This course challenges students to connect the cataclysmic formation of the Latin Americas from the cultures of Europe, Africa, and the Native (indigenous) peoples with the processes that inform our modern world. Colonialism, social stratification and forms of conflict and rebellion all played pivotal roles in the formation of Latin America from origins to the 18th century. The history and culture of the region is presented from many perspectives and across many disciplines.

Latin America is more than a geographical reality. This interdisciplinary course asks how Latin America has been forged through local and global struggles for economic sovereignty, political self-determination, social and cultural identities in the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries. Students will be introduced to the histories of economic dependence after the dawn of political independence, the intertwined dynamics of U.S. interventionism and Latin American resistance, the making of indigenous movements, as well as the interrelated issues of gender, race, and sexuality.

This course is an interdisciplinary introduction to Latino Studies. It explores the socio-historical background of the major Latino groups in the United States, and the economic, political, and cultural factors that converge to shape Latino group identity. This course examines contemporary issues affecting Latinos including the evolution of Latino ethnicity, immigration, transnationalism and the formation of Latino communities, activism, and media representations of Latinos.

LST 203 is an introduction to media and cultural studies with a specific focus on cultural transactions in the American hemisphere, particularly as they reflect the relationship of the U.S. to Latin America, Central America, Mexico, and the Caribbean. This course studies the history of national and cultural identities and social struggle, especially with regard to a north/south relationship, imperialism, revolution and social change, tourism, globalization, postcolonialism and the construction of gender, sexuality, race, and ethnicity. Students examine how relationships across the Americas have been depicted in popular culture and the social and political meanings of these representations.

A capstone course that integrates the students' prior course work and experiences by allowing the student to define a final culminating project. The seminar functions as a coordinated independent study course with extensive participation of Latin American and Latino Studies Program faculty.