SAKS04 North American Cultural Geographies

Faculty of Arts
Spring 2017
Extent and Intensity
0/2/0. 2 credit(s) (plus 3 credits for an exam). Recommended Type of Completion: zk (examination). Other types of completion: z (credit).
Teacher(s)
doc. Jeffrey Alan Smith, M.A., Ph.D. (lecturer)
Guaranteed by
doc. PhDr. Tomáš Pospíšil, Ph.D.
Center for North American Studies – Department of English and American Studies – Faculty of Arts
Contact Person: Tomáš Hanzálek
Supplier department: Center for North American Studies – Department of English and American Studies – Faculty of Arts
Timetable
Mon 14:10–15:45 G23
Prerequisites (in Czech)
! AJ27073 NA Cultural Geographies
Course Enrolment Limitations
The course is also offered to the students of the fields other than those the course is directly associated with.
The capacity limit for the course is 18 student(s).
Current registration and enrolment status: enrolled: 0/18, only registered: 0/18, only registered with preference (fields directly associated with the programme): 0/18
fields of study / plans the course is directly associated with
Course objectives
Historical survey of the origins and evolution of the English-speaking cultural regions of North America, principally the United States, including: settlement patterns and sources of regional diversity; immigration and ethnic subcultures; urbanization and suburbanization; and the development and geographical distribution of contemporary political cultures and identities. Students completing the course successfully will be conversant with these concepts, familiar with details and evidence associated with each of them, and able to make use of them analytically in further studies dealing with historical, cultural and political topics involving the North American Anglosphere.
Syllabus
  • NOTE: Unless otherwise indicated, assigned readings are available in the relevant folders at tiny.cc/NACulturalGeographies.
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  • WEEK 1 (20 February): Course introduction
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  • WEEK 2 (27 February): ENVISIONING THE LANDSCAPE; EARLY SETTLEMENT AND CULTURAL "HEARTHS" (17th - 18th centuries)
  • Read:
  • > Sanford, "Quest for Paradise," posted excerpts
  • > Woodard, "The Real U.S. Map"
  • ALSO read (no specific due date -- see "core readings" folder):
  • > Fischer, Albion's Seed, posted excerpts
  • > Robinson, summaries of Albion's Seed
  • > Woodard, American Nations: Introduction, chapters 21, 23-28, and Epilogue
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  • WEEK 3 (6 March): INDEPENDENCE, EXPANSION, THE FRONTIER (18th - 19th centuries)
  • Read:
  • > Turner, "The Significance of the Frontier in American History," posted excerpts
  • > Axtell, "Colonial America Without the Indians"
  • > Bryant, "The Prairies"
  • > Hawthorne, Sleepy Hollow journal entry, posted excerpt
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  • WEEK 4 -- class canceled
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  • WEEK 5 (20 March): INDUSTRIALIZATION, IMMIGRATION, ETHNIC CHANGE (19th - 20th centuries)
  • Read:
  • > Gerber, American Immigration, posted excerpts
  • > Roediger, The Wages of Whiteness, posted excerpts
  • > Horsman, Race & Manifest Destiny, posted excerpts
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  • WEEK 6 (27 March): SOUTHERN EXCEPTIONALISM AND THE MAKING OF AFRICAN AMERICA (19th - 20th centuries)
  • Read:
  • > Cobb, Away Down South, posted excerpts
  • > Berlin, The Making of African America, chapter 1
  • -------------------------------------
  • WEEK 7 (3 April): MULTICULTURAL AMERICA (20th century)
  • Read:
  • > Lind, The Next American Nation, posted excerpts
  • > King, "America's Post-Multiculturalist Settlement"
  • > STUDENT PRESENTATIONS 1
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  • WEEK 8 (10 April): SUBURBANIZATION, "SPRAWL," AND THE SUNBELT (20th century)
  • Read:
  • > Bueregard, "Identity and Urbanity"
  • > Cullen, "The Dream of Home Ownership"
  • > Fishman, "Urbanity vs. Suburbanity: France and the US"
  • > STUDENT PRESENTATIONS 2
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  • WEEK 9 (17 April): READING WEEK -- NO CLASS MEETING
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  • WEEK 10 (24 April): DEINDUTRIALIZATION, NEW MIGRATIONS, AND THE POLITICS OF RED, WHITE AND BLUE (20th - 21st centuries)
  • Read:
  • > Duany et. al., "What is Sprawl, and Why?"
