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SU Intro Seminar - Freshman. Nationalist platforms have been on the rise for years across the globe. The success of nationalist parties and candidates is often accompanied by backlash against outgroups, from immigrants to religious and ethnic minorities. Nationalism often leads people to act against their material interest, from voting against economic policies that would improve their standing, to undertaking extreme actions like self-sacrifice. Why is nationalism such a dominant force in today's world? And why is it such a powerful driver of human behavior? In this course, we will explore this question through a broad interdisciplinary lens, drawing lessons from the social sciences and history. We will ask what national identity is, where it comes from and why it has such appeal for humans. We will go back to the roots of nationalism in early modern Europe in order to understand the historical origin of national identities. And we will try to identify the forces that drive the rise in right-wing nationalism today, by exploring a number of country cases across the world.

Known as ghulam or mamluk in Arabic, the slave-soldier was a ubiquitous phenomenon in the world of medieval Islam. Usually pagan steppe nomads, mamluks were purchased in adolescence, converted to Islam, taught Arabic, and trained to lead armies. Sometimes manumitted and sometimes not, in either case mamluks rose to positions of privilege and prominence in numerous regimes in the medieval Middle East. Nowhere was the mamluk institution so fundamental as it was in Egypt between 1250 and 1517 CE, when Cairo was ruled by these slave-soldiers, their ranks constantly renewed by imports of new mamluks from the Black Sea and Caucuses. Born in the age of the crusades and ultimately conquered by the Ottoman Empire, the Mamluk Sultanate can be understood as a bridge between the worlds of medieval and early modern Islam, as well as between East and West, sitting astride the major Nile-Red Sea route that linked the Mediterranean world to that of the Indian Ocean and beyond. This class will investigate the rise and fall of the Mamluk Sultanate in Egypt and its key roles in the commercial, diplomatic, and political history both of the medieval Middle East and the wider world.

This course provides an introduction to the many disciplines and scholars at Stanford focusing on South Asia. Over the quarter we will learn about the literatures, histories, languages, arts, religions, politics, and economies of this diverse region. Examples are Queer South Asia via cinema, Hindu Epics, past and present, and How Nonviolence Works: Lessons from India's Independence Struggle

This course surveys the history of the Middle East from c.950 A.D. to c.1517 A.D., placing particular emphasis on the following questions: What were the social, cultural, and political contexts for conversion to Islam in the Middle Ages? How did the interplay of nomadic and sedentary peoples shape Middle Eastern history? What were the nature of Christian-Muslim relations and the fate of religious minorities in an age of Crusade and Jihad? What were the conditions for the rise, flourishing, and eventual collapse of a "world-system" in this period (with the lands of the Middle East serving as its nexus) Chronological topics include: the arrival in the Middle East of the Seljuk Turks, new adopters of Islam and recent nomads; the western European crusades to the Holy Land and the establishment of so-called "Crusader States" in Syria; the subjugation of Iran to pagan Mongols - and the Mongols' eventual conversion to Islam; the rise to power of a dynasty of Turkish slave-soldiers (mamluks) in Cairo and the political reunification of Syria and Egypt under their rule.

Under conditions of global environmental change and mass extinction, how will humanity share the planet with wildlife? This course invites undergraduate students to consider this question under the guidance of two biologists and a literary scholar. We will engage with a range of interdisciplinary scholarship on how humans seek to study, understand, exploit, protect, and empathize with charismatic megafauna. We ask how regional differences in culture, political economy, and ecology shape conservation efforts.

Independent studies for undergraduate students under the direction of a faculty member for which academic credit may properly be allowed. May be repeated for credit.

Students completing a capstone project for the Global Studies Minor must enroll in this course for units (1-5) with their capstone advisor selected as the instructor. The course may be repeated for credit, with advisor approval. Students are expected to participate in regular advising meetings with the instructor.

Known as ghulam or mamluk in Arabic, the slave-soldier was a ubiquitous phenomenon in the world of medieval Islam. Usually pagan steppe nomads, mamluks were purchased in adolescence, converted to Islam, taught Arabic, and trained to lead armies. Sometimes manumitted and sometimes not, in either case mamluks rose to positions of privilege and prominence in numerous regimes in the medieval Middle East. Nowhere was the mamluk institution so fundamental as it was in Egypt between 1250 and 1517 CE, when Cairo was ruled by these slave-soldiers, their ranks constantly renewed by imports of new mamluks from the Black Sea and Caucuses. Born in the age of the crusades and ultimately conquered by the Ottoman Empire, the Mamluk Sultanate can be understood as a bridge between the worlds of medieval and early modern Islam, as well as between East and West, sitting astride the major Nile-Red Sea route that linked the Mediterranean world to that of the Indian Ocean and beyond. This class will investigate the rise and fall of the Mamluk Sultanate in Egypt and its key roles in the commercial, diplomatic, and political history both of the medieval Middle East and the wider world.

This course investigates the relationship between culture, revolutionary decolonization, and post-colonial trajectories. It probes the multilayered development of 20th and 21st-century African literature amid decolonization and Cold War cultural diplomacy initiatives and the debates they generated about African literary aesthetics, African languages, the production of history, and the role of the intellectual. We will journey through national cultural movements, international congresses, and pan-African festivals to explore the following questions: What role did writers and artists play in shaping the discourse of revolutionary decolonization throughout the continent and in the diaspora? How have literary texts, films, and works of African cultural thought shaped and engaged with concepts such as "African unity" and "African cultural renaissance"? How have these notions influenced the imaginaries of post-independence nations, engendered new subjectivities, and impacted gender and generational dynamics? How did the ways of knowing and modes of writing promoted and developed in these contexts shape African futures?