Instructor

Kath Sands, G.S. Gushiken, and Spencer Oshita

Course Description

Required Text(s)

TBA

Instructor

Jeffrey Tripp

Course Description

This course examines formations of “America” in a global context, beginning with its emergence as a European colonial outpost imposed on indigenous peoples, to its emergence as an imperial and military power in the modern era. We will survey major world-historical events in which the U.S. has played key roles as well as consider the significant impacts that other world cultures have had on the American social, political, cultural and economic fabric (and vice versa). Central to the organization of this course is a consideration of race, class and gender as crucial axes for the formation of “America” and Americans.

Required Text(s)

• David Stannard: American Holocaust
• Zora Neale Hurston: Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo”
• Art Spiegelman: Maus, Volumes 1 and 2

Instructor

Robert Perkinson and Asalemo Crawford

Course Description

Institutions & Movements utilizes multiple fields of study that include History, Indigenous/Native Studies, and Black/African American Studies. We encourage students to critically investigate and interrogate the development, mobilization, and history of “America,” Race and Racism in the United States, and Racist Power. Students explore key terms and definitions for BIOLOGY, ETHNICITY, BODY, CULTURE, BEHAVIOR, COLOR, WHITE, BLACK, INDIGENOUS, CLASS, SPACE, GENDER, SEXUALITY, MILITARISM, CAPITALISM, and SETTLER COLONIALISM. Through these key terms, students expand their comprehension of the historical to contextualize the present and interrogate institutional power and the collective resistance to that power.

Required Text(s)

• Arvin, Maile. Possessing Polynesians: The Science of Settler Colonial Whiteness in Hawaiʻi and Oceania. Duke University Press, 2019.
• Kendi, Ibram X. How To Be An Antiracist. One World, 2019.
• Taylor, Keeanga-Yamahtta. From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation. Haymarket Books, 2016.
• **All books are available at Revolution Books: 2626 King St #201, Honolulu, 96826
• **Additional readings will be posted on the course website

Instructor

JiYeon Jung

Course Description

If contemplation of any aspect of America must include a consideration of culture, so too must any study of American culture include a discussion of the arts.  Surveying a variety of cultures practiced by people (s) (with) in America, this course investigates just what may be talking about when we use such words as “America,” “culture,” or “art,” and how our ideas about these words have developed.

Largely focusing on the ways in which power, beauty and belonging have been constructed, contemplated and asserted through the arts, we will conclude the semester by asking the question of whether we might analyze and shape our own lives — as people living (with) in America — as we might a piece of art?

Required Text(s)

The following may be purchased at the UH Bookstore.

• Alexie, Sherman. Reservation Blues. New York: Grove Press, 2005.
• Morrison, Toni. The Bluest Eye. New York: Vintage International Press, 2007 ed (any older edition acceptable).
• Yamashiro, Aiko and Noelani Goodyear-Ka‘ōpua, eds. The Value of Hawai‘i 2: Ancestral Roots, Oceanic Visions. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2014.

Instructors

Rachel Hong

Course Description

Power, Rights, and Space in Modern and Postmodern America

French philosopher and Nobel laureate Albert Camus is credited with saying the apt phrase, “The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion.” We live in a world made up of spaces, but very few of those spaces go unpoliced.  Someone, somewhere, seems to always be rather attentive to what we do and don’t do in the spaces that make up our lives.  But why?  And who put them in charge?

Investigating space means trying to understand how to exist in a world constantly beset by powerful people trying to control who we are and what we do.  This course explores the connections between that power and the rights we are supposed to have in the spaces that make up our lives.  To that end, we will begin with physical spaces, investigating the American educational system and the imperial and carceral states that have been built around us.  We will engage powerful and central texts concerning education, pedagogy, empire, and prisons while addressing both real and theoretical concerns.  But space isn’t always physical and neither are the systems of control and power that operate within them.  This course also turns toward investigating the institutions of memory, the body, identity, and epistemology to understand that even what we know and how we know it is also intimately wrapped up in systems of power and control.

