Courses

The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, offers over 1,000 courses with significant Africa-related content (i.e., at least 25 percent).  For a searchable PDF spreadsheet of Africa-related courses offered in AY 2016–2017, see here; note that many courses were offered again in AY 2017–2018 and AY 2018–2019.  To search for current courses, see OneStop.

In 2014–2018, the African Studies Initiative (ASI) funded curriculum innovation by Twin Cities faculty and P&A instructors in African Studies and in the four African less commonly taught languages (LCTLs) currently offered at Minnesota:  Arabic, Portuguese, Somali, and Swahili.  ASI Faculty Travel and Curriculum Development Grants, as well as ASI funds designated for African LCTLs and related area-studies instruction in literature, history, and culture, have supported the creation or redesign of over 50 undergraduate, graduate, and professional courses with significant Africa-related content.  These courses, many interdisciplinary, span departments or programs across five colleges and schools: the College of Continuing and Professional Studies; the College of Food, Agricultural, and Natural Resource Sciences; the College of Liberal Arts; the Medical School; and the School of Public Health. With ASI support, faculty and P&A instructors have reimagined approaches to teaching Africa across the disciplines. Faculty curricular innovation, in turn, informs the ASI’s research-based public programming and K–16 outreach—and growing visibility as a regional and national resource hub in African Studies.

ASI-Funded Academic-Year Courses with Significant Africa-Related Content, New or Redesigned:
  • AFRO 1021: Introduction to Africa
  • AFRO 1023W: Introduction to African World Literatures
  • AFRO 3006: Impact of African Migrations in the Atlantic World
  • AFRO 3135: Political Dynamics in the Horn of Africa
  • AFRO 3578/ARTH 3578/CSCL 3553/GLOS 3978: Arts of Africa: Contemporary Sub-Saharan African Popular Art Forms
  • AFRO 3654: African Cinema
  • AFRO 4478W/POL 4478W: Contemporary African Politics and the Colonial Legacy
  • AFRO 3xxx: African Americans and African Immigrants
  • AFRO 3xxx: Contemporary China-Africa Relations
  • ALL 3832: The Politics of Arabic Poetry (formerly ALL 3920)
  • ALL 3820/5820: Culture and Society of the Arabian Peninsula
  • ALL 3856: Palestinian Literature and Film (formerly ALL 3920)
  • ALL 3920: Orientalism and the Arab World
  • ALL 3920: Arab American Experiences
  • ALL 5866: Gender and Sexuality in Modern Arabic Literature (formerly ALL 5920)
  • ARAB 3811: Egyptian Colloquial Arabic I (formerly ARAB 3900: Conversational Arabic)
  • ARAB 3812: Egyptian Colloquial Arabic II (formerly ARAB 3900: Conversational Arabic II)
  • ARAB 3900: Jordanian Colloquial Arabic
  • ARAB 5040: Readings in Arabic Texts – Classical and Modern Arabic
  • ARAB 5101: Advanced Arabic I
  • ARAB 5102: Advanced Arabic II
  • FREN 3101W: Methods in French and Francophone Studies
  • FREN 3451: North African Cinema
  • FREN 3471/3750: Topics in Francophone African Literatures and Cultures: Migrants, Refugees, and the Mediterranean in Film, Literature, and Art
  • FREN 5350: The Mediterranean(s) in Theory: (The) Mediterranean Works: Art and Literature on the Borders of Fortress Europe
  • FREN 8420: The Mediterranean in the Global Era: Theory, Literature, and Art
  • GCC 3xxx/5xxx: Advancing Health Equity: The Structural Determination of Health at Home and Abroad
  • GEOG 5900: Applied Quantitative Methods Using Survey Data
  • GEOG 3xxx/5xxx: Land and People, Food and Health: Geographic Perspectives of Contemporary Africa
  • GLOS 3613W/SOC 3613W: Stuffed and Starved: The Politics of Eating
  • GLOS 3900: Biopolitics of Health and Disease in the African Diaspora
  • GLOS 3900: Politics of Global Health
  • HSEM 2001H: Fragile Subjects: Portraits of Childhood in African World Literature
  • HIST 3437: Politics of Violence in Africa: The Decolonization of Kenya and Algeria in Comparative Perspective
  • HORT 5032: Organic Vegetable Production
  • LING 1705W: World Englishes: The Linguistics of English-Based Varieties around the Globe
  • MUED 5301: General Music I
  • MUED 5302: General Music II
  • MUED 5750: World Music in Education: Africa
  • MUS 5460: World Music Ensemble
  • MUS 5805: Worlds of Improvisation
  • PUBH 6713: Global Health in a Local Context: Social Determinants, Community Engagement, and Social Action in Minnesota (formerly PUBH 7200)
  • SMLI 1225: Accelerated Beginning Somali I
  • SMLI 1226: Accelerated Beginning Somali II
  • SMLI 3xxx: Intensive Intermediate Somali
  • SWAH 3425: Advanced Swahili
  • TH 3152W:Global Avant-Gardes: Theatre, Music, Modernity (formerly TH 3152/5152, GLOS 3152/5152)
  • TRIN 4201: Interpreting in Medical Settings
  • TRIN 3101: Introduction to Interpreting
  • TRIN 3xxx:Foreign Language Study for Professional Purposes
  • TRIN xxxx:Somali for Health Care Professionals
ASI-Funded Summer African Language Courses:
Intensive summer program in Arabic, funded since 2014
  • ARAB 1101: Beginning Arabic I
  • ARAB 1102: Beginning Arabic II
  • ARAB 3101: Intermediate Arabic I
  • ARAB 3102: Intermediate Arabic II
Summer course in Portuguese, funded since 2014
  • PORT 3001: Portuguese for Spanish Speakers
Summer learning-abroad course in Somali, planned for 2020
  • SMLI xxxx: Somali Pastoralists: Culture of Survival