Results for AFRICAST

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.

Public policy issues, their roots, and the conflicts they engender. The policy making process: who participates, how, why, and with what results? Innovative approaches to contested policy issues. Foreign roles and their consequences. Case studies such as: a clinic in Uganda that addresses AIDS as a family and community problem; and strategies in Tanzania to increase girls' schooling.

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.

This course provides a general, introductory survey of Africa's past from prehistoric times into the 19th-century. Through lectures, readings, discussions, museum visits, debates and film, we will explore Africa's rich and dynamic past, juxtaposing the material remains of empires, states and cities with historical constructs of Africa as timeless, isolated and underdeveloped. The course begins with a critical examination of how we view Africa and its past and how the very concept of `Africa' changes throughout time. The course critically questions the usefulness of the prehistory/history divide and problematizes how Africa has served as an ethnographic font for examples of tribal life. We will challenge Western depictions of Africa as a dark continent `without history' by highlighting the continent's vibrant cultures, sophisticated technologies, dynamic and complex political systems and participation in far-reaching commercial networks, all predating the arrival of modern Europeans. The course ends with the transoceanic slave trade and nascent European colonialism and illuminates the roles these histories played in the production of negative and inaccurate images of Africa in contemporary discourse.

May be repeated for credit.

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.

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.

Public policy issues, their roots, and the conflicts they engender. The policy making process: who participates, how, why, and with what results? Innovative approaches to contested policy issues. Foreign roles and their consequences. Case studies such as: a clinic in Uganda that addresses AIDS as a family and community problem; and strategies in Tanzania to increase girls' schooling.

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.

Guest scholars present analyses of major African themes and topics. Brief response papers required. May be repeated for credit.

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.

Required for African Studies master's students. Student presentations.

Movements and choreography from Central Africa. Elements unique to all African dance movement: body isolation, polyrhythmic movement, and body posture. Live drumming. Open to all levels of dancers.

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.

Critical analysis of major issues relating to literatures in French language in and outside France. Focus is on exoticism and and self-representation, with an emphasis on the evolution of mentalities, new sensitivities and the role of literature in developing individual or collective identity. Readings include Le Clézio, Memmi, Malouf, Lopes, Schwarz-Bart, Delaygue, Glissant, Todorov, Kane and others. Primary sources, secondary sources and film. Taught in French.