Even as we analyze the important issues of addressing injustice and inequity across the sites of schools, prisons, courthouses, streets, or our own bodies, and tackling such topics as prison reform, immigration, disabilities, colonial occupation, criminal justice, public education, and more, the contemporary moment asks for more: it asks for solutions.  And while this course closes with a unit on the future as the final contemporary issue of the semester, the entire course will be structured around providing the students with the tools needed to engage in critical thinking and evalution, which are some of the best remedies for societal maladies of the worst variety.

AMST 211 is for anybody who has ever wondered about the world they live in, but is also, and perhaps more importanly, for anybody who has not.

[NOTE:  All interested students should attend the first day of the class.  Any questions or doubts about the course or its content will likely be addressed then.]

Required Text(s)

All readings will be provided to individuals via Slack, a mobile and desktop app available online and through the App Store and Google Play Store.  Two books, Writing Tools and The Death of Truth, will be available for purchase at the bookstore for those who might want or need to secure hard copies for those readings.

Instructor

Brian Dawson

Course Description

This course centers a place-based and feminist praxis to interrogate contemporary American global issues. Specifically, it uses the lens of Hawaiʻi to explore the gendered influence of American foreign policies and empire in the Pacific and across the globe. In this course, we will read anti-colonial literature from Indigenous women and women of color on American militarism, environmental justice, decolonization, inter/nationalism, tourism and Indigenous sovereignty to track the contours of America’s far reaching influence on Indigenous lands. In doing so, this course is designed to critically examine contemporary American geographies through gendered narratives of resistance, decolonization, and Indigenous resurgence in Hawai’i.

Course Requirements

TBA

Required Text(s)

Instructor

Brandy McDougall

Course Description

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

Kath Sands

Course Description

Surveys church-state jurisprudence since the 1940s, with special attention to difficulty of defining religion, and applies the religion clauses to current issues. A-F only. Pre: sophomore or higher standing, or consent.

Course Requirements

TBA

Required Text(s)

TBA

Instructor

William Temple

Course Description

Examination of design in American culture over the last century. Readings in industrial, graphic, interior, architectural, landscape, and user interface design used to study issues of gender, race, and class in the U.S. Open to all class standings.

Required Text(s)

TBA

Instructor

Joyce Mariano

Course Description

An introduction to the study of Filipino Americans in the U.S. and the diaspora. The course pays special attention to labor migration, cultural production and community politics. Pre: sophomore standing.

Required Text(s)

TBA

Instructor

Mari Yoshihara

Course Description

Materials and methods for the study of American life and thought. AMST majors only.

Required Text(s)

TBA

Instructor

Brian Dawson

Course Description

Colonialism, neocolonialism, and cultures of resistance in the Caribbean and its North American diaspora through literature, film, and the arts. Focus on political dissent; nation building; historical memory; construction of gender, race. Writing emphasis. Junior standing or higher. A-F only

Required Text(s)

Instructor

Randizia B. Crosostomo

Course Description

This course explores Indigenous access to justice in Oceania and Continental US (also known as Turtle Island) honing in on the experiences of Indigenous women, Queer, Trans Pacific-Islanders, 2-Spirit, Mahu, and Gela’ communities as they navigate complex legal, economic, political, racial and extreme violence and human rights violations.  Drawing from intersectional gender theory, testimony, storytelling, transborder thought, and Indigenous knowledge, this course examines case studies related to domestic violence, gender asylum, and grief that stem from military and paramilitary violence at national and international levels.  The course aims to shed light on ways to assist Indigenous communities in accessing various legal avenues while promoting gender justice and equality.  Student will create work that may contribute to a legal toolkit, zine, or paper to address issues of gender, justice and law.  Pre: one of WGSS 151, WGSS 175, WGSS 176, WGSS 202, WGSS 360, WGSS 381, or consent.

Course Requirements

TBA

Instructor

M. Koikari

Course Description

Examination of cultural, historical, and political processes informing our understandings and practices involving food. Focus on food and foodways in the U.S. and Hawai‘i. Junior standing or higher. A-F only. Pre: at least one course in WS, ES, or AMST; or consent by instructor.

