Class Schedules

This course will introduce students to the study of folklore, belief, and religious folklife of the Maya people at different points in history. We will consider examples of folktales, myths, foodways, material arts, paranormal experience narratives, magic, healing, and other traditions as they relate to religion. We will pay particular attention to the complex and sometimes problematic relationships between missionaries and Maya people in the construction of official and unofficial religions. By examining folklore that emerges within, between, and in reaction to religious traditions, students will be challenged to move beyond simple notions of culture, religious authority, and doctrine.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

This course will introduce students to the study of folklore, belief, and religious folklife of the Maya people at different points in history. We will consider examples of folktales, myths, foodways, material arts, paranormal experience narratives, magic, healing, and other traditions as they relate to religion. We will pay particular attention to the complex and sometimes problematic relationships between missionaries and Maya people in the construction of official and unofficial religions. By examining folklore that emerges within, between, and in reaction to religious traditions, students will be challenged to move beyond simple notions of culture, religious authority, and doctrine.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

Language loss is accelerating at alarming rates. In fact, Linguists predict that only five percent of the six thousand languages currently spoken in the world are expected to survive into the 22nd century. In this course, we will examine the historical, political, and socio-economic factors behind the endangerment and/or marginalization of languages in Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, and North and South America. We will also concentrate on the globalization of English (and other major languages), which plays a primary role in language endangerment and marginalization. Additional topics include: linguistic diversity, language policy, multilingualism (in both nations and individuals), global language conflict, and language revitalization. Students will have the opportunity to learn first-hand about these issues by interviewing speakers of an endangered and/or minority language.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WA
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Social science

Course Materials

The American West is central to the construction of America's identity and popular culture.  The mythology of the American West, built on a narrow foundation of Euro-American settlement and conquest, is critical to understanding the role of the West in the national narrative of American history. Using a variety of materials, including films, art and photography, literature, and historical sources, this course will examine how writers, artists, actors, settlers, and government officials, among others, shaped the creation of the mythic West.  This course will investigate what - and who - is and is not considered part of this mythology, as well as the ways in which these constructs attempted to make sense of the diverse populations converging in the West. Can count towards "Colonization and Empire," or "Race and Indigeneity," or "North America" fields.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WA
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

Human beings have an unprecedented ability to shape the environment around them, yet the environment powerfully shapes both individuals and species. Two main questions run throughout this course: 1. How does language influence the way we think about and perceive nature, which in turn influences the way we interact with and shape nature? 2. How has our environment shaped the Language faculty and individual languages? To answer these questions, we'll start by asking, what is language and what is nature? Then we'll turn to the way that our environment has impacted the evolution of Language. Next we'll look at indigenous knowledge as it is encoded by language and the Linguistic Relativity Hypothesis, which says that language influences the way we perceive the world. With this as background, we'll look at the language of environmental discourse. Next, using the metaphor of ecology, we'll examine languages as if they were organisms and analyze the ecosystems that sustain them. Knowing what makes a healthy language, we'll look at endangered languages and the connections between linguistic diversity and biodiversity.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WA

Distribution Requirements:
Social science

Course Materials

This course examines Native history since 1871, the year Congress unilaterally chose to stop making treaties with Native nations. By focusing on Native sovereignty, resistance, and the exercise of treaty rights, this course highlights histories and contemporary experiences of Native people in what is now the United States. Meets the post-1800 requirement, and can count towards "Colonization and Empire," or "Race and Indigeneity," or "Law and Social Justice," or "North America" fields.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WA
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

First day attendance required; cross-listed with HSIT 234-01 (30234)*

General Education Requirements:
Writing WP
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

Poor and minority populations have historically borne the brunt of environmental inequalities in the United States, suffering disproportionately from the effects of pollution, resource depletion, dangerous jobs, limited access to common resources, and exposure to environmental hazards. Paying particular attention to the ways that race, ethnicity, class, and gender have shaped the political and economic dimensions of environmental injustices, this course draws on the work of scholars and activists to examine the long history of environmental inequities in the United States, along with more recent political movements-national and local-that seek to rectify environmental injustices.

