AFR 170
What is Race in Black Studies? Fall 2024
Division II

Black/Africana Studies has offered much on the study of race, though race is not its sole focus. The goal of this course is to study theoretical perspectives and interrelated schools of thought on race in disciplines including and adjacent to Africana Studies. These perspectives include critical race theory, the Black radical tradition, whiteness studies, and decolonial theory. Our goal is to begin to notice the ways in which race — far from being a singular or uniformly understood mode of difference — can be theorized through a range of approaches. The course will explore questions including: What is at stake in various perspectives on race? What sort of redress is made possible using the framework of “race,” and what transformative possibilities are foreclosed? How does the twentieth century trajectory of the concept shape the twenty-first century racial politics? How does the state-form structure the concept of race?