The CARTER G. WOODSON INSTITUTE
for
AFRICAN-AMERICAN & AFRICAN STUDIES
at
THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA
108 Minor Hall
P.O. Box 400162
Charlottesville, VA 22904-4162
(434) 924-3109
COURSE OFFERING DIRECTORY
Spring 2008
THE CARTER G. WOODSON INSTITUTE
Founded in 1981, the University of Virginia’s Carter G. Woodson Institute for African-American and African Studies is named in honor of native Virginian Carter Godwin Woodson. Born in 1875 in Buckingham County to parents who were formerly enslaved, Woodson would go on to be the first African-American to earn a Ph.D. in history at Harvard University in 1912. He was instrumental in bringing professional recognition to the study of African-American history during a period when most historians held the opinion that African Americans were a people without history. Woodson was the founder of the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History and its scholarly journal The Journal of Negro History. Under his leadership, Negro History Week was inaugurated in the United States as an annual celebration of African-American achievement.
At the Carter G. Woodson Institute for African-American and African Studies, our goal is to continue the pioneering work of our namesake through an active program of undergraduate teaching and curriculum development, original interdisciplinary research; institutional and financial support of scholars; conferences and colloquia; publications and public outreach projects. The Woodson Institute promotes interdisciplinary and collaborative research and interpretation of the African and African-American experience in a global context. It links research and writing in African-American and African studies to undergraduate teaching. Throughout its history, the Woodson Institute has guided the University's African-American and African Studies major, offered graduate students doing work of topical interest an intellectual home, and received national and international acclaim for the success of its residential fellowship program.
THE CARTER G. WOODSON INSTITUTE
for
AFRICAN-AMERICAN AND AFRICAN STUDIES
AAS FACULTY ADVISORS
Melvin Butler ()
Music Department
Roquinaldo Ferreira ()
History Department and African-American and African Studies
Scot French ()
History Department
Claudrena Harold ()
History Department and African-American and African Studies
Cynthia Hoehler-Fatton (), Director of Undergraduate Programs, AAS
Department of Religious Studies
Adria LaViolette ()
Anthropology Department
John Mason ()
History Department
Deborah McDowell (), Interim Director, Carter G. Woodson Institute
English Department
Marlon Ross ()
English Department
Jalane Schmidt ()
Department of Religious Studies
Milton Vickerman ()
Sociology Department
Melvin N. Wilson ()
Psychology Department
Vesla Weaver ()
Department of Politics
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AFRICAN-AMERICANAFRICANSTUDIES
CURRICULUM
In January 1997, new requirements for a major in African-American and African Studies [AAS] became effective. Declared majors were not affected by these changes, however, new majors will be required to abide by the new requirements. Also, beginning Fall 1997, the AAS program implemented a Distinguished Majors Program. Current third-year AAS majors with a GPA of at least 3.4 are eligible (a full description of the program is included in this directory).
AASMAJOR REQUIREMENTS
The African-American and African Studies interdisciplinary major comprises 9 courses (29 credit hours) taken with a program approved by any member of the AAS Steering Committee, who will act as the student's advisor. These courses may include courses taken before declaration of the major. In order to declare a major, a student must have taken AAS 101 and 102 and earned a grade of C or better in each course. Students must have an average 2.0 in the major for it to be considered complete.
The major requires a distribution of courses in the following areas and levels, which must be selected from the AAS Course Offering Directory.
1. AAS 101 and 102.
2.One course concerning race and politics in the United States.
3.One course in the humanities: Art History, Drama, English, French, Music, Philosophy, or Religious Studies.
4.One course in the social sciences or history: Anthropology, Economics, Government and Foreign Affairs, History, Psychology, Slavic Languages, or Sociology. This course must be in addition to AAS 101 and 102.
5.One course about Africa, which may fulfill requirements 3-4 above.
6.Four courses above the 300 level, which may fulfill requirements 2-5 above.
7.One 400 level seminar requiring a research paper, which may fulfill requirement 6 above.
