LAH 3931 Section 03AG: Youth Culture in the Americas (Spring 2018)
History is often the story of adults. But what can children and youth teach us about the last two centuries’ cultural, political, social, and economic revolutions? This class is a survey of youth cultures and politics in Latin America and the Latinx United States. It also explores the importance of youth and children as history makers. Throughout the semester, we will be both consumers and critics of youth cultures. Music, fiction, dance, film, zines, posters, radical newspapers, and more will be our sources as we analyze the very creation of categories like “childhood,” “youth,” and “revolution.”
We will come to understand how and why the categories of childhood and youth have changed over time and explore the intersections of race, class, sexuality, and location in the meanings of childhood and youth. Key readings will come from Alice Bag, Richie Valens, Mexico City student activists in 1968, the Young Lords Party, Luis Fonsi, Daddy Yankee, and Junot Díaz.
If we examine history through the lens of childhood and youth, what can we see differently?
Click here to download the syllabus for LAH 3931 Section 03AG: Youth Culture in the Americas (Spring 2018)