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AFRICAST 31: Media and Conflict in Africa (AFRICAST 131)

Introduction to the variety of roles played by local and international media in covering conflict situations across the continent in the late 20t- and early 21st-centuries. The objective is to develop a theoretical and empirical understanding of the media as active participants in conflicts, rather than neutral witnesses. How the media in the African context have become tools for propaganda and for encouraging violence, as well as their role in promoting dialogue, peace and reconciliation between communities. These questions are relevant to the context of contemporary Africa where conflicts fueled by ethnic hatred or democratic aspirations have unfolded along with the development of media and communication technologies. Key concepts such as objectivity, impartiality, hate speech, peace journalism, citizen journalism, and cosmopolitanism, to analyze the role played by the media in case studies in Burundi, Cameroon, Egypt, Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda and Uganda. A wide variety of material including: readings drawn from a fields such as media and journalism studies, political sciences, anthropology, and postcolonial theory; linguistic, visual, audio, video and multimedia material produced by news media; and films and documentaries.
Terms: Win | Units: 3-5 | UG Reqs: WAY-SI
Instructors: ; Nothias, T. (PI)

AFRICAST 48S: History of Health, Science and Medicine in 20th Century Africa (ANTHRO 48S, HISTORY 48S)

This course will examine the impact of colonial policies and post-colonial development on patterns of sickness, wellness and health care in twentieth century sub-Saharan Africa. Some topics will include: the role of colonial science in the formulation of ideas about race, colonial epidemics, labor migration and disease, urban health, encounters between African healers and biomedicine, histories of HIV/AIDS, the impact of debt and Structural Adjustment Programs on public health, and the politics of humanitarian interventions in African health. Priority given to history majors and minors.
Terms: Win | Units: 5 | UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
Instructors: ; Hill, R. (PI)

AFRICAST 81: Media Representations of Africa (AFRICAST 181)

How has Africa been dominantly represented in the media? How are these representations challenged, complexified and reproduced in the postcolonial context? What is the role of African media in these processes? This class is an introduction to the variety of roles played by the media in representing Africa, with a particular focus on the postcolonial context. The topic is particularly relevant to contemporary Africa as the emerging middle-class, economic and cultural globalization, and the uptake for communication technologies are shaping contested images of the continent. You will: develop a theoretical and empirical understanding of the media as instruments of domination but also of resistance; learn how to critically deconstruct media representations in everyday life; understand the challenges of intercultural communication in an unequal world. Key concepts such as: representation, stereotyping, cultural appropriation, afropessimism, afrocentrism, afro optimism, afropolitanism. Readings drawn from media and cultural studies, anthropology, postcolonial theory and literature. In class-analysis of photographs, news articles and broadcasts, PR campaigns, social media, films and documentaries.
Terms: Spr | Units: 3-5 | UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
Instructors: ; Nothias, T. (PI)

AFRICAST 109: Running While Others Walk: African Perspectives on Development (AFRICAST 209)

Throughout the history of modern Africa, Africans have specified their desired future¿development, understood broadly¿and identified the major obstacles in achieving it. Debates about development have intensified in the post-colonial period, especially as African countries have replaced the leaders installed at independence. Amidst the general critique of the imposition of external values and rules, Africans have differed, sometimes sharply, on priorities, process, and programs. While for some the challenge is to catch up with development elsewhere, for others it is essential to leap ahead, to set the pace, to initiate a radical social, economic, and political transformation. To ground and extend the common approaches to studying development that emphasize economics and that rely largely on external commentators, we will explore African perspectives. Our major task will be a broad overview, sampling the analyses of Africa¿s intellectuals in several domains. Course participants will review, compare, and analyze major contributions, developing an understanding of contemporary intellectual currents.
Terms: Spr | Units: 5 | UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI

AFRICAST 111: Education for All? The Global and Local in Public Policy Making in Africa (AFRICAST 211)

Policy making in Africa and the intersection of policy processes and their political and economic dimensions. The failure to implement agreements by international institutions, national governments, and nongovernmental organizations to promote education. Case studies of crowded and poorly equipped schools, overburdened and underprepared teachers, and underfunded education systems.
Terms: Spr | Units: 5 | UG Reqs: GER:EC-GlobalCom, WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
Instructors: ; Samoff, J. (PI)

