The BA program in Chicana and Chicano Studies is committed to the practice of different forms of scholarship and pedagogy and to the promotion of critical thinking about such issues as gender, sexuality, social action, language, race, ethnicity, class, assimilation/acculturation paradigms, and indigenous traditions. The literary and visual arts often function as vehicles for social change and creative empowerment, and so they constitute one focus of the curriculum, that aims to strike a balance among the social sciences, humanities, arts, and the professions. The major prepares students for graduate education in academic and professional fields and for a variety of positions that involve community and social service in the U.S. and abroad.
 

Capstone Program

The Chicana and Chicano Studies major is a designated capstone program. Students have options for completing a senior honors thesis, individual research, or senior project under the direction of a faculty member. Alternatively, students may elect to complete an upper-division course that includes additional coursework culminating in the completion of a capstone paper or creative project. Through their capstone work, students are expected to demonstrate working knowledge of the major findings and methods of the disciplines from which they have drawn their Chicana and Chicano studies coursework, show their capacities for conceiving and executing a research or creative project on a self-selected topic as well as identifying and evaluating relevant documentation pertaining to that project, demonstrate appropriate levels of scholarly discourse on their selected topic, and develop greater capacity to be of lifelong service to the Chicana/Chicano and Latina/Latino community and to global society in the tradition of César Chávez and scholar activist exemplars.
 

Resultados del aprendizaje

1. Demonstrated skills and expertise, including research, analysis, and writing

2. Demonstrated familiarity and competence in a range of interdisciplinary methodologies and approaches

3. Demonstrated ability to identify and analyze appropriate primary and secondary sources, material evidence, and other primary documents

4. Demonstrated mastery and integration of knowledge and learned abilities

5. Demonstrated ability to use the knowledge gained in the classroom to conceive and execute projects

6. Demonstrated broad knowledge of fundamentals acquired through coursework, as informed by race, class, gender, and sexuality paradigms

7. Conception and execution of an original research project that identifies and engages with a topic relevant to the student’s area of concentration

8. Presentation of work to peers for discussion and critique