Africana Studies
Courses
AFAS 101 Introduction to Africana Studies 3.0 Credits
Provides an overview of the experience, culture, and political practices of African descendants in the Americas and the Caribbean. The course uses a multidisciplinary approach to introduce students to the history, art, music, and literature of the African Diaspora.
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
AFAS 201 Cross Currents in Africana Studies 3.0 Credits
With a temporal focus on the 20th century, this course critically explores and analyzes the cultural, political and intellectual practices of blacks in North, Central, and South America as well as in the Caribbean.
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
AFAS 210 Topics in Africana Arts 1.0-12.0 Credit
This course will focus on the literatures/music/or culture of the Africana Diaspora. The topics covered in this course will change from quarter to quarter and will often be offered in collaboration with other departments on campus.
Repeat Status: Can be repeated 3 times for 48 credits
AFAS 219 History of Policing Homosexuality 4.0 Credits
This course surveys the medical and penal criminalization of homosexuality from the late 19th to early 21st Century in the United States. It also traces the varied historical responses to the policing of homosexuality by LGBTQ+ people and other individuals who engage in same-sex sex. The course will approach policing (both medical and penal) with particular emphasis on how race, Blackness, gender performance, and class impact policing and the formation of homosexual identities through time.
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
AFAS 220 Topics in Africana Society 1.0-12.0 Credit
This course will take a social science approach to the study of the societies of the African Diaspora inside of the US or internationally. The topics covered in this course will change from quarter to quarter and will often be offered in collaboration with other departments on campus.
Repeat Status: Can be repeated 3 times for 48 credits
AFAS 221 Freedom, Medicine and Slavery 4.0 Credits
Covering the fifteenth to the nineteenth centuries, this course examines the history of medicine alongside the history of slavery from Africa to the Americas and traces the continuing presence of African diasporic knowledge and practices against the transformation of white "men of science" into modern physicians and specialists.
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
AFAS 222 Freedom, Medicine and Slavery’s Afterlives 4.0 Credits
Covering from the end of the American Civil War to present, this course examines the history of medicine in the United States, focusing on the contributions of African and African-descended peoples to western medicine alongside the continuing presence of African diasporic knowledge and practices into the era of the modern hospital and medical industrial complex.
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
AFAS 230 Topics in African History 1.0-12.0 Credit
This course will provide students with a historical understanding of African Societies from the medieval period to the present. The topics covered in this course will change from quarter to quarter and will often be offered in collaboration with other departments on campus.
Repeat Status: Can be repeated 3 times for 48 credits
AFAS 240 Topics in Africana Current Events 1.0-12.0 Credit
This topical course will offer students the chance to focus on current events in the global Africana Diaspora. The topics covered in this course will change from quarter to quarter and will often be offered in collaboration with other departments on campus.
Repeat Status: Can be repeated 3 times for 48 credits
AFAS 255 Gender & Black Popular Culture 3.0 Credits
This course critically examines the media’s role in the social construction of “Blackness.” Paying particular attention to images of race, culture and gender, this course examines representations of Black women and men in “popular culture” (film, television, music, advertising, etc.).
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
AFAS 260 Race, Politics and Religion 3.0 Credits
An examination of race and religion as in liberal tradition. How has liberal theory purported the state will confront issues of race and religion? Have the political realities of race and religion in the modern state lived up to the promises laid out by liberalism?.
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
Restrictions: Cannot enroll if classification is Freshman
AFAS 301 Politics of Hip Hop 3.0 Credits
This class in an interdisciplinary, socio-historical introduction to rap music and hip hop culture. Several themes will be explored including the origins of rap music as well as the role of urban youth and their notions of race and gender. Record industry practices will also be investigated together with the impact of commercialism on hip hop. We will also consider sexism, misogyny, and violence in both the music and culture.
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
AFAS 307 History of Education and Anti-Colonial Resistance 4.0 Credits
This course will explore historically complex moments in the history of education and the resistance forces that emerged during liberation struggles across the globe. Students in this class will engage with a critically historical study on the history and process of education that will allow us to think and reflect on educational experiences and also to think, imagine and develop possible strategies and praxis of the revolutionary pedagogy for liberation and decolonization. Some topics that will be approached in this course are 1) the theory of the hidden curriculum, 2) education under colonial and oppressive regimes, 3) social and political movements' educational practices, 4) their transnational approaches, and 5) historical ideas of learning, talent, opportunity and human difference.
