SCA Majors
The Africana Studies Program encompasses a varied curriculum on black peoples in Africa, the Americas, the Caribbean, and Europe, promoting an interdisciplinary approach to the field. The program offers especially strong emphasis in the areas of Pan-African History and Thought and Black Urban Studies. It thus fosters study of such literary and political movements as the Harlem Renaissance, negritude, black consciousness, and black feminism, and of such intellectual figures as W. E. B. DuBois, Zora Neale Hurston, C. L. R. James, Malcolm X, Angela Y. Davis, Léopold Senghor, and Kwame Nkrumah. It also explores patterns of black migration, black cultural production, and class and gender dynamics within urban black communities, in addition to analyzing black people’s relations to a wide range of social, cultural, and political institutions, including museums, public offices, music and sports industries, mass media, the police, and public schools.
The major in Africana Studies consists of nine courses. It is structured around the following three concentrations: (a) history; (b) social sciences; and (c) philosophy, religion, and the arts. An introduction to Pan-Africanism or to black urban studies and a senior-level seminar are required. The nine courses must be distributed as follows:
1. Introduction to Pan-Africanism, V18.0104 (formerly V11.0010), or Introduction to Black Urban Studies, V18.0105 (formerly V11.0020)
2. Four courses as follows: (a) two history courses coveringAfrica and the diaspora; (b) one approved Africana course in a social science discipline; and (c) one survey course in African diaspora philosophy, religion, or the arts
3. Two additional courses from one of the three concentrations or from an African language
4. One approved elective
5. One senior seminar
The Program in Gender and Sexuality Studies offers a broad interdisciplinary investigation of gender and sexuality as keys to understanding human experience, fully integrating the study of gender and sexuality in its core curriculum, and insistently extending the view beyond U.S. borders. At its core, the undergraduate program encourages students to question the meanings of “male” and “female,” as well as of sexual norms, in both Western and non-Western societies. Courses seek to unravel the ways in which ideas about gender and sexuality shape social roles and identities, in addition to the ways in which race, class, and ethnicity function in the experience of gender and sexuality within a culture. Gender and Sexuality Studies challenges the privileging of some categories (i.e., male or heterosexual) over others, along with the social and political implications of such hierarchies. Our curriculum makes gender and sexuality central rather than peripheral terms of analysis and seeks to complicate what is often presented as “natural” or “normal” in traditional academic curricula.
A student who majors in Gender and Sexuality Studies must also choose a concentration in any other department within the College of Arts and Science.
The Gender and Sexuality Studies major requires 48 points (12 courses). These include 32 points in Gender and Sexuality Studies and 16 points in the student’s departmental concentration. Because 8 of these points may overlap (for instance, V18.0704 Sex and Gender—formerly V97.0021—may count toward both the Gender and Sexuality Studies major and a concentration in Sociology), some students will complete the major with 40 points.
All majors must complete V18.0401 (formerly V97.0010), Approaches to Gender and Sexuality Studies (or an approved substitution course). Because of the interdisciplinary nature of scholarship, remaining Gender and Sexuality electives must be drawn from at least three different departments.
The Program in Metropolitan Studies is an interdisciplinary program for the study of cities, urban issues, and urban culture. Using New York City as their laboratory, students work to better understand the relationship between people and the constructed environment. In their course work, students develop a critical understanding of how metropolitan areas evolve while they examine those areas’ core problems. Internships, research, and fieldwork provide firsthand, in-depth experience for analyzing urban institutions and related policy initiatives. The Program draws upon faculty active in the city’s government, community, and nonprofit agencies.
Students majoring in metropolitan studies take two introductory sequence courses, four elective area courses, and four research core courses, including the internship. The major is structured sequentially. With the introductory sequence, the student begins a general, comparative, and historical overview of cities and how they change, comprehensively addressing cultural, political, and economic issues. The student then takes four electives that explore particular urban topics or issues. Thereafter the student develops his or her interests through an internship in a related area. Finally, two research seminars enable the student to develop skills in primary research and written communication, as well as data and policy analysis.
The introductory sequence consists of V18.0601 (formerly V99.0101) Introduction to Metropolitan Studies (or Societies and the Social Sciences: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Metropolitan Studies, V55.0631) and Cities in the Global Context V18.0602 (formerly V99.0103). Additionally, there is a required research core of four courses: Internship Fieldwork, V18.0400 (formerly V99.0401); Internship Seminar, V18.0042 (formerly V99.0402); Strategies for Social and Cultural Analysis, V18.0020 (formerly Research Methods in Metropolitan Studies, V99.0501); and a Senior Research Seminar, V18.0090 (formerly V99.0502). Students must complete one introductory sequence course before taking Strategies for Social and Cultural Analysis and two introductory sequence courses plus Strategies before taking Senior Research Seminar. Finally, students choose four courses in three elective areas of concentration—social welfare and public policy, urban culture and identity, and the material city.
