Learning Outcomes

After completing AADS 1110, students will:

1. Understand how AADS (variously termed Black Studies, Africana Studies, African and African American Studies by different university programs over time) emerged and has developed as an interdisciplinary field since the 1970s.

2. Be able to apply an intersectional analysis to a text, or demonstrate competence in explaining how race is operating with other identity categories鈥攕uch as gender, class, national identity, age, sexuality, political ideology, and spiritual beliefs鈥攊n authors鈥� approaches to a particular historical, social, or cultural problem.

3. Demonstrate competence in a taxonomy of thinking skills, including understanding of material and concepts under study and the ability to do the following:

  • identify underlying assumptions in an argument
  • identify and understand the various components of an argument
  • evaluate strengths and weaknesses of an argument
  • identify features of various written and visual forms
  • identify relationships between written forms and content
  • express orally and in writing their ideas in a clear and distinct manner

1. Critical skills and thinking. Students will be able to apply a sociological lens to scholarly research and other sources of information (e.g., newspapers).

2. Career training. Students will be well-prepared for graduate training and/or entry-level positions in various fields:

  • Students will be able to reason logically, write cogently, and work with others.
  • Students will be able to discuss, in depth, sociological theories, ideas, and literature.

3. Research skills.

  • Students will be able to transform a problem of interest into a researchable question.
  • Students will be able to justify various methodological decisions on ethical as well as logical grounds.
  • Students will be able to collect, analyze, and interpret qualitative and quantitative data.

4. Life skills. Students will develop a deeper understanding of themselves and their role in society. Students will be able to explain how societal and structural factors influence life experiences and social problems across historical and cultural contexts.

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