HST 324 - Race in American Memory

Course Units: 1.0

(TBD: Staff) “The struggle of man against power,” wrote Milan Kundera, “is the struggle of memory against forgetting.” This course will examine that struggle as it has taken place in the United States around the issue of race. How have Americans as a nation chosen to remember events that involved race? How and by whom were these collective memories constructed? In what ways were they contested? How have they changed over time? We will explore these issues focusing on such phenomena as Indian removal, slavery, the Civil War, Jim Crow, Japanese internment and World War II, and the Civil Rights movement, examining depictions in public history and popular cultural forms, including memorials, museums, battlefields, literature, and film. Prerequisite(s): Any 100-level or 200-level history course or permission of the instructor. CC: LCC, SOCS