From Maize to AI: The Nonhuman From Pre-Columbian Times to the Present

Catalog description

This course is structured thematically around the concept of the nonhuman from pre-Columbian times to the present. In each unit, we explore texts authored by different Indigenous groups during early colonial times, and we progress to contemporary writing about the nonhuman. The units cover a wide range of topics including plants, earthquakes, the underworld, nonhuman animals, maize, water, AI, and ghosts. This study of the nonhuman offers students a comprehensive understanding of the impact of colonialism and coloniality on climate change. We engage with a diverse array of texts, including codices such as the Codex de la Cruz-Badiano, Codex Telleriano-Remensis, Codex Vaticanus-Latinus A, the Popol Vuh, and Guaman Poma's chronicles. We also read works by contemporary Indigenous authors such as Yasnaya Elena Aguilar Gil, Kali Fajardo-Anstine, Natalie Diaz, Ruperta Bautista, and Irma Pineda, as well as non-Indigenous authors from the hemisphere, like Maricela Guerrero, Eleni Sikelianos, CD Wright, Jazmina Barrera, Yuri Herrera, and Maria Melendez. The course also includes an introduction to pictographic reading of Nahua texts (Classical Nahuatl).