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:
I. National Formations
II. International United States
III. Material Cultures
IV. Politics and American Communites
V. 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.
I. National Formations
"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
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
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
Seminars
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
Upper Level Seminars (400 level)
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
Non American Studies Courses (sample)
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
III. Material Cultures and Built Environments
"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
Seminars
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
Upper-Level Seminar (400 level)
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
Non-Am Stud Listed Courses (sample)
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
IV. Politics and American Communities
"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
Lectures
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
Seminars
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
Upper-Level Seminars (400 level)
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
Non American Studies Courses (sample)
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
V. Visual, Audio, Literary, and Performance Cultures
"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
Non American Studies Courses (sample)
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
