Areas of Concentration

Introduction

Each American Studies student selects an area of concentration, normally in the fall of their junior year, to define their course of study in the major. Students may select from five possible choices:

• Material Cultures and Built Environments
• Politics and American Communities
• National Formations
• The International United States
• Visual, Audio, Literary, and Performance Cultures

The following is a list of courses taken from recent editions of the blue book that would fall within the five new American studies concentrations: National Formations, International United States, Material Cultures and Built Environments, Visual, Audio, Literary, and Performance Cultures, and Politics and American Communities. Any of the lecture courses listed within the concentration would fulfill the "foundation for concentration" requirement. The upper-level seminars would fulfill both the junior and senior requirements for the major.

A small sampling of other non-American Studies courses -- lectures and seminars -- across the Yale curriculum that qualify for American Studies credit is also listed as a point of reference.

Courses may appear in several concentrations. This is not meant to be an exhaustive list, but a guide for majors and faculty advisors to plan out courses of study within each concentration.

The following lists do not represent actual courses to be taught in the coming semester. Please consult current course listings to confirm a course's availability.

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"National Formations" explores the historic migrations, settlements, and encounters among peoples who have formed the American nation, focusing especially on Native American history and the construction of America's frontiers and borderlands. The notion of borderlands may be both geographical and metaphorical in defining spaces of cultural, political, and economic exchange.

Faculty Advisors for National Formations:
Alyssa Mt. Pleasant
Diana Paulin
Stephen Pitti
Alicia Schmidt Camacho
John Warner

Lectures:

• Amst 130 History of American Bodies
• Amst 133 Introduction to American Indian History
• Amst 140 Civil War and Reconstruction Era
• Amst 141 The American West
• Amst 162 African American History: From Emancipation to Present
• Amst 188 The Colonial Period of American History
• Amst 189 FORMAC, 1750-1876
• Amst 190 FORMAC, 1876-1919
• Amst 191 FORMAC, 1920 to the Present
• Amst 204 Literature NOW
• Amst 207 American Cultural Landscapes
• Amst 210 Nineteenth-Century American Literature
• Amst 213 History of Mexican Americans since 1848
• Amst 215 Nationalism, Style and Taste: Nineteenth-Century American Decorative Arts and Domestic Architecture
• Amst 216 American Art: Colonies to Cold War
• Amst 217 Craft, Design and Art: Twentieth-Century American Decorative Arts and Domestic Architecture
• Amst 246 Hemingway, Fitzgerald and Faulkner
• Amst 259 Colonial Literatures of America
• Amst 260 Modern American Literature
• Amst 261 The American Novel since 1945
• Amst 270 Women in America: From the Colonial Period to 1900
• Amst 271 Women in America: The Twentieth Century
• Amst 272 Introduction to Asian American History
• Amst 275 New Immigrants in the U.S.
• Amst 294 African American Literature I, 1740-1900
• Amst 295 African American Literature II, 1900-1970
• Amst 296 African American Literature III, 1970-Present
• Amst 311 Religion in American Society
• Amst 312 Religion in Modern America
• HSAR 214 Anglicization of America: Architecture and Decorative Arts of Colonial America

Seminars (300 level):

• Amst 251 Asian American Literature and Culture
  Amst 258 Wilderness in the North American Imagination
• Amst 292 Interracial Literature
• Amst 307 American Culture in Revolutionary America
• Amst 321 Interraciality and Hybridity
• Amst 325 Indian-Colonial Relations in Comparative Perspective
• Amst 349 Border Feminism

Upper Level Seminars (400 level):

• Amst 403 The History of Latinos in the United States
• Amst 409 Northeastern Native America, 1850 to Today
• Amst 412 Film and History
• Amst 419 Land, Homelands, and American Indian Histories
• Amst 433 Representations of Miscegenation in U.S. Literature and Culture
• Amst 434 International Migration and Refugee Movements I
• Amst 445 Politics and Culture of the American Color Line
• Amst 450 Representing Islam: Conflict, Myth, and U.S. Policy in the Twentieth Century
• Amst 456 Making America Modern, 1880-1920
• Amst 458 Northeastern Native America to 1850
• Amst 475 Food, Culture, and Power in the Twentieth Century
• Amst 476 Baseball in the United States and the World
  
  Non Am Stud Courses (sample)

• Eng 127 Introduction to the Study of American Literature
• Eng 369 Adoption Narratives
• Hist 116 The American Revolution
  
• Hist 148 Jews in America, 1684-present
• Hist 174 American Intellectual Life in the 20th Century

Back to top II. The International United States

"The International United States " focuses on historic and contemporary diasporas, the role of the United States outside of its national borders, and the flow of American peoples, ideas, and goods throughout the globe.

