Wikipedia talk:Education program archive/University of Puget Sound/Cultural Theory (Spring 2014)/Course description

This course introduces students to the methodological and theoretical approaches of cultural studies and does so with attention to both the interrelationships of race, gender, and class as well as the contemporary politics of social justice. Although this course is, in general, not canonical in its orientation, the suggested readings do point you toward some key scholarship in Cultural Studies. Beyond seeing cultural studies, as traditionally viewed by academics, as developing out of Western academic critiques of culture and philosophy, this course examines the multiple locations, and politics of these locations, that gave rise to cultural studies. Mostly, however, I encourage you to explore in more depth areas of research that interest. The course has many goals: to introduce the nascent field of cultural studies scholarship, to encourage analysis of the "politics of location" of cultural studies research, to provide a broad understanding of the history of cultural studies, and to help students ground their own perspectives within an area of cultural studies scholarship with particular and particularistic assumptions, perspectives, and approaches.

Throughout the class, we will discuss the assumptions and related positions taken by scholars whose work falls within the broad spectrum of a field known as cultural studies. Specifically, we will work to "historicize" each work we read. Each book and essay will provide us an opportunity to consider questions such as: "What is this author's conception of cultural studies?" "What assumptions about culture, purpose, and methodology seem to undergird the scholar's project?" "What kind of research does this scholar draw on in order to make arguments about culture?" "To whom is the author speaking?" "How do the author's conception of cultural studies, assumptions about her field, scholarly resources, and intended audience shape the kind of cultural studies project that emerges?"

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