The Latino Experience in the U.S.


Dr. Gonzalo Santos

SOC 335

Winter 1997

Office: DDH-AA 205 Off Hrs: 2:00-3:00 pm MWF

Phone: 664-2191


TEXTBOOKS

COURSE CONTENT

This course is focused primarily on the twentieth-century Mexican-American experience in the United States. We will study the migration flows in and out of the U.S. Southwest since the turn of the century (mostly as preferred cheap labor pools for seasonal agricultural work) and the older-but-related semi-colonial enclave pueblos and barrios, until recently excluded from most social institutions other than certain workplaces. We will also analyze the varied and growing presence and participation of Mexicans and Mexican-Americans in most aspects of life in the United States. On a broader thematic level, the associated phenomena of conquest and colonization, migration and re-settlement, socioeconomic integration, labor segmentation & racial discrimination, ethnogenesis and ethnotransformation, political mobilization, resistance, and participation, will all be explored as they have applied to XX-Century Latino peoples in the United States (Mexican-Americans, Puerto Ricans and Cubans, especially).

COURSE STRUCTURE

Classes: Lectures will be complemented with video presentations and class discussions of both. Students are expected to come fully prepared to discuss the assigned readings for the day. Attendance is mandatory. Unauthorized absences, tardiness, and/or early departures, as well as lack of preparation, will be noted, recorded, and subsequently penalized at the time of issuing final grades. In the latter part of the course, besides the lectures, students will make short presentations on the readings from the Daly Heyck book.

Group Research Project: Students will form research groups of 4-to-6 students. Each group will meet at their convenience to design, research, and write a bound-volume research project on a topic related to Latinos in the United States. The groups need to secure authorization of their topic from the instructor no later than January 24; topics will be approved on a first-come-first-served basis (sorry, no repeats).

Paper Format: Each student will write a paper for the research project in his or her own name, 10 pages long, double-spaced, font size 10-12, 1-inch margins. Each group's volume will be nicely bound, and will contain a title page, a table of contents (identifying each individual paper by its title and the name of the student who wrote it), the actual papers, any data appendices, and a single, integrated bibliography at the end (with the compiler's name on it).

The citation style in the texts ought to be as follows: (Author's last name, year: pages). E.g.: (Santos, 1994: 36-38). Long quotes ought to be indented, single-space. Students should be aware that plagiarism of any kind will result in an automatic F-grade and should avoid it at all costs by quoting properly while adding their own analysis to the text, truly in their own words.

Students are strongly encouraged to visit Dr. Santos as a group during his office hours to discuss their specific project and each individual's focus or aspect. Historically-grounded projects tied to the present conditions of Latinos are especially encouraged. Finally, an electronic bulletin board is available to each group if they wish to communicate via e-mail, or they can set up one themselves.

Some broad Latino topics : Affirmative action as it has affected/being affected by Latinos; the hot debate over authorized and unauthorized migration flows and its impact on/involvement of Latinos; the special rights and obligations of certain Latinos (e.g., refugee status, island commonwealth, land grant Chicanos) and the dilemmas these pose; enduring institutional racism and discrimination against Latinos; the politics of racial labels & statistical counting and the pros and cons of Latino panethnicity vs. national-origin ethnicity and/or cultural assimilation; the hot issue of language and bilingualism; the socioeconomic impact of globalization and regionalization (NAFTA) on Latinos; the economic dead-ends, traps and opportunities facing Latinos today; the political challenges facing Latinos today; Mexico's (Cuba's, Puerto Rico's) relations to the U.S. and how it affects/is affected by Latinos in the U.S.; You may suggest other topics.

Exams: There will be a mid-term exam on Monday, February 10, and a final exam on Monday, March 21 (11:00 a.m. - 1:30 p.m.). Both exams will be made up of short essay questions based on the lectures, the videos, and the readings. The final exam will only cover the second half of the course.

Grading: Each exam is worth 30 points. The written research project is worth 30 points for each student (25 for each individual section + 5 for the quality of the whole volume). The class presentations are together worth 10 points. The final letter grade will be assigned, on a scale of 0 to 100, as follows:

94-100 = A 87-89 = B+ 77-79 = C+ 65-69 = D
90-93 = A- 84-86 = B 74-76 = C < 65 = F
80-83 = B- 70-73 = C-

Office Hours: All students are encouraged to visit the instructor regularly, especially to make sure their individual research papers are well focused, or to discuss any question they may have from the class lectures, the textbooks, or their group interactions.


Schedule of Reading Assignments

"Ch: #" = chapter in textbook assigned for that day's class

MONDAY

WEDNESDAY

FRIDAY

1/6

INTRODUCTION

1/8
Guerin-Gonzales

Ch: Intro. + 1

1/10
Guerin-Gonzales

Ch: 2

1/13
Guerin-Gonzales

Ch: 3

1/15
Guerin-Gonzales

Ch: 4

1/17
Guerin-Gonzales

Ch 5

1/20

HOLIDAY

Ch:

1/22
Guerin-Gonzales

Ch: 6

1/24
Gómez-Quiñones

Ch: 1

1/27
Gómez-Quiñones

Ch: 2

1/29
Gómez-Quiñones

Ch: 2

1/31
Gómez-Quiñones

Ch: 3

2/3
Gómez-Quiñones

Ch: 3

2/5
Gómez-Quiñones

Ch: 4

2/7
Gómez-Quiñones

Ch: 5 + 6

2/10

M I D - T E R M

E X A M

2/12
Readings on Puerto Rico

On Reserve/Web

2/14
Acuña

Chs: 1 & 2

2/17
Acuña

Ch: 3 + 4

2/19
Acuña

Ch: 5 + 6

2/21
Acuña

Ch: 7 + 8

2/24
Acuña

Ch: 9 + 10

2/26
Acuña

Ch: 11 + 12 + 13

2/28
NACLA I: Immigration

On Reserve/Web

3/3
NACLA II: Latinos in Labor

On Reserve/Web

3/5
NACLA III: Cuba & Cuban-Am's

On Reserve/Web

3/7
Daly Heyck

Part: 1

3/10
Daly Heyck

Parts: 2 & 3

3/12
Daly Heyck

Part: 4

3/14
Daly Heyck

Part: 5

3/17
Daly Heyck

Part: 6


FINAL EXAM IS ON

11:00 A.M. TO


FRIDAY, MARCH 21

1:30 P.M.