Please note: While a single course may fulfill more than one requirement, students should remember that they must take a total of seven courses in addition to AAS 101 and 102 for a total of 29 credit hours.
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Each semester, the African-American and African Studies program publishes a list of courses that satisfy the above requirements. Students should speak with an advisor if they have any questions about how to distribute the Major courses.
Students frequently find that African-American and African Studies works well as a double-major with another discipline in the humanities and social sciences. Up to 11 credits in another departmental major may count toward an AAS major, if the courses are among those listed in the AAS Course Offering Directory. Up to 6 transfer credits from relevant study abroad programs may be counted toward the major, with the advance written permission of the AAS Undergraduate Studies Director. Up to 3 credits of an appropriate language course may be counted toward the major.
Exceptions to any of these requirements will be made only upon written petition to the AAS Undergraduate Studies Director. No petitions will be accepted after the completion of a student's seventh semester.
Declaring an AAS Major Students considering a major or minor in African-American and African Studies may consult any member of the Steering Committee.
The procedure for declaring a major in African-American and African Studies are:
Pick up a Declaration of Major form in Garrett Hall.
Fill in section pertaining to courses you have already taken.
Consult with the AAS Undergraduate Studies Director concerning the assignment of a faculty advisor. Bring the Declaration of Major form and a copy of your PACE form.
Consult with your advisor about courses which you have taken or plan to take to fulfill the AAS requirements. Have the faculty advisor sign the form. (NOTE: At the end of this directory, there is a AAS Major worksheet to help you organize your studies.)
Return the form to the Carter G. Woodson Institute, Minor Hall 108.
AAS MINOR REQUIRMENTS In order to declare a minor, a student must have taken AAS 101 and 102 and earned a grade of C or better in each course. A Minor in African-American and African Studies comprises the following:
1.AAS 101 and 102.
2.Twelve credit hours, in addition to AAS 101 and 102, selected from the AAS Course Offering Directory.
3.An average of 2.0 in all courses counted under this requirement.
Declaring an AAS Minor
Pick up a Declaration of Minor form at the Carter G. Woodson Institute, Minor Hall 108.
Fill in section pertaining to courses you have already taken.
Consult with the AAS Undergraduate Studies Director concerning the assignment of an AAS faculty advisor.
Return the form, along with a copy of your PACE form, to the Carter G. Woodson Institute, Minor Hall 108.
AFRICAN STUDIES MINOR REQUIREMENTS A minor in African Studies comprises the following:
1.HIAF 201 and 202 (“C” or better in both courses)
2.Twelve credit hours beyond HIAF 201 and 202, selected from two departments with the approval of the African Studies faculty advisor.
3.An average of 2.0 in all courses counted toward the minor.
Note: Courses counted toward the minor may not be counted toward the student’s major. Up to six credits of approved study abroad credits may apply to the minor.
Declaring an African Studies Minor
Pick up a Declaration of Minor form from the Carter G. Woodson Institute, Minor Hall 108, or from the faculty advisor, Cynthia Hoehler-Fatton.
Fill in section pertaining to courses you have already taken.
Consult with the AS Minor faculty advisor.
Return the form, along with a copy of your VISTAA form, to the Carter G. Woodson Institute, Minor Hall 108.
INDEPENDENT STUDY in AAS 401 allows students to work on an individual research project. Students wishing to pursue this option should pick up an information sheet at the Woodson Institute, which explains the procedure and requirements. Students must propose a topic to an appropriate faculty member, submit a written proposal for his/her approval, prepare an extensive annotated bibliography on relevant readings comparable to the reading list of a regular upper-level course, and complete a research paper of at least 20 pages.
DISTINGUISHED MAJORS PROGRAM IN AFRICAN-AMERICAN AND AFRICAN STUDIES
The Distinguished Majors Program in African-American and African Studies affords qualified students the opportunity to do advanced research, and to receive, at graduation, the honor of “Distinction” or “High Distinction.” Third-year students with a superior academic record are encouraged to apply.
Entry into the Program
1. Students are eligible to apply if they have achieved an average of 3.40 in all coursework prior to application for the program.