General Education Requirements:
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

This survey course will explore history, policy, and pedagogy as they relate to race, ethnicity, and culture as education. K-12 public education will be the primary focus with topics including desegregation, standardized testing, multi-cultural and ethnocentric pedagogy, the teacher's role and experience, and significant historical events in education. The course will culminate by analyzing current trends and future expectations in education.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WP
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Social science

Course Materials

During the last three decades, a global indigenous rights movement has taken shape within the United nations and other international bodies, challenging and reformulating international law and global cultural understandings of indigenous rights. The recognition of indigenous peoples' rights in international law invokes the tensions between sovereignty and human rights, but also challenges the dominant international understandings of both principles. In this course, we examine indigenous peoples' movements by placing them in a global context and sociologically informed theoretical framework. By beginning with a set of influential theoretical statements from social science, we will then use indigenous peoples' movements as case studies to examine the extent to which these theoretical perspectives explain and are challenged by case studies. We will then analyze various aspects of indigenous peoples' movements and the extent to which these aspects of the movement are shaped by global processes.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WA
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Social science

Course Materials

This course examines Native history to 1871 -- the year that Congress unilaterally chose to stop making treaties with Native nations -- by considering the multifaceted histories and experiences of Native people in what is now the United States. By looking at Native interactions with (and resistance to) Spanish, French, British, and American explorers, settlers, missionaries, militaries, and government officials, this course argues that Native history is essential to understanding past as well as present issues. Can count towards "Colonization and Empire," or "Race and Indigeneity," or "Law and Social Justice," and or "North America" fields.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WA
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

This course examines Native history to 1871 -- the year that Congress unilaterally chose to stop making treaties with Native nations -- by considering the multifaceted histories and experiences of Native people in what is now the United States. By looking at Native interactions with (and resistance to) Spanish, French, British, and American explorers, settlers, missionaries, militaries, and government officials, this course argues that Native history is essential to understanding past as well as present issues. Can count towards "Colonization and Empire," or "Race and Indigeneity," or "Law and Social Justice," and or "North America" fields.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WA
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

People have always had to contend with the natural world, but only recently have historians begun to explore the changing relationships between people and their environment over time. In this course, we will examine the variety of ways that people in North America have shaped the environment, as well as how they have used, labored in, abused, conserved, protected, rearranged, polluted, cleaned, and thought about it. In addition, we will explore how various characteristics of the natural world have affected the broad patterns of human society, sometimes harming or hindering life and other times enabling rapid development and expansion. By bringing nature into the study of human history and the human past into the study of nature, we will begin to see the connections and interdependencies between the two that are often overlooked.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WP
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

This course explores the ways in which diverse groups of people interact with the natural environment to produce the contemporary landscapes (human and physical) and regional differentiation (social and cultural) of the U.S. and Canada. The course emphasizes patterns of human settlement, economic activity, and land use, with special attention given to social and legal issues relevant to Native populations in the U.S. and the historic and current status and development of Native lands. Case studies and a field study to the Boreal Forest region of northern Minnesota will be used to demonstrate broad themes at a more personal scale.

General Education Requirements:
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Social science

Course Materials

This course examines Pasifika Indigenous ways of knowing, being, and doing, rooted/routed in the region of Oceania. Drawing on scholarship, storytelling, and lived experiences from across Pasifika communities, students will explore epistemologies and pedagogies grounded in relationality, ocean, land, ancestry, and collective responsibility. The course also critiques the commodification and mis/representation of Oceania cultures in global popular media—focusing particularly on the Disneyfication of the region in films such as Moana. Students will analyze how Indigenous knowledge systems are represented, erased, and/or reimagined in these narratives, and consider the broader educational and cultural implications. Centering Indigenous perspectives, the course invites critical reflection on the role of education in sustaining cultural identity, advancing sovereignty, and resisting colonial narratives across Oceania and beyond.

