LAS 221 The U.S.-Mexico Border
An investigation of the history of the creation, maintenance, and evolution of the U.S.-Mexico border from the nineteenth through twenty-first centuries. Students investigate the geopolitical intentions that informed its invention in the nineteenth century, its growing importance as a site of immigration enforcement in the twentieth century, and its continuing importance in contemporary cultural narratives of inclusion and exclusion. Students discover the border’s complex dynamics through an interdisciplinary lens encompassing academic texts in fields such as Latin American Studies, history, sociology, literature, and media studies. The course will also incorporate cultural artifacts such as music, films, and performance that articulate polysemic representations of the U.S.-Mexico border.