Chicana/Latina Studies Requirements

This course on Chicana women introduces students to basic concepts, categories and issues organized around the concept of gender. We examine gender and power relations within various institutions: the home, the school system, university, the church, the environment, and various human work spheres.

This course examines the gendered constitution of race in the U.S., from 18th century naturalism and 19th century scientific racism, to 20th and 21st century eugenics, multiculturalism, neoliberalism, and "color blindness".

This interdisciplinary course examines key works by those women of color whose political and cultural investments in a collaborative, cross-cultural critique of U.S. imperialism and heteronormativity has been called "U.S. Third World Feminisms."

This course will examine the varied and evolving concerns of Chicanas as they forge new visions of feminism through the Chicano Movement of the 1960s; organizing among Chicana lesbian communities; Chicanas' entrance into academic, literary and artistic arenas; diverse community and national activist efforts in the 1980s; and current transnational initiatives.

Using a comparative and interdisciplinary focus this course critically examines major issues affecting today's Latinx populations. Major topics include immigration, class, race, gender, sexuality, culture and identity, and the role of discrimination, laws, public policies and policing in structuring inequality.

The nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were a formative period in Chicana/o literary and cultural history, especially for women. This course tracks the gendered, racial, linguistic, and national shifts marked by the literary and historical records left by cultural producers as they now receive critical attention as "recovered" texts.

This a co-convened course that will include advanced 4th-year undergraduate students who along with graduate students (enrolled in MAS 570) will examine migration as a worldwide phenomenon in part due to the greater participation of women. In the Americas, in particular, there has been a steady increase in migration to the U.S. from Mexico and Latin America since the 1960s, much of which can be traced to the negative impact of structural adjustment programs (SAPs) resulting in the impoverishment of agricultural sectors and lack of employment opportunities, a combination known to produce the feminization of migration. In this class, we will explore this phenomenon and the various challenges borne by women and youths. We will consider relevant theories, such as neoliberal economics and structural violence, as well as a wide range of perspectives, combining demography, history, ethnography and public policy analysis to better understand issues of borders, transnational identities, human rights, labor rights, and responsibilities of host and sending states.

Historical survey and sociological analysis of past and present experiences of Mexicanas and Chicanas in the United States.