New MALAS Seminar, Spring 2023 with Professor Taharka Adé, AFRICAN CIVILIZATION II

Art by Bruce Onobrakpeya

AFRICAN CIVILIZATION II 

(AFRAS 521 & MALAS 600C)

Mondays + Wednesdays, 1:00-1:50 PM

Professor Taharka Adé

 

This course serves as an intensive investigation into the rise and fall of several major African Civilizations. Civilizations and periods will normally include the Sudanic empires of Ghana, Mali, and Songhai, as well as the histories of more modern societies such as the Yoruba, Xhosa, and Asante. Emphasis will be placed on African agency, showing the evolution of the peoples, nations, and their civilizations at different places and times within the long history of Africa.

 

Bio: Dr. Taharka Adé is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Africana Studies. Adé obtained both his M.A. and Ph.D in Africology from Temple University. His research interest is primarily the development of comparative analyses between various African and African diaspora cultural phenomena. 

 

New Spring 2023 MALAS 585 Class Open to Juniors, Seniors, and Graduate Students! "Seminar in the Histories and Cultures of Skateboarding" with Professor David Kamper

MALAS  585 - Seminar in the Histories 

and Cultures of Skateboarding 
Mondays and Wednesdays, 3:30PM - 4:45PM in HH 146 
Professor David Kamper 

Skateboarding is one of the most popular sports/activities in the United States (and beyond) and is a billion dollar industry with millions of participants globally. What makes skateboarding unique and so worthy of study if the way it straddles the line between sports and art, with an electric improvisation of body, space, and style. Moreover, it constitutes a sub-culture, the examination of which teaches us about social interaction, fanaticism, and unwritten ethical codes and cultural values. 

This course will discuss a broad range of phenomenological questions about how skateboarders interact with space, urban built-environments, and aesthetics. It is far more than just a description or appreciation of skateboarding, but rather a course that combines critical analyses of social constructions of race, gender, and class with an advanced understanding of popular culture and how skateboarding relates to all of the above.

Cult[ural] Studies: Cars, California, Mark Dery, and the Ghost in the (Rolling) Machine Hepner Hall, 4pm, Monday December 5, 2022 Professor William Nericcio

MALAS Lecture Series - Fall 2022, A public lecture

"Cult[ural] Studies: Cars, California, Mark Dery, and the Ghost in the (Rolling) Machine"  

Hepner Hall 214, 4pm, Monday December 5, 2022  Professor William Nericcio, Director, MALAS 

 The lecture and discussion are open to the SDSU Community    

Great New MALAS Class Spring 2023 -- POST-IMPERIAL NATIONAL IDENTITY(IES) IN MODERN AND CONTEMPORARY PORTUGUESE LITERATURE Portuguese 530 | MALAS 600A Prof. Ricardo Vasconcelos SDSU | Spring 2023 | Tuesdays / Thursdays, 9:30am – 10:45am

POST-IMPERIAL NATIONAL IDENTITY(IES) IN MODERN AND CONTEMPORARY PORTUGUESE LITERATURE

Portuguese 530 | MALAS 600A

Prof. Ricardo Vasconcelos

SDSU | Spring 2023 | Tuesdays / Thursdays, 9:30am – 10:45am

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New MALAS Seminar, Spring 2023 with Professor D. J. Hopkins! Theatre and the City

Theatre and the City

Prof. D.J. Hopkins 

MALAS 600D Theatre and the City   

THEA 649 Topics in World Theatre

Tuesday 3:30PM to 6:10PM 

PSFA 358

Focusing on “theatre beyond the theatre,” this course will get students thinking outside the box, exploring new approaches and new contexts for live performance. Explorations of site-specific theatre and immersive experiences will be augmented by theories of social space, including urban space. Activities include: reading about, talking about, writing about (and occasionally making) “outside the box” theatre. Students will attend performances at the 2023 Without Walls Festival, produced by the La Jolla Playhouse. 

