Ethnic Studies (BS) Racial/Ethnic Communities in the United States

A study of American racial/ethnic minorities, especially the histories of Native Americans, African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and Asian Americans. Their roles and contributions to American society will be emphasized.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Purple

This course introduces students to multicultural and ethnic knowledge and values in and outside the United States. Students are exposed to such issues as race, culture, ethnicity, dominance, immigration, stereotypes, discrimination, and intergroup relations through interdisciplinary approaches-anthropological, economic, historical, political, psychological and/or sociological.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Purple

This course introduces concepts and methods of applying socio-cultural understanding to contemporary problems to bring about the empowerment of affected people. Case/field studies and other research methods in social sciences will be used to illustrate the impact and problems of cultural change with special attention to its affect on disadvantaged groups of people. Students will also design their own applied projects.

Prerequisites: ANTH 101, ANTH 230 or consent; ETHN 100, ETHN 101 or ETHN 150 or consent

Diverse Cultures: Gold

This is a comprehensive course, which introduces students to qualitative, quantitative and evaluation social research methods. It provides students with hands-on experience of collecting and analyzing data, from any given diverse ethnic community through participant observation and needs assessment.

Prerequisites: ETHN 100 or ETHN 101 or ETHN 150, or Consent

Diverse Cultures: Gold

This course will examine issues confronted in a multicultural society. It will study ethnic/minority groups not usually included in mainstream society, including their uniqueness and harmonious coexistence with other ethnic groups.

Prerequisites: none

Students will examine the forces which create and maintain prejudice, discrimination and racism within global perspectives. Special attention will be given to the work of Paulo Freire.

Prerequisites: ETHN 100 or ATHN 400

Diverse Cultures: Purple

Students will participate in field trips, activities, and guest discussions that will enable them to interact with people ethnically (race, religion, lifestyle, etc.) different from the students, to understand their perspectives and to appreciate their unique experiences and/or contributions to the U.S. pluralistic society. Students are expected to learn actively in and outside the classroom by experiencing events or people from diverse cultural groups.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Gold

This course will explore the historical, social, political, and cultural experience of African Americans. It will also examine the contributions of African Americans to the growth and development of the United States.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Purple

Introduction to the history and cultures of the major Asian American ethnic groups with a comparative approach to their similarities and differences.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Purple

A survey of the history and present status of Hispanics/Latinos in the United States from 1848. Emphasis will be on culture, history, and socio-political patterns.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Purple

This course will focus on the struggle for civil rights by diverse groups in the United States. Emphasis will be on how these struggles have impacted their communities and cultural pluralism in the U.S.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05

Diverse Cultures: Purple

The course is offered according to student demand and instructor availability/expertise. A variety of topics related to ethnic and cultural areas will provide curriculum enrichment on an ongoing, but irregular basis.

Prerequisites: none

Examines the history, identity, conflict and ethnic relations related to immigration as explored from an Ethnic Studies perspective as well as from American and global perspectives.

Prerequisites: none

This course will provide students with an in-depth examination of the issues affecting present-day Africans, and those of the Black Diaspora. Possible topics are fair representation in the media, education, cross-cultural interactions, economics, politics/law, and racial identity.

Prerequisites: ETHN 110 or ETHN 400 or consent

Examination of current issues affecting the status of Asian Americans. The focus of this course will vary to reflect students' interests in the area of politics, education, economics, social and/or cultural dealing with Asian Americans.

Prerequisites: ETHN 400, or consent

Goal Areas: GE-05

Thematic examination of major issues surrounding Latino/Hispanic communities in the United States. Emphasis will be on education, labor, politics, social welfare and migration.

Prerequisites: ETHN 400, or consent

This course will take an interdisciplinary ethnic studies approach to examine the past, present and future implications of the African American civil rights movement on race relations in the United States.

Prerequisites: none

The course examines racial and ethnic minorities, and the mutual influences between these groups and the structures, procedures and issues of US politics. Major topics include: opinion on racial issues, the representation of minorities in elective and appointive offices, and the nature of value conflicts underlying contemporary racial issues, including affirmative action, immigration, welfare, language policies and Native American tribal issues.

Prerequisites: none

Diverse Cultures: Purple

Supervised, scholarly experience to which the theories and methodologies of ethnic studies can be applied. Opportunitiesmay be on-campus and/or off-campus, including work in other countries. Prereq: ETHN major or minor

Prerequisites: ETHN major or minor

Students assist a faculty member in teaching ETHN 100 or ETHN 101.