AFRICAST 112: AIDS, Literacy, and Land: Foreign Aid and Development in Africa (AFRICAAM 111, AFRICAST 212)

Is foreign aid a solution? or a problem? Should there be more aid, less aid, or none at all? How do foreign aid and local initiatives intersect? A clinic in Uganda that addresses AIDS as a family and community problem. Multiple strategies in Tanzania to increase girls' schooling. These are imaginative and innovative approaches to pressing and contested policy challenges. We will examine several contentious issues in contemporary Africa, exploring their roots and the intense conflicts they engender, with special attention to foreign aid and the aid relationship. As African communities and countries work to shape their future, what are the foreign roles and what are their consequences?
Terms: Win | Units: 5 | UG Reqs: GER:EC-GlobalCom, WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
Instructors: ; Samoff, J. (PI)

AFRICAST 115: South African Encounters (AFRICAAM 115)

This course is a prerequisite for all those accepted to or on the wait list for the following quarter's BOSP Cape Town term abroad. It will explore issues in contemporary South Africa.
Terms: Aut, Win, Spr | Units: 1

AFRICAST 116: Islam in Africa through the Arts (AFRICAST 216)

This course will survey the history of Islam and Muslim societies in Africa through their arts. Covering three periods (Pre-colonial, Colonial, and Post-colonial), and four geographic regions (North, East, West, and Southern Africa), the course will explore the various forms and functions of Qur anic recitation and calligraphy, architecture, illumination, dress, poetry, music, literature, portraiture, and the contemporary cinematic arts of Muslim societies on the continent from a variety of perspectives (spiritual, intellectual, aesthetic, social, political, etc.). Through these artistic works and traditions we will explore the general themes of philosophy/ theology/ mysticism, trade, Islam s relationship with other religions, state formation and revolution, gender and ethnic dynamics, colonial constructions of religious identity, diasporic communities, and contemporary conflicts and debates between Sufis, Salafis, and the state across the continent. Students will become familiar with the basic vocabulary and concepts of Islam, as well as various forms of African Islamic artistic traditions and those of African Muslim societies. Students and will become familiar with what these artistic productions mean(t) for the communities that produce(d) them, and what they can tell us about the philosophy, beliefs, history, and socioeconomic and political circumstances in which they are/were produced. This course will feature a number of creative assignments in which students will get a chance to produce their own piece of calligraphy, design their own mosque, and write their own Sufi poem or Sufi commentary on a popular song. These creative projects will be featured in an exhibit at the end of the class.
Terms: Spr | Units: 3-5 | UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-CE
Instructors: ; Ogunnaike, O. (PI)

AFRICAST 119: Novel Perspectives on South Africa (AFRICAST 219, CSRE 119)

South Africa's rich vein of contemporary fiction provides as a fascinating window onto that country's social dynamics. In this class we'll focus on a number of recent works that tease out some of the key themes that continue to shape both South Africa and the world today.nnSelected novels will provide a framework within which to consider, among other topics: explosive public protest aimed at the Zuma government and other institutions, particularly around the question of university fees and other #MustFall issues; the place of youth culture and coming-of-age in a changing society; attempts to deal with HIV-Aids and other infectious diseases, with their considerable impact; simmering dissatisfaction, especially among young people, about 'Transformation'; the apparent victory of neoliberal policies over social justice, at least it was perceived in the 1980s and early 90s, and the rise of a new black middle class; changing notions of South Africa's place in Africa and in the world. If we take these themes together, the novel seems well suited to the exploration of personal identities amid the social change, and our choices of authors are aimed at showcasing South Africa¿s literary talent beyond the tired tropes of J. M. Coetzee¿s bleak vision.nnFour novels will form the core of our discussion. Zakes Mda in Little Suns (2016) uses one of his characteristic historical settings to explore the private aftermaths of a public event: the assassination of the colonial commissioner, Hamilton Hope (1880), amidst a rising of the amaXhosa people in the Eastern Cape. Niq Mhlongo's After Tears (2007) is the story of a young man's attempts to negotiate academic failure at the University of Cape Town on the one hand and his family's upwardly mobile expectations of him on the other. Ivan Vladislavic setsThe Restless Supermarket (2001) in central Johannesburg of 1993, adopting the perspectiveof a retired proofreader of telephone directories, enjoying one of his old haunts on the eve of its demolition. Finally, in Zoë Wicomb's October: a novel (2014), a scholar-author tries to deal with changes in her own life in Scotland at the same time as she reconnects with her family in rural Western Cape and deals anew with its challenges and skeletons in the cupboard.nnThis course is conceived in the frame of (South) African humanities. Anyone interested in contemporary Cape Town, including students who have spent a term in BOSP-Cape Town or intend to do so, will find several points of engagement. Graduate students are welcome to audit the class: the key point will be a willingness to read and discuss.
Terms: Spr | Units: 1
Instructors: ; Parker, G. (PI)

