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TCXUS 238 Hispanics in the United States (5) I&S/VLPA
Provides overview of the diverse groups of people who are called "Hispanic" in the U.S., with emphasis on the significant cultural, political and economic influence that Hispanics have had on U.S. society. Examines literature, film, television shows, internet sites, popular magazines, music and folk art as forms of cultural expression, and discusses how they reflect and interact with political issues.
TCXUS 245 Multi-Ethnic American Literature (5) VLPA Raynor
Examines multicultural and multi-ethnic literature by American authors. Focuses on novels, short stories, essays, and poetry that examine the social construction of race in American society, the construction of American identity, and the intersections of race, class, and gender. Offered: AWSpS.
TCXUS 276 American Architecture (5) VLPA
Examines the architecture of the United States from early Native American structures to late twentieth-century buildings. Focuses on issues concerning style, technology, regionalism, functions, and reform to address the diverse forces that have shaped and continue to shape American architecture.
TCXUS 370 Asian American History (5) I&S
Examines the histories, cultures, and literatures of Chinese, Japanese, Filipinos, Koreans, East Indians, and Southeast Asians in America from 1850 to 2009. Focuses on struggles of individual groups confronting widespread hostility and poverty. Explores how they established viable communities that continue to flourish to the third, fourth, and fifth generations.
TCXUS 371 History of Rock and Roll (5) VLPA
In-depth look at the musical, social, and political history of rock and roll. From the pre-rock era of the 1940s through the fragment rock styles of the 1990s and beyond. Recorded examples and video clips underscore the tremendous changes in American popular music and culture brought by rock and roll.
TCXUS 372 Asian American Literature (5) VLPA
Examines major works of Asian American literature and the "double burden" of Asian American writers in both creating art and representing a group. Compares this "burden" to those of writers of other ethnicities. Includes historic themes and represents voices of marginalized groups commenting on themselves and on mainstream society.
TCXUS 373 Themes in American Literature (5, max. 10) VLPA
Studies major themes addressed by writers in America. Includes topics such as: individualism, identity and community; sex, love and marriage; justice and injustice; industrialization, technology and the city; authenticity and egalitarianism; and race relations. May be repeated for credit with instructor's approval.
TCXUS 374 American Literary Movements, Genres, and Historical Periods (5, max. 10) VLPA
Studies movements (Transcendentalism, Modernism, the Harlem Renaissance, etc.); genres (poetry, fiction, drama, essay); historical periods (American Renaissance, the '20s, etc.); and investigates the literature of ethnic, political, and/or regional groups. May be repeated for credit with instructor's approval.
TCXUS 375 Writing in the Pacific Northwest (5) VLPA
Examines the way place or region provides a context for writing. Compares several kinds of writing from the Pacific Northwest (e.g., history, journalism, fiction, nature writing) and analyzes how writing is made more effective by awareness of audience, setting and occasion for writing.
TCXUS 377 American Poetry (5) VLPA
An examination of different types of American poetry. Emphasizes writers from a variety of backgrounds. Poems approached from formal, thematic and historical perspectives.
TCXUS 378 Studies in Selected American Writers (5) VLPA
Analysis of selected American writers, focusing on their depictions of success and failure, and their characteristic styles of affirmation and alienation. Are there typically American patterns that can be discerned? What makes a writer's vision compelling?
TCXUS 381 Immigrant and Ethnic Literature (5) VLPA
Explores dynamics of cultures in contact and conflict and examines how literatures of different ethnic groups reflect this contrast. Emphasizes historical and cultural perspectives on immigrant and ethnic experience in the U.S. Analyzes literature depicting different aspects of the immigrant and ethnic experience within the larger context of America.
Instructor Course Description:
Stephanie Owings
TCXUS 382 Cross Cultural Studies in Contemporary Women's Fiction (5) VLPA Raynor
Examines novels and short stories concerned with race, politics, feminism, and the representation of women. Issues addressed include minority discourse, autobiographical modes, myth, storytelling, definitions of womanhood, and cultural identification. Writers studied include Allison, Erdrich, Silko, Kingston, Tan, Morrison, and Cisneros. Offered: AWSpS.
