DIRECTOR OF THE PROGRAM:
Associate Professor Walter Johnson

DIRECTOR OF GRADUATE STUDIES:
Associate Professor Adam Green

The Program in American Studies, located within the Department of Social and Cultural Analysis, offers courses of study leading to the degrees of Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy. It is designed to prepare students for advanced work and teaching in American studies. Interdisciplinary by definition, the student’s course of study is arranged with the director of the program and the director of graduate studies and includes seminars offered in the program, in the larger Department of Social and Cultural Analysis, and in selected other departments including Anthropology, Cinema Studies, Comparative Literature, English, History, Journalism, Middle Eastern Studies, Performance Studies, and Sociology.

The program’s affiliates include faculty from many of these departments. The program interprets “American” in a broad sense to include assessments of the historical role of the United States in the Americas and, more generally, in world affairs. Inasmuch as the program has a regional focus, special attention is given to studies in urbanism and to New York in particular, a global city that comprises many world cultures. The program also emphasizes the interrelation of social formations, including those of race, gender, class, and sexuality, with global political economies both historical and contemporary. Students pursue these studies through methodological training in historical analysis, ethnographic research, and critical and cultural theory.

Faculty

Arlene Dávila, Professor, Social and Cultural Analysis (American Studies), Anthropology. Ph.D. 1996 (cultural anthropology), CUNY; M.A. 1990 (anthropology and museum studies), New York; B.A. 1987 (anthropology), Tufts.
Race and ethnicity; popular culture; nationalism; media studies; globalization; the politics of museum and visual representation; urban studies; Puerto Ricans and Latinos in the United States.

Lisa Duggan, Professor, Social and Cultural Analysis (American Studies, Gender and Sexuality Studies); Director, Program in American Studies. Ph.D. 1992 (modern American history), Pennsylvania; M.A. 1979 (women’s history), Sarah Lawrence College; B.A. 1976 (social and political theory and women’s studies), Virginia.
Modern U.S. politics and culture; history of women and gender; lesbian and gay studies; feminist and queer theory.

Gayatri Gopinath, Associate Professor, Social and Cultural Analysis (American Studies, Gender and Sexuality Studies). Ph.D. 1998 (English and comparative literature), Columbia; B.A. 1991 (Latin American studies), Wesleyan.
Postcolonial literatures and cultures; South Asian diaspora studies; transnational feminist cultural studies; queer studies; Asian American studies; popular culture.

Adam Green, Associate Professor, Social and Cultural Analysis (American Studies), History. Ph.D. 1998 (history), Yale; B.A. 1985 (history), Chicago.
Modern U.S. history; African American history; urban history; comparative racial politics; cultural economy.

Phillip Brian Harper, Professor, English, Social and Cultural Analysis (American Studies). Ph.D. 1988 (English), M.A. 1986 (English), M.F.A. 1985 (creative writing), Cornell; B.A. 1981 (creative writing/literature), Michigan.
Twentieth-century British and American literature; African American literature and culture; contemporary U.S. cultural studies; lesbian/gay studies.

Walter Johnson, Professor, Social and Cultural Analysis (American Studies), History. Ph.D. 1995 (American history), M.A. 1992 (American history), Princeton; Postgraduate Diploma (history), Cambridge; B.A. 1988 (history), Amherst College.
Nineteenth-century America; capitalism; race; slavery.

Jennifer Morgan, Associate Professor, Social and Cultural Analysis (American Studies, Africana Studies), History. Ph.D. 1995 (history), Duke; B.A. 1986 (Third World studies), Oberlin College.
Colonial America; black Atlantic; comparative slavery; feminist and race theory.

Crystal Parikh, Assistant Professor, Social and Cultural Analysis (American Studies), English. Ph.D. 2000 (English), M.A. 1995 (English), Maryland; B.A. 1992 (English and religious studies), Miami.
Asian American literature and studies; Latino/Chicano literature and studies; feminist and race theory; postcolonial studies; 20th-century American literature.

Maria Josefina Saldana Portillo, Associate Professor, Social and Cultural Analysis (American Studies, Latino Studies); Director, Program in Latino Studies. Ph.D. 1993 (modern thought and literature), Stanford; B.A. 1983 (English), Yale.
Latin American revolutionary literature and culture (Mexico, Central America); 20th-century U.S. and Latino literature and culture; ethnic studies; postcolonial theory; development studies; globalization studies.

Andrew Ross, Professor, Social and Cultural Analysis (American Studies). Ph.D. 1984 (English and American literature), Kent (Canterbury); M.A. 1978 (literature), Aberdeen.
Labor and work; urban and suburban studies; intellectual history; social and political theory; science; ecology and technology; cultural studies.

Caitlin Zaloom, Assistant Professor, Social and Cultural Analysis (American Studies, Metropolitan Studies). Ph.D. 2002 (anthropology), M.A. 1998 (anthropology), California (Berkeley); B.A. 1995 (modern culture and media; Middle Eastern studies), Brown.
Interdisciplinary approaches to the contemporary problems of economy, culture, and cities; ethnography of markets; science and social science.

ASSOCIATED AND AFFILIATED FACULTY

Faye Ginsburg, Anthropology; Jeff Goodwin, Sociology; Linda Gordon, History; Christine Harrington, Politics; Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, Performance Studies; Barbara Krauthamer, History; Emily Martin, Anthropology; Randy Martin, Art and Public Policy (Tisch School of the Arts); Anna McCarthy, Cinema Studies; Elizabeth McHenry, English; José Esteban Muñoz, Performance Studies; Tavia Nyong’o, Performance Studies; John Kuo Wei Tchen, Gallatin School of Individualized Studies, Social and Cultural Analysis (Asian/Pacific/ American Studies).