WesMaps - Wesleyan University Catalog 2008-2009       Summer Session       Winter Session       Home       Archive       Search
CS92PROD
Social Norms and Social Power
AMST 118
Spring 2009
Section: 01  
Crosslisting: FGSS 119

This seminar is an interdisciplinary exploration of the privileges and penalties associated with "the normal" in the United States. We will think through the intersections of such categories of identity as race, ethnicity, religion, class, ability, gender and sexuality in terms of social power: the ways regimes of normativity are produced, reproduced, and challenged by various social groups. Drawing on a wide range of genres, including novels, ethnographies, theory, memoirs and films, we will pay particular attention to the ways bodily difference and social identity interarticulates with "normalness" to locate individuals within hierarchical power structures, and we will think creatively about ways to challenge this.

Essential Capabilities: Interpretation
The class will encourage students to develop skills to analyze the key concepts "difference," norm and power across multiple genres--fiction, ethnography, film, theory, etc. This requires them both to develop their own interpretive frameworks and to understand those of our authors', who are often working from different subject positions and social locations.
Email me at mdweiss@wesleyan.edu for finalized list of course texts.
Credit: 1 Gen Ed Area Dept: SBS AMST
Course Format: SeminarGrading Mode: Graded
Level: UGRD Prerequisites: None
Fulfills a Requirement for: None
Past Enrollment Probability: Not Available

Last Updated on NOV-04-2024
Contact wesmaps@wesleyan.edu to submit comments or suggestions. Please include a url, course title, faculty name or other page reference in your email ? Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut, 06459