Major Requirements for Social & Cultural Analysis
The Department of Social and Cultural Analysis (SCA) explores the
range of relationships between human collectivities, on the one hand, and
institutions and structures of power, on the other, taking into account how
these are affected by such modern global developments as intensified
urbanization, increased transnational exchange, and proliferating diasporic
populations.
Because these matters are highly complex, SCA combines research
methods from the social sciences and the humanities, and examines such varied
phenomena as consumer culture, industrial activity, mass media representations,
artistic productions, subcultural practices, and aspects of everyday life in
their economic, material, political, and historical contexts. At the same time,
it typically focuses its analyses through attention to the city in general and
New York in particular, in order to situate the region–and the nation–amid the
conditions and processes affecting the entire globe.
Study in SCA thus provides excellent background for careers in
such fields as community organizing, legal advocacy, non-profit administration,
public policy, and urban and regional planning, among many others. SCA students
select specific courses of study from among the several majors currently
offered in the department. These include majors in Africana Studies, Gender and
Sexuality Studies, and Metropolitan Studies; and minors in Social and Cultural
Analysis, Asian/Pacific/American Studies, American Studies, and Latino Studies.
See the Bulletin entries for these individual programs for detailed
information.
Major Requirements
The Social and Cultural Analysis major consists of introductory, elective, and
research components, together comprising a total of eleven courses, as laid out
below:
Three introductory courses, could be taken in any order:
• V18.0001
Concepts in Social and Cultural Analysis—An introduction to key terms and
analytical categories for interdisciplinary work in Social and Cultural
Analysis and related fields. This course
fulfills Society and Social Science MAP requirement
Two courses from among the following:
• V18.0101,
Approaches to Africana Studies
• V18.0201,
Approaches to American Studies
•
Approaches to Asian/Pacific/American Experience
(V18.0301) or History of Asians in the United States
•
(V18.0302) or MAP course World Cultures:
Asian/Pacific/American Cultures (V55.0539)
•
Approaches to Gender and Sexuality Studies
(V18.0401)
•
Approaches to Latino Studies (V18.0501) or the
MAP course, World Cultures: Contemporary Latino Cultures (V55.0529)
•
Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Metropolitan
Studies (V18.0601) or Cities in a Global Context (V18.0602).
Six elective
courses
• Four
courses (at least two of which must be upper division) distributed across two
of the six different programs within the Department: Africana Studies; American
Studies; Asian/Pacific/American Studies; Gender and Sexuality Studies; Latino
Studies; Metropolitan Studies.
• Two
upper-division courses offered by the Department of Social and Cultural
Analysis which address issues relevantacross the Department’s various fields of
study
Two research courses:
• V18.0040 Social
and Cultural Analysis-related Internship Fieldwork
• V18.0090 Senior
Research Seminar pertinent to Social and Cultural Analysis
A note about Language/Linguistic
Competency: The type of rigorous intercultural
study promoted within the Department of Social and Cultural Analysis requires
students to recognize the complex modes of communication at work both within
and across different social groups. Thus the department strongly
encourages its students to develop advanced skills in language and linguistics
by any of the following means: taking elective courses in sociolinguistics;
studying a language other than English beyond the minimum level required by
CAS; studying languages especially germane to the department's fields of study;
pursuing community-based internship fieldwork necessitating the development and
use of specific language skills; undertaking study or research abroad in
contexts entailing the exercise of key language or linguistic capabilities.