Dr. D.J. Hopkins (he/him) is a professor at San Diego State University. His publications focus on Shakespeare in performance and theatre in urban contexts. His current research includes immersive theatre and virtual reality. Twitter @_DJHopkins

MALAS Spring 2023 Seminar! Ecofascism with April Anson!

MALAS 600B Ecofascism 

HUM 580 Topics in the Humanities 

Thursday 4:00PM to 6:40PM 

AL 109 

Professor April Anson

Ecofascist rhetoric circulates in our everyday lives, using environmental ideas to justify violence, death, and other systemic harms. For example, the Covid-19 pandemic prompted analogies that "humans are a virus," but this recent example of ecofascism has a much longer history. This class will trace ecofascist rhetoric from its identification across the spectrum of modern American environmental politics, earlier origins in the Green Nazis, and nineteenth century precursors in the transnational circulation of “survival of the fittest” fantasies. Through novels, poetry, film and research, we will investigate the rhetorical imprecision of the term “ecofascism,” attend to its specific pasts, and anticipate its possible futures due to climate change, infectious disease, and police violence, among many other topics. 

Dr. April Anson is an Assistant Professor of Public Humanities at San Diego State University, core faculty for the Institute for Ethics and Public Affairs, and affiliate faculty in American Indian Studies. Her research explores the historical and ongoing connections between climate change, white supremacy, and political sovereignty—and the Indigenous environmental justice traditions that eclipse those relations. She is the co-founder of the Anti-Creep Climate Initiative, co-author of Against the Ecofascist Creep, and was a Mellon postdoctoral fellow at the University of Pennsylvania. Her research has appeared in boundary 2, Resilience, Environmental History, Western American Literature, and others. In all, she remains committed to anti-racist and anti-colonial knowledge production and social movements.

MALAS Spring 2023 Seminar: Foodways Rhetoric with Professor Consuelo Salas

Foodways Rhetorics 

Professor Consuelo Salas

MALAS 600C: Foodways Rhetoric 

RWS 596: Special Topics in Rhetoric and Writing Studies

Thursday 4:00PM to 6:40PM SH 124

Food writing has proliferated into many different genres, such as cookbooks, memoirs, and blogs; however, many disciplines have also turned their attention to the intricate network that food creates in our everyday lives. Examining a plate of food from a food studies perspective allows you to question means of production, labor and agricultural issues, as well as ideology and culture. From a rhetorical perspective, you can view the same plate of food and question the power, gender and class dynamics, and, similarly to food studies, ideology and culture. Focusing on seminal texts in both rhetorical theory and food studies and where these two disciplines intersect, this course will examine community foodways literacies and practices in the San Diego, CA area. Bringing together the two disciplines of rhetoric and food studies, this course examines foodways rhetorics.

Consuelo Salas is an Assistant Professor of Border Rhetorics. As a visual rhetorician  and a food studies scholar, her areas of interest include commodification and representations of Mexican and Mexican Americans to U.S. based audiences within “food spaces.” Her areas of interest also include foodways rhetoric, the scholarship of teaching and learning, information literacy, and the intersections of translanguaging and monolingual technological interfaces. Dr. Salas is at work on a book that critically explores images associated with the cultural imaginary of Mexico and their relationship to food and identity. Dr. Salas' co-edited collection Latin@s’ Presence in the Food Industry: Changing How We Think About Food, published with University of Arkansas Press, was awarded the Gourmand World Cookbook third best in the world in the category of Professionals in 2017. Her work can also be found in edited collections, such as Visual Imagery, Metadata, and Multimodal Literacies Across the Curriculum, Food Feminism and Rhetoric, as well as in peer reviewed journals, such as Gastronomica and the Community Literacy Journal. 

10 Years on Facebook for MALAS @ SDSU

MALAS Cultural Studies Lecture, Fall 2022 | DRONES and SURVEILLANCE and more ... with Professor Bill Nericcio

 

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MALAS Graduate Students — Simply Amazing! Antonio Márquez in a Palm Springs Elementary School!

 

MALAS! Making the World a Better Place, One Professor, One Book at a Time! Kudos to Matt de la Peña!

