Race and Resistance Studies

RRS 100 Introduction to Ethnic Studies (Units: 3)

History, objectives, and philosophy of Ethnic Studies. Student's personal, educational, and career development in a pluralistic society and in an institute of higher education. [CSL may be available]
(This course is offered as ETHS 100 and RRS 100. Students may not repeat the course under an alternate prefix.)

Course Attributes:

• D1: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 101 Introduction to Arab and Muslim Communities (Units: 3)

Introduction to Arab and Muslim communities studies in U.S. and Americas and Asian and African ancestral homelands. Employing Arab, Muslim, Ethnic, Race and Resistance, Gender and Sexuality, American Middle East, Diasporas, Ethnicity Studies and Social Movement theory.

Course Attributes:

• C2: Humanities
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 103 Introduction to Pacific Studies (Units: 3)

Examination of historic and contemporary issues related to Pacific Islander communities in the United States across the Pacific Islander diaspora.
(This course is offered as RRS 103 and AIS 103. Students may not repeat the course under an alternate prefix.)

Course Attributes:

• U.S. History
• D2: Social Sciences: U.S. Hist
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 110 Critical Thinking and the Ethnic Studies Experience (Units: 3)

Basic skills involved in understanding, criticizing, and constructing arguments by using materials reflective of experiences of ethnic/racial groups in the U.S.
(Note: In order for this course to satisfy General Education, students must earn a C- or CR or higher grade if taken fall 2014 or later.)

Course Attributes:

• A3: Critical Thinking
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities

RRS 201 SFSU's Palestinian Cultural Mural and the Art of Resistance (Units: 3)

Critical investigation of the roles public art plays in transnational social justice movements, historically and currently. Examination of the history and legacy of Palestine Cultural Mural at San Francisco State University.

Course Attributes:

• C2: Humanities
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 212 Edward Said (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: RRS 101.

Critical investigation of Edward Said's scholarship and its influence in transnational social justice movements, historically and currently. Examination of the history, theory, and legacy of post-colonial studies, orientalism, Islamophobia, and Palestine.

Course Attributes:

• C2: Humanities
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 224 Arab-American History, Community, and Activism (Units: 3)

Introduction to Arab-American history, community, and organizational development in the United States.

Course Attributes:

• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 230 Muslims in America: Communities and Institutions (Units: 3)

Examination of the emergence of identifiable Muslim communities through the U.S. and focuses on migration patterns, the ethnic makeup of such communities, gender dynamics, political identity, and conversion to Islam.

Course Attributes:

• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Social Justice

RRS 240 All Power to the People: Comparative Freedom Movements of the "Sixties" (Units: 3)

Introduction to the history and comparative survey of the African American, Chicana/o, Native American, and Asian American protest/liberation movements of the "Long Sixties" (1945-1975). [CSL may be available] [Formerly ETHS 240]

Course Attributes:

• U.S. History
• D2: Social Sciences: U.S. Hist
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Social Justice

RRS 250 Race, Ethnicity and Power in America (Units: 3)

Critical examination of political concepts, processes and constructions of power that center race and ethnicity within a comparative analysis of American ideals, institutions and laws. Includes a study of constitutional issues and state and local governmental processes. [Formerly ETHS 250]

Course Attributes:

• U.S. Govt CA State Local Govt
• D3: Social Sciences: US CA Gov
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Social Justice

RRS 255 Voices in Exile: Arab and Muslim American and Civil Liberties post-9/11/2001 (Units: 3)

Changes post 9/11/2001, focusing on how Arab and Muslim Americans are affected. The case of the LA8, Sami Al-Arian, and Rasmeah Odeh will be used as a case study to analyze how government actions have affected Arab and Muslim Americans' civil liberties.

Course Attributes:

• D1: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 260 Introduction to Arab and Arab American Feminisms (Units: 3)

Writings by Arab and Arab American feminists to explore assumptions on and about Arab and Arab American experiences in the United States from multiple geographical sites, spiritualties, occupations, sexualities, class backgrounds, and generations.

Course Attributes:

• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 276 Race, Activism and Climate Justice (Units: 3)

Examination of the intersection of race, socio-economics, political ecology and climate change on a global scale; overview of the scientific evidence for anthropogenic causes and impacts; and exploration of environmental justice, political ecology, disparate impacts on different peoples and activism on global and local levels.

