African-American Studies

Tobin Miller Shearer, Program Director

African-American Studies at the University of Montana connects African and African-American (including Latin America and the Caribbean) history, experiences, and perspectives with the 21st century. The goal of the African-American Studies curriculum is to develop basic knowledge of, and appreciation for, the diverse experiences of the African Diaspora, and their contributions to the nations into which they were incorporated. Through this study students will recognize that the African-American narrative connects to the core issues of nation formation, identity politics, social movements, and the liberal state. Those who take this minor will likewise be equipped to talk alongside, through, and in the midst of the racial fracture lines that mark this nation as a country where the color of one's skin is socially significant. In all these efforts, we promote scholarship that is driven first and foremost by an interest in creating knowledge and furthering our understanding of the African-American experience. The interdisciplinary curriculum of African-American Studies includes course offerings from the following academic disciplines: anthropology, economics, English, geography, history, music, political science, and sociology. Some topics of study include: African heritage and cultural continuity among African-Americans; African-American identity issues and cultural variation; the history of African-American protest and resistance, including the abolitionist, anti-lynching, and civil rights movements; the Harlem Renaissance; the social dynamics of integration and segregation; and the various circumstances of, and prospects for, African Americans in the 21st century.

Undergraduate Degrees Available

Subject Type Option Track
African-American Studies Minor

Faculty

Affiliates

  • Jill Bergman, Professor
  • Benedicte Boisseron, Associate Professor
  • Gregory Campbell, Professor
  • Johan Eriksson, Assistant Professor of Saxophone and Jazz Studies
  • Jeffrey Gritzner, emeritus Professor
  • Anya Jabour, Professor of History; Co-Director, Women & Gender Studies
  • Michael Mayer, Professor of History
  • George Price, Lecturer
  • Daisy Rooks, Assistant Professor
  • Tobin Miller Shearer, Associate Professor of History; Director of African-American Studies
  • Kyle G. Volk, Associate Professor of History; Director of Undergraduate Studies
  • Celia Winkler, Associate Professor

Course Descriptions

African-American Studies

  • AAS 141H - Black: Africa to Hip-Hop

    Credits: 3. Level: Undergraduate. Offered autumn. Same as HSTA 141H. This course introduces students to the primary questions, themes, and approaches to African-American Studies. In addition to examining key historical periods such as Reconstruction, the Harlem Renaissance, and the Civil Rights era, students will encounter Hip-Hop, African-American film, African-American religion, and contemporary identity politics. This course concludes by discussing the reasons for and new directions in African-American studies, including diaspora studies, Pan-Africanism, and post-colonial studies. Overall students will gain new insight into the social, cultural, political, and intellectual, experiences of a diverse people and into the history and contemporary experience of the United States.
    Course Attributes:
    • Historical & Cultural Course
    • Indigenous and Global

  • AAS 191 - Special Topics

    Credits: 1 TO 6. Level: Undergraduate. (R-6) Experimental offerings of visiting professors, experimental offerings of new courses, or one time offerings of current topics.

  • AAS 208H - Discovering Africa

    Credits: 3. Level: Undergraduate. Offered intermittently. Interdisciplinary study of the history of pre-colonial Africa, focusing on social, economic, political, and cultural institutions and traditions including the wealth, diversity, and complexity of ancient and classical African civilizations and cultures.
    Course Attributes:
    • Historical & Cultural Course
    • Non-Western Course

  • AAS 260 - African Amer & Native Amer

    Credits: 3. Level: Undergraduate. Offered Fall, even years. Same as NAS 260. A study of the broad scope of relations between African Americans and Native Americans in colonial and United States history. Topics explored through history, sociology, and cultural anthropology.

  • AAS 291 - Special Topics

    Credits: 1 TO 6. Level: Undergraduate. (R-6) Offered intermittently. Experimental offerings of visiting professors, experimental offerings of new courses, or one-time offerings of current topics.

  • AAS 292 - Independent Study

    Credits: 1 TO 6. Level: Undergraduate. Prereq., consent of instr.