AFRICAST 127: African Art and Politics, c. 1900 - Present (ARTHIST 127A)

This course explores the relationship between art and politics in twentieth century Africa. Artistic production and consumption is considered in the context of various major political shifts, from the experience of colonialism to the struggle against Apartheid. Each week we will look closely at different works of art and examine how artists and designers responded to such challenges as independence, modernization and globalization. We will look at painting, sculpture, religious art, public and performance art, photography and film. How western perceptions and understanding of African art have shifted, and how museums have framed African art throughout the twentieth century will remain important points of discussion throughout the course.
| Units: 4

AFRICAST 131: Media and Conflict in Africa (AFRICAST 31)

Introduction to the variety of roles played by local and international media in covering conflict situations across the continent in the late 20t- and early 21st-centuries. The objective is to develop a theoretical and empirical understanding of the media as active participants in conflicts, rather than neutral witnesses. How the media in the African context have become tools for propaganda and for encouraging violence, as well as their role in promoting dialogue, peace and reconciliation between communities. These questions are relevant to the context of contemporary Africa where conflicts fueled by ethnic hatred or democratic aspirations have unfolded along with the development of media and communication technologies. Key concepts such as objectivity, impartiality, hate speech, peace journalism, citizen journalism, and cosmopolitanism, to analyze the role played by the media in case studies in Burundi, Cameroon, Egypt, Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda and Uganda. A wide variety of material including: readings drawn from a fields such as media and journalism studies, political sciences, anthropology, and postcolonial theory; linguistic, visual, audio, video and multimedia material produced by news media; and films and documentaries.
Terms: Win | Units: 3-5 | UG Reqs: WAY-SI
Instructors: ; Nothias, T. (PI)

AFRICAST 133B: Covering Islam: On What We Learn to See, Think and Hear about Islam & Muslims (ANTHRO 133B, CSRE 133B)

In this course, students will think critically about how knowledge about Islam, Muslims, and Muslim Societies is produced and circulated. As a class, we will consider why and how certain kinds of ideas about Islam and Muslims become representative (i.e., authoritative discourse) while others ideas do not. This is an interdisciplinary class; course material will draw on readings from anthropology, literary criticism, history, sociology and media and cultural studies. We will also be engaging with other kinds of material, including news articles, editorials, documentaries, and films.
Terms: Aut | Units: 3-5
Instructors: ; Ghani, A. (PI)

AFRICAST 135: Designing Research-Based Interventions to Solve Global Health Problems (AFRICAST 235, EDUC 135, EDUC 335, HRP 235, HUMBIO 26, MED 235)

The excitement around social innovation and entrepreneurship has spawned numerous startups focused on tackling world problems, particularly in the fields of education and health. The best social ventures are launched with careful consideration paid to research, design, and efficacy. This course offers students insights into understanding how to effectively develop, evaluate, and scale social ventures. Using TeachAIDS (an award-winning nonprofit educational technology social venture used in 78 countries) as a primary case study, students will be given an in-depth look into how the entity was founded and scaled globally. Guest speakers will include world-class experts and entrepreneurs in Philanthropy, Medicine, Communications, Education, and Technology. Open to both undergraduate and graduate students.
Terms: Spr | Units: 3-4

AFRICAST 138: Conflict and Reconciliation in Africa: International Intervention (AFRICAST 238, ANTHRO 138A, ANTHRO 238A)

