SAKS004 North American Cultural Geographies

Faculty of Arts
Spring 2023
Extent and Intensity
0/2/0. 8 credit(s). Type of Completion: zk (examination).
Teacher(s)
doc. PhDr. Tomáš Pospíšil, Ph.D. (lecturer)
doc. Jeffrey Alan Smith, M.A., Ph.D. (lecturer)
Guaranteed by
doc. PhDr. Tomáš Pospíšil, Ph.D.
Contact Person: Tomáš Hanzálek
Supplier department: Department of English and American Studies – Faculty of Arts
Timetable
Thu 18:00–19:40 G32
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: 9/18, 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, including: settlement patterns and sources of regional diversity; immigration and ethnic subcultures; industrialization, urbanization and suburbanization; the development and geographical distribution of contemporary political cultures and identities; and the geographical dimensions of contemporary political and cultural conflicts.
Learning outcomes
Students will be able to present and explain key concepts of cultural geography and apply them to specific cultural regions of North America. They will be able to analyze contemporary events and developments in cultural-geographical terms, and will be prepared for further studies dealing with historical, cultural and political topics involving the North American Anglosphere.
Syllabus
  • Note: Follow the course ELF page and announcements in class for any changes or updates to this schedule.
  • WEEK 1: Course introduction; political nations and states vs. cultural regions
  • -------------------------------------
  • WEEK 2: ENVISIONING THE LANDSCAPE; EARLY SETTLEMENT AND CULTURAL "HEARTHS" (17th - 18th centuries)
  • Read:
  • > Sanford, "The Quest for Paradise," selections posted
  • > Joseph Mede's letter on American settlement, 1634
  • > BEGIN reading Colin Woodard, American Nations
  • > BEGIN researching and preparing class presentations on individually assigned topics
  • -------------------------------------
  • WEEK 3: INDEPENDENCE, EXPANSION, THE FRONTIER (18th - 19th centuries)
  • Read:
  • > Axtell, "Colonial America Without the Indians"
  • > Turner, "The Significance of the Frontier in American History," selections posted
  • > Mondi, "Connected & Unified? A More Critical Look at Turner's America"
  • > Smith, Virgin Land, selections posted
  • > Bryant, "The Prairies"
  • -------------------------------------
  • WEEK 4: INDUSTRIAL GROWTH AND THE CHANGING LANDSCAPE (19th century)
  • Read:
  • > Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, Query 19
  • > Coxe, A View of America, selections posted
  • > Hawthorne, Sleepy Hollow journal entry
  • > Thoreau, Walden, selections posted
  • > Whitman, "Democratic Vistas" and other selections posted
  • -------------------------------------
  • WEEK 5: INDUSTRIALIZATION, IMMIGRATION, ETHNIC CHANGE (19th - 20th centuries)
  • Read:
  • > Gerber, American Immigration, selections posted
  • > Roediger, The Wages of Whiteness, selections posted
  • > Horsman, Race & Manifest Destiny, selections posted
  • -------------------------------------
  • WEEK 6: SOUTHERN EXCEPTIONALISM (19th - 20th centuries)
  • Read:
  • > Cobb, Away Down South, selections posted
  • > Moore, How Covid-19 gave me back my Southern accent
  • -------------------------------------
  • WEEK 7: AFRICAN AND MULTICULTURAL AMERICA (19th - 20th centuries)
  • Read:
  • > Lind, The Next American Nation, selections posted
  • > King, "America's Post-Multiculturalist Settlement"
  • > Berlin, The Making of African America, Chapter 1 and Epilogue
  • > Hannah-Jones, Introduction to “The 1619 Project,” selections posted
  • -------------------------------------
  • WEEK 8: SUBURBANIZATION 1 (20th century)
  • Read:
  • > Beauregard, Identity and Urbanity, selections posted
  • > Cullen, The Dream of Home Ownership, excerpt indicated
  • > Fishman, "Urbanity vs. Suburbanity: France vs. the US"
  • -------------------------------------
  • WEEK 9: SUBURBANIZATION 2 -- "SPRAWL," THE SUNBELT, AND CHANGING DEMOGRAPHICS (20th - 21st centuries)
  • Read:
  • > What is Sprawl, and Why?, selections posted
  • > Russell, "On the Embattled 'Burbs"
