New Geography Course 295 Borderlands: Gender, Race & Place, WINTER 2015

Borderlands: Gender, Race & Place
Geography 295 | 5 credits
Next up, Winter Quarter 2015 | MWF 10:30 - 11:20am

Cities, Citizenship & Migration (CCM) and Globalization, Health & Development (GHD) Geography tracks

We tend to think of borders as fixed lines that divide Us from our Others. In recent years, geographers, political scientists, poets and activists have debated the meaning of borders, focusing on borderlands as a concept that transcends physical borders between nation-states. Our goal is to direct scholarly inquiry towards a broad array of sources to think through the following questions: What difference do borders make between an “us” and a “them”? How does living in the borderlands shape our understandings of language, culture, and citizenship?

To grapple with these questions, we will focus the class around a reading of Borderlands/La Frontera, a seminal work by Gloria Anzaldúa. Each week we will build on key themes, including: living in the US-Mexico borderlands (and how far it extends!); settler colonialism, mestizaje and indigenous appropriation; bilingualism and code-switching; the meaning of home in transnational identities; sex and body politics; and rebellion and finding your voice.