Course Requirements

TBA

Instructor

Elizabeth Colwill

Course Description

Reading of selected works of U.S. women’s literature and cultural texts (such as art and film). Emphasis on historical and cultural context and diverse expressions of women’s gendered identities.

Required Text(s)

TBA

Instructor

Yuka Polovina

Course Description

Sports as reflected in literature, films, and TV.

Required Text(s)

Instructor

Robert Perkinson

Course Description

Capstone course for American studies students to undertake a major research-based project. AMST majors only. Pre: consent.

Course Requirements

TBA

Required Text(s)

TBA

Instructor

Spencer Oshita

Course Description

Course Requirements

TBA

Required Text(s)

TBA

Instructor

Jeffrey Tripp

Course Description

This course examines formations of “America” in a global context, beginning with its emergence as a European colonial outpost imposed on indigenous peoples, to its emergence as an imperial and military power in the modern era. We will survey major world-historical events in which the U.S. has played key roles as well as consider the significant impacts that other world cultures have had on the American social, political, cultural and economic fabric (and vice versa). Central to the organization of this course is a consideration of race, class and gender as crucial axes for the formation of “America” and Americans.

Required Text(s)

• Zora Neale Hurston: Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo”
• Spiegelman, Art.  Maus I: A Survivor’s Tale
• Spiegelman, Art.  Maus II: A Survivor’s Tale
• Stannard, David.  American Holocaust

Instructor

Asalemo Crawford

Course Description

Institutions & Movements utilizes multiple fields of study that include History, Indigenous/Native Studies, and Black/African American Studies. We encourage students to critically investigate and interrogate the development, mobilization, and history of “America,” Race and Racism in the United States, and Racist Power. Students explore key terms and definitions for BIOLOGY, ETHNICITY, BODY, CULTURE, BEHAVIOR, COLOR, WHITE, BLACK, INDIGENOUS, CLASS, SPACE, GENDER, SEXUALITY, MILITARISM, CAPITALISM, and SETTLER COLONIALISM. Through these key terms, students expand their comprehension of the historical to contextualize the present and interrogate institutional power and the collective resistance to that power.

Required Text(s)

• Arvin, Maile. Possessing Polynesians: The Science of Settler Colonial Whiteness in Hawaiʻi and Oceania. Duke University Press, 2019.
• Kendi, Ibram X. How To Be An Antiracist. One World, 2019.
• Taylor, Keeanga-Yamahtta. From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation. Haymarket Books, 2016.
• **All books are available at Revolution Books: 2626 King St #201, Honolulu, 96826
• **Additional readings will be posted on the course website

Instructor

Sarah Jung

Course Description

If contemplation of any aspect of America must include a consideration of culture, so too must any study of American culture include a discussion of the arts.  Surveying a variety of cultures practiced by people (s) (with) in America, this course investigates just what may be talking about when we use such words as “America,” “culture,” or “art,” and how our ideas about these words have developed.

Largely focusing on the ways in which power, beauty and belonging have been constructed, contemplated and asserted through the arts, we will conclude the semester by asking the question of whether we might analyze and shape our own lives — as people living (with) in America — as we might a piece of art?

Required Text(s)

The following may be purchased at the UH Bookstore.

• Alexie, Sherman. Reservation Blues. New York: Grove Press, 2005.
• Morrison, Toni. The Bluest Eye. New York: Vintage International Press, 2007 ed (any older edition acceptable).
• Yamashiro, Aiko and Noelani Goodyear-Ka‘ōpua, eds. The Value of Hawai‘i 2: Ancestral Roots, Oceanic Visions. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2014

Instructors

Rachel Hong

Course Description

Interdisciplinary exploration of such current American domestic issues; topics such as politics, economics, civil rights, family life, the justice system, and the environment.

Course Description

• TBA

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

Yilan Hu

Course Description

Instructor

Logan Narikawa

Course Description

Instructor

Kyle Kajihiro

Course Description

History of selected Asian immigrant groups from the 19th century to the present.  Topics include:  immigration and labor history.  Asian American movements, literature and cultural productions, community adaptations and identity formation.