3. The applicant must obtain the agreement of a thesis supervisor. The supervisor can be any faculty member who offers courses that count toward the AAS major. The thesis supervisor must agree to direct the thesis research, and the applicant must submit the name of one appropriate secondary reader.
3. Application should be made to the director of the Undergraduate Program by filling out the one-page application form and attaching a two-to-three page proposal.
Requirements for completion of the Program
1. Satisfaction of all College requirements as stated in the Undergraduate Record with an overall GPA of at least 3.40.
2. Fulfillment of the distribution requirements for the normal AAS major.
3. Like the AAS major, the DMP comprises a minimum of 29 credits. DMP participants must complete at least six credits of course work at or above the 400-level, in addition to the six credits specific to preparation of the thesis, outlined in #4, below.
4. Participants register for 3 credits of AAS 451 (Directed Research) in the first semester. In the second semester, students register for AAS 452 (Thesis).
5. Participants must write a thesis of approximately 8,000 words, or 40 pages.
COURSE DESCRIPTIONS
AFRICAN-AMERICAN AND AFRICAN STUDIES PROGRAM
AAS 102 – Crosscurents in the African Diaspora (4)
Instructors: Marlon Ross and Ian Grandison
1230-1345 TR
MIN 125
This introductory course builds upon the histories of people of African descent in Africa, the Americas, and the Caribbean surveyed in AAS 101. Drawing on disciplines such as anthropology, history, religious studies, political science, sociology, geography, mapping, and spatial analysis, the course focuses on the period from the late 19th century to the present and is comparative in perspective. It examines the links and disjunctions between communities of African descent in the United States and in Latin America, the Caribbean, and Africa. The course begins with an overview of AAS, its history, assumptions, boundaries, and topics of inquiry, and then proceeds to focus on a number of inter-related themes: patterns of cultural experience; community formation; comparative racial classification; language and society; family and kinship; religion; social and political movements; arts and aesthetics; and archaeology of the African Diaspora.
AAS 307 – History of Brazil (3)
Instructor: Roquinaldo Ferreira
12:30-1:45 TR
CAB 337
This class surveys the History of Brazil from early Portuguese colonization in the sixteenth century to Brazilian Independence in 1822. It places the onset of the colonization of Brazil against the backdrop of the broader Portuguese empire between the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries. It devotes significant attention to the establishment and growth of indigenous slavery and the transition to African slavery, dwelling on the intellectual and religious debates that the establishment of slavery brought about in the colony and the metropolis. It analyzes the social, political, cultural, and religious underpinnings of colonial Brazil by seeking to integrate Brazilian history into the broader Atlantic World, primarily Africa and the Spanish colonies in the Americas. In addition to lectures and discussions, several movies on colonial Brazil will be shown.
(This course is cross-listed with HILA 307)
AAS 351 - African Diaspora Religions (3)
Jalane Schmidt
930-1045 TR
HAL 123
The seminar will feature close readings of ethnographic literature about African diaspora religions, and require students to write a seminar-length final paper. Often deemed emblematic of these groups' ethnic identities, the religious practices of African-descended populations in Latin America and the Caribbean are a frequent site of inquiry for cultural anthropologists. We will examine the often-polemical "African retention" vs. "creolization" debate as this relates to changing theoretical paradigms in anthropology and to African-descended populations' shifting political fortunes, activism, and cultural cachet. We will attend to changing conceptions of "race," "religion," and "nation" in the treatment of these religions by legal institutions, as well as how officials from the tourism industry and government ministries have influenced processes of "folkloricization."
(This course is cross-listed as RELA 351)
AAS 401 – Independent Study (1-3)
Topic to be determined by the instructor and the student
AAS 402 – Africa and the Black Atlantic (3)
Instructor: Roquinaldo Ferreira
1530-1800 R
CAB 236
This seminar investigates the relationship between Africa and the Atlantic World between the fifteenth and fourteenth centuries. The class begins by undertaking a critical reading of the historiography of the Black Atlantic/African Diaspora (Gilroy, Matory, Mann, among several others), then moving on to analyze contemporaneous accounts by Africans, including Equiano. Key issues that will be treated are the circulation of ideas in the Atlantic through the rise of the Afro-Brazilian religion, Candomblé, the conceptualization of slavery and the Atlantic world by Africans, as well as both failed and successful reverse migration movements. Students will write a research paper based on the accounts analyzed in class.
