A broadly comparative course on the effects of transnational displacement and dislocation on culture, identity, and place as depicted in contemporary literature and cultural theory. All transnational displacements are not the same, and we will examine important paradigms featured in critical discussion on the topic: migration (the movement of peoples from one place to another); diaspora (scattered communities displaced over wide distances but held together by myths of the homeland); borderlands (transnational space centered on a geopolitical line).

Primary texts: Americo Paredes, George Washington Gómez; Francisco Goldman, The Ordinary Seaman; Edouard Glissant, The Fourth Century; Francisco Jiménez, The Circuit; as well as excerpts from Gloria Anzaldúa; Thomas King; Alfonso Quijada Urías, and others.

Secondary readings by Stuart Hall, James Clifford, Edouard Glissant, Bruce Robbins, Arjun Appadurai, Edward Said, Deleuze, Rosi Braidotti, Paul Gilroy, Doreen Massey, Karen Kaplan, Robin Cohen, William Safran, Iain Chambers, Rey Chow and others.

Assignments: 12-15 pp. research paper; mock review of journal article; presentation on secondary readings.