"Unwanted": Refugees, Asylum Seekers, and Patterns of Global Migration

Catalog description

What is home? What does it mean to belong? What does it mean to be mobile? Is mobility a privilege or a curse? How do experiences of migration, exile, and displacement shift one's understanding of home? This course examines the modern patterns of mobility and displacement, with a focus on the US and Europe at particular moments during the 19th,the 20th, and 21st centuries. We will focus on several case studies to illustrate broader concepts: the connection between the formation of nation-states and the rise of exclusionary citizenship; the emergence of 20th-century modern legal concepts such as "refugee" and "asylum"; the influence of the Cold War on the immigration policies in the US; and the criminalization of border-crossing. This course fulfills Dietrich College's "Perspectives on Justice and Injustice" general studies requirement.