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Academic Year 2003/2004


Jr. Col., Indigenous Ecotheories of Identity and Place in the Era of Nation-Building, 15th-20th Cen.
AMST 199 SP

This seminar course will challenge students to consider how intersecting ideas about place transformed indigenous peoples' ecocultural systems in the era of nation building. The center of the course will be a review of various texts regarding Native North American philosophies of space, time and the uses of place. Native Americans' cultural beliefs about the environment did not end with the onset of European colonization, rather, they were transformed to incorporate different ways of seeing and being in the world. Therefore the course will expand from distinctly Native perspectives to European views about the "management" of lands, resources and Native peoples. A significant key to European hegemony in the Americas has included displacing Native peoples from their lands and replacing them in Eurocentric settings and institutions. Thus we will examine Puritan Praying Towns and tribal villages, reservations and residential schools, urban centers and prisons, and the borders in between to better understand the continuing role of place in contemporary indigenous struggles for land, resources and cultural survival.

MAJOR READINGS

Basso, Keith, WISDOM SITS IN PLACES: LANDSCAPE AND LANGUAGE AMONG THE WESTERN APACHE, 1996, Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press
Brody, Hugh, MAPS AND DREAMS, 1983, New York: Pantheon Books
Collins, James, UNDERSTANDING TOLOWA HISTORIES: WESTERN HEGE MONIES AND NATIVE AMERICAN RESPONSES, 1997, New York: Routledge
Cronon, William, CHANGES IN THE LAND: INDIANS, COLONISTS AND THE ECOLOGY OF NEW ENGLAND, 1983, New York: Hill and Wang
Allen, Paula Gunn, OFF THE RESERVATION: REFLECTIONS O N BOUNDARY-BUSTING, BORDER-CROSSING LOOSE CANONS, 1999, Boston: Beacon Press
Hale, Janet Campbell, THE JAILING OF CECELIA CAPTURE, 1985, University of New Mexico Press
Ross, Luana, INVENTING THE SAVAGE: THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION FO NATIVE AMERICAN CRIMINALITY, 2000, Austin: University of Texas Press
Welch, James, FOOLS CROW, 1987, New York: Penguin Books
Wyss, Hilary E., WRITING INDIANS: LITERACY, CHRISTIANITY AND NATIVE COMMUNITY IN EARLY AMERICA, 2001, Amherst: University of Massachusetts P res

EXAMINATIONS AND ASSIGNMENTS

Students will turn in weekly seminar response papers, give a seminar presentation utilizing Powerpoint and complete a term research project.

COURSE FORMAT: Seminar

REGISTRATION INFORMATION

Level: UGRD    Credit: 1    Gen Ed Area Dept: SBS AMST    Grading Mode: Graded   

Prerequisites: NONE

SECTION 01

Instructor(s): Boyd,Colleen E.   
Times: ..T.R.. 12:30PM-02:30PM;     Location: FISK115
Reserved Seats:    (Total Limit: 15)
SR. major: 5   Jr. major: 10
SR. non-major: X   Jr. non-major: X   SO: X   FR: X

Special Attributes:
Curricular Renewal:    Speaking, Writing
Links to Web Resources For This Course.

Last Updated on MAR-19-2004


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