Course Attributes:

• B2: Life Science
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Environmental Sustainability
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 280 Race, Gender, and Science Fiction (Units: 3)

Science fiction as a way of examining intersections of race, gender, and sexuality. Includes histories such as slavery, removal, and colonization. Discussion of reproductive technologies. [Formerly ETHS 280]

Course Attributes:

• C3: Humanities: Literature
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities

RRS 285 Race, Sports, and Society (Units: 3)

Examines connections between race, "politics" and high-profile professional sports in the United States and abroad. Multiple issues explored using interdisciplinary approach, including critical race theory and socio-historical and socioeconomic constructs. [Formerly ETHS 285]

Course Attributes:

• D1: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities

RRS 303 Health and Wellness among Pacific Islanders (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Exploration of issues of health and wellness among Pacific Islanders with an introduction to major health issues impacting Pacific Islanders at home in the Pacific to within the U.S. and various health disparities. Includes an examination of the diversity of community responses toward health and wellness.

Course Attributes:

• E1: Lifelong Learning Develop
• UD-B: Physical Life Science
• Social Justice

RRS 304 Decolonize Your Diet: Food Justice and Gendered Labor in Communities of Color (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Focus on food justice in communities of color addressing issues including sex/gender and food production, racism and attacks on traditional food systems, indigenous foodways, environmental racism, GMO contamination of heritage foods, urban food deserts, and impact of diseases and development on communities of color. (Plus-minus ABC/NC, CR/NC)

RRS 305 Arab American Art and Artists of the Diaspora (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Examination of the ethnic, religious, and artistic diversity of Arab American visual artists. Topics include politics, language, culture, identity, economics, and many other issues.
(This course is offered as RRS 305 and ARAB 305. Students may not repeat the course under an alternate prefix.)

Course Attributes:

• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives

RRS 310 Arab Revolutions and Social Movements (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Examination of the recent uprisings in the Arab world focusing both on the immediate events that sparked these revolutions as well as the historical, socio-economic, political and ideological factors that contributed to the political shifts in 2010-2011.

Course Attributes:

• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 312 Arab and Arab American Literary Expressions (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Exploration of Arab and Arab American women's experiences through interdisciplinary lens and utilization of multiple approaches to expand notions of literary expressions.
(This course is offered as RRS 312 and ARAB 312. Students may not repeat the course under an alternate prefix.)

Course Attributes:

• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 315 Arab-American Immigration, Society, Identity, and Culture (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: ENG 214 or equivalent.

Exploration of important political, social, and cultural events, that have occurred in the Arab world and influenced Arab migration to the U.S.; how Arabs have evolved at different levels in America, eventually leading to the creation of an Arab-American identity.

Course Attributes:

• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities

RRS 330 Comparative Race and Ethnicity in the U.S.: Class, Gender, and Nation (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Examines dynamics of race and racism by analyzing intersections of class, race, gender, and nationalism, including theoretical perspectives shaping the subfield of comparative race and ethnicity in sociology, theories of racial formation, constructivist theory, ethnic boundaries, assimilation, and ethnocentrism. [Formerly ETHS 330]
(This course is offered as RRS 330 and SOC 330. Students may not repeat the course under an alternate prefix.)

Course Attributes:

• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Social Justice

RRS 350 Race, Labor, and Class (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Exploration of historic and contemporary intersections between communities of color and struggles for economic justice. Labor (broadly defined) remains profoundly racialized. This racialized class struggle will constitute the center of gravity for this course. [Formerly ETHS 350]

RRS 360 Cultural Dialogues and Ethnic Literature (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Ethnic literature as a comparative dialogue between cultures, in relation to other forms of artistic expressions, and within the context of the humanities, cultural patterns, aesthetic experiences, and political activism. [Formerly ETHS 360]

Course Attributes:

• UD-C: Arts and/or Humanities
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities

RRS 370 Islamophobia: Roots, Development, and Contestation of Hatred (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: ETHS 100 or RRS 100.

Examination of how limited conceptual frameworks color our understandings of history, race, gender, religion, and justice with regard to Muslims. [Formerly ETHS 370]

Course Attributes:

• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 375 Queer Arabs in the U.S. (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Examination of the place of queer Arabs in the U.S. in the larger context of queer people of color organizing in the U.S. and will also understand queer Arabs in the U.S. in the context of the international gay movement.

