Spring 24

AIS 101 – Intro to American Indian Studies

Interdisciplinary introduction surveys the stories, histories, and lands of tribal peoples who became known as "American Indians".

MW 1:00 - 2:15
Professor Ryan Burchfield


AIS 265 – Intro to American Indian Lit

This course explores a selection of recent writing by Indigenous authors in the United States and Canada. Among the issues examined in this course are enduring legacies of colonization, ethical literary scholarship, representations of gendered and sexual violence, histories of immobility and removal, LGBTQ, two-spirit, and indigiqueer identities, environmental justice, and the function of reconciliation for settler-colonial states. Our literary archive spans a range of forms and genres, including poetry, memoir, orature, travel narrative, short story, and graphica (animation and comic book). Written assignments will gear you toward presenting and supporting a critical argument and responding sensitively to literary texts through analysis.  

TR 11:00 - 12:15
Professor Rymhs


AIS 285 – Indigenous Thinkers

An introduction to the English-language traditions of indigenous intellectuals. Specific topics vary.

MW 2:00 - 3:15
Professor Maldonado


AIS 459 – Topics in American Indian Literature

“Stories Are Law”: The Legal Reasonings of Indigenous Literatures. This course examines what Indigenous (Native American/American Indian) literatures, from creation stories to legal memorials to novels, reveal about Indigenous legal frameworks and ways of ordering the world. Where Euro-American law has long cast Indigenous people as lawless, this course reveals the historical importance and ongoing significance of Indigenous legal reasoning. The course also delves into how Native authors and legal scholars have responded to and analyzed US law. As Heidi Stark (Turtle Mountain Ojibwe) puts it, Indigenous writings “dispel the sanctity of law, demonstrating that law is a set of stories.” We will approach law as story by studying literature from multiple tribal-national contexts and historical time periods. Readings will likely include the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Great Law of Peace, Angeline Boullie’s young adult novel Firekeeper’s Daughter, Layli Long Soldier’s experimental book of poetry Whereas, Louise Erdrich’s National Book Award-winning novel The Round House, William Apess’s autobiographical A Son of the Forest and legal memorial Indian Nullificaton for the White Man, Leslie Marmon Silko’s short story “Lullaby,” and selections from readings in Indigenous legal scholarship.

TR 12:30 - 01:45
Professor Calcaterra


AIS 501 – Indigenous Critical Theory

Oddkin: Rethinking Relations in Indigenous Literary and Visual Texts: In “How Do We Behave as Good Relatives?” Daniel Heath Justice writes about “making kin as oddkin […] where the range of relatives to whom we are responsible extends far beyond our biological relatives and, indeed, the category of the human itself.” This practice of “making oddkin” serves as centerpiece of this seminar, which turns to literary and visual texts by Indigenous artists whose work sees the human as thoroughly imbricated in more-than-human worlds—and indeed, challenges the coherence of such categories altogether. The various kinscapes invoked by these works show humans in intimate relation not only with “nature” but with the strange, abject, and seemingly non-living. Their embrace of the unwanted and, at times, the “monstrous” is a radical recuperation of the negative that models ways of making others into familiars while ultimately shifting who or what is seen as worthy of relation. This course will have a hybrid online/in-person meeting.

M 1:00 - 02:50
Professor Rymhs


AIS 503 – Seminar in Indigenous Studies

Indigenous Technologies: The term technology has a wide-ranging definition that covers a lot of ground. This class will take it up in terms of Indigenous communities across the globe and look at Indigenous technologies in many different temporalities. We will look at Indigenous technologies through virtual reality, augmented realities, games, printing, language revitalization and other modalities with hands on experiences that will ground our theoretical approach.

T 1:00 - 2:50
Professor Ryan Burchfield


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