|
African Studies Courses Offered Fall 2005
AFS 100A - Elementary Kiswahili I w/lab 8:30-9:30 a.m. m w f C 207 Dr. Mohochi
The introductory course in Swahili enables students to speak and comprehend elementary Swahili phrases and sentences. The cultural component highlights important aspects of the life and people of East Africa. Oral skills are stressed to help students practice usage while writing helps the students understand the language better. The course is open to any student who wants to study a foreign language, to those interested in the African studies and to those who are interested in the Kenya semester program. Two one-hour language labs every week enhance oral practice and are also used for remedial work.
AFS 100B - Lab for Kiswahili 101 3:00-4:00 p.m. m w C 212 Dr. Mohochi
AFS 101 - Introduction to African Studies 8:30-10:00 a.m. t h C 010 Dr. Lloyd
This course aims to build a fundamental awareness of Africa, its peoples, their struggles and achievements within a historical framework. It focuses on continuity and change, the interplay of internal and external forces, and the diversity of African responses and reactions` to numerous challenges over the centuries. Specific themes include agricultural domestication, technological diffusion, demographic growth and migration, cultural and linguistic diversity, the impact of the slave trades, gradual inclusion of Africa into an international economy, the colonial experience, the rise of nationalism and the problems of development since independence. In addition to a number of recently published books and novels, the course draws upon some of the best film resources available. Dual listed with History 108.
AFS 105A - Intermediate Kiswahili w/Lab 10:50-11:50 a.m. m w f C 214 Dr. Mohochi
Continuation of SWAH 101A.
AFS 105B - Lab for Kiswahili 102 8:00-9:00 p.m. t h C 214 Dr. Mohochi
AFS 215A - W. African Arts 12:00-1:00 p.m. m w f GR 123 Dr. Udechukwu
This course deals for the most part with the traditional arts of West Africa. It explores the wide range of West African art forms, materials, and functions as well as questions of production, ownership, utility, evaluation and change. Diversity and humanities distribution credits.
AFS 240A - Environment & Resource Use in Kenya 8:30-9:30 a.m. m w f PK 015 Dr. Nyamweru
The contrast in Kenya's physical and human environment is addressed, between highland and lowland, cropland and rangeland, domestic livestock and wildlife, modern and traditional ways of life and land-use systems. The impact of the colonial regime on land ownership and resource use is studied with reference to certain ethnic groups. Responses to changing economic and political conditions in the post-colonial era are also discussed.
AFS 245A - Women and Land in Africa 8:30-10:00 a.m. t h PK 015 Dr. Nyamweru
The position of women is analyzed with reference to ethnic groups from different parts of Africa. Their significant role is in food production and fuel wood and water collection creates a heavy labor burden for women with few ownership rights to land or livestock. Trends in colonial and post-colonial Africa provided education to some women but decreased property rights and increased their responsibilities. Through films and biographies, African women speak in their own words about the realities of their lives.
AFS 265A - West African Diaspora 1:40-3:10 p.m. m w PK 019 Dr. Lloyd
West Africans were building complex social systems from approximately 1000 to 1800. This was also a time of unprecedented strain when millions of Africans were uprooted from their homelands and spread across the world as a result of the Atlantic and trans-Saharan slave trades. Scholarly research in the last decade has attempted to explain both slavery and the slave trade and to assess their impact on Africa, and Americas and the West. An understanding of these processes and their legacy is crucial to a fuller comprehension of human struggles and conflicts during the past 200 years.
AFS 323A - South African Drama 10:10-11:40 a.m. t h NC 225 Dr. Nouryeh
This course introduces students to the theatrical developments in South Africa in the apartheid and post apartheid eras. The purpose is to foster awareness of the potency of drama for political protest and for social change in post-colonial Africa. Issues about gender and racial discrimination, as well as the challenge of technocracy and European values to traditional beliefs and customs, are the primary focuses for study.
AFS 343A - Famine 12:40-2:10 p.m. t h PK 101 Dr. Nyamweru
Physical, economic and cultural factors give rise to famines. Cultural factors include the ways different societies respond to food shortage and the role of cultural conflicts and misunderstandings in contributing to famine or preventing adequate response to food shortage. These issues are discussed as they relate to famines in Europe, Asia and Africa during the 19th and 20th centuries. Films and print media sources are used to evaluate the cultural image of famine prevalent in this society.
AFS 347A - SPTP: African Popular Musics 2:20-3:50 p.m. t h GR 015 Dr. Mangin
This course examines the rise and development of African popular musics in their historical and cultural contexts. The aim is to explore how indigenous African musical practices are reconfigured and fused with popular music styles from the West and other African countries in the twentieth century. Because of the breadth of popular musics in Africa, this course will focus only on select genres that highlight certain themes of modernity such as new collective identities, nationalism, youth culture, and appropriations from the diaspora. Some genres that we will analyze are mbalax, jùjú, hip hop, jazz, soukous, and African salsa. The course is interdisciplinary and involves reading, listening, and the use of audiovisual materials.
|