American Culture Studies

About our Program

The American Culture Studies (AMCS) program in Arts & Sciences at Washington University fosters the multidisciplinary study of the Americas. We promote a pluralistic and transnational view of American historical, social, political, material, and cultural contexts. Our approach is theoretically and empirically inclusive, emphasizing the enormous diversity within American society and the wider world. We are especially concerned with issues of race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, class, and other social contrasts that spur so much debate, expression, and conflict within the United States and across borders.

We offer one major (American Culture Studies) and two minors (American Culture Studies and Asian American Studies) in our undergraduate program. For undergraduates and graduate students, including the Harvey Graduate Fellows and Harvey Undergraduate Scholars programs, AMCS and AAS offer diverse curricular opportunities for transdisciplinary study, as well as mentoring from faculty in different fields who can support their intellectual growth. The AMCS major includes a series of concentration areas such as “Ability and the Body,” “Citizenship, Nationhood, and Identity,” “Gender and Sexuality,” “Place, Space, and the Environment,” and “Race and Ethnicity.”

The minor in Asian American Studies is designed to enrich students' critical understanding of both individual experiences and collective histories of Asian Americans in regional, national, and transnational contexts. As an inter- and multi-disciplinary program, it underlines transnational contexts and comparative perspectives for the study of Asian American experiences.

Above all else, our aim is to foster expansive and critical perspectives and understandings of the historical, social, and cultural dimensions of life across the Americas.

 

McMillan Hall