Anth/ChStu 416, Winter 2003
Comparative Social Movements: Mexico and the United States

Course Schedule

JANUARY

T-7      Personal introductions. Review course syllabus, objectives, and requirements. Introduction to the study of social movements.


I. THEORIES OF SOCIAL MOVEMENTS AND GLOBALIZATION

Th-9      Situating Mexican and Chicano social movements in the context of globalization. The critique of neoliberalism.

Readings: Electronic Reserve #1 – Pierre Hamel, Henri Lustiger-Thaler, and Louis Maheu, Is there a role for social movements? Electronic Reserve # 2 – Gustavo Esteva and Mahdu Prakash, From global to local: Beyond neoliberalism to the international of hope.
     
T-14      Social movement theory, I: Classical approaches from the study of collective behavior to social movements. Deprivation, structural strain, mass society, and resource mobilization theories.

Readings: Electronic Reserve #3 – Rajendra Singh, The theory of social movements: Old and new.

Th-16      Social movement theory, II: The rise of new social movement (NSM) theory.
     
Readings: Electronic Reserve #3 – Rajendra Singh, The theory of social movements: Old and new. Electronic Reserve #4 – Leslie Sklair, Social movements and global capitalism.


II. HISTORICAL OVERVIEW OF MEXICAN AND CHICANO SOCIAL MOVEMENTS

T-21      Historical roots of Mexican and Chicano social movements.

Readings: Rosales, Chicano!, pp. 2-38.

Th-23      Immigration, labor, and social movements.

Readings: Rosales, Chicano!, pp. 42-52, 112-151.

Assignment Note: Issue paper #1 is due at the beginning of class.

T-28      Land rights and Chicano social movements.

Readings: Rosales, Chicano!, pp. 154-170.

Th-30      Chicano youth and student movements. Chicano Moratorium. Cultural nationalism in the sixties and beyond.

Readings: Rosales, Chicano!, pp. 174-225.


III. LA MUJER IN SOCIAL MOVEMENTS

T-4      Women in social movements, I: Madres veracruzanas and the anti-nuclear power movement in Mexico.

Readings: García-Gorena, Mothers and the Mexican Antinuclear Power Movement, pp. 3-58.
     

FEBRUARY

Th-6      Women in social movements, II: Madres veracruzanas

Readings: García-Gorena, Mothers and the Mexican Antinuclear Power Movement, pp.59-146.

Assignment note: Mid-term take home exam is assigned.

T-11      Women in social movements, III: Mothers of East Los Angeles and ecological democracy.

Readings: Pardo, Mexican American Women Activists, pp. 1-104.

Assignment note: Mid-term take home exam is due at the beginning of class.

Th-13      Women in social movements, IV: Chicanas, identity, and politics.

Readings: Pardo, pp. Mexican American Women Activists, pp. 105-252.

T-18      Women in social movements, V: Maquiladora workers - From managerial tyranny to tortuguismo.

Readings: Peña, The Terror of the Machine, pp. 3-133.

Assignment Note: Issue paper #2 is due at the beginning of class.

Th-20      Women in social movements, VI: Maquiladora workers – From factory to community struggles.

Readings: Peña, The Terror of the Machine, pp. 135-241.


IV. INDIGENOUS COMMUNITIES IN SOCIAL MOVEMENTS

T-25      Indigenous communities in social movements, I: The Zapatista Revolt and postmodern politics. Critiques of dominant theories of globalization, left and right.

Readings: Nash, Mayan Visions, pp. xi-29.

Th-27      Indigenous communities in social movements, II: Genesis of indigenous
communities.

Readings: Nash, Mayan Visions, pp. 31-117.


MARCH

T-4 Indigenous communities in social movements, III: From the New Year’s War to the New Civil Society.

Readings: Nash, Mayan Visions, pp. 119-218.

Th-6      Indigenous communities in social movements, IV: Autonomy and globalization.

Readings: Nash, Mayan Visions, pp. 219-254.


VI. LATINOS AND NEW SOCIAL MOVEMENTS

T-11      Chicanos and the environmental justice movement: Identity, place, and ecological struggles. The problematic of cultural essentialism.

Readings: Electronic reserve #5 – Devon G. Peña, The scope of Latino environmental studies. Electronic reserve #6 – Devon G. Peña, Identity, place, and communities of resistance. Electronic reserve #7 – Laura Pulido, Cultural essentialism and ecological legitimacy.

Assignment Note: Issue paper #3 due at the beginning of class.

Th-13      Transbordered and transnational communities in new social movements. What is the state of post-millennial Latina/o politics in the aftermath of 9-11?

Review session for final exam.

Readings: Electronic reserve #8 – Alberto Moreiras, Global fragments: The second Latinamericanism.

Assignment Note: Final take home exam assigned.

T-18 No class. Exam week.

Assignment Note: Final take-home exam due by 4 p.m. in my mailbox, Anthropology Department, Denny Hall.