AMST 250 - Empire as a Way of Life

Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)

What is empire? How has it shaped the global world order? And the everyday lives of working people? Is the idea and reality of America possible without it? This question posed by historian William Appleman Williams in 1980 remains both prescient and critical in our current moment. This course examines how US empire has become “a way of life” in organizing American society since the mid 19th century. We examine the formations and consequences of American imperialism, colonization, slavery, capitalism, nation-building, and globalization through multidisciplinary texts and methods. Students gain theoretical tools to better understand key terms like ideology, culture, hegemony, and discourse in how they shape changing definitions of class, indigeneity, race, ethnicity, dis/ability, gender and sexuality in America. This course is open to all students and also is a core requirement of American Studies majors and enables students to go on to complete advanced work in the program. Amy Chin.

Two 75-minute periods.

Course Format: CLS