| Course Title: How to Think About Race and Politics in the U.S. |
| Start Date: 01/27/2026 End Date: 05/12/2026 |
| Term: Spring Semester 2026 |
| Description: We examine logical implications of the view of "race" as a social construction. Constructionism's core point is that there are no naturally occurring subdivisions between the level of our species, Homo sapiens sapiens, and local breeding populations, and therefore that "racism" is at bottom belief that such intermediate groupings exist -- whether or not one embraces assumptions regarding their relation to one another in hierarchies of worth or capacities. We will interrogate conceptual elisions that mark thinking about race among scholars and civic actors -- between categories v. groups, race as category of analysis v. category of practice, relative v. absolute inequality, race v. class -- by tracing them within flash points in American political history from emergence of the modern view of race to the present moment. |
| Distribution(s): III - Social Sciences , MP - Multicultural Perspectives , SI - Speaking-Intensive , WI - Writing-Intensive |
| Academic Level Of Course: Undergraduate | Credits:4.00 |
| Faculty | Phone | Email address |
| Adolph Reed Jr. | areedjr@mtholyoke.edu |
| Meeting Dates | Method | Meeting days | Meeting times | Building name | Room | Frequency |
| 01/27/2026 - 05/12/2026 | Seminar | Friday | 01:30PM - 04:20PM | TBA | TBA | Weekly |
| Requisite Courses | ||
| None |
| Comments |
| Additional Comments |
| Course Tags | ||
| POLIT-AMER | POLIT-AMER: Politics - American subfield | This course has been approved to count towards the American Politics subfield of the Politics major (100-200-level courses only) and minor (all courses). |
| Cross-listed Sections |
| None |
| Course Availability | ||||
| Section status: Open | Capacity: 18 | Enrollment: 16 | Available: 2 | Waitlist: 0 |
BOOK INFORMATION
| Book List | Required | Publisher Full Price |
| To be determined. |
| Additional Book Comments |
| This is NOT the complete book list for this class. |