This course will explore recent debates on the causes and structural terms of large-scale violence in Africa in the context of key contemporary models for reconciliation and transitional justice. Discussions will emphasize the broader international legal and political order each presupposes, and specifically whether their underlying reconstitution of rights and subjectivities are compatible with cultural, political or legal diversity. A historical assessment of the predominating Nuremberg paradigm of transitional justice¿structured around international military intervention and criminal trials based on international criminal courts¿will be contrasted with other regional models that engage with the challenges of the political reconciliation of formerly divided political communities. The necessity of understanding the specificities of both global and local historical and structural contexts will be examined with respect to various proposals for how to balance of balance concerns for both justice and peace. Readings will cover case studies from South Africa, Rwanda, DRC, northern Uganda, Sudan (including Darfur and South Sudan), Libya, Mali, and CAR.
Last offered: Summer 2014 | Units: 3-5

AFRICAST 138B: Urban Africa (ANTHRO 138B, URBANST 139)

This course explores the production of urban space and the social, cultural, and political significance of cities in sub-Saharan Africa. Topics include: architecture and the built environment; urban planning and colonial public health; migration and rural-urban dynamics; youth, politics, and popular culture; violence, policing, and the privatization of public space; (in)formality in housing, transportation, and employment; class, gender, and mobility in the public sphere; urban citizenship and `right to the city¿ movements; gentrification, tourism, and the commodification of poverty; and efforts to (re)theorize postcolonial African cities. Readings are drawn from anthropology, history, urban studies, and geography. Discussion will situate struggles over urban forms and the contours of everyday life within broader trends in the political economy of the region from the late colonial period to the present.
Last offered: Spring 2015 | Units: 5

AFRICAST 139A: Forgotten Africa: An Introduction to the Archaeology of Africa (ANTHRO 139A, ARCHLGY 139A)

This course provides an introductory survey of Africa¿s past from prehistoric times through the 19th-century. The course will challenge Western depictions of Africa as a dark continent `without history¿ by highlighting the continent¿s vibrant cultures, sophisticated technologies, complex political systems and participation in far-reaching commercial networks, all predating European colonization. In tandem, the course explores how these histories are mobilized in the production of negative ideas about Africa in contemporary discourse.
Last offered: Spring 2014 | Units: 5

AFRICAST 141A: Science, Technology, and Medicine in Africa (ANTHRO 141A)

Africa is often depicted as a place simply in need of science, technology, andnmedicine. This class will introduce students to the culture and politics of science innsub-Saharan Africa: to the diverse and rich traditions, histories and contemporarynpredicaments of knowledge practices on the continent. We will consider the rolenof science in the colonial period, covering the expansion of European empires intonAfrica and the forms of technical knowledge that colonial governments encountered, especially as they relate to health and the environment. We will examine the role of science at African independence and in international development work. Finally, we will discuss the techno-politics of medical training and research, resource extraction, and the internet in contemporary Africa. This course will provide some important background for those with an applied interest in Africa as well as provide an introduction to a growing area of scholarship. Course materials include historical and ethnographic works, as well as primary sources and films emphasizing scientific practice in the context of geopolitical relations of power and inequality.
Last offered: Autumn 2013 | Units: 4

AFRICAST 142: Challenging the Status Quo: Social Entrepreneurs Advancing Democracy, Development and Justice (AFRICAST 242, INTNLREL 142)

This seminar is part of a broader program on Social Entrepreneurship at CDDRL in partnership with the Haas Center for Public Service. It will use practice to better inform theory. Working with three visiting social entrepreneurs from developing and developed country contexts students will use case studies of successful and failed social change strategies to explore relationships between social entrepreneurship, gender, democracy, development and justice. It interrogates current definitions of democracy and development and explores how they can become more inclusive of marginalized populations. This is a service learning class in which students will learn by working on projects that support the social entrepreneurs' efforts to promote social change. Students should register for either 3 OR 5 units only. Students enrolled in the full 5 units will have a service-learning component along with the course. Students enrolled for 3 units will not complete the service-learning component. Limited enrollment. Attendance at the first class is mandatory in order to participate in service learning.
Terms: Spr | Units: 3-5 | UG Reqs: WAY-SI
Instructors: ; Janus, K. (PI)