We work to ensure that all the Professors that teach for MALAS are the very best at what they do -- but some, even, take...

Posted by MALAS, the Master of Arts in Liberal Arts and Sciences at SDSU on Saturday, August 20, 2022

New MALAS Graduate Seminar, Fall 2022 with Professor Lashon Daley | THE WRITING OF FICTION !!!

THE WRITING OF FICTION

MALAS 600D OR ENGL 581W | PROFESSOR LASHON DALEY

Calling all cinephiles: have you ever wanted to adapt your favorite film into a novel? Or your favorite TV show into a collection of short stories? In this course, you will learn the basics of writing fiction while producing original works of fanfiction. Through a series of writing exercises and in-class workshops, you will develop skills on how to write strong characters, climactic plots, and descriptive settings. This course is not about becoming a professional creative writer. Rather, it is about learning the skills of creativity, communication, style, and voice.

We will read How to Write Mind Blowing FanFiction by Roslyn Thomas as well as participate in NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) to help us dive more deeply into fanfiction and develop community around our writing. 

This course will help you compose a short story or a compilation of flash fiction pieces totaling an approximate count of 6,500 words based on your favorite film, TV series, or web content. Weekly reading and writing assignments, and in-class workshops will be used to practice specific composition skills.

Bio: 

Lashon Daley is the director of the National Center for the Study of Children’s Literature and an assistant professor of English and Comparative Literature at San Diego State University. She earned her PhD in Performance Studies with a Designated Emphasis in New Media from the University of California, Berkeley. She also holds an MFA in Writing from Sarah Lawrence College and an MA in Folklore from UC Berkeley. Her children’s book, Mr. Okra Sells Fresh Fruits and Vegetables, was released in February 2016.

ENGL-581W 03 21615 THE WRITING OF FICTION 3.0 Lecture 1230-1345 TTH COM-206 L. DALEY 0/27 Footnotes: 04 , 15 , S , Y

MALAS-600D 03 34444 THE WRITING OF FICTION 3.0 Seminar 1230-1345 TTH COM-206 L. DALEY 0/3

New MALAS Graduate Seminar, Fall 2022: Meagan Marshall's LIVING WRITERS

MALAS 600A.03 / ENGL 579: Living Writers

Professor: Meagan Marshall  | Wednesdays 7-9:40

Derek Walcott’s Fortunate Traveler asserts, “…literature is an old couch stuffed with fleas.” This course aims to counter his assertion by examining the texts of living writers who are working to maintain literature’s livelihood. Guest authors will visit the class to conduct discussions, writing workshops, and readings centered on their work and experience in the literary world. This course provides the rare opportunity to work closely with visiting authors while exploring multiple genres and mediums, including poetry, prose, and creative nonfiction. Active participation and inquiry will expand your perception of literature and strengthen your ability as a writer and reader. This course promises to shake the fleas from static written word. Writers of all experience-levels and genres are welcomed and encouraged.   

About the Professor:  

Meagan Marshall is a poet, performer, and professor. She directs the Hugh C. Hyde Living Writers Series and teaches in the Department of English and Comparative Literature. She is a recent recipient of the Pitt and Virginia Warner Innovation Award. She also teaches in the English Department at San Diego City College. Her work has appeared in various journals, including The Portland Review, Web Del Sol, San Diego Poetry Annual, Charlotte: A Journal of Literature and Art, Poetry Internationaland elsewhere. Meagan is co-author of the essay “The Hugh C. Hyde Living Writers Series at San Diego State University: How One of the Nation’s Oldest Reading Series Found a Home in the Library” (McFarland 2017). She is commissioned frequently by San Diego Dance Theater and has written and performed several micro-fictions with the company including “Pillow: Case” (2015), “Requiem for an Ocean” (2016), “Shaker Loops” (2019), and “Janus II” (2020).      

