Course catalog

Lower Division Courses and Descriptions

NAS 2v. Introduction to Native American Studies & Indigenous Studies (4) | Faculty

Virtual lecture—3 hours; virtual discussion—1 hour. Introduction to the field of Native American Studies. Regional, national, and hemispheric focus. Native American/Indigenous Studies theory, methodology, and pedagogy. Diverse realities and original languages of Indigenous Nations. GE credit: AH or SS, DD, WC.

NAS 5v. Introduction to Native American Literature (4) | Faculty

Virtual lecture/discussion—4 hours. Prerequisite: completion of Subject A requirement. Intensive focus on analysis of Native American literary texts, with frequent writing assignments to develop critical thinking and composition skills. GE credit: ArtHum, Div, Wrt | AH, DD, OL, WE.—I, II, III, IV. (I, II, III, IV.)

Upper Division Courses and Descriptions

CH ST 116. Maya History & Resistance (4) | Batz

The course examines Maya History and Resistance in the Mayab’, or where the Maya live/are. It attempts to de-center the nation-state, while also recognizing the ways that governments have played a role in repressing Indigenous Peoples. The course analyzes the Maya through time and space, with each week focusing on a particular topic.

ENGL 165IB. Indigenous Border Studies (4)  | Salomón

This course presents a critical perspective on national borders and borderlands through the experiences of Indigenous peoples and nations who are occupied and partitioned by colonial regimes, specifically in the Americas. We will survey the impacts of colonial occupation and competition such as militarization, partition, resource extraction, carcerality, gender violence, and impunity on Indigenous peoples, with a particular focus on the intersections of gender and sexuality. Students will learn transdisciplinary methodologies to examine popular culture and discourse, historical and legal records, film, digital media, literature, cartography, and testimonials to consider both the settler imaginary of the border and Indigenous border resistance.

ETHN 163FR. Playing Indian: Native American and First Nations Cinema (4) | Burelle

(Cross-listed with TDGE 131R.) This online course examines recent movies by Native American/First Nations artists that labor to deconstruct and critique reductive stereotypes about America’s First Peoples in Hollywood cinema. Carving spaces of “visual sovereignty” (Raheja), these films propose complex narratives and characterizations of indigeneity.

INTL ST 146W.  Global Indigeneity  (4)  | Whitt

Situates the interdisciplinary fields of Native American and Indigenous Studies within a transnational context, focusing on the global dimensions of indigeneity informing local histories, politics, and experiences. Examines settler colonialism, sovereignty, and the enduring legacies of colonialism as global phenomena.

Prerequisite: Satisfactory completion of the Lower-Division Writing requirement.  

NAS 123v. Native Foods and Farming of the Americas (4) | Grandia

Virtual lecture/discussion—4 hours. Cultural and social history of native American foods like maize, potatoes, quinoa, chocolate, peppers, beans, avocados, etc. Discussion of socio-economic, environmental, legal challenges facing indigenous and peasant farmers today. Offered in alternate years. GE credit: SciEng or SocSci, Wrt|DD, SE or SS, WC.—S. (S.) 

NAS 175v. Hemispheric Indigenous Connections (4) | Faculty

Virtual lecture/discussion—4 hours. Indigenous worlds in motion in the Americas, 1491-present. Comparative Indigenous experiences of colonialism and neocolonialism, plus histories of resistance, cultural survival, and transnational grassroots organizing with an emphasis on environmental justice movements. GE credit: SS, VL, WC.

NAS 181v. Native American Poetry (4) | Hernández-Ávila

Virtual lecture/discussion—4 hours. Contemporary Native American/Indigenous poetry, poets, and the practice of writing poetry. Understanding poetry from the perspective of Indigenous oral and ritual traditions and from the contemporary aesthetic/poetic practices of the selected poets. GE credit: AH, DD, WC.

SOC 139NG. Special Topics in Race, Ethnicity, and Nation: Native American Genders and Sexualities (4) | Jolivétte

This course introduces students to some of the most salient and critical themes/interventions within the field of queer Indigenous studies across the Americas and the Pacific from a sociological perspective with a focus on the sociology of gender and sexuality. As a uniquely American Indian driven perspective on issues of sexuality, this course examines not just sexuality and issues of gender, but provides students with course content distinct from any other in the department and university---it offers a historic and contemporary analysis of Native and Indigenous sexuality that is specific to the field of American Indian Studies and Critical Ethnic Studies.