Current class schedules and course information are listed in the Schedule of Classes. You can find additional useful information in the official BU Online Bulletin. Unless otherwise noted, all undergraduate courses carry four credits and are offered every year.
INTRODUCTION TO LATIN AMERICAN STUDIES
Explores the history, culture and current issues of Latin America and the Caribbean.
LATINOS IN THE UNITED STATES
Explores the history, cultures and current condition of Chican@s, Puerto Ricans, Dominicans, Cubans and others in the United States.
MODERN CARIBBEAN
Offers a broad, interdisciplinary and socio-historical introduction to the Caribbean, beginning with the Haitian Revolution at the end of the 18th century and ending with the trends and changes emerging during the 1990s.
Social Change: Race and Class
Explores the complex interplay between race and class. Focuses on issues of race (including the way it has been defined), ethnicity, class structures and class stratification, and communities.
SPECIAL TOPICS IN LACAS
May be repeated for credit if different topic is offered.
SPECIAL TOPICS IN LATIN AMERICAN HISTORY
Intensive study of particular themes and problems in Latin American history, determined in advance. May be repeated for credit if different topic is offered.
WOMEN OF COLOR IN THE U.S.
Examines the diverse struggles (political, economic, social, legal, etc.) Asian, Native American, African American, and Latina/Chicana women have historically faced in the U.S., the impact of social movements, personal experiences, and state policies on their lives, and the means by which they have sought to empower themselves.
SOCIAL CHANGE IN PUERTO RICO
INDIGENOUS PEOPLES OF TROPICAL LOWLAND SOUTH AMERICA
Studies indigenous peoples and cultures in lowland areas of the South American neo-tropics. Emphasizes an understanding of neo-tropical ecology, an appreciation of indigenous perception and worldview, and the crucial importance of historical interactions that have affected indigenous existence since the arrival of Columbus.
LIBRARY RESEARCH ON LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN
Resources and information skills primarily associated with electronic forms of information for research and study of Latin America, the Caribbean and Latin@s in the U.S.. The Internet is introduced through demonstrations and hands-on exercises. Assignments focus on historical and contemporary issues.
SPECIAL TOPICS IN LACAS
May be repeated for credit if different topic is offered.
WOMEN, RACE AND REPRESENTATION
Exploration of how women are individually and collectively situated and how they shift within existing social framework; also, the ways in which these changing positions are represented within contemporary U.S. visual media. Examination of ways in which representations of women have been understood in terms of race and in terms of how this racialization has intersected social class and sexuality within dominant U.S. cultural theories by women and men of all races.
GEENDER AND SOCIETY
This course examines the ways in which representations of gender have been understood in terms of race and in terms of how this racialization has intersected social class and sexuality within dominant U.S. cultures. We will examine the representation of gender from a socio-historical and cultural perspectives.
SPECIAL TOPICS IN LACAS
May be repeated for credit if different topic is offered. 2 credits.
SPECIAL TOPICS IN LATIN AMERICAN HISTORY
Intensive study of particular themes and problems in Latin American history, determined in advance. May be repeated for credit if different topic is offered.
SLAVERY, RACE, CULTURE
Sociological analysis of slavery as process of social and cultural change and of redefinition of social groups within the world economy. Draws on materials from United States, the Caribbean and Brazil.
RACE AND CULTURAL RELATIONS IN THE WORLD COMMUNITY
Historic identity as important factor in social development in multiethnic and multiracial world community. The focus will be on selected communities from Africa, Asia and Europe.
COMPARATIVE SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT
Origins and development strategies of regimes in various zones or regions of the world. Social composition of regimes; changes in social base that accompany shifts in development policies. Consideration of costs/benefits that accrue to different classes.
LATIN AMERICAN WOMEN AND THEIR COMMUNITIES
Examines the political, social and economic role of women in Latin America and the Spanish-speaking Caribbean, the impact of personal experiences, social movements, and state policies on their lives, and the manner in which they seek to empower themselves and their communities.
