Introduction to different types of college level writing and information literacy with a focus on American culture and society. A-F only.
COURSES
AMST 111 (FW) » Introduction to American Studies Writing
Instructor
Kath Sands, G.S. Gushiken, and Spencer Oshita
Course Description
Required Text(s)
TBA
AMST 150 (FGB) » America and the World
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
AMST 201 (DH) » An American Experience – Institutions and Movements
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
AMST 202 (DH) » American Experience: Culture and the Arts
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.
AMST 211 (DS) » Contemporary American Domestic Issues
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.
AMST 212 (DS) » Contemporary American Global Issues
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)
- Erakat, Noura. Justice for Some: Law and the Question of Palestine.
- Getachew, Adom. Worldmaking After Empire: The Rise and Fall of Self Determination.
- Manjapra, Kris. Black Ghost of Empire: The Long Death of Slavery and the Failure of Emancipation.
- Snyder, Timothy. The Road to Unfreedom: Russia, Europe, America.
AMST 220 (DH) » Introduction to Indigeous Studies
Instructor
Brandy McDougall
Course Description
Interdisciplinary survey that examines the histories, politics, popular representations, self-representations, and contemporary issues of the indigenous peoples of the U.S. and its territories, including Native Americans, Alaska Natives, Kanaka Maoli, Chamorro, and Samoans.
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 325 (DH) » Religion and Law in the U.S. (Cross-listed as POLS 325).
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
AMST 348 (DH) » American Design: An Historical Survey
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
AMST 373 (DS) » Filipino Americans: History, Culture and Politics (Cross-listed as ES 373)
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
AMST 383 (DH) » American Studies Approach
Instructor
Mari Yoshihara
Course Description
Materials and methods for the study of American life and thought. AMST majors only.
Required Text(s)
TBA
AMST 433 (DH) » Islands, Empires and the Arts
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)
- Césaire, Amié. Discourse on Colonialism.
- Jones, Le Roi. Blues People: Negro Music in White America.
- Kincaid, Jamaica. A Small Place.
- Lordi, Emily J. The Meaning of Soul: Black Music and Resilience since the 1960s.
- Manjapra, Kris. Black Ghost of Empire: The Long Death of Slavery and the Failure of Emancipation.
- Njoroge, Njoroge. Chocolate Surrealism: Music Modernity, Memory, and History in the Circum Caribbean.
Select readings from the following will be in the semester:
- Bradley, Lloyd. Bass Culture: When Reggae was King.
- Hebdige, Dick. Cut ‘N’ Mix: Culture, Identity, and Caribbean Music.
- Gaddy, Kristina R. Well of Souls: Uncovering the Banjo’s Hidden History.
- Jabir, Johari. Conjuring Freedom: Music and Masculinity in the Civil War’s “Gospel Army”.
- Katz, David. Solid Foundation: An Oral History of Reggae.
- Kincaid, Jamaica. ANNiE JOHN.
- Mahon, Maureen. Black Diamond Queens: African American Women and Rock and Roll.
- Schloss, Joseph G. Foundation: B-Boys, B-Girls, and Hip-Hop Culture in New York.
AMST 436 (DS) » Gender, Justice and Law (Cross-listed as POLS 368 and WGSS 436)
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
AMST 448 (DS) » Food, Culture and Empire
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
AMST 455 (DL) » U.S. Women's Literature and Culture (Cross-listed as ENG 455 and WGSS 445)
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
AMST 459 (DS) » Sports in America
Instructor
Yuka Polovina
Course Description
Sports as reflected in literature, films, and TV.
Required Text(s)
- People’s History of Sports in the United States: 250 Years of Politics, Protest, People, and Play (New Press People’s History); ISBN-13 : 978-1595584779
AMST 474 (DH) » Preservation: Hawaii, Asia, and the Pacific (Cross-listed as ARCH 474)
Instructor
Jeff Tripp
Course Description
This O-focused course is an overview of issues in conservation and historic preservation facing peoples of Hawai‘i, Asia, and the Pacific. The course covers the range of historic and cultural resources found in the region, steps taken in the past to preserve these resources and present threats to their preservation. Issues of past colonial interventions, the rights of indigenous peoples to have a say in what is preserved and how, and the means by which traditional cultures might best be saved and recognized are treated in detail throughout the course.
Although significant emphasis is placed upon examples of tangible cultural and historic resources-buildings, structures, landscapes, and archaeological sites-more recently identified cultural preservation issues, as embedded in language, food, ceremonies, and other cultural practices, will also feature in course readings, lectures, and discussion.
Course Requirements
Readings/discussions (O-focus): 10% (O-focus 5%)
Book report (O-focus): 20% (O-focus 10%)
Country/Regional Reports (O-focus): 20% (O-focus 10%)
Mid-term exam: 10%
Research paper/Final Pres. (O-focus): 30% (O-focus 15%)
Final exam: 10%
Required Text(s)
- COURSE READER on-line on Laulima
AMST 484 » Senior Capstone Project
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
AMST 490B » Topic in American Studies: Social Structure and Interaction (Where Science and Culture Collide)
Instructor
Spencer Oshita
Course Description
Themes, problems, and issues not addressed in other American studies undergraduate courses, focused within these areas: (B) social structure and interaction.