Section Details:

Course	MALAS-600A
Course Title	LIVING WRITERS
Section	03
Schedule #	34443
Units	3.0
Session	FALL CAMPUS
Seats	3/3
Meetings	Seminar   1900-2140   W   AH-2116   M. MARSHALL
Full Title	Interdisciplinary Study in Liberal Arts and Sciences: Cultural Studies
Description	MALAS seminars are divided into four general areas with content that varies semester to semester. Each course may be repeated once with new content. See Class Schedule for specific content. Maximum credit six units for MALAS 600A.
Prerequisite	Graduate standing.
Footnotes	07   This course is stacked with ENGL 579 "Living Writers." Not open to students currently enrolled in or with previous credit in ENGL 579 "Living Writers." ZL   The following student levels are allowed: Graduate.

New Fall MALAS Graduate Seminar! Comix and History, aka #eyegasm22

New Fall MALAS Graduate Seminar! 

Comix and History, aka #eyegasm22

Graduate students can take an MA-level version of this class! More info here: https://sunspot.sdsu.edu/schedule/sectiondetails… or write Professor Bill Nericcio at bnericci@sdsu.edu

A great sequence from Marjani Satrape's EMBROIDERIES (Translated from the French by Anjali Singh) ... one of the comix volumes in my Fall class at #SDSU ... The class is called #eyegasm22 and is focused on visual culture, comix, history, autobiography, and more ... book info here https://amzn.to/3JWdicu class info here https://eyegiene.sdsu.edu/2022/fall/

New MALAS Seminar Fall 2022: Techniques of the Novel with Professor Matt de la Peña!

ENGL 573/MALAS 600A.02  

Techniques of the Novel

Matt de la Peña, Wednesdays 3:30 to 6:10, Storm Hall 316

 

Writing a novel is a long, messy, exhilarating, frustrating, and profoundly beautiful undertaking. Most novel writers get lost at some point during the journey and fear they no longer know where the story is going. Author Denis Johnson didn’t see this as a problem. “You get in your teacup and take your oar and strike off for Australia,” he once said, “and if you wind up in Japan, you’re ecstatic.” In other words, novel writing is about the journey, not the destination. Similarly, a good novel doesn’t set out to provide answers, it asks interesting questions while following interesting characters. 

In this course we will honor the mystery of the novel, while also studying techniques all writers should be exposed to as they take on this work. We will examine published novels, explore how-to philosophies and generate original creative materials. In addition to our course texts, I will bring in other literature to help spark discussion and/or help initiate generative exercises. We will explore many of the tools in our novel-writing toolboxes, such as character, setting, scene, POV, pacing, plot/theme and revision. You will be required to offer both written and oral feedback to your classmates during workshop. Our focus in this class will be craft, but there will also be some discussion of the marketplace and the business side of the writing life.

Matt de la Peña is the #1 New York Times Bestselling, Newbery Medal-winning author of seven young adult novels (including Mexican WhiteBoy and We Were Here) and seven picture books (including Patchwork and Last Stop on Market Street). In 2016 he was awarded the NCTE Intellectual Freedom Award. Matt received his MFA in creative writing from San Diego State University and his BA from the University of the Pacific where he attended school on a full basketball scholarship. In 2019 Matt was awarded an honorary doctorate from UOP.

Section Details:

Course	MALAS-600A
Course Title	TECHNIQUES OF NOVEL
Section	02
Schedule #	34442
Units	3.0
Session	FALL CAMPUS
Seats	2/3
Meetings	Seminar   1530-1810   W   SH-316   M. DE LA PENA
Full Title	Interdisciplinary Study in Liberal Arts and Sciences: Cultural Studies
Description	MALAS seminars are divided into four general areas with content that varies semester to semester. Each course may be repeated once with new content. See Class Schedule for specific content. Maximum credit six units for MALAS 600A.
Prerequisite	Graduate standing.
Footnotes	09   Stacked with ENGL 573. Not open to students currently enrolled in or with prior credit in ENGL 573 "Techniques of Novel." ZL   The following student levels are allowed: Graduate.