  • AAS 342H - Afr Amer Hist to 1865

    Credits: 3. Level: Undergraduate. Offered intermittently. Same as HSTA 342H. Survey of the African-American experience from the African background to the end of the Civil War. Focus on Black American quest for the American Dream, and how Blacks attempted to deal with the challenges of enslavement and racism.
    Course Attributes:
    • Historical & Cultural Course

  • AAS 343H - Afr Amer Hist Since 1865

    Credits: 3. Level: Undergraduate. Offered intermittently. Same as HSTA 343H (HIST 379H). Study of the African-American experience since the Civil War. Change and continuity in the African-American experience, the fight against Jim Crow, the struggle for civil rights, and post-civil rights economic, political, social and cultural developments and challenges.
    Course Attributes:
    • Historical & Cultural Course

  • AAS 372 - African American Identity

    Credits: 3. Level: Undergraduate. Offered autumn. Interdisciplinary course designed to explore and illuminate the multifaceted nature and development of African-American group and individual identity.
    Course Attributes:
    • Writing Course-Upper-Division
    • Writing Course-Approved

  • AAS 391 - Special Topics

    Credits: 1 TO 6. Level: Undergraduate. (R-9) Prereq., consent of instr. Experimental offerings of visiting professors, experimental offerings of new courses, or one time offerings of current topics.

  • AAS 392 - Independent Study

    Credits: 1 TO 9. Level: Undergraduate. (R-9) Prereq., consent of instr. Course material appropriate to the needs and objectives of the individual student.

  • AAS 415 - The Black Radical Tradition

    Credits: 3. Level: Undergraduate, Graduate. (AM) Offered autumn, odd years. From slave revolts through to the Move rebellion in Philadelphia, this course examines how the African-American community has engaged in radical efforts to change the status quo in the name of seeking justice.
    Course Attributes:
    • Writing Course-Upper-Division

  • AAS 417 - Prayer & Civil Rights

    Credits: 3. Level: Undergraduate. (AM) Offered autumn, even years. This course explores the meaning of public prayer in the Civil Rights Movement.  Built around the question, "Does religion help or hinder the pursuit of social change?" this class combines historical and religious studies inquiry to trace changes in civil rights activists' efforts to make use of religion.  By focusing on a particular religious practice - in this case prayer - in a specific, but limited period of time, this course challenges students to consider how meaning is formed through historical action and study the social significance of religious practice.  This formed through historical action and study the social significance of religious practice.  This course complicates prevailing ideas about the normalcy of  African-American religious practitioners' prayer, invites students to examine their assumptions about the nature of prayer, and traces how religion spilled out of sanctuaries into the streets during the civil rights era.
    Course Attributes:
    • Writing Course-Upper-Division

  • AAS 420 - America Divided, 1848-1865

    Credits: 3. Level: Undergraduate, Graduate. Offered intermittently. Same as HSTA 420. This course explores the period in American history from the close of the Mexican War through the conclusion of the Civil War.  Topics include slavery and sectionalism; race and racism; immigration and ethno-religious conflict; military mobilization and wartime dissent; the meaning of freedom in the age of emancipation. This course is intended to hone skills fundamental to the historical discipline: the critical analysis of primary sources; independent primary research and historical writing; engagement with and assessment of historical scholarship; the construction of a historiographical essay.
    Course Attributes:
    • Writing Course-Upper-Division

  • AAS 491 - Special Topics

    Credits: 1 TO 6. Level: Undergraduate, Graduate. (R-9) Prereq., consent of instr. Experimental offerings of visiting professors, experimental offerings of new courses, or one time offerings of current topics.

  • AAS 492 - Independent Study

    Credits: 1 TO 9. Level: Undergraduate, Graduate. (R-9) Prereq., consent of instr. Course material appropriate to the needs and objectives of the individual student.

  • AAS 562 - Problems in AfAm History

    Credits: 3. Level: Undergraduate, Graduate. Spring, even years.  Same as HSTA 562.  This course explores the question, "How does one study African-American history?" through the lens of African-American religious practice.