Research-oriented and designed for upper-division English majors. Intensive examination of critical approaches, literary theory, or a special topic in literary and cultural studies. Topics vary from semester to semester. Students should consult the department's "Announcement of Classes" for offerings well before the beginning of the semester.

This course will survey literature and film centering on the US-Mexico border, a site of intense cultural conflict since the nineteenth century. Students will become familiar with the history of the border, beginning with the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo in 1848 and extending through NAFTA and up to the current political climate. As students develop original research papers, we will consider together how the border has become such a potent site for contemporary mythmaking, a flashpoint for anxieties about race, labor, gender, and sexuality. How are borders made? How have writers and filmmakers depicted the cultural anxieties and potentials created by the border? How has the militarization of the border affected Latinx individual and communities? This class satisfies the Literatures in English requirement for the English major.

Book List:

Gloria Anzaldúa, Borderlands / La Frontera; Carmen Boullosa’s Texas: The Great Theft, Américo Paredes, George Washington Gómez; Sandra Cisneros, Woman Hollering Creek; Valerie Martinez, Each and Her; and Emmy Pérez, With the River on Our Face

Requisites

• English 100 is prerequisite to English 190.

Repeat Rules