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
AFAS 310 Women, Crime, & History 3.0 Credits
This class will examine gender, race and crime in US history. Specifically, we will explore the experience of female criminals from the colonial period to the present. We will conduct primary research into this subject at the Philadelphia City Archive (PCA), located at 3101 Market Street. Students will be responsible for a final research paper based on their research findings.
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
AFAS 344 History of the AIDS Pandemic 4.0 Credits
This course explores responses to the AIDS crisis in Philadelphia and the United States. It investigates the medical, political, and activist responses to the AIDS crisis with a special emphasis on the lesser-known perspectives of AIDS activists and organizations.
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
AFAS 368 Silences in African History 4.0 Credits
Colonization and capitalism deeply impacted the history of Africa, including in the way we understand the history. This course examines some of the silences in the historical record and considers the ways research can construct and reproduce the silences, as well as unveil them, in the history of the continent. What are these silences? What forces might be moving behind them? What hidden languages can we find when we question the silences? How do these silences affect our perception of the continent today? What are the ramifications in the world today?.
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
AFAS 385 Rum, Rice and Revolution: Caribbean History 3.0 Credits
Course provides a broad, interdisciplinary and socio-historical introduction to the Caribbean. Several themes are covered including empire and the making of the Caribbean; slavery and emancipation; labor formation and race; revolution and resistance; gender oppression and women's experiences; and cultural expressions.
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
AFAS 401 Urban Social Justice Practicum I 3.0 Credits
The Urban Social Justice Practicum offers Drexel students an exciting opportunity to work on-site at a variety of community based organizations that address issues relevant to the African Diaspora. Students can work as mentors, teaching assistants, and interns and inner-city schools, governmental agencies, judicial offices and health care facilities. Working 5 hours per week at a site of their choosing, students also participate in weekly seminars, maintain journals, and complete a final paper. Course runs over two quarters.
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
AFAS 402 Urban Social Justice Practicum II 3.0 Credits
The Urban Social Justice Practicum offers Drexel students an exciting opportunity to work on-site at a variety of community based organizations that address issues relevant to the African Diaspora. Students can work as mentors, teaching assistants, and interns and inner-city schools, governmental agencies, judicial offices and health care facilities. Working 5 hours per week at a site of their choosing, students also participate in weekly seminars, maintain journals, and complete a final paper. Course runs over two quarters.
Repeat Status: Not repeatable for credit
Prerequisites: AFAS 401 [Min Grade: CR]
AFAS I199 Independent Study in AFAS 0.0-12.0 Credits
Self-directed within the area of study requiring intermittent consultation with a designated instructor.
Repeat Status: Can be repeated multiple times for credit
AFAS I299 Independent Study in AFAS 0.5-3.0 Credits
Self-directed within the area of study requiring intermittent consultation with a designated instructor.
Repeat Status: Can be repeated 2 times for 6 credits
AFAS I399 Independent Study in AFAS 0.0-12.0 Credits
Self-directed within the area of study requiring intermittent consultation with a designated instructor.
Repeat Status: Can be repeated multiple times for credit
AFAS I499 Independent Study in AFAS 0.0-12.0 Credits
Self-directed within the area of study requiring intermittent consultation with a designated instructor.
Repeat Status: Can be repeated multiple times for credit
AFAS T180 Special Topics in Africana Studies 0.0-12.0 Credits
Topics decided upon by faculty will vary within the area of study.
Repeat Status: Can be repeated multiple times for credit
AFAS T280 Special Topics in Africana Studies 0.0-12.0 Credits
Topics decided upon by faculty will vary within the area of study.
Repeat Status: Can be repeated multiple times for credit
AFAS T380 Special Topics in Africana Studies 0.0-12.0 Credits
Topics decided upon by faculty will vary within the area of study.
Repeat Status: Can be repeated multiple times for credit
AFAS T480 Special Topics in Africana Studies 0.0-12.0 Credits
Topics decided upon by faculty will vary within the area of study.
Repeat Status: Can be repeated multiple times for credit