Faculty Advisors for The International United States:
Hazel Carby
Michael Denning
Wai-Chee Dimock
Matthew Jacobson
Lisa Lowe
Mary Lui
Patricia Pessar
Alicia Schmidt Camacho
John Warner

Lectures:

• Amst 218 Metaphors of Globalization
• Amst 213 History of Mexican Americans since 1848
• Amst 230 International History of the United States in the Twentieth Century
• Amst 265 Transatlantic Drama
• Amst 272 Introduction to Asian American History
• Amst 386 Music and Performance from the Hispanophone Caribbean

• Amst 276 Migration in the Americas
• Amst 322 Gender, Family, and Cultural Identity in Asia and the United States
• Amst 367 Latino and Latin American Theater and Performance

• Amst 326 Modernization and Decolonization
• Amst 403 The History of Latinos in the United States
• Amst 410 Asian American Women's History
• Amst 411 Idea of the Western Hemisphere
• Amst 412 Film and History
• Amst 434 International Migration and Refugee Movements I
• Amst 438 Caribbean Diasporic Literature

• AfAm 364 African Diaspora Photography
• Hist 186 African American History: From the Beginning to Emancipation
• Hist 196 Terrorism in America
• Hist 449 Race in Historical Perspective
• Hist 451 US-African Relations, 1787-1920
• Hist 452 Pan-Africanism and Black Nationalism in the United States, the Caribbean, and Africa
• Hist 486 Slavery and the Slave Trade
• HSAR 378 Black Atlantic Visual Tradition
• LITR 449 Dictator Novels across the Americas
• LITR 452 Writing and Power across the Americas
• Span 392 Literature of the Americas North and South

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"Material Cultures and Built Environments" examines the formation of the American landscape from the natural to the man-made, including the development of American architecture, visual and decorative arts.

Faculty Advisors for Material Cultures and Built Environments:
Jean-Christophe Agnew
Dolores Hayden
Robert Stepto

Lectures:

• Amst 189 FORMAC, 1750-1876
• Amst 207 American Cultural Landscapes
• Amst 215 Nationalism, Style and Taste: Nineteenth-Century American Decorative Arts and Domestic Architecture
• Amst 216 American Art: Colonies to Cold War
• Amst 217 Craft, Design, and Art: Twentieth-Century American Decorative Arts and Domestic Architecture
• Amst 220 American Photographs, 1839-197
• Amst 263 Nineteenth-Century American Art: Culture and Politics
• HSAR 214 Anglicization of America: Architecture and Decorative Arts of Colonial America

• Amst 258 Wilderness in the North American Imagination
• Amst 302 Racialization of Urban Spaces in America
• Amst 304 American Culture in the Revolutionary Era
• Amst 333 Visuality and Violence
• Amst 341 Visual Culture of the American Home Front
• Amst 350 Suburbs and the Culture of Sprawl

• Amst 419 Land, Homelands, and American Indian Histories
• Amst 424 Introduction to the Cultural History of Things
• Amst 431 Representation and the Black Female Body
• Amst 447 American Documentary Film and Photography

• Anth 414 Urban Anthropology and Global History
• Engl 258 American Literature in the Electric Age
• Engl 272 Genre and Geography in Nineteenth Century U.S. Literature
• EVST 120 Introduction to Environmental History
• Hist 151 New Haven and the Problem of Change in the American City
• Hist 436 Science, Invention, and the Visual Arts
• Hist 463 History of Suburbanization
• HSAR 221 Architecture since 1945
• HSAR 375 African American Artists in the 20th and 21st Century
• HSAR 378 Black Atlantic Visual Tradition
• HSAR 379 New York Mambo: Microcosm of Black Creativity
• HSAR 470 African American Artists in the Western United States
• HSAR 471 Early African American Visual and Decorative Arts

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"Politics and American Communities" investigates the emergence of social groups and their political struggles at the local and national levels emphasizing the themes of power, inequality, and social justice.

Faculty Advisors for Politics and American Communities:
Kate Dudley
Matthew Jacobson
Mary Lui
Joanne Meyerowitz
Patricia Pessar
Stephen Pitti
Alicia Schmidt Camacho

• Amst 110 History of American Bodies
• Amst 131 U.S. Political and Social History, 1900-1945
• Amst 133 U.S. Political and Social History, 1945-present
• Afam 162 African American History: From Emancipation to Present
• Amst 170 Biology and Society in the Twentieth Century
• Amst 207 American Cultural Landscapes
• Amst 213 History of Mexican Americans since 1848
• Amst 229 Health Social Movements
• Amst 270 Women in America: From the Colonial Period to 1900
• Amst 271 Women in America: The Twentieth Century
• Amst 272 Introduction to Asian American History
• Amst 323 Alcohol and Other Drugs in American Culture
• Amst 324 U.S. Women's Rights

