RACE AND AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY

History 183A
University of California Irvine
Instructor: Tim Kelly, Ph.D.
M/W/F 9:00-9:50
Humanities Hall 262

From its inception, the U.S. has been guided by a series of racial principles in both its North American expansion and its dealings with the outside world. This course takes a chronological approach from the Revolution to the current war against terrorism to explore the influences of ethnicity and racial hierarchy in American foreign policy.

This course is a definite departure from traditional foreign relations courses. Though following a chronological timeline from the colonial period to the present, the course will focus largely on specific case studies in an attempt to be part of an emerging dialogue to discover ways of exploring the connection between America's domestic social structure and the dominant ideology of racism in relation to foreign policies.

Among the questions this course seeks to answer are the following:

	What were the views on race of America 's diplomats, and in what ways did those views shape American foreign relations towards people of color?
	How can we explain America ’s foreign policy in a racial/ethnic context?
	What is the political influence of American racial and ethnic groups in shaping this nation's foreign policy?
	And finally, can American multi-culturalism serve as a model for a world disintegrating along ethnic lines, or is the U.S. also "disuniting?"

Through the use of multimedia lectures, readings, and class discussion we will seek to investigate this fascinating and controversial discipline.