Course Requirements

• TBA

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

Kathleen Sands

Course Description

Analyzes selected historical examples of religious conflicts in America, discerning characteristic patterns of American religious discourse, and identifying the social structures, interests, and ethical principles of stake in conflicts about religions.

Course Requirements

• TBA

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

William Temple

Course Description

Examination of design in American culture over the last century.  Readings in industiral, graphic, interior, architectural, landscape, and user interface design used to study issues of gender, race, and class in the U.S.

Course Requirements

• TBA

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

Brandy McDougall

Course Description

Examines indigenous practices born of and located in Indigenous places. Analyzes how indigenous knowledge of place informs Indigenous cultural, linguistic, intellectual, and political survivance and sovereignty, and resistance.

Course Requirements

• TBA

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

Jonna Eagle

Course Description

Introductory history of American cinema from the silent to the digital era, with an emphasis on criticism, genre and style, as well as cultural and sociopolitical context.

Course Requirements

• TBA

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

Joyce Mariano

Course Description

An introduction to the study of Filipino Americans in the U.S. and the diaspora. The course pays special attention to labor migration, cultural production and community politics.

Course Requirements

• TBA

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

Yuka Polovina

Course Description

A multidisciplinary examination of the dynamics of the Hawaiian Islands’ racial and cultural diversity from the perspectives of historical trends, social processes, and contemporary political, social, and economic issues as they impact interracial relations.

Course Requirements

• TBA

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

Jeffrey Tripp

Course Description

History of American architecture in terms of style, techniques, and symbolic meaning.

Course Requirements

• TBA

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

Elizabeth Colwill

Course Description

Examines the history of slavery, race, and abolition in the Americas from a comparative, global perspective, and traces the legacy of slavery in the post-emancipation societies of the New World.

Course Requirements

• TBA

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

Ava Ladner

Course Description

Focus on various aspects of Trans* identities, biographies, cultural productions, and communities. It also addresses issues on racism, medical intervention, dating, societal condemnation, mental health, and incarceration. Junior standing or higher. (Cross-listed as WGSS 493)

Course Requirements

• TBA

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

Robert Perkinson

Course Description

Examination of mass mobilization in U.S. history from the Revolution forward, including abolitionism, feminism, civil rights, labor, and more. Concludes with analysis of various community organizing efforts today.

Course Requirements

• TBA

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

Kathleen Sands

Course Description

Examines religious and ethical conflicts about sexuality and gender nonconformity in contemporary America. Students gain knowledge, practical wisdom, and communication skills to negotiate moral disagreement in a pluralistic society. Pre: junior standing or consent.

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Course Requirements

• TBA
  

Instructor

Jonna Eagle

Course Description

Directed readings and research for majors. Pre: consent.Junior standing or consent.

Instructor

Mari Yoshihara

Course Description

Required Text(s)

Instructor

Joyce Mariano

Course Description

Prepares advanced graduate students to present original research findings to colleagues, write for peer review, design undergraduate classes in their areas of expertise, and participate actively in their fields.

Course Requirements

• TBA

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

Jonna Eagle

Course Description

Appraisal of major media of communications in American society with attention to political, educational, cultural, and ethical implications.

Instructor

Jonna Eagle

Course Description

AMST 650 is designed for Ph.D. students to reinforce and deepen content knowledge in the general field of  American Studies and in specialized subfields within American Studies.  By the time that Ph.D. students begin their dissertations, students are expected to have engaged at a sophisticated level with the major themes, problems, and interdisciplinary methods of the field of American Studies, and to have developed specializations in two subfields that will serve as their professional teaching and research fields.

AMST 650, offered each semester with variable content, aims to provide students with a defined pathway toward field mastery, and thus to facilitate progress to degree.  To prepare for the qualifying examination, students read 40-50 texts in their major field, and in each of two subfields under the supervision of a faculty member.  Each of the three fields requires intensive preparation.  By consequence, advanced Ph.D. students will be permitted to register for this course, with different content, up to three times (up to 9 credits)–each with a separate field adviser.

AMST 650 involves substantial intellectual content and regular meetings with a faculty member, receives a letter grade, and counts toward the 45-credits required for the Ph.D. It requires the approval and signature of the supervising instructor and the graduate chair prior to receipt of the CRN.