AFRICAST 145B: The African Atlantic (AFRICAAM 148, COMPLIT 145B, COMPLIT 345B, CSRE 145B, FRENCH 145B, FRENCH 345B)

This course explores the central place Africa holds in prose writing emerging during early and modern periods of globalization across the Atlantic, including the middle passage, exploration and colonialism, black internationalism, decolonization, immigration, and diasporic return. We will begin with Equiano's Interesting Narrative (1789), a touchstone for the Atlantic prose tradition, and study how writers crossing the Atlantic have continued to depict Africa in later centuries: to dramatize scenes of departure and arrival in stories of self-making or new citizenship, to evoke histories of racial unity or examine psychic and social fragmentation, to imagine new national communities or question their norms and borders. Our readings will be selected from English, French, Portuguese and Spanish-language traditions. And we will pay close attention to genres of prose fiction (Conrad, Condé, Olinto), epic and prose poetry (Césaire, Walcott), theoretical reflection (Gilroy, Glissant, Mudimbe, Benitez-Rojo), and literary autobiography (Barack Obama, Saidiya Hartman).
Terms: Spr | Units: 3-5 | UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-GlobalCom, WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP
Instructors: ; Ikoku, A. (PI)

AFRICAST 151: AIDS in Africa

Medical, social, and political aspects of the HIV epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa including: biology, transmission, diagnosis,and treatment of HIV; mother-to-child transmission and breastfeeding; vaccines; community and activist responses to the HIV epidemic; economics of HIV treatment; governance and health; ethics in research and program implementation.
Last offered: Spring 2008 | Units: 3

AFRICAST 181: Media Representations of Africa (AFRICAST 81)

How has Africa been dominantly represented in the media? How are these representations challenged, complexified and reproduced in the postcolonial context? What is the role of African media in these processes? This class is an introduction to the variety of roles played by the media in representing Africa, with a particular focus on the postcolonial context. The topic is particularly relevant to contemporary Africa as the emerging middle-class, economic and cultural globalization, and the uptake for communication technologies are shaping contested images of the continent. You will: develop a theoretical and empirical understanding of the media as instruments of domination but also of resistance; learn how to critically deconstruct media representations in everyday life; understand the challenges of intercultural communication in an unequal world. Key concepts such as: representation, stereotyping, cultural appropriation, afropessimism, afrocentrism, afro optimism, afropolitanism. Readings drawn from media and cultural studies, anthropology, postcolonial theory and literature. In class-analysis of photographs, news articles and broadcasts, PR campaigns, social media, films and documentaries.
Terms: Spr | Units: 3-5 | UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
Instructors: ; Nothias, T. (PI)

AFRICAST 190: Madagascar Prefield Seminar

The purpose of this seminar is to prepare students for their overseas field experience in Madagascar. The seminar will provide an introduction to island biogeography and culture, with emphasis on Madagascar. During the seminar, students will give presentations on specific aspects of biogeography and will also lay the groundwork for the presentations they will be giving during the field seminar where access to the internet and to other scholarly resources will be quite limited. In addition, we will cover logistics, health and safety, cultural sensitivity, geography and politics, and basic language skills. We will also deal with post-field issues such as reverse culture shock, and ways in which participants can consolidate and build up their abroad experiences after they return to campus. Students will have the opportunity to participate pilot study aimed at developing a series of innovative online curriculum based upon their field experience.
Terms: Spr | Units: 1-2
Instructors: ; Siegel, R. (PI)

AFRICAST 195: Back from Africa Workshop

For students who conducted research over the summer in Africa. Students reflect on their time in Africa, transform their observations and research into scholarship, and connect as a community. Cape Town fellows and any others who conducted summer research in Africa can use this course to finish their research.
Last offered: Autumn 2013 | Units: 1-2

AFRICAST 199: Independent Study or Directed Reading

May be repeated for credit.
Terms: Aut, Win, Spr, Sum | Units: 1-5 | Repeatable for credit

