Write a formal paper reviewing the readings and relating them to the course themes.

This course name is Race & Disease in the Americas

In his book “Bengali Harlem and the Lost Histories of South Asia,” Bald Vivek traces the movement of inhabitants from both East and West Bengal and the reasons that prompted their migration into the United States. He also documents the struggles Bengali immigrants had to deal with during their fight for recognition and American citizenship. Vivek (2013) begins by detailing the efforts of three figureheads in the struggle for American citizenship. Indian immigrants first started making their way into the United States at the beginning of the twentieth century. Most of them came into America to escape the political and economic tribulations they were facing back home courtesy of the British administration. They felt that the industrial revolution taking place in the United States would give them a way out and felt the need to move to America (Vivek, 2013). From the moment they made their way into the country, they faced intense xenophobia from American labor unions who were already dealing with other Asian immigrants. American labor unions protested against immigrants coming into the United States because they believed they would take up the industrial jobs opening up courtesy of the industrial revolution happening in America.

The theme is

This seminar considers race from a transnational perspective, with a focus on the Americas. We examine broader historical developments, including the emergence of global empire and colonialism, that gave rise both to concepts of race, racial difference, and hierarchy and to concepts of nation and nationality. As slavery, labor migrations, and the establishment of settler colonies brought peoples from different regions of the world together, racial difference justified unequal exceptions to otherwise equal rights of national citizens. This semester we will explore, in particular, how disease – both its medical and social understanding – shaped racial ideas and affected racialized groups.

Objectives

The course objectives are to:

1. a) introduce students to Asian American history as part of transnational histories of race;
2. b) consider historical concepts of race, ethnicity, and nationality as they relate to the United States,the Americas, and the world;
3. c) consider other dynamics of social difference including region, religion, class, gender, and sexualorientation as they relate to race;
4. d) explore the relationship between social conceptions/understanding of race, biology, anddisease;
5. e) learn to consider critically the course subjects and themes and communicate them effectivelythrough writing, oral presentation, and in other media.