Current Affairs and Critical Issues in American Culture

3 units

What's in your newsfeed? Media outlets drive critical conversations and public discourse, and in this course students have the chance to keep up and weigh in. Students read the news and examine current affairs as they unfold week by week, critically analyzing and exploring modes of understanding, historicizing, and contextualizing contemporary issues in American society. The course introduces students to theoretical and conceptual frameworks for this engagement and asks questions such as the following: How are these issues related to the past? How have Americans experienced this issue before, and how is the contemporary context different? We will follow trends in pop culture, technology, politics, and society. Students learn to layer current issues with historical documents, the commentary of public intellectuals and cultural critics, and political, economic, and social policies. The course stresses research analysis, group process, critical thinking, multidisciplinary inquiry, and professional writing and speaking skills.