General Education Requirements:

Distribution Requirements:
Social science

Course Materials

Macalester College sits on the homelands of the Dakota people. But what’s the history of the land Macalester occupies? Whose stories are told -- and who gets to tell these stories? How do language, culture, and thought shape the ways we understand the land and our relationships with it? This course will center and amplify these narratives by focusing on the past, present, and future uses of the Katharine Ordway Natural History Study Area (commonly called the Ordway Field Station) in order to help students understand the Indigenous history of Minnesota and the Twin Cities, as well as Indigenous ways of knowing and understanding non-human nature. Fields: Environment, Public History, Race and Indigeneity, North America.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WP
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

Macalester College sits on the homelands of the Dakota people. But what’s the history of the land Macalester occupies? Whose stories are told -- and who gets to tell these stories? How do language, culture, and thought shape the ways we understand the land and our relationships with it? This course will center and amplify these narratives by focusing on the past, present, and future uses of the Katharine Ordway Natural History Study Area (commonly called the Ordway Field Station) in order to help students understand the Indigenous history of Minnesota and the Twin Cities, as well as Indigenous ways of knowing and understanding non-human nature. Fields: Environment, Public History, Race and Indigeneity, North America.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WP
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

In this course, students will explore how stories of past and present Christians and the theologies they produced contribute to the histories of gender and sexuality, particularly in the United States. We will pay special attention to the development of and intersections among queer theory, queer and trans activism, queer biblical interpretation, and queer theology in the U.S. from the late twentieth century on. Students will learn how the development of queer biblical interpretation and theology grew out of the intellectual and activist work of feminist, womanist, and mujerista scholars, theologians, ethicists, and pastors. In readings, class discussion, online forums, and written and creative work, students will be invited to explore the social construction of gendered identities and sexualities over time, from antiquity to the postmodern, and the intersections of these identities with religion, race, ethnicity, class, and dis/ability. Although the majority of the class will be devoted to historical scholarship and theological writing that insists on the inclusion of diverse sexualities and genders in the Christian past, present, and future, we will also examine the role that some forms of American Christianity play in the exclusion of LGBTQ+ people, the enforcement of compulsory heterosexuality, the “naturalization” of a gender binary, and the reification of patriarchal, racist, homophobic, and transphobic cultures.

General Education Requirements:

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

This course provides opportunities for students to engage with research methods that promote inclusive, egalitarian, exploratory social inquiry aimed at enriching the quality of learning and life in schools and civic spaces. Pedagogical in addition to formal research applications are addressed, as are implications for development and change on personal to organizational to societal levels. Ethical dimensions of engaging children and youth, in schools and community settings, as research participants and as researchers, are also carefully considered.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WP
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Social science

Course Materials

From the Amazon to Patagonia, the expansion of South American nations in the 19th century relied on the acculturation, displacement, and extermination of native populations. Despite their high degree of violence, collective traumas such as the Selknam genocide (Chile), "the conquest of the desert" (Argentina) and "the Putumayo atrocities" (Colombia-Peru) remain in the margins of the cultural memory of the region more than a century later after the events. How do survivors, activists, and artists confront the legacies of colonialism? What forms of reparation are appropriate in the present? From novels to films and documentaries, the cultural works that we will analyze in this course will help us not only to understand what these traumatic episodes mean today for the indigenous populations of the Amazon and Patagonia, but also to interrogate the limits and contradictions of any act of memory. This course satisfies the Area 2 requirement of the Spanish major. Prerequisite: SPAN 307 or consent of the instructor.

General Education Requirements:

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

This course provides an interdisciplinary mechanism for exploring Indigenous feminisms and queer Indigenous studies. We will explore Indigenous histories through women’s, feminist, two-spirit, and queer writings that raise critical questions about normative gender and sexuality, nationhood, colonization, and decolonization. We will also explore the following topics: the relationship between mainstream feminism and Indigenous feminism; gender and sexual violence; settler colonialism and decolonization; law and restorative justice; sexuality; two-spirit, queer, and gender non-conforming subjectivities and politics; sexual and reproductive health; activism; the environment, embodiment, and materialisms; culture and tradition; erotics; biopolitics; Indigenous epistemologies; and sovereignty and governance.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WA
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:

Course Materials

This course provides an interdisciplinary mechanism for exploring Indigenous feminisms and queer Indigenous studies. We will explore Indigenous histories through women’s, feminist, two-spirit, and queer writings that raise critical questions about normative gender and sexuality, nationhood, colonization, and decolonization. We will also explore the following topics: the relationship between mainstream feminism and Indigenous feminism; gender and sexual violence; settler colonialism and decolonization; law and restorative justice; sexuality; two-spirit, queer, and gender non-conforming subjectivities and politics; sexual and reproductive health; activism; the environment, embodiment, and materialisms; culture and tradition; erotics; biopolitics; Indigenous epistemologies; and sovereignty and governance.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WA
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:

Course Materials