Course Attributes:

• Social Justice

RRS 380 Coloring Queer: Imagining Communities (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Interdisciplinary examination of the experience of queers of color in the U.S. through anthropology, sociology, history, literature, and cultural studies. Specific focus on racism, homophobia, transphobia, and intersectionality. [Formerly ETHS 380]
(This course is offered as RRS 380 and SXS 380. Students may not repeat the course under an alternate prefix.)

Course Attributes:

• UD-C: Arts and/or Humanities
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Social Justice

RRS 410 Grassroots Organizing for Change in Communities of Color (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

An advanced examination of grassroots social change movements in communities of color in the U.S.; how they are organized; how they succeed and even fail; by combining social change theory, history, and practical contemporary approaches to grassroots social justice work. [CSL may be available] [Formerly ETHS 410]
(This course is offered as RRS 410 and SOC 410. Students may not repeat the course under an alternate prefix.)

Course Attributes:

• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Social Justice

RRS 420 Arab American Identity: Memory and Resistance (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Examination of emergent Arab American identity from the historical context of post-colonial processes including nationalism, culture, and politics. Anti-orientalist analysis utilizing texts from different subject areas including history, poetry, psychoanalysis, post-colonial studies, critical theory, and cinema. [CSL may be available] [Formerly ETHS 420]

Course Attributes:

• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 430 Arab Media Images in America: Impact on Arab Americans (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Historical and contemporary imaging of Arab people in their mainstream American media and its effects on Arab American communities and individuals. A look at stereotypes and negative Arab images in American film, television, literature, and journalism. [Formerly ETHS 430]

Course Attributes:

• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 433 Pacific Islanders in Film: Re-Presenting Oceana Through an Indigenous Lens (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Examination of the work of contemporary Pacific Islander filmmakers who dispute and subvert the prevailing ethnographic and Hollywood imagery of Oceania. Exploration of the use of media as a decolonizing practice and as a counternarrative to the ongoing racialization and gendering of Oceania in mainstream and globalized media.

RRS 435 National Security and the Racialization of Arabs and Muslims in North America (Units: 3)

Prerequisites: Upper division standing; RRS 100 or ETHS 100.

Examination of how U.S. and Canadian National Security policies have racialized and targeted members of Arab and Muslim communities since September 11, 2001. [Formerly ETHS 435]

Course Attributes:

• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 450 Contemporary Arabic and Arab American Literature (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Contemporary literature from Arab American and Arabic speaking communities and their diasporas. Exploration of the political and cultural context of the Arab region by using poetry and fiction as a foundation. [Formerly ETHS 450]
(This course is offered as RRS 450 and ARAB 450. Students may not repeat the course under an alternate prefix.)

Course Attributes:

• UD-C: Arts and/or Humanities
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives

RRS 460 AIDS and People of Color in the U.S. (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

The political, psychological, social, and economic impact of AIDS/HIV infection on diverse cultural backgrounds. Prevention and educational strategies.
(This course is offered as COUN 450, RRS 460, and SXS 460. Students may not repeat the course under an alternate prefix.)

Course Attributes:

• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Social Justice

RRS 480 Youth Culture, Race and Resistance (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Surveys how young people of color use popular culture to challenge social inequalities based on race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, class and nationality. Students will gain theoretical tools to analyze youth culture and its relationship to social change. [Formerly ETHS 480]

Course Attributes:

• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Social Justice

RRS 490 Race, Performance and Social Justice (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Use of performance strategies to explore the challenges of gentrification and out-migration within Latina/o/Chicana/o and Black communities. Focus on "art for social change" techniques such as Everyday Life Performance, personal narratives, self-reflective performance, Living Newspaper, Theatre of the Oppressed, and Performance Art.

RRS 520 Race, Radicalism and Revolution (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Surveys diverse revolutionary movements and moments; theoretical and practical intersection of race with class, gender, sexuality and national/global oppression; role of culture and consciousness; relationship of "the revolution" to state, meaning of solidarity, leadership models and liberated visions of society/world. [Formerly ETHS 520]

RRS 566 Gender and Modernity in the Muslim and Arab Worlds (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: ENG 214 or equivalent.

Investigates implications of the project of modernity/modernization for gender and sexuality in the Muslim and Arab worlds. By interrogating dichotomies that oppose tradition to modernity, examines the multifaceted ways in which gender identities are produced historically. [Formerly ETHS 566]
(This course is offered as WGS 566 and RRS 566. Students may not repeat the course under an alternate prefix.)

