AMER 100:
The South in American Politics & Culture
Boyd, T.
AMER 100–01, MWF 11:10-12:00
This course will study the role that the former Confederate states have played in the shaping of contemporary American politics and culture since World War II. In 1945, the South was viewed as a distinct region within America: far more rural, far poorer and with an apparently entrenched system of racial segregation, the South was looked on by many in the rest of the United States as hopelessly backward. In recent years, however, southern politicians and southern cultural traditions have become ever more influential in national affairs. In this course, we will therefore consider how this transformation came about. Using a combination of political speeches, films, music and literature, we will first examine the main pillars of southern culture as it existed up until the 1950s; secondly we will look at the confrontation between the South's traditional culture and the nation during the postwar years and the civil rights movement; finally we will then look at the question "how southernized has American politics and culture become since the 1970s?" Throughout the course, we will be looking at just what it is that causes political and cultural attitudes to change, an issue that remains of great importance for understanding American society.
AMER 100W:
American Social History Through Dance
Kevra, S.
AMER 100W–02, MWF 12:10-1:00
Social history examines the lives of everyday people as a means for understanding their history and culture. We may look at material objects, such as cookbooks to understand how a generation fed itself. Or trends in fashion can offer a window into class differences.
In this course, social dance will be our focal point for understanding American identity. Dance trends offer historical moments for understanding issues related to race, gender and class. Adopting a chronological approach, we will set about to answer a range of questions. For instance, how do dance figures in colonial dances bear the mark of the countries from which they originated? And how does their transplantation onto American soil contribute to visible displays of democracy on the dance floor in a move away from the more regimented and symbolic choreography of court dances? How do specific dance crazes reveal responses to political and cultural events and anxieties? What influence has the African American community had on dance in this country?
Our texts in this course will be a combination of historical readings related to dance and others related to broader social issues. We will also look at images of dance, both photographic and moving pictures. Literary works will also help us to understand attitudes towards dance. In addition, to really understand dance, which, after all, is a kinesthetic activity, you have to move, feel the beat, dance the dances. To this end, we will have occasion in and outside of class to try out dances.
Because this is a writing seminar, we will dedicate a number of classes (or portions of classes) looking at how to improve your writing. Topics will range from 1) remedies for wordiness 2) word choice 3) organization 4) getting starting writing a paper 5) how to conduct research 6) punctuation 7) transitions and more. Peer review and on class reflections on writing will figure prominently.
Topics will include:
AMER 100W: Quilting and Jazz: American Modes of Creativity
Pingree, A.
AMER 115F–02, TR 2:35-3:50
The course will focus on quilting and jazz, both for what they reveal as quintessentially American forms of artistic expression, and for what they reveal more broadly about the creative process. Through study of literary texts, historical contexts, and through experiential learning projects, we will explore how constructions of voice and identity (e.g., race, class, gender, sexuality, region) shape and are shaped by these art forms. Ultimately, quilting and jazz—through their hybrid modes of composition, improvisation, design, and structure—will offer both a counterpoint and an analogue to our own writing processes.
AMER 100W: The Fifties in American Life & Culture
Boyd, T.
AMER 100W–03, MWF 10:10-11:00
The dominant image of “the Fifties” from the perspective of the 21st century is of a time when life was predictable, ordered, and straightforward—a tame prelude to the upheaval and social tension of the Sixties that was either stifling or reassuring, depending on your point of view. This course will examine both what life was like in the Fifties and how accurately that life is represented in popular memory today. For the first part of the course, we will look at how America experienced the Fifties—the major political, social, racial, and economic changes, as well as how “normal” American life was depicted in popular culture at the time. For the second part of the course, we will look at how America has remembered the Fifties, with a particular emphasis on how popular culture has shaped our perceptions of life during the postwar years through movies and TV shows.
AMER 115F:
Cultural Conflict in 20th Century America
Boyd, T.
AMER 115F–01, MWF 1:10-2:00
The idea that there is an ongoing "culture war" in 21st century American politics is firmly established in media coverage of contemporary political debate. Broadly speaking, the term "culture war" has come to mean a politically polarized discussion over a moral or cultural issue in which observers divide into at least two groups, each accusing the other of seeking to impose "un-American" values on the nation. In 2008, such "culture war" issues would include gay marriage, abortion, gun control, stem cell research and a host of other concerns. In such discussions, questions of economic self-interest, often assumed to be the driving force behind an individual person's political behavior, play either a minor or insignificant role in the debate. As a result, there is also a continuing discussion within American society as to whether these "culture wars" are an important and substantial part of political discourse, or a distraction from what people's "real concerns" ought to be.
This course will consider three major instances from the 20th Century where the politics and rhetoric of "culture war" were particularly evident. By considering how these instances came about, how they were seen by the participants on both sides and how they have been remembered in popular culture, it will be possible to better understand the roots and nature of today's politically charged cultural debates. The three instances in question are the Scopes Trial of 1925, the Kinsey Reports of the 1940s and 1950s and the debate over Gun Control in the 1990s. To understand these three case studies, this course will look at not just historical accounts of each, but also the ways they were viewed by observers at the time as well as how the issues raised in each were subsequently portrayed in film, music and popular culture since then. There will be one paper due on each of the three topics, as well as work with primary sources related to them in the Vanderbilt Library.
AMER 295: Undergraduate Seminar
Southern Food, in Text, as Text
Tichi, C., and Randall, A.
AMER 295–01, W 4:00-7:00
An exploration of food as subject and metaphor in southern literature, film, song and life. Representations of the production,collection, storage, distribution, preparation, consumption, and disposal of food in the south will be explored. Assigned readings will include fiction and non-fiction that engage the subject of food in the new and old south.
Students will also read essays from a variety of scholars, ranging from Levi-Strauss to Bower, that will provide an introduction to foodways as an evolving discipline. Traditional and non-traditional texts will be considered.
AMER 297: Senior Project
Goddu, T..
AMER 297–01, M 3:10-5:00
Required of all American Studies seniors.
AMER 300: Graduate Workshop
Social Movements and American Cultural Change
Isaac, L.
AMER 300–01, W 12:30-3:00
The primary objectives of this seminar are to understand (a) how social movements have shaped American culture, and (b) how scholars in various disciplines have attempted to analyze the movement—cultural change process. From the abolitionist movement to suffrage movement to workers’ movements to civil rights and other movements of the 1960s wave (e.g., student, antiwar, feminist, counterculture), as well as more contemporary struggles, American culture has been repeatedly reconstituted, re-envisioned, reshaped and remembered. To what extent can social movements be credited as agents in augmenting and changing American culture? Under what conditions and in what ways do movements produce cultural change?
The class will examine these questions for different social movements (e.g., labor, women’s, civil rights) in a variety of historical contexts using research produced by both humanistic and social science scholars to examine specific forms of cultural change (e.g., literary genres/subgenres, journalistic discourse, pictorial art, music, theater, poetry, fashion, built environment, political/civic culture) shaped by a particular social movement. An array of disciplinary methods and interdisciplinary approaches will be featured and interrogated for their substantive claims, strengths, and weaknesses. These will include theoretical and conceptual considerations (e.g., re: “social movement” and “culture”) as well as ways in which scholars from different disciplines marshal and interpret evidence.
The major project for the semester will be an empirically based research paper. Students will select one particular movement—cultural change moment from which to ground and focus their individual research projects. Throughout the semester we will examine exemplars of movement-cultural change research, consider different methodological approaches, along with different data sources, all of which will contribute to generating ideas for student research projects.