Reading and composition courses based upon primary historical documents and secondary historical scholarship. These courses provide an introduction to core issues in the interpretation of historical texts and introduce students to the distinctive ways of reading primary and secondary sources. Courses focus on specific historical topics but address general issues of how historians read and write. Satisfies the second half of the Reading and Composition requirement.

If you live in Berkeley, you are in xučyun (Huchiun), the ancestral and unceded homeland of the Chochenyo-speaking Ohlone people. For the majority of its human history, the place we call California was home to many hundreds of distinct Indigenous polities. Today, over two hundred inherently sovereign California tribal nations exist and operate inside a settler state, many without federal recognition or a land base. At the same time, many tribes have become important political players with a growing say over the future of land stewardship, education, and allocation of resources in California. Many communities around the state are revitalizing their languages and cultures, advocating (and winning) land return, and reversing socially, economically, and environmentally ruinous colonial policies such as the damming of the Klamath River. How did all of this come about? What kind of story is it, and where is it heading? This seminar charts a course through the multi-millennial history of California’s original peoples. As we journey from antiquity to present (and even, briefly, into the future), we will encounter a cluster of thinkers who have taken different stands on the above questions. Readings will center on the places and peoples inside the present-day state of California, but we will also explore the currents of change connecting Native California to larger spatial units, including the Pacific world and Indigenous North America. We will read, too, about the twentieth-century global politics of Indigeneity recognizing commonalities of experience among peoples indigenous to the Pacific Islands, North America, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Africa—to which California Indians have contributed in important ways. Throughout, readings will prompt reflection on the UC’s longtime role as a key producer of knowledge about California Indian peoples and history. As it satisfies the second half of the Reading & Composition requirement, this course is also intended to strengthen and consolidate fundamental skills of writing and research.

Repeat Rules

Course is not repeatable for credit.

Requirements class fulfills