African Cultural Studies 983: The Question of Agency

This course will focus on the concept of “agency in order to consider not just what to think about the history, cultures, and politics of Africa but also how to think and teach about this part of the world in a politically-, ethically-, and theoretically-informed way. While some “Africanist scholarship has emphasized the structural conditions that limit the choices of African people wherever they find themselves in the world other scholarship has emphasized the choices that people have made in spite of, or within, various structural conditions. Some scholarship claims to recover or restore the agency of Africans within academic discourse. Yet still other scholarship assumes the agency of all people and focuses on the scope and scale of their choices in various times and places.

Intensive reading and discussion culminating in a seminar paper

Typical topics and/or Schedule