As Penn celebrates Black History Month through programming and events, here are five classes offered this semester across departments that highlight Black history.
1. AFRC 1187: “The History of Women and Men of African Descent at the University of Penn”
This spring-term class offers students a look at the history of the women and men of African descent who have studied, taught, researched, and worked at Penn.
By examining records, texts, and archives at the University, the class attempts to uncover the history of Black people in America and throughout the diaspora as well as collectively unpack Black history at Penn.
Taught by co-facilitators University Chaplain Charles Howard and Penn Spectrum Programs and Shared Interest Groups Director Daina Troy, the course includes a “making Black History project” that explores a “facet of life at Penn linked to Black culture, diversity, and/or social justice, and developing a proposal to enhance that facet.”
2. ENGL 0525: “Black Style: Fashions, Fictions, and Films of the 1920s”
This 15-person course focuses on the 1920s Harlem Renaissance, using fashion as a lens to discuss the relationship between race and representation in print and on film. The course emphasizes collaborative skills through discussions.
Taught by English professor Zita Nunes, the class also incorporates visits to local archives and museums and a semesterlong project highlighting the Harlem Renaissance’s hidden histories in Philadelphia. The course, which is listed as a Benjamin Franklin Seminar, was taught for the first time last fall semester.
3. MUSC 3440: “Black Music and Sports”
MUSC 3440 explores the intersection of sports, music, and race within the United States’ popular culture through modern and historical examples. The course is instructed by Music assistant professor Jasmine Henry, who is a musicologist and sound engineer specializing in 20th and 21st-century African American popular music.
Students will examine the complexities of Black athleticism and musicianship through modern media coverage. Other topics include how sports and music serve as an opportunity to break the color line, the role of capitalism and exploitation in the music industry, and how sports and music are represented across cultural mediums. This interdisciplinary course prepares students for the broader study of popular culture.
4. PHIL 4515: “Existence in Black”
Cross-listed in the Africana Studies and History departments, PHIL 4515 examines how the global Black experience shapes and is shaped by various issues such as freedom, alienation, race, and gender. In the course, students delve into texts on Black aliveness and Black existential philosophy.
The class is taught by Africana Studies professor David Amponsah and juxtaposes Black existential thought with canonical European existential philosophy, examining expressions of Black experience through literature, music, and philosophy.
5. AFRC 1177: “African American History 1876 to Present”
This spring semester lecture is a continuation of AFRC 1176: “African American History 1550-1876.” Covering the post-Reconstruction era to the present, the course delves into major events, issues, and figures in African American history and examines different forms of Black resistance, rebellion, and activism within the system of slavery and beyond.
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