African American Studies
81 Wall St., 432.1170
www.yale.edu/afamstudies/
M.A., M.Phil., Ph.D.
Chair
TBA
Director of Graduate Studies
Gerald Jaynes (81 Wall St., gerald.jaynes@yale.edu)
Professors Elizabeth Alexander, Elijah Anderson, David Blight, Hazel Carby, William Foltz, Glenda Gilmore, Ezra Griffith, Jonathan Holloway, Matthew Jacobson, Gerald Jaynes, Christopher L. Miller, Patricia Pessar, Joseph Roach, Robert Stepto, John Szwed, Robert Thompson, Emilie Townes
Associate Professors Kamari Clarke, Michael Veal
Assistant Professors Khalilah Brown-Dean, Terri Francis, Alondra Nelson, Naomi Pabst, Edward Rugemer
Lecturers Kathleen Cleaver, Flemming Norcott, Deborah Thomas, Jennifer Wood
Fields of Study
African American Studies offers a combined Ph.D. in conjunction with several other departments and programs. Departments and programs which currently offer a combined Ph.D. with African American Studies are: American Studies, Anthropology, English, Film Studies, French, History, History of Art, Political Science, Psychology, Religious Studies, Sociology, and Spanish and Portuguese. Within the field of study, the student will select an area of concentration in consultation with the directors of graduate studies of African American Studies and the joint department or program. An area of concentration in African American Studies may take the form of a single area study or a comparative area study: e.g., Caribbean or African American literature, a comparison of African American literature in a combined degree with the Department of English; an investigation of the significance of the presence of African cultures in the New World, either in the Caribbean or in Latin and/or South America in a combined degree with the Spanish and Portuguese department. An area of concentration may also follow the fields of study already established within a single discipline, e.g., race/minority/ethnic studies in a combined degree with Sociology. An area of concentration must either be a field of study offered by a department or fall within the rubric of such a field. Please refer to the description of fields of study of the prospective joint department or program.
Special Admissions Requirements
Strong undergraduate preparation in a discipline related to African American studies; writing sample; description of the fields of interest to be pursued in a combined degree. This is a combined degree program. To be considered for admission to this program you must indicate both African American Studies and one of the participating departments/programs listed above. Additionally, please indicate both departments on all supporting documents (personal statement, letters of recommendation, transcripts, etc.).
Special Requirements for the Ph.D. Degree
Students will be subject to the combined Ph.D. supervision of the African American Studies department and the relevant participating department or program. The student’s academic program will be decided in consultation with an adviser, the director of graduate studies of African American Studies, and the director of graduate studies of the participating department or program and must be approved by all three. Students are required to take four designated core courses in African American Studies. Core courses are (1) Theorizing Racial Formations (AFAM 505a/AMST 643a), which is a required course for all first-year graduate students in the combined program; (2) American Legal History: Citizenship and Race (AFAM 829b/WGSS 715b) and/or Race, Racism, and Social Theory (AFAM 719b/SOCY 654bu/WGSS 719b), which is a required course for all first-year graduate students in the combined-program spring term; (3) Interdisciplinary Analysis in Race, Class, Gender (AFAM 827b), which is a required course for all second-year graduate students in the combined-program spring term; (4) Dissertation Prospectus Workshop (AFAM 895). After completion of course work, students will be required to attend the one-year dissertation prospectus workshop during their third year. This workshop is intended to support preparation of the dissertation proposal. Each student will be expected to present his or her dissertation prospectus during that year. The workshop will also feature seminars in which students present chapters of their dissertations-in-progress. The expectation is that this workshop will be voluntarily attended by students even during terms when they are not required to register for it. The workshop will be an important part of each graduate student’s professionalization and will serve as a vital stimulus to intellectual activity.
