»Ethnic Studies

The Ethnic Studies minor is the interdisciplinary study of race, ethnicity, and indigeneity, with a focus on the histories, cultures, perspectives, and community work of marginalized racial and ethnic groups in the United States. The curriculum takes a theoretical, historical, and experiential approach to examine: modern (in)justice; social movements; legal and public policy activism; antiracist and anti-patriarchal ontologies; liberationist epistemologies; and community and identity formation in American history. Students will learn about multiple cultures’ social and historical context within the United States; academic and experiential learning are interwoven such that key themes, concepts, and ideas in the field of Ethnic Studies are applied intentionally with communities.

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Stephanie Takaragawa is a cultural anthropologist whose research examines visual and material culture. Her research broadly focuses on media, art, performance, exhibition, and theme parks and their relationship to racial representation. Much of her work specifically looks at the Japanese-American incarceration during WWII and how that is understood, represented and memorialized in the present. Her teaching areas include cultural anthropology and visual culture, Asian American studies and Disneyland.

Analyze the ways in which race and racism have been, and continue to be, powerful social, cultural, and political forces, connecting these to other axes of stratification, including gender, class, sexuality, and legal status.
Understand critical histories, continual forms of oppression, and compare representations of borderlands, hybridity, migration, and diaspora within and between fields of Native American, African American, and/or Latinx Studies.
Apply critical frameworks of indigenous and liberationist epistemologies to contemporary social issues through engaging in building critical knowledge OR serving/organizing with marginalized communities around issues of culture, diversity, and justice.

»Ethnic Studies

Director: Dr. Stephanie Takaragawa

Program Learning Outcomes

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