Prerequisites: none

Cultural aspects of interactions between people and their environment focusing on spatial patterns of population, agriculture, politics, language, religion, industrialization, and urbanization. Emphasis is placed on the processes that create the cultural landscape and on management of land and natural resources.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-08

Diverse Cultures: Purple

Investigation of historical developments in Sub-Saharan Africa during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Topics will include trade with Europe and America, European colonization and African resistance, life in colonial Africa, independence movements, South Africa's apartheid state and the Rwanda genocide.

Prerequisites: none

Diverse Cultures: Purple

How do we define the Middle East? In our popular culture and media sources that we are exposed to daily, the Middle East is one of the more discussed and yet, one of the most misunderstood topics. Our goal is to both to unlearn misconceptions and to create an accurate representation of the region. Our class will start with an introduction to the region and its history and the misconceptions that are attached to it. It will then proceed from the late 18th century to the revolutionary events of recent years dubbed the Arab Spring and their aftermaths.

Prerequisites: none

A study of American racial/ethnic minorities, especially the histories of Native Americans, African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and Asian Americans. Their roles and contributions to American society will be emphasized.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Purple

A comparative history of the Chinese and Japanese nations from the 19th century to 1945.

Prerequisites: none

Investigation of historical developments across the African continent from pre-history through the eighteenth century. Topics will include ancient empires of West Africa, the Swahili coast, the spread of Islam, the trans-Atlantic slave trade and the formation of South Africa's multi-racial society.

Prerequisites: none

Diverse Cultures: Purple

This course traces the history of Latin America from the late colonial period through the present as the various countries in the region attempted to transcend their colonial past and confront the pressures of modernization and globalization.

Prerequisites: none

Diverse Cultures: Purple

This course surveys African American history from slavery to the twenty-first century. We will explore the history of enslavement, black resistance, African American culture, freedom, migration patterns, and black political thought and participation as well as how historians have interpreted and re-interpreted this history.

Prerequisites: none

Diverse Cultures: Purple

Popular music is a multi-billion dollar industry today. What is it, and where did it come from? Learn about the origins of jazz in the music of African-Americans, its growth from Dixieland through the Big Band era (with the contributions of performers like Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington) to its influences on musical styles in the present day.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-06, GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Purple

Rock music has fans in every country and in every culture. It really is a universal language, but it didn't start that way. It began as black Rhythm and Blues in the 40's, and through to the present, minority groups have had a major influence on the music.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-06, GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Purple

A survey of literature, artists and performances with specific regard to the theatre of diversity including, but not restricted to: Feminist Theatre, Gay and Lesbian Theatre, African-American Theatre, Asian American Theatre, Hispanic Theatre, etc.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-06, GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Purple

Language provides not only communication but identification of oneself and one's group. Humans are extremely sensitive to language, dialect, jargon, and slang. An understanding of language and its relationship to culture is basic to any understanding of human beings.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-08

Diverse Cultures: Purple

The history, development, and application of criminal laws and criminal procedures in the criminal justice system.

Prerequisites: none

Provides the developing helping professional with an introduction to basic helping skills: attending, listening, responding to content and affect, probing, and providing feedback. The course is experiential in nature and includes small group interaction, videotaping, and role-playing simulations.

Prerequisites: none

The course introduces students to the historical and theoretical foundations of environmental racism and inequality. Therefore, students will explore the social, industrial, and government forces that create inequitable burdens of environmental pollution across communities as well as social movements to reduce such burdens. While a majority of the course focuses on the United States, readings include case studies from around the world.

Prerequisites: none

This course examines the economic, social and political factors that affect the identities, rights and social perceptions of multiracial individuals. The social changes resulting from the 1960s Civil Rights Movement played an important role in reducing the social distance between people of different racial/ethnic backgrounds. As a result, contributing to the rising multiracial population. According to the U.S. Census conducted in 2010, over nine million individuals reported belonging to two or more races.

Prerequisites: none

The purpose of this course is to examine the challenges and opportunities of the new immigrants,refugees,families,and specifically their children,in the United States.

