US Latinx Literature Culture

3 Credits · Level: Undergraduate

Imagine the cultural, social, and political history of the United States, and of the continent and the peoples that predate it, if it were narrated from west to east, rather than east to west? Through a primary archive of literary, cultural, and media texts, “State(s)” offers alternative imaginings of the American experience that resist and critique colonial, imperial, and other dominant structures of knowledge based around intersectional formations of race, and class, and culture, as well as around, gender, sexuality, and ability. Writers assigned may include Joan Didion, Thomas Pynchon, Walter Mosley, Richard Rodríguez, Maxine Hong Kingston, and Tommy Orange, but the course will also feature numerous sources from popular culture, including film, television, music and new media, from the Beach Boys and Los Lobos to Kendrick Lamar and Lana Del Rey, from films like East of Eden and Psycho to Boyz n the Hood to Strange Days to There Will Be Blood.