  • > Gutreund, Twentieth-Century Sprawl, posted excerpts
  • > Sprawl in Atlanta (3 articles posted)
  • > Russell, "On the Embattled 'Burbs"
  • > Graham, "Red State, Blue City"
  • > STUDENT PRESENTATIONS 3
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  • WEEKS 11-12 (1 and 8 May): THE POLITICS OF RED, WHITE AND BLUE, continued; ENVISIONING THE 21st-CENTURY LANDSCAPE
  • (Readings only; no class meetings in 2017 due to national holidays)
  • Read:
  • > Hasan, "Top Democrats are Wrong About Trump Supporters"
  • > Gunn, "How to Save Coal Country"
  • > Popper and Popper, "The Great Plains: From Dust to Dust"
  • > Rees, "Buffalo Commons: Responses to a Radical Vision"
  • > Miller, "How Geography Explains the United States"
  • > Brooks, "The Unifying American Story"
  • > Wolin, "Site of Catastrophe," posted excerpts
Literature
    required literature
  • Timothy L Hall, Religion in America. New York: American Experience / Facts on File, 2007.
  • Colin Woodard, American nations: a history of the eleven rival regional cultures of North America. New York: Viking, 2011.
  • BERLIN, Ira. The making of African America : the four great migrations. New York: Viking, 2010, 304 s. ISBN 9780670021376. info
    recommended literature
  • Jonathan Halperin Earle, The Routledge atlas of African American history. Routledge, 2000.
  • Warren A Beck; Ynez D Haase, Historical atlas of the American West. University of Oklahoma Press, 1989.
  • Michael Lind, The next American nation: the new nationalism and the fourth American revolution. Free Press, 1995.
  • The Settling of North America: the atlas of the great migrations into North America from the Ice Age to the present. Macmillan, ©1995.
  • FISCHER, David Hackett. Albion's seed : four British folkways in America. New York: Oxford University Press, 1989, xxi, 946. ISBN 0195037944. info
    not specified
  • John Miller, Egotopia: Narcissism and the New American Landscape. University of Alabama Press, 1997.
  • Jim Cullen, The American dream: a short history of an idea that shaped a nation. Oxford University Press, 2003.
  • H.B. Cavalcanti, Gloryland: Christian Suburbia, Christian Nation. Praeger, 2007.
  • William S Saunders, Sprawl and suburbia: a Harvard design magazine reader. Univ. of Minnesota Press, 2005.
  • Noel Ignatiev, How the Irish became White. Routledge, 1995.
  • James C. Cobb, Away Down South: A History of Southern Identity. Oxford University Press, 2005.
  • Thomas Frank, What's the matter with Kansas?: How conservatives won the heart of America. Metropolitan Books, 2004.
  • James Axtell, After Columbus: Essays in the ethnohistory of colonial North America. Oxford University Press, 1990.
  • Owen D. Gutfreund, Twentieth century sprawl: highways and the reshaping of the American Landscape. Oxford University Press, 2004.
  • Michael Lind, Made in Texas: George W. Bush and the Southern takeover of American politics. Basic Books, 2003.
  • Byron E. Shafer and Richard Johnston, The End of Southern Exceptionalism: Class, race, and partisan change in the postwar South. Harvard University Press, 2009.
  • Robert Fishman, Bourgeois utopias: the rise and fall of suburbia. Basic Books, 1987.
  • David R. Roediger, The wages of whiteness: race and the making of the American working class. Verso, 1991.
  • Desmond King, The Liberty of Strangers: Making the American Nation. Oxford University Press, 2005.
  • Stephen A Flanders, Atlas of American migration. Facts on File, 1998.
Teaching methods
Readings, lectures, discussions, presentations
Assessment methods
Final exam (to be scheduled); the "re-sit" will be an essay; also, one in-class report
Language of instruction
English
Further Comments
Study Materials
The course is taught annually.
Teacher's information
http://tiny.cc/NACulturalGeographies
The course is also listed under the following terms Spring 2018, Spring 2019, Spring 2020.
  • Enrolment Statistics (Spring 2017, recent)
  • Permalink: https://is.muni.cz/course/phil/spring2017/SAKS04