Qualifying examinations and the dissertation proposal will be administered jointly by the program and participating department and must be passed within the time required by the participating department. The total number of courses required will adhere to the requirements of the participating department or program. Each student must complete the minimum number of courses required by the participating department or program; African American Studies core courses (excepting the dissertation prospectus workshop) count toward the participating department’s or program’s total. For details of these requirements, see the special requirements of the combined Ph.D. for the particular department printed in this publication. Students will be required to meet the foreign language requirements of the participating department (see Policies and Regulations: Degree Requirements). Students will not be admitted to candidacy until all requirements, including the dissertation prospectus, have been met and approved by the Graduate Studies Executive Committee of the African American Studies department and the participating department. If a student intends to apply for this combined Ph.D. in African American Studies and another department, he or she should contact the prospective department and request a description of all Ph.D. requirements and courses.
The faculty in African American Studies consider teaching to be an essential component of graduate education, and students therefore will teach in their third and fourth years.
Master’s Degrees
M.Phil. See Graduate School requirements.
M.A. (en route to the joint Ph.D.) Students will be awarded a combined M.A. degree in African American Studies and the relevant participating department or program upon successful completion of all course work except the Research Workshop, which is taken in the student’s third year of study. See also Graduate School requirements.
Program materials are available upon request to the Director of Graduate Studies, African American Studies, Yale University, PO Box 203388, New Haven CT 06520-3388.
Courses
AFAM 505a/AMST 643a, Theorizing Racial Formations Hazel Carby
A required course for all first-year students in the joint Ph.D. in African American Studies; also open to students in American Studies. This interdisciplinary reading seminar focuses on new work that is challenging the temporal, theoretical, and spatial boundaries of the field. M 1:30–3:20
[AFAM 525bU, Psychosocial Study of Black Autobiography]
[AFAM 563bu, Ralph Ellison in Context]
AFAM 573a/ANTH 595a, Transnationalism, Globalization, and New Diasporic Formations Kamari Clarke
As anthropologists continue to grapple with changing notions of “the field” from local to global, this course covers recent and emerging scholarship that explores theoretical problems of globalization, transnationalism, and diaspora in specific historical and ethnographic context. Drawing on a range of ideas from world systems theories of globalization and notions of the invention of diasporas, to postmodern ideas of social constructions, the emphasis is on the interrelations between local and global cultural processes. These processes disrupt the once-homogenizing tendencies of ethnography and instead push us to examine different criteria for analyzing and constructing communities. TTH 2:30–3:45
[AFAM 588bu, Autobiography in America]
AFAM 596a/AMST 641a/ENGL 947au, African American Poets of the Modern Era Elizabeth Alexander
The African American practice of poetry between 1900 and 1960, especially of sonnets, ballads, sermonic, and blues poems. Poets studied include Paul Laurence Dunbar, Langston Hughes, Sterling Brown, Gwendolyn Brooks, Margaret Walker, and Robert Hayden. The classes include sessions at Beinecke Library for the inspection and discussion of original editions, manuscripts, letters, and other archival materials. T 1:30–3:20
AFAM 693b/AMST 730b/HIST 709b, The Black Intellectual since 1941 Jonathan Holloway
This course examines the post-1941 African American history of ideas and the histories of those who produced them. Multiple methodological approaches are considered for what they reveal and conceal about race and other attendant constructions during the long civil rights movement. Th 1:30–3:20
AFAM 697a/HIST 713a, Research in Slavery and Abolition Edward Rugemer
This is a research seminar in the history of slavery and its abolition in the Atlantic World from the emergence of African slavery in the late sixteenth century through the final emancipations of the 1880s. Potential topics include slavery, slave resistance, rebellions, abolitionism, and emancipation. m 3:30–5:20
AFAM 709b/AMST 709b/HIST 736b/WGSS 736b, Research in Twentieth-Century United States Political and Social History Glenda Gilmore
Projects chosen from the post-Civil War period, with emphasis on twentieth-century social and political history, broadly defined. Research seminar. W 1:30–3:20