  • > Sprawl in Atlanta, selections posted
  • > Gutfreund, 20th-Century Sprawl, selections posted
  • -------------------------------------
  • WEEK 10: READING WEEK, NO CLASS MEETING
  • -------------------------------------
  • WEEK 11: PRESENTATIONS
  • -------------------------------------
  • WEEK 12: PRESENTATIONS
  • -------------------------------------
  • WEEK 13: DEINDUSTRIALIZATION AND NEW MIGRATIONS (20th - 21st centuries)
  • Read:
  • > Gunn, "How to Save Coal Country"
  • > Poppers, "The Great Plains: From Dust to Dust"
  • > Rees, "Buffalo Commons: Responses to a Radical Vision"
  • -------------------------------------
  • WEEK 14: CONCLUSION -- THE POLITICS OF RED, BLUE AND WHITE (21st century)
  • Read:
  • > Johnson, Reimagining My Geography of Consumption
  • > Miller, How Geography Explains the United States
  • > Graham, Red State, Blue City
  • > Brooks, The Unifying American Story
  • > Wolin, "Site of Catastrophe," selections posted
Literature
    required literature
  • Colin Woodard, American nations: a history of the eleven rival regional cultures of North America. New York: Viking, 2011.
  • Timothy L Hall, Religion in America. New York: American Experience / Facts on File, 2007.
  • BERLIN, Ira. The making of African America : the four great migrations. New York: Viking, 2010, 304 s. ISBN 9780670021376. info
    recommended literature
  • The Settling of North America: the atlas of the great migrations into North America from the Ice Age to the present. Macmillan, ©1995.
  • Jonathan Halperin Earle, The Routledge atlas of African American history. Routledge, 2000.
  • Michael Lind, The next American nation: the new nationalism and the fourth American revolution. Free Press, 1995.
  • Warren A Beck; Ynez D Haase, Historical atlas of the American West. University of Oklahoma Press, 1989.
  • FISCHER, David Hackett. Albion's seed : four British folkways in America. New York: Oxford University Press, 1989, xxi, 946. ISBN 0195037944. info
    not specified
  • Michael Lind, Made in Texas: George W. Bush and the Southern takeover of American politics. Basic Books, 2003.
  • William S Saunders, Sprawl and suburbia: a Harvard design magazine reader. Univ. of Minnesota Press, 2005.
  • David R. Roediger, The wages of whiteness: race and the making of the American working class. Verso, 1991.
  • 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.
  • Noel Ignatiev, How the Irish became White. Routledge, 1995.
  • H.B. Cavalcanti, Gloryland: Christian Suburbia, Christian Nation. Praeger, 2007.
  • James C. Cobb, Away Down South: A History of Southern Identity. Oxford University Press, 2005.
  • John Miller, Egotopia: Narcissism and the New American Landscape. University of Alabama Press, 1997.
  • James Axtell, After Columbus: Essays in the ethnohistory of colonial North America. Oxford University Press, 1990.
  • Thomas Frank, What's the matter with Kansas?: How conservatives won the heart of America. Metropolitan Books, 2004.
  • Owen D. Gutfreund, Twentieth century sprawl: highways and the reshaping of the American Landscape. Oxford University Press, 2004.
  • Stephen A Flanders, Atlas of American migration. Facts on File, 1998.
  • Desmond King, The Liberty of Strangers: Making the American Nation. Oxford University Press, 2005.
  • Jim Cullen, The American dream: a short history of an idea that shaped a nation. Oxford University Press, 2003.
Teaching methods
Readings, lectures, discussions, presentations
Assessment methods
One presentation and accompanying written report, 15%; final exam, 85% (online on ELF, exactly 1 week after the last class meeeting)
Language of instruction
English
Further comments (probably available only in Czech)
Study Materials
The course is taught annually.
Teacher's information
See the course ELF page for posted assignments and other materials and updates.
The course is also listed under the following terms Spring 2020, Spring 2021, Spring 2022, Spring 2024, Spring 2025.
  • Enrolment Statistics (Spring 2023, recent)
  • Permalink: https://is.muni.cz/course/phil/spring2023/SAKS004