• Amst 302 Racialization of Urban Spaces in the U.S.
• Amst 314 Race, Cinema, and the Migrant
• Amst 320 Black Feminisms
• Amst 327 Workers in the Twentieth Century
• Amst 349 Border Feminisms
• Amst 352 Postwar Queer Avant-Garde Film
• Amst 353 Selected Topics in Lesbian and Gay History
• Amst 367 Latino and Latin American Theater and Performance
• Amst 369 Socialism and Marxism in the Twentieth Century

• Amst 403 The History of Latinos in the United States
• Amst 406 The Spectacle of Disability
• Amst 407 Race and Medicine in America
• Amst 408 Cultural Grounding of Modern Medicine
• Amst 410 Asian American Women's History
• Amst 418 Ethnographic Fieldwork: Analysis and Practice
• Amst 423 Black Intellectuals in the Twentieth Century
• Amst 426 The Fiction of Imaginary or Imminent Futures
• Amst 429 American Communities
• Amst 430 Documentary Film and Video
• Amst 442 Documentary and War
• Amst 445 Politics and Culture of the American Color Line
• Amst 446 History of Sexuality in the United States
• Amst 450 Representing Islam: Conflict, Myth, and U.S. Policy in the Twentieth Century
• Amst 462 Music Cultures in America
• Amst 475 Food and Power
• Amst 476 Baseball in the United States and the World
• Amst 479 Chicano Politics and Culture
• Amst 482 History of Feminist Thought

• Afam 250 Blacks and the Law
• Engl 288 American Literature and the History of Punishment
• Hist 150 American Legal History
• Plsc 229 Race and Ethnicity in American Politics
• Plsc 264 Big City Politics in America
• Soc 115 Contemporary American Society
• Soc 183 Urban America
• Soc 216 Social Movements
• Soc 236 Working in America
• Soc 342 Labor Relations in the U.S.
• Soc 385 Race, Gender, and the African American Experience

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"Visual, Audio, Literary, and Performance Cultures" explores American consumer culture, popular culture and media in relation to U.S. literatures.

Faculty Advisors for Visual, Audio, Literary, and Performance Cultures:
Jean-Christophe Agnew
Hazel Carby
Michael Denning
Wai-Chee Dimock
Dolores Hayden
Charles Musser
Robert Stepto

Lectures:

• Amst 128 World Performance
• Amst 189 FORMAC, 1750-1876
• Amst 190 FORMAC, 1876-1919
• Amst 191 FORMAC, 1920 to the Present
• Amst 204 Literature NOW
• Amst 210 Nineteenth-Century American Literature
• Amst 246 Hemingway, Fitzgerald and Faulkner
• Amst 259 Colonial Literatures of America
• Amst 260 Modern American Literature
• Amst 261 The American Novel since 1945
• Amst 294 African American Literature I, 1740-1900
• Amst 295 African American Literature II, 1900-1970
• Amst 296 African American Literature III, 1970-Present

Seminars:

• Amst 225 American Film Comedy
• Amst 251 Asian American Literature and Culture
• Amst 273 Black Women's Literature
• Amst 304 American Culture in the Revolutionary Era
• Amst 307 American Consumer Culture in the Twentieth Century
• Amst 308 The Films of Woody Allen, Spike Lee, and Martin Scorcese
• Amst 309 Toni Morrison
• Amst 314 Race, Cinema, and the Migrants
• Amst 319 American Documentary Film
• Amst 321 Interraciality and Hybridity
• Amst 337 Errol Morris and Contemporary Documentary
• Amst 342 The Hollywood Novel, The Hollywood Movie
• Amst 352 Postwar Queer Avant-Garde Film
• Amst 386 Music and Performance from the Hispanophone Caribbean

Upper-Level Seminars (400 level):

• Amst 405 Autobiography in America
• Amst 406The Spectacle of Disability
• Amst 412 Film and History
• Amst 416 U.S. Cinema from 1960 to the mid-1970s
• Amst 420 Ralph Ellison in Context
• Amst 424 Introduction to the Cultural History of Things
• Amst 426 The Fiction of Imaginary or Imminent Futures
• Amst 428 Film Noir and the American Culture of the 1940s and 1950s
• Amst 430 Contemporary Documentary Film and Video
• Amst 431 Representation and the Black Female Body
• Amst 433 Representations of Miscegenation in U.S. Literature and Culture
• Amst 439 American Fiction since 1940
• Amst 442 Documentary and War
• Amst 447 American Documentary Film and Photography
• Amst 448 Walt Whitman
• Amst 452 Harlem Renaissance
• Amst 460 Twentieth Century African American Poetry
• Amst 462 Music Cultures in America

• Afam 407 August Wilson and his Contexts
• Afam 431 Introduction to Jazz Studies
• ENGL 292 Dreaming New Orleans
• Film 150 Introduction to Film Studies
• Film 323 American Avant-Garde Cinema
• Film 364 Milos Forman and His Films
• Film 421 Film and the Harlem Renaissance
• MUSI 265 Jazz in Transition
• MUSI 276 Motown and Soul

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