To register

• Obtain the 650 Form and the Ph.D Qualifying Exam Fields Approval Form from the graduate coordinator or the AMST website;
• Obtain the consent of professor who will supervise the field, in person or via email;
• Consult with the supervising professor concerning the specific texts and writing assignments required for completion of AMST 650 in that field.
• Complete the forms, and obtain first the professor’s, and then the graduate chair’s signatures;
• Give the forms to the graduate coordinator, who will provide the CRN needed to register for one or more 650s.

Instructor

R.T. Kam

Course Description

The manifestations, visual characteristics, and social/cultural meaning of “style” in American architecture and decorative arts from the early settlement period through the present.

Course Requirements

• TBA

Required Text(s)

• TBA

Instructor

TBA

Course Description

Work of museums and professionals (registrars, collections managers, conservators, curators ad others) in the care of collections, interpretive studies of museum displays and collections and field trips.  Pre: 683 (or concurrent) or consent.

Instructor

TBA

Course Description

This course is designed as the final requirement for the Graduate Certificate in Museum Studies. It is generally taken as the last course in the sequence of required courses for the certificate, although students may be enrolled simultaneously in the Practicum/Internship and other courses in the program. This course is restricted to “majors” in the Museums Studies Graduate Certificate Program.

The Practicum/Internship is intended to advance the student’s knowledge of the field of museum work and to provide an opportunity to research areas of special interest. Since the course is meant to be of a practical character, students are encouraged to take advantage of work-related opportunities in museums and related places (art galleries, historic sites, parks, zoos, aquariums, festivals, etc.). Students should consider new areas of exploration, or build on and consolidate projects in which they have had prior involvement. The Practicum/Internship may include research reports for non-profit organizations, research projects for museum exhibits or collections, or other similar activities.

American Studies 699V is a directed reading/directed research course. Such courses are not intended as routine alternatives to regular course offerings but rather as opportunities to explore themes and topics that are not covered in any available course within the American Studies Department or other departments within the University.

A directed reading/research 699 will be counted as a course towards an American Studies degree only if it carries 3 credits.

Students must first discuss with the graduate chairperson what is to be studied and with whom as well as justify why a 699 is the only feasible alternative.

Master and doctoral students are limited to three (3) credits to count towards their degree.

To enroll in a 699, you must obtain the consent of a particular professor with an expertise on the topic you wish to pursue. This professor may be in American Studies or in any department. Within a week after registration, you must submit to the department office a one-page account of the work to be done. This account must contain the following:

• The theme or topic to be explored
• The nature of the work to be done
• Grade Options (letter grade or CR/NC)
• Justification as to why 699 is the only feasible alternative
• The list of books to be read (if a directed reading course)
• The number of credits to be awarded
• The basis upon which the credits are to be awarded–a paper, exam, etc.
• Include information on the frequency of student/professor meetings.

This one-page account must be signed by you, the professor, and the graduate chair and submitted to the American Studies Department Office (Moore 324). Without it, you will lose the right to have your directed work count towards your degree. Procedure for Registration: You may obtain appropriate forms/approvals from the American Studies Department office (Moore 324) or download these forms.

Directed Reading Consent Form
Directed Reading Approval Form

Before registering for a Thesis 700 (for Plan A students only), the student must have completed and obtained an approved thesis committee approved/thesis topic/proposal progress form from Graduate Division.

If the above have not been submitted and approved by Graduate Division, the CRN for AmSt 700 WILL NOT BE ISSUED. Please see graduate chair (in Moore 324) one month prior to registration to process the necessary forms.

NOTE

Master’s Plan A students MUST register in 700 in the semester they plan to graduate.

Before a doctoral student can register for a Dissertation 800 course, the student must have achieved the following:

• Passed the written and oral qualifying examination
• Received approval of doctoral committee/dissertation topic/proposal
• Passed the oral comprehensive examination

The CRN for AmSt 800 WILL NOT BE ISSUED unless all the above have been completed.

NOTE

Doctoral students MUST register in 800 in the semester they plan to graduate.