Course Attributes:

• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 571 Women, Class, and Race (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Effects of class division and racism on the experiences, self-images, and social identities of women in U.S. Nature and relationships of the ideologies which underlie these divisions. [CSL may be available] [Formerly ETHS 571]

Course Attributes:

• UD-C: Arts and/or Humanities
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Environmental Sustainability
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 580 Educational Equity (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Is education the great equalizer? Educational equity and policy issues, including institutional racism, school finance, recruitment/retention of under-represented students, language. [CSL may be available]
(This course is offered as LTNS 580, SOC 580, and RRS 580. Students may not repeat the course under an alternate prefix.)

Course Attributes:

• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Social Justice

RRS 600 History of People of Color in the U.S. (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

History of the U.S. people of color, their experience in the development of American society, from the 1600s to present. Consequences of domination and racism in thwarting economic interests, and responses to limiting institutional arrangements.
(This course is offered as RRS 600 and HIST 466. Students may not repeat the course under an alternate prefix.)

Course Attributes:

• U.S. History
• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Social Justice

RRS 620 Colonialism, Imperialism and Resistance (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: ENG 214 or equivalent.

Examination of debates about postcolonial studies and the relevance of such intellectual projects to the socio-cultural experiences in the postcolonial world, such as the production of discourses, identification patterns and collective action among the post-colonized.

Course Attributes:

• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 625 Mixed Race Studies: A Comparative Focus (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Introduction to the field of mixed race studies from a comparative and ethnic studies perspective. Exploration of various multiracial issues for ethnic studies from the viewpoint of scholars and cultural expressionists who are themselves of mixed-racial heritage. [Formerly ETHS 625]

Course Attributes:

• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Social Justice

RRS 630 Palestine: Ethnic Studies Perspective (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing.

Advanced seminar examines Palestinian diasporic experiences in an historical and a comparative perspective. The rise, development, and decline of a Palestinian resistance movement will be the center of analysis. Seminar situated in post-colonial and diaspora/exile studies. [CSL may be available] [Formerly ETHS 630]

Course Attributes:

• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 655 Comparative Border Studies: Palestine and Mexico (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: ETHS 100 or consent of instructor.

Examination of debates and tensions in border studies utilizing case studies from Palestine and Mexico; focus on the history and development of the walls that U.S. and Israeli government are building and their impact on displacing marginalized communities. [Formerly ETHS 655]

Course Attributes:

• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Environmental Sustainability
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 657 South Asian Diaspora (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Uses transnational and comparative frameworks to examine South Asian immigration to various countries; how colonialism, nationalism, and the politics of race, gender, class, and sexuality shape diasporic identities and communities. [CSL may be available] [Formerly ETHS 657]
(This course is offered as RRS 657 and AA S 541. Students may not repeat the course under an alternate prefix.)

Course Attributes:

• UD-D: Social Sciences
• Am. Ethnic & Racial Minorities
• Global Perspectives
• Social Justice

RRS 670 Making Whites: Race-making in America (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

Evolution and implications of whiteness in America from colonial period to the present post-Civil Rights, multicultural era; includes the definition of whiteness and critical role of the racial construction of whiteness in the history of American racism and race relations.
(This course is offered as RRS 670 and HIST 462. Students may not repeat the course under an alternate prefix.)

RRS 690 Methods in Race and Resistance Studies (Units: 3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing.

Introduction to research methods with a focus on critical ethnographic methodologies as a way of building coalitions among Latina/no/Chicana/o and Black communities facing gentrification and out-migration. Primary ethnographic strategies include fieldwork, observant participation, interviewing, and oral histories.

RRS 694 Community Service Learning: Praxis in Race and Resistance Studies (Units: 1-3)

Prerequisite: Upper division standing or consent of instructor.

A community service learning activity course designed to engage students in experiential learning by collaborating with community partners that are involved in struggles for social justice, community empowerment, and equity within and/or across communities of color. May be repeated for a total of 6 units. [CSL may be available]

RRS 699 Independent Study (Units: 1-3)

Prerequisite: Consent of adviser, instructor, and program coordinator.

Supervised individual study of a particular inter-ethnic problem in ethnic studies. May be repeated for a total of 6 units.