American Indigenous Studies (CERT)

Class introduces students to history of the discipline and surveys both historical and contemporary topics of importance to American Indian Studies including gender roles, education, sovereignty treaties, and oral traditions.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-07

Oral traditions are at the base of all American Indian cultures. This class will provide students with the necessary tools for a better understanding of traditional knowledge and its importance within diverse traditional cultures.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Purple

This course is an introduction to Native American history from creation to 1900 in North America. It introduces students to the continuity of social, cultural, political, and economic diversity amongst Native American peoples and focuses on adaptions to intertribal and colonial relationships during this time period.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Purple

This course is an introduction to Native American history from 1900 to present day. It introduces students to the continuity of social, cultural, political, and economic diversity amongst Native American peoples and focuses on the impact of federal Indian policy, issues of power, sovereignty, identity, activism, and self-determination.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Purple

Course introduces students to the legal side of being American Indian. Politics and policies will be examined to show how a contemporary native experience is shaped through American courts, Presidential chambers, and Native activist movements.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Purple

This course will provide overview of Minnesota Indian nations and their relations to each other and the effects of European incursion. Subsequent relations will focus on the US-Dakota war and its aftermath.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-07

Diverse Cultures: Purple

Being American Indian and being woman creates a unique situation for women who have been directly influenced by the differences of gender roles from two intersecting cultures. This course will focus on how those differences have affected American Indian Women.

Prerequisites: none

Goal Areas: GE-05, GE-07

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 basis.

Prerequisites: none

This class introduces students to Indigenous perspectives of education, knowledge, and learning. Students will explore the historical relationships between educational institutions, policies, practices, and Indigenous communities. Through an engagement with present day efforts of educators, programs, and institutions that incorporate and engage traditional knowledges, students will develop a deeper understanding of Indigenous education and ways to promote teaching practices and pedagogies that value and support a diverse educational community.

Prerequisites: none

Diverse Cultures: Purple

This course examines American Indian identity as it relates to Hollywood film industry history. Underlying issues of contemporary Indians are also addressed through an introduction to Native Cinema and the effects of current technologies and globalization.

Prerequisites: none

Diverse Cultures: Purple

Introduces students to the differences between indigenous and Western views of the environment. Analyzes the impact of invasion and encroachment on indigenous societies' interactions with nature. Compares historical and contemporary environmental issues in indigenous societies.

Prerequisites: none

Diverse Cultures: Purple

Course introduces students to the various ways that land is used by American Indians. We will explore traditional land use, contemporary land use, and land issues that impact American Indians and cultural activities that are tied to the land.

Prerequisites: none

Diverse Cultures: Purple

Introduces students to museum science and how historic constructs, practices, and contemporary issues of the museum as an institution relates to the representation of American Indians. Focus will be on translating western practices to a Indigenous aesthetic.

Prerequisites: none

Diverse Cultures: Gold

Working with a faculty advisor, students will gain practical knowledge of fieldwork techniques and gain practical experience through this experiential learning course. Students will learn to approach indigenous communities and people with respect to cultural practices and behave like relatives in their research practices. This course is a capstone research project for the AIS program.

Prerequisites: none

Diverse Cultures: Gold

This 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 basis.

Prerequisites: none

A detailed study of Minnesota archaeology from ca. 12,000 years ago to ca 1900, with a focus on diverse and changing Native American populations.

Prerequisites: none

A survey of current knowledge about the prehistoric Native American inhabitants of North America from ca. 15,000 years ago until ca. 1900. Topics will focus on the processes of cultural development, change, and disruption by Euro-American influences.

Prerequisites: none

American Indians adapted to environmental systems in North America with cultures ranging from small groups of foragers to cities supported by intensive agriculture. This course presents a variety of perspectives of this cultural diversity from the Ice Age to the 20th century.

Prerequisites: none

This writing-intensive course surveys the earliest Native American literary works, from oral tradition and songs to contemporary works and authors, with a particular emphasis on tribal and cultural contexts that identify these works as Native American.

Prerequisites: none

Diverse Cultures: Purple