Course Requirements
TBA
Required Text(s)
TBA
AMST 499 » Readings in American Studies
Instructor
Jonna Eagle
Course Description
Directed readings and research for majors. Pre: consent.
Fall 2024 (Undergraduate)
AMST 110 (FW) » Introduction to American Studies Writing
Instructor
TBA
Course Description
Introduction to different types of college level writing and information literacy with a focus on American culture and society.
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 150 (FGB) » America and the World
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
AMST 201 (DH, WI) » An American Experience – Institutions and Movements
Instructor
Robert Perkinson
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
AMST 202 (DH, WI) » American Experience: Culture and the Arts
Instructor
TBA
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
AMST 211 (DS, WI) » Contemporary American Domestic Issues
Instructors
Areerat Worawongwasu
Course Description
An Introduction to Marxist Cultural Analysis
This writing-intensive course serves as an introduction to Marxist cultural analysis, through interrogating contemporary “American” “domestic” issues, from our positions in U.S.-Occupied Hawaiʻi. We will trace the origins and historical materialist developments of contemporary issues, grounded in place-based epistemologies, while also thinking about how they transit throughout the U.S. empire.
Required Text(s)
This is a TXT0 (Textbook Cost $0) course. All readings will be provided via Laulima. Readings include Keywords for American Cultural Studies, Third Edition (2020), Manifesto of the Communist Party (1848), as well as writings by Haunani-Kay Trask, Antonio Gramsci, and more.
AMST 212 (DS, WI) » Contemporary American Global Issues
Instructor
TBA
Course Description
Interdisciplinary exploration of such current global issues as international diplomacy, economic development, national security, demographic change, and environmental protection.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 220 (DH, HAP) » Introducation to Indigenous Studies
Instructor
Brandy McDougall
Course Description
Interdisciplinary survey that examines the histories, politics, popular representations, self-representations, and contemporary issues of the indigenous peoples of the U.S. and its territories, including Native Americans, Alaska Natives, Kanaka Maoli, Chamorro, and Samoans.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 310 (DH, OC) » Japanese Americans: History, Culture, Lifestyles
Instructor
Logan Narikawa
Course Description
Explores the experiences of Japanese Americans in Hawai‘i and the U.S. at large: historical and cultural heritage, biographical portraits, changing family ties, ethnic lifeways, gender relations, local identity, and the future of island living.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 318 (DH, ETH) » Asian American (Cross-listed as ES 318)
Instructor
Joyce Mariano
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
AMST 325 (DH) » Religion and Law in the U.S> (Cross-listed as POLS 325)
Instructor
Kathleen 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. (Once a year) (Cross-listed as POLS 325)
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 348 (DH, ETH) » American Design: An Historical Survey
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
AMST 360 (DH) » American Cinema
Instructor
Rachel Hong
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
AMST 373 (DS, ETH, WI) » Filipino America (cross-listed as ES 373)
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
AMST 383 (DH, WI) » Critical Research Methods
Instructor
Jeff Tripp
Course Description
Overview of methods and methodologies for conducting interdisciplinary research and writing in the field of American Studies. AMST majors only.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 423 (DH, OC) » History of American Architecture (Cross-listed as ARCH 473)
Instructor
Jeffrey Tripp
Course Description
History of American architecture in terms of style, techniques, and symbolic meaning.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 425 (DH) » American Environmental History (Cross-listed as HIST 480 and SUST 482)
Instructor
F.S. Zelko
Course Description
Survey history of the complex relations between American societies and diverse U.S. ecosystems, from European contact and colonization to the present.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 437 (DH, W, ETH)» Trans* Studies: Trans (feminine/masculine/gender nonconforming/sexual
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
AMST 440 (DH, WI)» Race and Racism in America (Crosslisted as HIST 476)
Instructor
Njoroge Njoroge
Course Description
Racial ideas and ideologies, and their effects throughout American history.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 442 (DH, OC) »Social Movements
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
AMST 459 (DS, ETH, WI) »Sports in America
Instructor
Ava Ladner
Course Description
Sports as reflected in literature, films, and TV.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 469 (DH, ETH, OC) » Religion, Sex, and Gender
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
AMST 499 (V) »Readings in American Studies
Instructor
Jonna Eagle
Course Description
Directed readings and research for majors. Pre: consent.Junior standing or consent.
Spring 2024 (Graduate)
AMST 601 » Patterns of American Cultures
Instructor
Joyce Mariano
Course Description
American cultural origins and development.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 646 » Advanced Topics: Social/Cultural/Intellectual (Cross-listed as HIST 639B)
Instructor
Brandy McDougall
Course Description
Readings and research on American social and intellectual history. Repeatable one time. Pre: graduate standing and consent.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 650 » Field Mastery
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.
