How does psychology—as an academic field and in terms of people’s beliefs, feelings, and behaviors—foment racism? This course is designed to provide students with a historical, structural, and psychological understanding of racism—with a focus on the US context. Through lectures, discussions, class activities, and course materials (i.e., readings, podcasts, videos), we, as a class, will come to a more comprehensive understanding of how psychology in the form of human psychological processes (e.g., motivations, categorization), as well as the rise of psychology as a scientific discipline, assist in constructing and challenging racism. We define racism as a multipronged tool that enables the exploitation and oppression of certain groups of people by tying access to material, cultural, and political resources to the socially constructed idea of race(s), which is based on physical appearance (e.g., skin color, physical features) and cultural practice (e.g., language, dress).

Upon completing this course, students will be able to:
1. Discern the sociohistorical roots of racism in the US.
2. Understand the interplay between different manifestations of racism at the individual and
societal levels
3. Effectively analyze and critique empirical research on racism and psychology
4. Communicate effectively about racism in society

Course Format: 

Class Format:

The course will meet twice weekly for 1.5 hours sessions. Both sessions will include a lecture to introduce the week’s topics, synthesize the assigned readings, and relate them to other relevant work in psychology and phenomena in the world. In addition, each session will include small and large-group discussions and in-class activities (e.g., concept mapping, 4 corners activity).