New MALAS Course for Fall 2022

https://www.facebook.com/Classics.Humanities.SDSU/photos/a.339227932916390/2011338409038659/

Posted by MALAS, the Master of Arts in Liberal Arts and Sciences at SDSU on Thursday, June 30, 2022

More info here: https://sunspot.sdsu.edu/schedule/sectiondetails?scheduleNumber=34249&period=20224&admin_unit=R

SDSU MALAS LECTURE SERIES! The [Mexican-] American Revolution With Myriam Gurba and Alex Espinosa

Something wickedly cool coming to SDSU this week! The [Mexican-] American Revolution -- a mini-lecture series from @sdsumalas @SDSUPress, @sdsu IRA funding (Instructionally Related Activities Fund) ... #mextasy at #sdsu

Featuring Mexy superheroes @lesbrains + @alex_esp pic.twitter.com/BpFYsieIJr

— William Nericcio (@eyegiene) April 24, 2022

Art Department and MALAS @ SDSU Professor Kim Stringfellow Opens a New Exhibition at UNLV

MALAS, the Master of Arts in Liberal Arts and Sciences at SDSU collaborating professor, Kim Stringfellow, has a dazzling...

Posted by William Nericcio on Monday, February 28, 2022

MALAS and SDSU Press Along with the Centro Cultural de la Raza in Balboa Park Present : CARLOS SOLORIO, Beyond Transfronterizo Lens, A Cultural Photo Exhibit

Photographer and cinematographer Carlos Solorio, MALAS Alum and SDSU Press contributing artist, in a one man photography show at the Centro Cultural de la Raza in Balboa Park.

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MALAS in Association with SDSU Press and the AGLSP: Publishing and the Humanities, A Streaming Lecture Event ...

Save the date! Monday, March 21 at 6pm CST -- The 21st Century Labyrinth: Humanities Degrees and Publishing Careers...

Posted by Amy Danzer on Wednesday, February 23, 2022

Unessays! MALAS Graduate Student Work Showcased!

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From: Kristal Bivona <kbivona@sdsu.edu>

Date: Wed, Feb 16, 2022 at 4:04 PM
Subject: flyer for student art exhibition
To: William Nericcio <memo@sdsu.edu>

Hey there,

Now that we're back on campus, I planned this event for the students from MALAS 600d / ANTH 529 / BRAZ 496 last semester to show their final projects. It's open to all and the flyer is attached. Please come by if you're around and share with the other MALAS students. Thanks!

Abrazos,

-- 

Kristal Bivona, Ph.D. 

Assistant Director, Behner Stiefel Center for Brazilian Studies

Lecturer, College of Arts and Letters

San Diego State University

Pronouns: she/ela/ella

Visit the Digital Brazil Project

How to Prepare Sharing Your Work at an Academic Conference: MALAS's Carson Poole on her AGLSP 2021 Conference Experience

by Carson Poole 

2nd Year MALAS Graduate Student, SDSU

As the deadline for 2022’s AGLSP Conference, Biblio-TECHa is now open, I was asked to reflect on my experience at 2021’s (virtual) conference. The theme of last year’s conference was “Unmute Yourself: Voice, Representation, and Power”. 

I believe I was the only student from SDSU in attendance, with Dr. Nericcio acting as my panel’s moderator. The topics addressed in the panels were diverse, entertaining, and very well thought out. Since it was a Liberal Studies conference, the topics for presentations were across the map: several people presented on music analysis or music history, others presented on business theory, and some presentations were on literature. 

My experience was really smooth and stress-free for being my first time presenting at a conference. I recorded my material and had a live (Zoom) Q&A with other panelists after my video was played. The Q&A made me nervous initially, because I wasn’t sure if anyone would ask me an “over my head” kind of question, but the other panelists were very kind, respectful, and open to discussion. 

Over the course of the three-day conference, I learned a lot about topics well outside of my own expertise, which made my academic-nerd heart sing. The panels transitioned smoothly, with breaks in between. Everything ran without any major hitches, save for a few accidentally muted mics. The challenges of a Zoom conference are very different than an in-person one, so I can’t give much in the way of advice on public speaking in front of other people in a conference hall, but if you are confident in your material then the speaking part will come easier. 

