Spring 2027 COURSE OFFERINGS (this list subject to change)
LSP 1101 - Research Strategies in Africana and Latina/o Studies (also ASRC 1900). The digital revolution has made an enormous amount of information available to research scholars, but discovering resources and using them effectively can be challenging. This course introduces students with research interests in Latino and Africana Studies to search strategies and methods for finding materials in various formats (e.g., digital, film, and print) using information databases such as the library catalog, print and electronic indexes, and the World Wide Web. Instructors provide equal time for lecture and hands-on learning. Topics include government documents, statistics, subject-specific online databases, social sciences, the humanities, and electronic citation management. Instructor: Hannah Toombs. MW 2:30 – 3:20. 1 credit. PLEASE NOTE: This course is a ½ semester course – 1st 7 week session – 1/25 – 3/24/2027. (This course does not fulfill minor/major requirements).
Introduction to Latinos in U.S. History – LSP 1802 (also HIST 1802. This course seeks a fuller recounting of the U.S. history by remapping what we understand as “America”. We will examine traditional themes in the teaching of U.S. history – territorial expansion and empire, migration and nation building, industrialization and labor, war and revolution, and citizenship and transnationalism—but we will examine this “American experience” in a broader hemispheric context and include as actors Americanos of Spanish, Mexican, Caribbean, and Central/South American ancestries. Instructor: Maria Cristina Garcia. TR 11:40 – 12:55. 3 credits. (This course fulfills required course for the LSP undergraduate minor/major).
Introduction to Latinx Studies – LSP 2100 (also AMST 2106). This course is an introduction to Latina/o Studies, an interdisciplinary field of knowledge production that focuses on historical, sociopolitical, cultural, and economic experiences of Latinx peoples in the United States—both as a nation and as a geopolitical location in a larger world. We will survey and analyze the arts, histories, cultures, politics, and sociological landscapes of Puerto Ricans, Dominican Americans, Cuban Americans, Mexican Americans, Central Americans, as well as other Latinx peoples who have made communities within the United States for centuries, and who are part of Latinx diasporas. Intersections of U.S. Latinx identities are also explored in this course by asking questions related to the fields housed within Latina/o Studies: How is Latina/o/x identity defined and performed? What does the use of an ‘x’ in Latinx mean or do? How do histories of race, class, gender, and sexuality in the U.S. impact one’s Latina/o/x identity? Many of these questions will be answered by using scholarship produced by the Latina/o Studies Program faculty at Cornell, familiarizing students with the breadth of research and expertise of program. Instructor: Evelyn Ambriz. MW 1:25 – 2:40. 3 credits. (This course fulfills required course for the LSP undergraduate minor/major).
Introduction to U.S. Latinx Literature – LSP 2400 (also ENGL 2400). Latina/os have always been part of U.S. history, yet the media often represents Latinx as only recent immigrants or as stereotypes that reduce rich cultures into a single, unified category or group of people. This practice hides the many unique and varied voices, stories, experiences, and ideas produced by Latinx expressive practices in forms ranging from novels and poetry to podcasts, tiktoks, films, theater, comics, memoirs, visual arts, and dance. This course will sample all of these forms while considering how artists meditate on their experiences of home, friendship, languages, love, migration, education, racialization, within the contexts of histories of colonization, discrimination, war, invasion, revolution, and ongoing activist organizing for resistance, sustainability, and thriving futures. In addition to common material, students will also have the chance to explore specific expressive practices that interest them. Instructor: Mary Pat Brady. TR 10:10 – 11:25. 3 credits. (This course fulfills Humanities distribution for the LSP undergraduate minor/major).
The North American West – LSP 2765 (also HIST 2765). In this course, we will learn about the history of the West. We will deconstruct popular myths about the West, as we engage with the major themes and significant debates that define the historical scholarship. This course will begin with Native origin stories and end with the 20th century. As a class, we will study the west from a multitude of perspectives, such as race, gender, and ethnicity, the environment, labor, politics and culture. This course is designed to increase our knowledge of the social, political and intellectual developments that have shaped our understanding of the West. Instructor: Camille Suarez. TR 8:40 – 9:55. 4 credits. (This course fulfills Humanities distribution for the LSP undergraduate minor/major).
“Vamos Pa’l Norte”: U.S. Migration and Communication – LSP 3250 (also COMM 3250). Migrants are a heterogenous group of people. The reasons for relocating to another country under which they relocate, whether they are authorized to remain in a country, their cultural background, their ethnic/racial identities, their education level, their gender identity and sexual orientation, and their socio-economic status are merely a few factors that contribute to immigrants’ diverse experiences. Thus, this course will introduce us to different frameworks, research, and practices that can help us understand the important role of communication in different migration experiences. On the one hand, communication can help mitigate some of the social and structural barriers that migrants face in the United States and elsewhere. On the other hand, communication can also exacerbate or lead to educational, economic, and health inequities among migrants. We will consider both ways in which communication can function for migrant communities. Overall, migration: (1) is a diverse area of research that can incorporate intrapersonal, interpersonal, community, organizational, institutional, cultural, and policy levels of analysis; (2) is studies using a wide range of methodologies; and (3) is affected by a variety of communication channels. Instructor: Monica Cornejo. MW 1:25 – 2:40. 3 credits. (This course fulfills Social Science distribution for the LSP undergraduate minor/major).
