CL 105: Native American Autobiographies

This course examines autobiographies by Native American people to learn about the histories of Indigenous individuals and communities from their own perspectives. Students will engage with historical and political contexts, including US attempts to abolish Indigenous Peoples’ sovereignty and treaty rights; Indian Removal and the reservation system; colonial migration and settlement; federal Indian assimilation policy; and Indigenous Peoples’ continuing presence and resistance to ongoing US settler colonialism. Students will gain an introduction to uniquely Native American autobiographical forms, including as-told-to narratives; mixed genre works; visual texts; and storytelling methods that blend oral traditions, mythography, and cosmology with personal experience. Course materials include autobiography, memoir, mixed genre works, and academic essays by artists and scholars from the Dakota, Kiowa, Kumeyaay, Laguna Pueblo, Osage, and Pequot nations.
Days: TU TH  11:00-12:20 PM

This course provides an introduction to film history beginning with the incorporation of synchronous sound technology at the onset of the “Golden Age” of cinema. Although we will focus significantly on the development and maintenance of the Hollywood film industry, this lens will also prompt questions about power, propaganda, and spectatorship, in a global context. Therefore, we will track the evolution of the motion picture industry in both Hollywood and international markets through the end of, what is known as, the “studio system” era. One of the primary goals of this class is to understand how dominant ideologies related to race, class, gender, and sexuality have impacted American and international film industries over time. By analyzing the industrial, technological, and cultural changes that shaped the film industry, students will be prompted to consider various film movements and the ways in which they attempted to address the socio-political conditions of their respective audiences. Students will be encouraged to critically engage with a range of film styles that collectively shifted the form and function of the industry during critical moments in history.
Days: TU TH  05:00-06:20 PM

California is the “Great Exception.”  California is the “Leading Edge” State.  California is an Island or it’s a center of Global Trends.  The Land of Sunshine.  The Golden State, Gold Mountain, gam saan, Alta California, the Eastern Pacific.  These and many other designations carry great cultural weight in California history.  This course examines the history of California as a state, but it places the state within the broader context of the American West, the nation, and the world.  Lectures, discussions, movies, and other visual material will explore this history, spotlighting pivotal events and issues.
Days: MO WE  11:00-11:50 AM