SPRING 2022 SOCIAL THEORY  and SOCIAL THEORY AFFILIATED COURSES 

(ST courses are required for the Social Theory Graduate Certificate. ST affiliated courses have significant social theory content and may be substituted for ST 690.)

ST 600: Reproductive Justice and Politics seminar
Friday 2-4:30; co-taught by Drs. Sharon Yam (Rhetoric), Lindsey Chambers (Philosophy), Carol Mason (Gender and Women's Studies), Lydia Pelot-Hobbs (Geography).

How do we theorize this historical moment when movements for black lives and against reproductive freedom converge? We will open the seminar with African American perspectives that allowed a radically expansive take on reproductive politics. Readings will illuminate the history and theory of reproductive justice, the blending of reproductive rights and social justice movements, and Loretta Ross will be our first speaker.   In the second unit, we will engage with transnational scholarships, critical race and gender theories to explore the intersections across stratified reproduction, assisted reproductive technologies, and queer family-making. This unit will begin with a talk by Natalie Deomampo (Fordham), whose research focuses on the ways in which international commercial surrogacy shapes transnational politics on race and kinship. Next we examine how racial and colonial state violence has been leveraged against the reproductive autonomy of Black , indigenous and communities of color from sterilization campaigns to the foster system to the criminalization of abortion. This unit will include a talk by Brianna Theobald whose research explores the intersection of colonial and reproductive politics in Native America from the late nineteenth century to the present. In our final unit, we’ll turn to the philosophical arguments about the morality of abortion, the moral status of fetuses, and the use of reproductive technology to avoid so-called undesirable genetic traits or to select for genetic enhancements. We’ll end with a talk by Natalie Lira (Illinois), who has written on the racism and ableism of California’s 1920’s to 1950’s eugenics program.

In this seminar on reproductive justice and politics, we will invite students to be critical not only of the positions taken in different disciplines with respect to reproductive justice, but also the very questions their positions are answers to. 

ST 610 Disclosure Journal Editorial collective

In Spring 2022 the collective will edit the current Queer Theory issue and compiling materials for next year’s Social and Reproductive Justice issue.
Faculty advisor: Stefan Bird-Pollan

ENG 570 SELECTED TOPICS FOR ADV STUDIES IN LITERATURE: ANTICOLONIAL WRITING AND THOUGHT — THE PRIMARY DOCUMENTS

Dr. Peter Kalliney TR 11:00

This course looks at the traditions of anticolonial thought from the late nineteenth century to the present day. Comparing movements for national liberation, realignment, and literary self-determination from across the world, we'll consider the shifting claims of the British, American, French, Spanish, and Russian empires, and the colonial subjects, postcolonial frameworks, and decolonial movements that sought to contest these formations from Chile to Alcatraz, India to Ireland, and Azerbaijan to Martinique. Our focus will most often be on the manifestos and essays in which anticolonial writers outlined their literary and political programs, but we may also look at a few poems, stories, and films. From Vicente Huidobro's fantasies of a secret international society to end British Imperialism to Ngügì wa Thiong'o's call  to abolish the English Department, how did the radical  claimsof anticolonial political thought take shape in literary  writing? This course will be taught in conjunction with parallel courses offered by Professor Leah Feldman at the University of Chicago and Professor Harris Feinsod at Northwestern University. We anticipate building opportunities for cross-campus research

LAS 601: Interdisciplinary Seminar in Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies
Dr. F. Chassen-López, Tues 5:00 –  7:30 pm   

This interdisciplinary topical seminar engages with a series of fundamental issues, methods, and current trends in Latin American, Caribbean and Latinx Studies. For Spring 2022, among the topics we’ll look at are social inequalities, revolution, indigenous struggles, coloniality/modernity, the memory turn, and immigration to the U.S. in fiction and non-fiction. The seminar will host guest appearances by LACLS affiliated faculty providing the opportunity to read and discuss their latest research.  

GWS 600: Feminism, Capitalism, Crisis, and Socialism
Dr. Karen Tice, Thursdays- 4:30-7:00

We will explore historical trajectories, contemporary connections, debates, and the frictions that have characterized feminist engagements with capitalism and socialism from a variety of geo-political locations. We will examine the following questions: Is feminism and socialism compatible? How have they been related to each other and how have they been at odds?  How have changing configurations of capitalism, neo-liberalism, globalization, affective economies, crisis, state socialism, and socialist feminism shaped feminist struggles, critiques, and affinities? How have  intersectional hierarchies and differences shaped the relationship between feminism and anti-capitalist, anti-imperialism, and anti-colonialism struggles. 

Phi 680: Heidegger vs Adorno
Dr. Stefan Bird-Pollan Mondays, 4:00-630.

The seminar focuses on Heidegger’s discussion of authenticity in the second part of Being and Time as an exploration of practical philosophy. After spending the first half of the seminar reading Heidegger, we will read the first half of Adorno’s Negative Dialectics. Adorno criticizes Heidegger’s notion of authenticity and present his own understanding of the basis of practical philosophy, namely attention to the particular which must be upheld against the domineering universal.

The aim is to offer an appreciation of Heidegger’s philosophical ambition to move beyond the subject to an analysis of Being. We will also seek to understand the consequence of Heidegger’s move which, for Adorno, is the evacuation of any sort of ethical content from human life.

LIS 619 (Library and Information Science) Informal Learning in Information Organizations
Dr. Daniela DiGiacomo Time: Fully online, fully asynchronous

Course description: How people learn has implications for how learning environments should be designed. This course examines theories of informal learning— primarily drawing upon research from the sociocultural tradition of learning and human development—and considers how they can be practically implemented into information organization contexts. Being grounded in a sociocultural tradition means that this class will center issues of equity, diversity, and justice as they relate to the organization and design of information organization contexts and settings (e.g. libraries, museums, youth programs, new media centers, non-profit organizations).  For example, how do issues of culture and learning inform the development of afterschool literacy programs in public libraries or Maker spaces in school libraries, especially those that serve predominantly minoritized communities? By gaining a deep understanding of how people learn across their lifespan, students will be able to consider how to create a community of learners in a range of settings in which people from various backgrounds participate. Topics covered include issues related to culture and cognition, identity development, adult-youth partnerships, access to/relationships with new digital media, and design thinking. No prerequisites.