AFRICAST 200: The HIV/AIDS Epidemic in Tanzania: A Pre-Field Seminar

Goal is to prepare students for an HIV/AIDS prevention, service-learning experience in Tanzania. Topics include: history of HIV/AIDS epidemic globally and in Tanzania; social and economic impact of AIDS; national and societal responses; ethical issues in crosscultural service learning; teaching for prevention; biology of HIV transmission, disease progression, and prevention; introduction to Tanzanian history and politics; HIV/AIDS and development; social, cultural, and economic context of HIV risk; and strategies for HIV prevention in Tanzania.
Terms: Spr | Units: 1
Instructors: ; Katzenstein, D. (PI)

AFRICAST 209: Running While Others Walk: African Perspectives on Development (AFRICAST 109)

Throughout the history of modern Africa, Africans have specified their desired future¿development, understood broadly¿and identified the major obstacles in achieving it. Debates about development have intensified in the post-colonial period, especially as African countries have replaced the leaders installed at independence. Amidst the general critique of the imposition of external values and rules, Africans have differed, sometimes sharply, on priorities, process, and programs. While for some the challenge is to catch up with development elsewhere, for others it is essential to leap ahead, to set the pace, to initiate a radical social, economic, and political transformation. To ground and extend the common approaches to studying development that emphasize economics and that rely largely on external commentators, we will explore African perspectives. Our major task will be a broad overview, sampling the analyses of Africa¿s intellectuals in several domains. Course participants will review, compare, and analyze major contributions, developing an understanding of contemporary intellectual currents.
Terms: Spr | Units: 5

AFRICAST 211: Education for All? The Global and Local in Public Policy Making in Africa (AFRICAST 111)

Policy making in Africa and the intersection of policy processes and their political and economic dimensions. The failure to implement agreements by international institutions, national governments, and nongovernmental organizations to promote education. Case studies of crowded and poorly equipped schools, overburdened and underprepared teachers, and underfunded education systems.
Terms: Spr | Units: 5
Instructors: ; Samoff, J. (PI)

AFRICAST 212: AIDS, Literacy, and Land: Foreign Aid and Development in Africa (AFRICAAM 111, AFRICAST 112)

Is foreign aid a solution? or a problem? Should there be more aid, less aid, or none at all? How do foreign aid and local initiatives intersect? A clinic in Uganda that addresses AIDS as a family and community problem. Multiple strategies in Tanzania to increase girls' schooling. These are imaginative and innovative approaches to pressing and contested policy challenges. We will examine several contentious issues in contemporary Africa, exploring their roots and the intense conflicts they engender, with special attention to foreign aid and the aid relationship. As African communities and countries work to shape their future, what are the foreign roles and what are their consequences?
Terms: Win | Units: 5
Instructors: ; Samoff, J. (PI)

AFRICAST 216: Islam in Africa through the Arts (AFRICAST 116)

This course will survey the history of Islam and Muslim societies in Africa through their arts. Covering three periods (Pre-colonial, Colonial, and Post-colonial), and four geographic regions (North, East, West, and Southern Africa), the course will explore the various forms and functions of Qur anic recitation and calligraphy, architecture, illumination, dress, poetry, music, literature, portraiture, and the contemporary cinematic arts of Muslim societies on the continent from a variety of perspectives (spiritual, intellectual, aesthetic, social, political, etc.). Through these artistic works and traditions we will explore the general themes of philosophy/ theology/ mysticism, trade, Islam s relationship with other religions, state formation and revolution, gender and ethnic dynamics, colonial constructions of religious identity, diasporic communities, and contemporary conflicts and debates between Sufis, Salafis, and the state across the continent. Students will become familiar with the basic vocabulary and concepts of Islam, as well as various forms of African Islamic artistic traditions and those of African Muslim societies. Students and will become familiar with what these artistic productions mean(t) for the communities that produce(d) them, and what they can tell us about the philosophy, beliefs, history, and socioeconomic and political circumstances in which they are/were produced. This course will feature a number of creative assignments in which students will get a chance to produce their own piece of calligraphy, design their own mosque, and write their own Sufi poem or Sufi commentary on a popular song. These creative projects will be featured in an exhibit at the end of the class.
Terms: Spr | Units: 3-5
Instructors: ; Ogunnaike, O. (PI)

AFRICAST 219: Novel Perspectives on South Africa (AFRICAST 119, CSRE 119)

