Courses Archive

Topics will vary each semester.

The objective of this course is to examine substantive issues in the African American female experience from colonial times to the present. The dominant themes of this course include family, work, community, sexuality, and individual and collective activism. Particular attention will be paid to the interplay between race, class, and gender in American society. Assigned readings consist of an introduction to the scholarly secondary literature on African American women's history. Lectures and discussions will examine the readings in context. Videos will augment the lectures and discussions.

This is an upper division course dealing with the relevance of language to social issues in African societies. It will focus on political developments in Africa and the use of language in fostering national identity; attaining cultural emancipation; and as a tool of oppression, of maintenance of social relations, and of addressing issues of education and childhood development, etc. The course will examine such issues as the roots of national language policies as influenced by Africa's reaction to colonialism; the role of western languages in African society and the attitudes towards African languages and cultures; the challenges of nation-building in modern African states; the use of African languages in government, education, and technology; the role of language in dealing with the HIV/AIDS pandemic, and other health issues; minority languages, endangered languages, and language preservation; cultural responses to migration and African diaspora: the use of African languages in the age of globalization and information technology.

A critical appraisal of the theoretically based policies employed by Third World nations in their attempts at transition to modernized developed socio-political and economic systems and an examination of the international and intranational impediments to Third World development. The focus will be on actual examples that represent the diversity of developing countries.

Cancelled 

Berkeley Connect is a mentoring program, offered through various academic departments, that helps students build intellectual community. Over the course of a semester, enrolled students participate in regular small-group discussions facilitated by a graduate student mentor (following a faculty-directed curriculum), meet with their graduate student mentor for one-on-one academic advising, attend lectures and panel discussions featuring department faculty and alumni, and go on field trips to campus resources. Students are not required to be declared majors in order to participate.

An examination of the movement of individuals, ideas, ideologies, and institutions between minority American communities in the U.S. (African Americans, Asians, Chicanos) and their cultures of origin, in the 19th and 20th centuries. The course will utilize the concepts of "migration," "diaspora," "otherness," "multiculturalism," and "global village" and will draw largely on social science perspectives.

The Berkeley Seminar Program has been designed to provide new students with the opportunity to explore an intellectual topic with a faculty member in a small-seminar setting. Berkeley Seminars are offered in all campus departments, and topics vary from department to department and semester to semester.

The Berkeley Seminar Program has been designed to provide new students with the opportunity to explore an intellectual topic with a faculty member in a small-seminar setting. Berkeley Seminars are offered in all campus departments, and topics vary from department to department and semester to semester.

Continued training in expository and argumentative writing, with more emphasis on literary interpretation. Satisfies the second half of the Reading and Composition requirement