Modern and Contemporary Latino/Latin American Art – LSP 3551 (also ARTH 3550). This course is designed as a thematic survey of Latin American Latino art from the early twentieth century to present. Attention is given to issues such as the effect of colonialism on Latin American Latino visual arts, the creation of national artistic styles, the relation of Latin American arts and artists to European and American cultural centers, the interaction of high art and popular culture, the role art criticism on popular perceptions of Latin American art, and the contributions of Latin American Latino women to various aspects of artistic practice. Instructor: Maria Fernandez. MW 11:40 – 12:55. 3 credits. (This course fulfills an elective option for the LSP undergraduate minor).
Contemporary Issues in Latina/o/Latin America – LSP 4000/6000 (also LATA 4000/6000). Interested in Latina/o Studies and Latin American Studies? This course will explore topics in Anthropology, Art, Economics, History, Literature, Government, Sociology, and more, of US Latina/o and Latin American contexts. Course features guest speakers from Cornell and other institutions. Course requirements: Attend a total of 12 programming events of your choice throughout the semester sponsored by the Latina/o Studies and Latin American Studies (you should plan for at least one a week), and write a brief follow-up critical or analytic report on some aspect of what you learned. These reports are due within one week of the event. Instructor: Alex Nading. T 12:20 – 1:10. 1 credit. (This course DOES NOT fulfill requirements for the LSP minor/major).
Desbordando: Reading Caribbean Waters in Latinx Studies – LSP 4577 (also ENGL 4577). As Latinx studies continues to expand beyond its nationalistic origins and re-examines its geographical bounds, nuancing the role of borders within the field becomes urgent. This course probes at the primacy of the border in Latinx studies by centering Caribbean waters. As a liquid that refuses to succumb to the violence of fragmentation and instead embodies iterations of radical wholeness, water has an innate capacity to “undo” borders, a quality epitomized by the Spanish verb “desbordar” (to overflow). Through discussion and analysis of key Latinx cultural products we will gain an appreciation for the multiple ways in which water sustains provocative contradictions across borders regarding representations of historical memory, gender and sexuality, migration, race, and religion and spirituality, among others. Instructor: Rebeca Hey-Colón. T 2 – 4:30 pm. 4 credits. (This course fulfills Humanities distribution for the LSP undergraduate minor/major).
Performing Queer Masculinities - LSP 4702/6702 (also PMA 4702/6702). In this upper-level undergraduate/graduate seminar, students will analyze the survival strategies employed by people (of color) assigned female at birth as they perform versions of queer masculinities—on stage, on screen, in literature, in visual culture, and in everyday life.This course begins with a series of questions: What exactly are queer masculinities? How do performances of queer masculinities, from artistic productions to the everyday, evidence mechanisms for resilience, resistance, and survival? How do queer masculinities open up new ways for critically understanding the changing world around us? What might the lack of television shows and movies featuring BIPOC lesbian, queer, trans, and non-binary masculine figures tell us about the precarity of their lived experiences? As a way to answer these and other questions, students will analyze cultural productions, predominantly by artists of color, that center masculinities performed by people assigned female at birth who self-identify as butch, transgender, gender non-conforming, non-binary, and/or genderqueer. Students will learn to employ an inter- and multi-disciplinary theoretical framework, drawing from performance studies, media studies, trans, queer, feminist and gender studies, critical ethnic studies, literary theories, and visual cultural studies to analyze how television shows such as Vida, Work In Progress, King of Drag; books such as Stone Butch Blues and When We Were Outlaws; and the photography of artists like Lola Flash make visible queer masculine survival. Course participants will closely read the work of theorists such as Kemi Adeyemi, Briona Simone Jones, Judith Butler, Jack Halberstam, Deborah R. Vargas, and Francisco J. Galarte, amongst others. Instructor: Karen Jaime. MW 12:20 - 2:15. 4 credits. (This course fulfills Humanities distribution for the LSP undergraduate minor/major).
Latino Politics and the Boundaries of Belonging - LSP 6252 (also GOVT 6252). This course explores the concepts of membership, belonging, citizenship and (im)migration with regards to the U.S. Latina-o-x experience. In this course, we will examine how historically, politically, socially and culturally, Latinas-os-xs have been construed as belonging or not belonging members of U.S. society. Given the multifaceted nature of the topics, our investigation of these topics will rely on an interdisciplinary approach. That is, we will draw from materials and knowledge in political science, sociology, history, public policy, and the law. The course will survey materials, concepts, and theories to investigate the ways in which race, immigration, gender, geography, politics and policy have defined how, when and under what circumstances Latinas-os-xs belong or do not belong in America. Instructor: Kennia Coronada. Tuesday 8:30 - 11. 4 credits. (This course fulfills Social Science distribution for the LSP undergraduate minor/major).