South Africa's rich vein of contemporary fiction provides as a fascinating window onto that country's social dynamics. In this class we'll focus on a number of recent works that tease out some of the key themes that continue to shape both South Africa and the world today.nnSelected novels will provide a framework within which to consider, among other topics: explosive public protest aimed at the Zuma government and other institutions, particularly around the question of university fees and other #MustFall issues; the place of youth culture and coming-of-age in a changing society; attempts to deal with HIV-Aids and other infectious diseases, with their considerable impact; simmering dissatisfaction, especially among young people, about 'Transformation'; the apparent victory of neoliberal policies over social justice, at least it was perceived in the 1980s and early 90s, and the rise of a new black middle class; changing notions of South Africa's place in Africa and in the world. If we take these themes together, the novel seems well suited to the exploration of personal identities amid the social change, and our choices of authors are aimed at showcasing South Africa¿s literary talent beyond the tired tropes of J. M. Coetzee¿s bleak vision.nnFour novels will form the core of our discussion. Zakes Mda in Little Suns (2016) uses one of his characteristic historical settings to explore the private aftermaths of a public event: the assassination of the colonial commissioner, Hamilton Hope (1880), amidst a rising of the amaXhosa people in the Eastern Cape. Niq Mhlongo's After Tears (2007) is the story of a young man's attempts to negotiate academic failure at the University of Cape Town on the one hand and his family's upwardly mobile expectations of him on the other. Ivan Vladislavic setsThe Restless Supermarket (2001) in central Johannesburg of 1993, adopting the perspectiveof a retired proofreader of telephone directories, enjoying one of his old haunts on the eve of its demolition. Finally, in Zoë Wicomb's October: a novel (2014), a scholar-author tries to deal with changes in her own life in Scotland at the same time as she reconnects with her family in rural Western Cape and deals anew with its challenges and skeletons in the cupboard.nnThis course is conceived in the frame of (South) African humanities. Anyone interested in contemporary Cape Town, including students who have spent a term in BOSP-Cape Town or intend to do so, will find several points of engagement. Graduate students are welcome to audit the class: the key point will be a willingness to read and discuss.
Terms: Spr | Units: 1
Instructors: ; Parker, G. (PI)

AFRICAST 224: Memory and Heritage In South Africa Syllabus

The focus of this course is to provide a forum in which students examine the role of memory and heritage in South Africa. The course will include visiting speakers, discussion and other activities. The complex relationship between memory and heritage in South Africa will provide the basis for a series of broad conversations about citizenship, national reconciliation, memorialization, justice, modernity and heritage ethics.
Last offered: Spring 2012 | Units: 1

AFRICAST 229: Literature and Global Health (AFRICAAM 229, COMPLIT 229, CSRE 129B, FRENCH 229, HUMBIO 175L, MED 234)

This course examines the ways writers in literature and medicine have used the narrative form to explore the ethics of care in what has been called the developing world. We will begin with a call made by the editor-in-chief of The Lancet for a literature of global health, namely fiction modeled on the social reform novels of the nineteenth century, understood to have helped readers develop a conscience for public health as the field emerged as a modern medical specialty. We will then spend the quarter understanding how colonial, postcolonial, and world literatures have answered and complicated this call. Readings will include prose fiction by Albert Camus, Joseph Conrad, Tsitsi Dangaremgba, Amitav Ghosh, Susan Sontag as well as physician memoirs featuring Frantz Fanon, Albert Schweitzer, Abraham Verghese, Paul Farmer. And each literary reading will be paired with medical, philosophical, and policy writings that deeply inform the field of global health.
Terms: Win | Units: 3-5 | UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-GlobalCom, WAY-A-II, WAY-ER
Instructors: ; Ikoku, A. (PI)

AFRICAST 235: Designing Research-Based Interventions to Solve Global Health Problems (AFRICAST 135, EDUC 135, EDUC 335, HRP 235, HUMBIO 26, MED 235)

