Juliet Hooker

Despite the current trend towards the study of comparative political theory, the work of Latin American political thinkers, which has been tremendously influential in their own region, remains marginal to the canon of Western political thought. Likewise, the work of U.S. African-American political thinkers is an important yet often overlooked strand of [U.S.] American political thought. This course is an an introduction to the history of these two traditions, and a comparative effort to understand the main thematics in each and the similarities and differences between them. It examines the answers U.S. African-American and Latin American thinkers have given to some of the fundamental preoccupations of political theory, as well as to other questions that have sometimes been viewed as marginal, such as: What is justice? What is freedom? What are the conditions of possibility for democratic politics? How should we theorize race? How should we conceive racial identity? What form should anti-racist politics take? The course will introduce students to some of the most influential figures in U.S. African-American and Latin American political thought, including: Domingo F. Sarmiento, José Martí, José Vasconcelos, Frederick Douglass, W.E.B. DuBois, as well as to contemporary thinkers and debates about racial justice and black, latino, and indigenous politics in the U.S. and Latin America. The aim of the course is to identify the contours and substantive problematics of U.S. African-American and Latin American political thought, particularly as they relate to questions of racial justice. 

STUDY ABROAD COURSE

Course Description

This course will examine the politics of race, culture, nation, and political mobilization among Afro-Caribbean communities on Central America’s Caribbean Coast. It will discuss the historical process by which these communities were formed in the region during the colonial era, different periods of labor migration, the emergence of anti-Black mestizo nationalism, and contemporary struggles for racial justice. Students will learn how Afro-Caribbean populations have drawn from their Caribbean roots to navigate and resist persistent patterns of racial, gender, and economic inequality and have challenged the racially defined limits of citizenship and national belonging within mestizo nation-states. The course will provide students with a foundation for understanding larger racial formation patterns in Central America and ground this analysis in historical and ethnographic studies of Afro-Caribbean populations in Nicaragua, Honduras, Costa Rica, Panama, and Belize.

Despite the current trend towards the study of comparative political theory, the work of Latin American political thinkers, which has been tremendously influential in their own region, remains marginal to the canon of Western political thought. Likewise, the work of U.S. African-American political thinkers is an important yet often overlooked strand of [U.S.] American political thought. This course is an an introduction to the history of these two traditions, and a comparative effort to understand the main thematics in each and the similarities and differences between them. It examines the answers U.S. African-American and Latin American thinkers have given to some of the fundamental preoccupations of political theory, as well as to other questions that have sometimes been viewed as marginal, such as: What is justice? What is freedom? What are the conditions of possibility for democratic politics? How should we theorize race? How should we conceive racial identity? What form should anti-racist politics take? The course will introduce students to some of the most influential figures in U.S. African-American and Latin American political thought, including: Domingo F. Sarmiento, José Martí, José Vasconcelos, Frederick Douglass, W.E.B. DuBois, as well as to contemporary thinkers and debates about racial justice and black, latino, and indigenous politics in the U.S. and Latin America. The aim of the course is to identify the contours and substantive problematics of U.S. African-American and Latin American political thought, particularly as they relate to questions of racial justice.