Carson Poole at Balboa Park, San Diego

As far as my preparation for the conference, I had already entered into my application with a clear topic idea. I had prepared a rough abstract beforehand and tidied it up before submitting it. The abstract was honestly the hardest part of my application—summing up my work in such a limited space was a challenge. As this conference was virtual, I had to record my material in a 15-minute video, which was nice because I could make multiple takes and revise as I went. 

For an in-person conference like this year’s will be, I think recording it beforehand might be something worth doing as it helps to fine-tune the content of the speech. If you’re thinking of applying, go for it! The experience was a very rewarding one for me and I think it would be the same for you.

New Spring 2022 MALAS Seminar with Professor Andrés Aguilar! Community Activism Through Arts Practice!

New Spring 2022 MALAS Seminar with Professor Andres Aguilar! 

Community Activism Through Arts Practice! 

More info here: https://sunspot.sdsu.edu/schedule/sectiondetails?scheduleNumber=22285&period=20222&admin_unit=R

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New Spring 2022 MALAS Seminar! MEDIA AND CONFLICT with Professor Gilad Halpern!

New Spring 2022 MALAS Seminar! MEDIA AND CONFLICT!!!

More info here!

New Spring 2022 MALAS Seminar: Parábolas ópticas / Optical Parables : Latin American/Latinx Literature, Art, Photography, & Cinema with Professor Bill Nericcio

New Spring 2022 MALAS Seminar: Parábolas ópticas / Optical Parables : Latin American/Latinx Literature, Art, Photography, & Cinema with Professor Bill Nericcio 

Note that the course can be taken in three "flavors" depending on what program you are with (or your curricular needs) at SDSU:

MALAS-600A

 

 

01

 

39125

 

LATINX/LATINAM CULTURES

  

0930-1045

 

TTH

 

NE-271

C LT-594

 

 

01

 

20640

 

LATINX/LATINAM CULTURES

  

0930-1045

 

TTH

 

NE-271

LATAM-580

 

 

02

 

39155

 

LATINX/LATINAM CULTURES

  

0930-1045

 

TTH

 

NE-271

Comparative Literature 594 | MALAS 600A | LATAM 580   

Parábolas ópticas | Optical Parables    

Latin American and Latinx Lit, Art, Photography & Cinema  

9:30am to-10:45 T/TH | NE-271  Professor William Nericcio

This is a Comparative Literature class, a MALAS seminar, and a Latin American Studies class, but it should appeal to any and all folks who are curious about the literatures and cultures of the Americas working their magic both north and south of the U.S./Mexico border).

The title of the class comes from a 1931 photograph by Manuel Álvarez Bravo entitled “Optical Parable/[Parábola Opticas]” – you can see a facsimile of it here opposite (and a self portrait of Bravo below). The photo can be read as a deep semiotic meditation on the nature of visual representation; but it can also be read as a joke, a bit, a gag – a photo of an optometrists shop printed in reverse (literally, a sight gag).      

This dialectic between the deeply intellectual and the comedic will run through our class as we probe texts that are literary, photographic, painted, filmed, streaming, and more.   

No expertise in Latin American or Latinx (Chicana/o/x, Boriqua/o/x, etc) literature or culture is expected or presumed nor should anyone worry if they’ve never studied film, photography, graphic narrative, or art at the collegiate level. The only requirement or prerequisite for this class is curiosity and a little drop of imagination!     

The final lineup of works is still a little in flux. Readings / Screenings / Art include works by Alfonso Cuarón (y tu Mamá tambien), Myriam Gurba (pictured below), Hector Ortega, Gabriel García Márquez, Flor Garduño, Junot Diaz, Cristina Rivera Garza, Raoul Peck, Gilbert Hernandez, Tina Modotti, Orson Welles (!), Alex Espinoza, yours truly, Salvador Plascencia, and other surprises!