The excitement around social innovation and entrepreneurship has spawned numerous startups focused on tackling world problems, particularly in the fields of education and health. The best social ventures are launched with careful consideration paid to research, design, and efficacy. This course offers students insights into understanding how to effectively develop, evaluate, and scale social ventures. Using TeachAIDS (an award-winning nonprofit educational technology social venture used in 78 countries) as a primary case study, students will be given an in-depth look into how the entity was founded and scaled globally. Guest speakers will include world-class experts and entrepreneurs in Philanthropy, Medicine, Communications, Education, and Technology. Open to both undergraduate and graduate students.
Terms: Spr | Units: 3-4

AFRICAST 238: Conflict and Reconciliation in Africa: International Intervention (AFRICAST 138, ANTHRO 138A, ANTHRO 238A)

This course will explore recent debates on the causes and structural terms of large-scale violence in Africa in the context of key contemporary models for reconciliation and transitional justice. Discussions will emphasize the broader international legal and political order each presupposes, and specifically whether their underlying reconstitution of rights and subjectivities are compatible with cultural, political or legal diversity. A historical assessment of the predominating Nuremberg paradigm of transitional justice¿structured around international military intervention and criminal trials based on international criminal courts¿will be contrasted with other regional models that engage with the challenges of the political reconciliation of formerly divided political communities. The necessity of understanding the specificities of both global and local historical and structural contexts will be examined with respect to various proposals for how to balance of balance concerns for both justice and peace. Readings will cover case studies from South Africa, Rwanda, DRC, northern Uganda, Sudan (including Darfur and South Sudan), Libya, Mali, and CAR.
Last offered: Summer 2014 | Units: 3-5

AFRICAST 239: The Politics of Development: Social Service Delivery in the Developing World (IPS 239)

In this course we will examine variation in service delivery across the developing world, with an eye to identifying key factors in success or failure, and to understanding how the interests of individuals, governments, donors, and non-state actors shape the outcomes we observe in the world. The course will include a practicum component, where students will work directly with development practitioners in developing countries to problem-solve and to write case studies. Much of the course material will be drawn from sub-Saharan Africa, but we will also cover material from Latin America, South Asia, and Southeast Asia.
Terms: Spr | Units: 3-5
Instructors: ; Izama, M. (PI)

AFRICAST 242: Challenging the Status Quo: Social Entrepreneurs Advancing Democracy, Development and Justice (AFRICAST 142, INTNLREL 142)

This seminar is part of a broader program on Social Entrepreneurship at CDDRL in partnership with the Haas Center for Public Service. It will use practice to better inform theory. Working with three visiting social entrepreneurs from developing and developed country contexts students will use case studies of successful and failed social change strategies to explore relationships between social entrepreneurship, gender, democracy, development and justice. It interrogates current definitions of democracy and development and explores how they can become more inclusive of marginalized populations. This is a service learning class in which students will learn by working on projects that support the social entrepreneurs' efforts to promote social change. Students should register for either 3 OR 5 units only. Students enrolled in the full 5 units will have a service-learning component along with the course. Students enrolled for 3 units will not complete the service-learning component. Limited enrollment. Attendance at the first class is mandatory in order to participate in service learning.
Terms: Spr | Units: 3-5
Instructors: ; Janus, K. (PI)

AFRICAST 299: Independent Study or Directed Reading

Terms: Aut, Win, Spr, Sum | Units: 1-10 | Repeatable for credit

AFRICAST 300: Contemporary Issues in African Studies

Guest scholars present analyses of major African themes and topics. Brief response papers required. May be repeated for credit.
Terms: Aut, Win, Spr | Units: 1 | Repeatable for credit
Instructors: ; Hubbard, L. (PI)

AFRICAST 301A: The Dynamics of Change in Africa (HISTORY 246, HISTORY 346, POLISCI 246P, POLISCI 346P)

Crossdisciplinary colloquium; required for the M.A. degree in African Studies. Open to advanced undergraduates and PhD students. Addresses critical issues including patterns of economic collapse and recovery; political change and democratization; and political violence, civil war, and genocide. Focus on cross-cutting issues including the impact of colonialism; the role of religion, ethnicity, and inequality; and Africa's engagement with globalization.
Terms: Aut | Units: 4-5
Instructors: ; Roberts, R. (PI)

AFRICAST 302: Research Workshop

Required for African Studies master's students. Student presentations.
Terms: Spr | Units: 1
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