POLT 218 - Settler Colonialism in Comparative Perspective

FC SSCI WINT

4 credits
In recent decades, “settler colonialism” has become a frequently invoked analytic and political category. It has been used to describe past and present relations between dominant and subordinate populations in locales as diverse as the United States, Australia, Ireland, South Africa, Algeria, Korea, and Israel/Palestine. This course will examine both well-known and more obscure case studies in an attempt to answer the following questions: Which features of the “classic” settler-colonial states are definitive of settler colonialism, and which are contingent or variable? How does settler colonialism differ from “traditional” colonialism and international legal designations like “apartheid” and “occupation”? What have been the different paths to “decolonization” where it has occurred, and what implications might past patterns hold for the future of existing settler-colonial states?