TCXUS 383 Early American Music, Art, Literature, and Theater (5) VLPA
Examines the cultural life of Americans from Colonial times to the eve of the Civil War. Includes topics such as Anglo/Celtic and Afro folk and church music, landscape and genre painting, regional and frontier literature, newspaper humor, popular culture, circus, Chautauqua, and minstrel shows.
TCXUS 384 African American Women's Literature (5) VLPA Raynor
Examines female slave narratives and novels from the Harlem Renaissance, Social Protest Movement, and the contemporary period. Examines how black women illustrate social constructions and intersections of race, gender, and class. Readings, lectures, and films will explore the political motivation and public response to black women's writing. Offered: AWSpS.
TCXUS 385 African American Literature from Slavery to the Present (5) VLPA Raynor
Readings, films, lectures, and class discussions will focus on constructions of racial identity, social consciousness, race class, and gender relations as reflected in novels, short stories, essays, and poetry by African American authors. Offered: AWSpS.
TCXUS 386 Black, Labor, and Protest Music in Historical Perspective (5) I&S/VLPA
Presents distinctive musical traditions of African-American, labor and protest movements. Uses folk and protest music as a way to access and understand submerged elements of the American experience that are often ignored or lost to history. Reviews folk traditions embodied in American popular culture.
TCXUS 471 History of Jazz (5) VLPA
Presents a broad survey of the primary periods and styles of jazz during the 20th century in the United States. Exposes students to the most innovative jazz musicians and their music as well as their contributions to American culture through the use of extensive audio and video examples.
TCXUS 476 American Women's Literature: Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Texts (5) VLPA Raynor
Examines primarily novels and short stories by American women authors from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Explores women's work, women's education, women's activism, marriage, motherhood, and crimes committed against and by women. Addresses the construction of female identity and how American women authors revise American history and literature.
TCXUS 477 Nature and Environment in American Literature (5) VLPA
Examines the varying attitudes toward nature in American literary works -- nature as antagonist, nurturer, resource, divinity, commodity. Consideration of how writers achieve authority for their visions of the natural world: to what extent is nature writing sentimental? To what extent is it our most clear-sighted literature? Writers studied may include John Muir, Annie Dillard, Barry Lopez, Robinson Jeffers, Loren Eiseley.
TCXUS 478 Literature of the Harlem Renaissance (5) VLPA Raynor
Examines the images, themes, and characterizations in literature written by African Americans during the Harlem Renaissance. Writers include Johnson, Hughes, Larsen, Harston, Cullen, Fauset, Thurmann, White and McKay. Offered: AWSpS.
TCXUS 479 Contemporary Native American Women's Literature (5) VLPA Raynor
Examines novels, short stories, and poetry by contemporary Native American women authors. Addresses racial and gender oppression, reservation life, acculturation, political and social emergence as well as the leadership role of Native American women. Writers studied include Erdrich, Silko, Hogan, Tapahonso, and Harjo. Offered: AWSpS.
TCXUS 480 American Indian Literature (5, max. 10) VLPA
Studies American Indian literature reflected in thematic and topical expressions. Examines content revolving around leading Native American writers, and/or non-Indian depictions of Native Americans, and/or American Indian biographical studies. May be repeated for credit with instructor's approval.
TCXUS 481 Western American Literature (5) VLPA
Studies Western American writers and their contribution to understanding the Western landscape. Focuses on selected topical areas and/or cultural themes characteristic to the West.
TCXUS 482 American Folklore (5) VLPA
Examines types of American folklore and the techniques of the folklorist. Includes topics such as: American folk heroes, folklore vs. fakelore, Southern and New England archetypes, the rural mystique, sexism, violence and racism in folklore, printed folktales, and modern folk heroes.
TCXUS 485 Media Genres (5, max. 10) VLPA
Study of genre, the thematic classification of films (e.g. westerns, musicals) and television programming. Topics vary, but can include comedy, news/documentary, musical, and social-problem melodramas.
Instructor Course Description:
Claudia L. Gorbman
TCXUS 489 Topics in Cultural Expression (5, max. 15) VLPA
Advanced course offerings in cultural expression designed to respond to faculty and student interests and needs
