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This seminar addresses the history of the western United States, with particular attention to categories of race, ethnicity and nationalism that were consolidated as the trans-Mississippi west became a location for modern industrial, agricultural and extraction economies. Beginning with a discussion of the eighteenth and nineteenth century frontier, we will explore how the categories "race" and "nation" emerged in relation to each other over time and space. What are the transhistorical and transnational implications of identity categories, and how are they refracted in/experienced through gender and sexuality? How do governments and social groups use racial ideologies and nationalisms to extend and solidify political/cultural power? Are racialism and nationalism useful categories for political resistance as well as for political domination?

As a sophomore seminar in the history department, this course places a strong emphasis on strategies for reading large amounts of secondary material well, close reading and evaluation of primary texts, developing ideas and articulating them to others, imagining research questions and developing practices of historical writing.

This course may be counted as an Ethnic Studies elective in the American Studies program: please see the listing for this course on the American Studies page of Wesmaps, where the appropriate 200-level number is available for your records.

Books available for purchase at Atticus and on reserve at Olin library:
Tomas Almaguer, Racial Fault Lines: the Historical Origins of White Supremacy in California
Alexandra Harmon, Indians in the Making: Ethnic Relations and Indian Identities Around Puget Sound
Richard R. Flores, Remembering the Alamo
Dorothy Fujita-Rony, American Workers, Colonial Power: Philippine Seattle and the Transpacific West, 1919-1941
Linda Gordon, The Great Arizona Orphan Abduction
Reginald Horsman, Race and Manifest Destiny: the Origins of American Racial Anglo-Saxonism
Lon Kurashige, Japanese-American Celebration and Conflict: A History of Ethnic American Identity and Festival, 1934-1990
Becky Nicoliades, My Blue Heaven: Life and Politics in the Working-Class Suburbs of Los Angeles, 1920-1965
Richard Rodriguez, Brown: the Last Discovery of America
George Sanchez, Becoming Mexican American: Ethnicity, Culture and Identity in Chicano Los Angeles, 1900-1945
Nayan Shah, Contagious Divides: Epidemics and Race in San Francisco's Chinatown

Articles are available online at Olin reserve.

Assignments:
For writing assignments, each student is expected to obtain a style manual: you will be expected to use footnote or endnote-style citations, properly executed, and will not receive full credit for an assignment unless you do. For reading, please acquire a dictionary.

You will be asked to complete the following:

Five 2 page (short) papers, topic to be organized around a particular feature of historical writing. They will be turned in at the end of class and cannot, under normal circumstances, be turned in late: 20%

Two 5-7 page (long) critical papers requiring some research: 60%

In addition to evaluations of assigned work, 20% of your grade will take into account:

Class attendance. It is expected that you will attend all classes. In the case of illness or emergency your absence will be excused, but if you miss more than two classes, your grade will be lowered or you may be asked to withdraw.

Class participation. It is expected that you will come to class ready to contribute your thoughts and to respond to the thoughts of others. Students who have difficulty speaking in class are invited to work with the professor to learn to do so.

Please note: to allow all of us to focus on the intellectual content of the course, I will grade on the system used by the Harvard Business School. Instead of letter grades, you will receive numerical grades of 1,2 and 3. Roughly, these grades correspond to the following:

1 = outstanding = A

2 = good = B

3= average = C

At the end of the course, I will translate these numbers into a letter grade, and factor in attendance and participation to arrive at a final grade. It is possible to get less than a C in this course, but not if you complete all the work, attend class, and are a participant in discussions.