Prerequisites: none

This course is concerned with racial/ethnic minorities who live in large urban (inner city) areas. It is especially concerned with the roles that culture and discrimination play in the shaping of America's ghettos, barrios, reservations, and Chinatowns.

Prerequisites: none

Diverse Cultures: Purple

Examines the effects of sexism and racism on women of color and provides an understanding of the significant contributions they have made in their struggle against oppression.

Prerequisites: ETHN 400, or consent

Diverse Cultures: Purple

This course will examine the different definitions of family through time in the United States. It will focus on changes in the African, Native, Hispanic/Latino, and Asian-American families. It will compare and contrast differences and similarities among ethnic minority families as well as between them and white ethnic families.

Prerequisites: ETHN 400, or consent

This is a hands-on, exercise-based GIS for Law Enforcement course analyzing the contemporary realities of the spatial and geographic aspects of crime. Students acquire practical tools necessary to conduct effective mapping and spatial analyses of crime using GIS software. Lab activities are designed to benefit those working with public safety and emergency response systems.

Prerequisites: none

This class traces the evolving history of race from its creation in early modern Europe to political uses of this history in the twenty-first century United States. Students will learn about whiteness and blackness as social constructions that implicated the trans-Atlantic slave trade, patterns of imperialism, systems of oppression, and notions of beauty in western society. Students will also be involved in historical commemoration and/or racial justice projects involving communities of color in Minnesota to reflect on how the historical context informs these activities and how history continues to be used politically.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-09, GE-11

Diverse Cultures: Gold

HLTH 260 Introduction to Applied Health Science is required of all Applied Health Science majors and minors. This is the foundation class for the professional preparation of health educators. The course explores the knowledge, skills, and competencies of health educators in various settings.

Prerequisites: none

To what extent do the differences among races and between genders represent biological differences, and to what extent are they constructed by society? Is racism best conceptualized as an additional burden to sexism or as one different in kind?

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-06, GE-07

Discussion of the ways that a culture both creates human community and shapes self-identity. Exploration of similarities and differences between and interdependence among cultural traditions, and of vocabularies for assessing traditions.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-06, GE-08

Combine study with action to remake yourself into a democratic citizen. Consider your beliefs, debate issues and learn political skills. Integrate these in practical public work on a real issue or project in a student group or community organization.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-09, GE-11

This course is designed to provide a thorough introduction to the broad spectrum of theories and applications that make up the field of psychology

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05

This higher level course offers knowledge, strategies, tools-techniques, and leadership skills to effectively manage human and social services programs. Learn sociological theories of organizations and behavior to manage programs and organizations with different structures and functions. Apply learned skills to current and/or future professional positions as, e.g., project managers, organizational leaders and CEOs, or as private contractors to federal and state government, local community, and/or international organizations.

Prerequisites: none

The study of the principles and processes that account for the patterns of relations among racial and ethnic groups in the context of the U.S. society. It is designed to provide students with the essential background that will allow them to analyze social structures based on different dimensions such as class, gender, sexuality, and others. In any one of these dimensions or at the cross-section of two or more we find dominant (or majority) groups, which have better access to institutional resources, and subordinate (or minority) groups, which are kept on the margins and powerless.

Prerequisites: SOC 101

Diverse Cultures: Purple

Within the pluralistic culture of the United States, sociology promotes knowledge about multi-cultural groups. With rapid globalization, sociology reveals how the sociological imagination extends beyond the United States. The principle goal of the course is to help students to develop a broader, more informed understanding of the past and present social forces that have created and sustained a global society composed of various class, racial and ethnic groups. The goal of this course is for students to develop an appreciation of the ways in which various theoretical perspectives lead to different understandings of the structures and practices of group relations.

Prerequisites: SOC 101 or SOC 150 or by instructor approval.

Diverse Cultures: Purple

An introduction to social work as a profession including the history of the profession, professional behaviors, values and Codes of Ethics, fields of practice, roles and tasks, and core theories and social work skills required for generalist social work practice. Students will develop skills in critical thinking, professional communication and behaviors, demonstrate self-awareness as they prepare to work in a diverse society, and apply values, ethics, and theories through group-based projects. Students are provided with information about the BSSW curriculum.

Prerequisites: none

This course will identify and analyze global social, economic, political and environmental problems impacting community viability and explore the full range of solutions to these problems. The course will view communities as complex, sustainable organisms and bring together the works of the great minds working on sustainability.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-10