WOMEN AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE
Examines the types of offenses for which women are arrested, the punishment they receive, and the treatment they face once institutionalized. Attention is also given to how women respond to the conditions of incarceration.
MULTICULTURALISM
Exploration of possible meanings of pluralism in the U.S. Studies histories of racial formation (including construction of whiteness), material erasure and subordination, and cultural domination that have shaped contemporary social fabric.
INTRODUCTION TO HISPANIC LITERATURE: LITERARY ANALYSIS
Analysis of representative works of Peninsular and Latin American literature (poems, plays, essays, narratives), emphasis on study of basic literary concepts and terminology. Recommended for students planning to take SPAN 360 and/or 370. Prerequisites: SPAN 215 or equivalent.
GENDER, POWER AND DIFFERENCE
Examination of how construct of difference raises important questions about problems faced by most women of color in general vis-à-vis historically existent feminism, ideological differences among feminists and women's rights advocates. Focus on issues of race, gender, sexuality and culture.
ANTHROPOLOGY OF DEVELOPING NATIONS
Social, political and economic change in the Third World. Articulation of rural production systems with world market. Analysis of rural and urban development, famine, population, poverty, inequality and powerlessness. Economic and environmental impacts of United Nations, World Bank and other development organizations.
THEORIES OF SOCIAL CHANGE
SURVEY OF LATIN AMERICAN LITERATURE
Selected readings reflecting historical developments of Latin American literature from colonial to contemporary period. Prerequisites: one from SPAN 244, 250 or 251, or equivalent.
SPECIAL TOPICS IN LACAS
May be repeated for credit if different topic is offered.
SPECIAL TOPICS IN LATIN AMERICAN HISTORY
Intensive study of particular themes and problems in Latin American history, determined in advance. May be repeated for credit if different topic is offered.
INTERNSHIP
See LACAS Director. Variable credit.
INDEPENDENT STUDY
See individual LACAS faculty. Variable credit.
LATIN AMERICAN SHORT STORY
Principal development from Independence to present. Prerequisites: SPAN 244 and 370 or equivalent.
LITERATURE OF THE CARIBBEAN
Literary and historical developments of Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic and Cuba in contemporary period. Prerequisite: SPAN 370 or equivalent.
SPECIAL TOPICS IN LACAS
May be repeated for credit if different topic is offered.
SPECIAL TOPICS IN SPANISH LITERATURE
Study of writer or movement not otherwise available at upper-division level. Subjects to be determined. Prerequisite: SPAN 360 or equivalent. May be repeated if different topic is offered.
SENIOR SEMINAR IN LATIN AMERICAN HISTORY
Primarily for history majors and minors, dealing with particular themes or problems in Latin American history. Research paper required. May be repeated for credit if different topic is offered. Prerequisites: junior or senior standing and a 100-level history course, or consent of the instructor.
SPECIAL TOPICS IN LATIN AMERICAN LITERATURE
Significant period, literary movement or group of authors. Specific subject to be determined. Prerequisites: SPAN 244 and 370, or equivalent. May be repeated for credit.
TEACHING PRACTICUM
Independent study by assisting in a particular LACAS course. Course instructor directs students in preparation of course materials, as well as lecturing and/or leading discussions. May be repeated for total of no more than eight credits. Credit may not be used in conjunction with course in which student is currently enrolled. Does not satisfy major or Harpur College Distribution requirements.
INDEPENDENT FIELD RESEARCH
Off-campus independent field research. A faculty member must approve in advance the proposed project. The student writes a proposal in communication with an on-site organization and a LACAS faculty member. The work is written up as a senior thesis during the term after return from the field, as a separate four-credit course (LACS 498). Variable credit.
INDEPENDENT STUDY
See individual LACAS faculty. Variable credit.
SENIOR THESIS
The senior thesis, under the guidance of a member of the LACAS faculty, is the conclusion of the field research. The student writes up and provides the analytical framework for interpretation of the data gathered in the field. Papers written for the course may be submitted for consideration for honors on advice of the instructor.