AFAM 719bu/AMST 680b/SOCY 654bu/WGSS 719b, Race, Racism, and Social Theory Alondra Nelson
In this seminar we examine some of the ways in which “race” has been defined, delineated, and critiqued by social analysts. Bearing in mind that some regard the idea of race as always signaling notions of inferiority and superiority, while others regard it as a positive sign of shared history and collective identity, we consult a range of opinions as to what race is and how perceptions of racial difference shape the social world. We consider the interplay of race with class and gender, and the consequences of this “intersectionality” for how racism is deployed and experienced. We examine the role of medicine, scientific knowledge, and the body in the constitution of race. We also turn our attention to explanations of how race and racism are reflected in the structure of institutions, in the formation of the nation-state, and in the production of cultural representations, among other sites. T 2:30–4:20
AFAM 721a/AMST 720a/HIST 731a, Readings in Southern History since 1865 Glenda Gilmore
Readings in Southern History since 1865 revisits traditional themes in southern historiography, matching classics of southern U.S. history with recent work. The course expands the definition of “southerner,” challenges the narratives and periodization of Reconstruction, Jim Crow, and the Civil Rights Movement, and brings theories on the construction of gender and race into dialogue with southern history. The readings place the U.S. South in a global discourse of white supremacy, imperialism, Communism, Fascism, and Pan-Africanism. The course requires book reviews and an historiographical paper that reviews an issue in southern history and suggests opportunities for future research on the topic. Th 3:30–5:20
[AFAM 723a, Caribbean Diasporic Intellectuals]
AFAM 728bu/AFST 778bu/HSAR 778bu, From West Africa to the Black Americas: The Black Atlantic Visual Tradition Robert Thompson
Art, music, and dance in the history of key classical civilizations south of the Sahara—Mali, Asante, Dahomey, Yoruba, Ejagham, Kongon—and their impact on the rise of New World art and music, especially rock, blues, North American black painting of the past ten years, and black artists of Cuba, Haiti, and Brazil. TTh 11:35–12:50
AFAM 729au/HSAR 779au, New York Mambo: Microcosm of Black Creativity Robert Thompson
Rise, development, and philosophic achievement of the world of New York mambo and salsa. Emphasis on Palmieri, Cortijo, Roena, Harlow, and Colon. Examination of parallel traditions, e.g., New York Haitian art, Dominican merengue, reggae and rastas of Jamaican Brooklyn, and the New York school of Brazilian capoeira. TTh 11:35–12:50
AFAM 739a/AFST 781a/HSAR 781a, Problem and Theory in Afro-Atlantic Architecture I: Africa Robert Thompson
The seminar addresses a new frontier—rebuilding the inner cities. This refers to Latino and mainland black cities within the cities of America. Accordingly, the course focuses on major roots of Latino and black traditional architecture. Topics include the architecture of Djenne, Berber art and architecture, Mauritanian sites, the monumental stone architecture of Zimbabwe, the sacred architecture of Ethiopia, and Muslim-influenced architecture from Rabat to Zanzibar. Then comes a case-by-case examination of some of the sites of African influence on the architecture of the Americas—the Puerto Rican casita; the southern verandah; the round-houses of New York, Virginia, North Carolina, Mexico, Panama, and Colombia; Ganvie, the Venice of West Africa, and its mirror image among the tidal stilt architectures of blacks of the Choco area in Pacific Colombia. Th 3:30–5:20
AFAM 739b/AFST 781b/HSAR 781b, Problem and Theory in Afro-Atlantic Architecture II: The Black Americas Robert Thompson
A continuation of AFAM 739a. Th 3:30–5:20
[AFAM 742b, Black Religion in the Public Square]
[AFAM 747b, Performativity]
[AFAM 748au, Rethinking the African American Literary Canon]
[AFAM 749b, Transnational Imaginaries]
AFAM 764b/AMST 715b/HIST 715b, Readings in Nineteenth-Century American History, 1820–1877 David Blight
This course explores recent trends and historiography on several problems through the middle of the nineteenth century: sectionalism; expansion; slavery and the Old South; northern society and reform movements; Civil War causation; the meaning of the Confederacy; why the North won the Civil War; the political, constitutional, and social meanings of emancipation and Reconstruction; violence in Reconstruction society; the relationships between social/cultural and military/political history; problems in historical memory; the tension between narrative and analytical history writing; and the ways in which race and gender have reshaped research and interpretive agendas. W 7–8:50 p.m.
