class is actually being taught and for specific course meeting dates and times.

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  • CAS AA 313: The Politics and Policy of HBO's The Wire
    HBO's television series The Wire is used to explore politics and policy. A number of interdisciplinary topics are covered, including the war on drugs, urban elections, bureaucracy, rational choice theory, and the decline of American cities. Also offered as CAS PO 313. Effective Fall 2018, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Social Inquiry II, Ethical Reasoning, Teamwork/Collaboration.
    • Ethical Reasoning
    • Social Inquiry II
    • Teamwork/Collaboration
  • CAS AA 316: African Diaspora Arts in the Americas
    Study of the transmission of African artistry in the Caribbean, South America, and the United States from the period of slavery to the present. Topics include Kongo and Yoruba arts and their influence on the arts of Santeria, Vodun, and carnival. Also offered as CAS AH 316.
  • CAS AA 319: Race and the Politics of Criminal Justice Policy
    How many people are affected by the criminal justice system? What is the relationship between crime and race? What criminal justice policies, if any, should change? In this course, students will grapple with these questions. Effective Fall 2019, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Social Inquiry I, Ethical Reasoning, Critical Thinking.
    • Social Inquiry I
    • Ethical Reasoning
    • Critical Thinking
  • CAS AA 335: Sociology of Race, Class & Gender
    No one of us is one thing, one identity, nor motivated by one singular interest, nor privileged or subjugated by one singular form of power, but how do those multiple forms of ourselves affect how we are advantaged, disadvantaged, viewed, and understood by the social world? Our social world, is, by default, a vast web of social intersections between and across groups with shared, overlapping, and conflicting identities. Race, class and gender affect nearly all of our lived experiences and greatly complicate and nuance concepts of diversity and difference. Effective Fall 2020, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Digital/Multimedia Expression , The Individual in Community, Historical Consciousness.
    • Historical Consciousness
    • The Individual in Community
    • Digital/Multimedia Expression
  • CAS AA 350: Resistance, Revolution, and Slavery in African American Literature
    Focuses on African American literature before the Thirteenth Amendment, paying particular attention to the practices, institutions, and ideologies of abolitionism and slavery as domestic and global systems. We read novels, autobiographies, poems, speeches, and essays that resisted slavery in various registers--political, religious, philosophical, and artistic.
  • CAS AA 363: Race and the Development of the American Economy: A Global Perspective
    Surveys the economic history of African Americans within the context of the development of the American and global economies. Topics include the economics of slavery; race and industrialization; the Great Migration; anti- discrimination legislation; and the historical origins of contemporary racial inequalities. Also offered as CAS EC 363. Effective Fall 2020, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Historical Consciousness, Social Inquiry II.
    • Historical Consciousness
    • Social Inquiry II
  • CAS AA 371: African American History
    Surveys the history of African Americans from their African origins to the present, investigating their critical role in shaping the meaning of race, rights, freedom, and democracy during slavery, reconstruction, Jim Crow, and the civil rights era. Effective Fall 2020, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Digital/Multimedia Expression, Historical Consciousness, Teamwork/Collaboration.
    • Historical Consciousness
    • Digital/Multimedia Expression
    • Teamwork/Collaboration
  • CAS AA 380: European Dimensions of the Black Diaspora
    Explores writings about the Black experience in Europe since the 1800s through examinations of historical and literary works, artistic and folkloric depictions, as well as politics and sports in England, France, Germany, Russia, and the Netherlands. Also offered as CAS HI 360.
  • CAS AA 382: History of Religion in Pre-Colonial Africa
    The study of the development of religious traditions in Africa during the period prior to European colonialism. An emphasis on both indigenous religions and the growth and spread of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam in the continent as a whole. Also offered as CAS HI 349 and CAS RN 382. Effective Spring 2021, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy, Historical Consciousness.
    • Historical Consciousness
    • Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy
  • CAS AA 383: African Diaspora Religions
    An introduction to religions of the African Diaspora, with a specific focus on the Caribbean and the Americas. In this course, students engage diverse traditions such as Africanized Christianity, Cuban Santeria, Haitian Vodou, Brazilian Candomble, and African American Spiritualism.
  • CAS AA 385: Atlantic History
    Examines the various interactions that shaped the Atlantic World, connecting Europe, Africa, and the Americas between 1400 and 1820. Begins by defining the political interaction, then emphasizes cultural exchange, religious conversion, and the revolutionary era.
  • CAS AA 388: Transnational Black Radicalism from the 19th Century to the Present
    Explores black cultural and political movements and examines how they interacted in ways that establish ideas crucial to our contemporary moment through readings in literature and history, film and popular culture productions. Effective Spring 2021, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy, Historical Consciousness, Critical Thinking.
    • Historical Consciousness
    • Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy
    • Critical Thinking
  • CAS AA 395: Power, Leadership, and Governance in Africa and the Caribbean
    Haitian Revolution; British Caribbean, leadership, governance, and power in Africa during the period of legitimate trade; visionaries, dictators, and nationalist politics in the Caribbean; chiefs, western elites, and nationalism in colonial Africa; road to governance in post-colonial Caribbean and Africa. Also offered as CAS HI 352 and IR 394.
  • CAS AA 400: Topics in African American Studies
    Topics and pre-requisites vary. May be repeated for credit as topics vary. Topic for Fall 2020: Gender and Sexuality in the Neo-slave Narrative. Examines how neo-slave narratives intervene in the sexual and gendered silences of slave narratives and the power relations that produced them. Students who are hesitant to study depictions of sexual violence might consider taking another course. (Prerequisite: two previous literature courses or junior or senior standing.)
  • CAS AA 404: Seminar: The Family
    Explores the rise of "modern" families and the plurality of contemporary family forms and processes including gay and lesbian families and new reproductive technologies. Particular attention to social and economic inequalities and their implications for family life. Also offered as CAS SO 404.
  • CAS AA 408: Seminar: Ethnic, Race, and Minority Relations
    Formation and position of ethnic minorities in the United States, including cross-group comparisons from England, Africa, and other parts of the world. Readings and field experience. Also offered as CAS SO 408.
  • CAS AA 459: Reparations, Restitution, Restorative Justice for Slavery and Jim Crow Segregation: The Debate
    Drawing from a wide-range of interdisciplinary scholarship, this course examines the debate surrounding demands for reparations for slavery, Jim Crow Segregation, and institutionalized racism in the US. Also examines reparations in the comparative context of emerging national and international movements.
  • CAS AA 477: Critical Studies: Black Diaspora Theory and Practice
    Explore "diaspora" as a keyword for black studies, intervene in the term's emergence, usage, and many theorizations. Beginning with Paul Gilroy's take on diasporic culture and consciousness, course goes on to complicate/extend/challenge through lens of black gender and sexuality studies. Effective Fall 2021, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: The Individual in Community, Aesthetic Exploration, Critical Thinking.
    • Aesthetic Exploration
    • The Individual in Community
    • Critical Thinking
  • CAS AA 489: The African Diaspora in the Americas
    History of peoples of African descent in the Americas after end of slavery from an international framework. Examines development of racial categories, emergence of national identities in wake of the wars of independence, diverse Black communities in the twentieth century. Also offered as CAS HI 489.
  • CAS AA 490: Blacks and Asians: Encounters Through Time and Space
    Exploration of historical encounters between Africans and people of African descent, and Asians and people of Asian descent. How such people imagined themselves, interacted with each other, viewed each other, influenced each other, and borrowed from each other. Also offered as CAS HI 490.

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