(Cross-listed as HIAF 401A)
AAS 406A – Gendered Experiences in Africa and its Diaspora (3)
Instructor: Edwina Ashie-Nikoi
1530 -1800 M
BRN 310
This seminar explores the interconnections between gender and history in Africa and its Diaspora in Latin America and the Caribbean. The course will pay particular attention to the experiences of women of the African Diaspora, but will also explore the experience of men and their articulations of masculinity, and will examine how gendered readings could challenge our understandings and assumptions about historical events in the Diaspora. Readings for the course will be multidisciplinary, and include novels and auto/biographies such as The History of Mary Prince, the only biography of an enslaved woman in the Caribbean. The seminar proceeds from the theoretical perspective that gender is a critical and indispensable category of historical analysis that interlocks with race, class, and other factors. The course will culminate in a 17-25 page research paper.
AAS 406 B – Racial Geographies of Virginia (3)
Instructor: Ian Grandison
1830-2100 T
BRN 332
Traditionally, geography is a scientific discipline devoted to studying and recording, through the supposedly neutral lens of empirical observation, the distribution of features or "resources" (minerals, soils, terrain, drainage, vegetation, wildlife, climate, tribes, clans, kingdoms, nations, "races") that exist at, below, or above the earth's surface. In the popular imagination, geography is often seen as the hobby of people who like to know what and where things are in the world, whether for the love of trivia or for the leisure of touristic adventure. An experimental seminar, this course resonates with "critical geography," which challenges both academic and popular assumptions about geography. Informed and inspired by cultural critique in the humanities, critical geography is a new area of inquiry that interrogates the presumed empirical neutrality of the discipline by focusing on how geographic knowledge has been shaped by the messy negotiation of power among social groups. Critical geography rejects theories of environmental determinism whereby the temperament and social progress of the world's peoples are seen as wholly determined by regional climates and ranked on a scale from primitive to civilized. Thus, racial geography acknowledges the ways in which human groups, arbitrarily distinguished through race, have been among the resources catalogued by geography for the purpose of exploitation. This seminar will serve as a forum for participants to collaborate on delineating the scope of the notion of "racial geography" using the state of Virginia-in any or all of its past or present configurations-as a frame of reference. How has the formation of race helped to give rise to the idea of Virginia, first as a crown colony, then as a commonwealth? How has the emergence of Virginia with its shifting territorial boundaries (from colonization to birthplace of North American slavery, from capital of the confederacy to headquarters of massive resistance against desegregation) been geographically constructed through the notion of race (enterprising settlers, indentured servants, savage vs. friendly natives, chattel slaves, immigrant aliens)? The seminar is conducted through a variety of short, intensive readings; map interpretation workshops; informal individual and group exercises; and field trips. Graded requirements include a midterm exam and a final critical essay (3750 to 5000 words).
AAS 406C – Black Power and the Civil Rights Movement
Instructor: Julian Hayter
1530-1800T
CAB 432
This seminar explores the relationship between the American civil rights movement and the black power movement. Recently, a number of scholars have started to expand the traditional chronology of the two movements by searching for their ideological and social origins. In their search, these historians insist that the noncompliant ideology found in the black power movement (e.g., armed resistance, black nationalism, communism, & socialism) and the black populism commonly associated with the civil rights movement, both pre-date WWII. Scholars have also found that these supposedly distinct forms of activism were combined in various times and places, suggesting that the black power movement may not have been a complete refutation of civil rights activism. We will interrogate this supposed binary through class discussion and readings. We will consider how civil rights activists used measures commonly associated with black power ideology, and we will explore how the marriage of these allegedly dissimilar movements informed the construction of black power politics during the late 1960s and early 1970s. Readings, class discussion, and research will culminate into a 17-20-page paper.