[AFAM 767a, Race and Rights in the Twentieth Century]
AFAM 814b/PLSC 823b, Race and Ethnicity Khalilah Brown-Dean
This course is an introduction to research on race and ethnicity in American politics. Topics include the social construction of race; intersections between race and gender; black, Latino, and Asian American public opinion and political participation; minority representation; the relationship among race, racism, and public policy; immigration and citizenship; state politics; the psychology of racial politics; and the role of race in campaigns. We discuss and debate the empirical contributions of this literature, as well as questions of theory, methodology, and research design. T 1:30–3:20
AFAM 821a/REL 742a, Warrior Chants and Unquiet Spirits Emilie Townes
An exploration of the spiritual writings and social actions of significant representatives of the Christian protest tradition. Study of public and private documents, analysis of personal disciplines and basic commitments for social justice form the framework for exploring the nature of a spirituality that is a social witness. T 8:30–10:20
[AFAM 823a, The Political Economy of Misery]
AFAM 827b, Interdisciplinary Analysis in Race, Class, Gender Gerald Jaynes
Examination of some of the most influential social science texts treating theories of race, class, and gender. The seminar covers various theoretical and methodological paradigms common to social science disciplines. Authors discussed include classical (Marx, Weber) and more contemporary scholars (Giddens, Bourdieu, Butler, Moi, Hill-Collins, Wilson). Emphasis is placed on interdisciplinary analysis and critique of past and contemporary scholarship in African American studies and related fields. W 1:30–3:20
[AFAM 829b, American Legal History: Citizenship and Race]
[AFAM 831bu, August Wilson and His Contexts]
AFAM 833b/REL 746b/RLST 846b, Vexations: Religion and Politics in the Black Community Emilie Townes
This course explores the theo-ethical perspectives of selected Black Christian thinkers with special attention to how their thought intersects with and also responds to contemporary public policy issues. The challenge is to relate the essentials of Christian ethics to contemporary personal and social issues, identify basic elements of Christian ethical reflection in public discourse, consider a variety of ethical perspectives for decision making, and evaluate Black ethical thinkers as they respond to concrete social issues and public policy statements. T 1:30–3:20
[AFAM 837b, African American Moral and Social Thought]
[AFAM 846a, Postcolonial Theory and Its Literature]
AFAM 847b/AFST 847b/CPLT 947b/FREN 947b, African-Caribbean Connections in French Christopher L. Miller
The intertwined literary and cultural relations between Africa and the Caribbean, as established by the slave trade, French colonialism, and globalization. Focus on changing models of linkage and exile, beginning with nineteenth-century experiments and continuing with early twentieth-century movements in Haiti and France; two versions of Negritude; social realism; independence; “creoleness.” Authors include Maran, Senghor, Césaire, Roumain, Sembène, Glissant, Condé, Warner-Vieyra, Lopes. Reading knowledge of French required. Conducted in English. Th 1:30–3:20
[AFAM 851b, Creole Identities and Fictions]
AFAM 857b/FILM 781b, Blackspace and Cinema Terri Francis
Critical perspectives on relationship among films, audiences, filmmakers as components of the cinema’s social and aesthetic circuitry. We examine terms such as whiteness, colonial gaze, an Africanist presence, and blackspace through African diaspora and other motion picture networks in order to consider how constructions of visual pleasure around or through spectacles of racialized differences function or are imagined in the cinema. W 3:30–5:20, screenings T 7 p.m.
AFAM 880a or b, Directed Reading
By arrangement with faculty.
AFAM 895, Dissertation Prospectus Workshop Gerald Jaynes
A noncredit, yearlong course required of all third-year students. Fall term consists of biweekly work-in-progress talks by Yale faculty, advanced graduate students, and outside speakers. Spring term has biweekly workshops that focus on the dissertation prospectus.
For course offerings in African languages, see African Studies.
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