CAS 364. Culture and Violence in Central America (3)

Preparatory: Completion of the lower division writing requirement; either CAS 100, CAS 102 or permission of the instructor. This course will provide students with a basic theoretical and practical understanding of the relationship between culture and violence in Central America and the historical and socioeconomic conditions that have generated a culture of violence in the region. The course will include an analysis of the concept of violence as it takes ideological and physical forms, both in public and private spaces. Major topics of discussion include the historical legacy of exclusion, authoritarianism and the militarization of Central America; the colonial legacy of ethnic exclusion; the destruction and exploitation of the environment; the role that violence plays in the experience of displacement that Central American immigrant communities undergo; and the relationship between violence, culture and the construction of Central American identity.