AMST 683 » Museums: Theory, History, Practice
Instructor
M. W. Cadora
Course Description
History and theory of museums and related institutions (art galleries, historic houses, zoos, parks). Relationship between museums, collections, and communities. Introduction to governance, planning, legal, and ethical concerns.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 685 » Museums and Education (Cross-listed as EDCS 685)
Instructor
Noelle Kahanu
Course Description
Museums and related sites (e.g., art galleries, historic homes, parks, festivals) hold important roles in civil society. Through their exhibitions and programs they represent and shape a culture’s knowledge about itself and the surrounding world. This course will examine museums as educational institutions and the significance of informal leaning in helping to build a vibrant, informed, and participatory society. Students will be introduced to a constellation of topics that will enable them to evaluate the educational effectiveness of museums by looking at national museum policies/mandates, theories of learning, critical pedagogical practice, museum education programs, visitor studies and audience research, innovative art curricula, and new technologies and online learning.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 686 » Museum Studies Practicum
Instructor
Noelle Kahanu
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.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 690 » Research Seminar (Narration and Nation:Building Novels, Constructing Nation)
Instructor
TBA
Course Description
TBA
Course Requirments
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 699 Directed Readings/Research
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.
AMST 700 Thesis Research
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.
AMST 800 Dissertation Research
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.
Fall 2024 (Graduate)
AMST 600 » Approaches to American Studies
Instructor
Brandy McDougall
Course Description
This seminar introduces students to the theoretical frameworks and methodological tools used in American Studies. Tracing the key moments in the field’s historiography, we will examine how the interdisciplinary projects of American Studies have developed through generations of scholarship. Readings are organized into thematic clusters: (1) images, representations, narratives; (2) racial formation, settler colonialism, indigeneity, (3) archive of the senses, (4) locating Hawaiʻi in American Studies. Students will gain familiarity with the field of American Studies and various interdisciplinary research methods as well as acquire the skills of critical reading, analytical thinking, and academic writing.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- Melani McAlister, Epic Encounters: Culture, Media, & U.S. Interests in the Middle East since 1945 Updated Edition (Berkeley: University of California Press, [2001] 2005)
- Joseph Darda, How White Men Won the Culture Wars: A History of Veteran America (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2021)
- Marita Sturken, Terrorism in American Memory: Memorials, Museums, and Architecture in the Post-9/11 Era (New York: NYU Press, 2022)
- George Lipsitz, The Possessive Investment in Whiteness: How White People Profit from Identity Politics 20th Anniversary Edition (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2018)
- Manu Karuka, Empire’s Tracks: Indigenous Nations, Chinese Workers, and the Transcontinental Railroad (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2019)
- Evyn Lê Espiritu Gandhi, Archipelago of Resettlement: Vietnamese Refugee Settlers and Decolonization across Guam and Israel-Palestine (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2022)
- Saidiya Hartman, Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments: Intimate Histories of Riotous Black Girls, Troublesome Women, and Queer Radicals (New York: W. W. Norton, 2020)
- Camille Fojas, Border Optics: Surveillance Cultures of the US-Mexico Frontier (New York : NYU Press, 2021)
- Leslie Bow, Racist Love: Asian Abstraction and the Pleasures of Fantasy (Durham: Duke University Press, 2022)
- Vernadette Vicuña Gonzalez, Securing Paradise: Tourism and Militarism in Hawaiʻi and the Philippines (Durham: Duke University Press, 2013)
- Dean Itsuji Saranillio, Unsustainable Empire: Alternative Histories of Hawaiʻi Statehood (Durham: Duke University Press, 2018)
- Stephanie Nohelani Teves, Defiant Indigeneity: The Politics of Hawaiian Performance (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2018)
- Mari Yoshihara, Embracing the East: White Women and American Orientalism (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003); Musicians from a Different Shore: Asians and Asian Americans in Classical Music (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2007); OR Dearest Lenny: Letters from Japan and the Making of the World Maestro (New York: Oxford University Press, 2019)
AMST 615» Performance, Culture & Theory (CROSS-LISTED at WGSS 614)
Instructor
Elizabeth Colwill
Course Description
Survey of major critical works in fields of performing arts and public culture (e.g., dance, theater, music, commemoration). Topics include: theoretical application for the discipline of American studies, and the impact of social movements and labor migration on the performing arts.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 650 » Field Mastery
Instructor
Brandy McDougall
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.
AMST 683» Museums: Theory, Histroy, Practice
Instructor
M. W. Cadora
Course Description
History and theory of museums and related institutions (art galleries, historic houses, zoos, parks). Relationship between museums, collections, and communities. Introduction to governance, planning, legal, and ethical concerns.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 684 » Museums and Collections
Instructor
J. M. Sommer
Course Description
This class covers the “nuts and bolts” of running museums, galleries, and related institutions. It provides an overview of the responsibilities of museum professionals (registrars, collections managers, conservators, curators, etc.) in the care of collections and interpretive studies of museum displays. Includes on-site visits to institutions, to meet with collections professionals, for a deeper look at museum professionals’ duties and the challenges they face. Pre: 683 (or concurrent) or consent.
Course Requirements
- TBA
Required Text(s)
- TBA
AMST 686 (Restriction: Instructor Approval) » Museums Studies Practicum
Instructor
Elizabeth Colwill
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.
AMST 699 Directed Readings/Research
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.
AMST 700 Thesis Research
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.
AMST 800 Dissertation Research
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.