Program Overview
Comparative American Studies
Interrogating power, exploring social change.
A linocut, framed in a triptych, stained glass style, features three scenes from novel The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo. This student work was produced as a creative final project for CAST 201, Latinas/os in Comparative Perspective.
Photo credit: Katie Hunter ’24 and Fiona Giménez-Collins ’24
What is American Studies?
More than 40 interviews by students, staff, and faculty as part of the ongoing Latino Lorain oral history project
Student-Curated Digital Projects
Digital humanities projects encourage interdisciplinary work in which students in the Comparative American Studies Program interact with people in various parts of the college as well as community partners in Oberlin, Lorain, and throughout Northeast Ohio.
Education and Social Justice
With a unique history beginning in 1833, Oberlin College works to acknowledge the distinctive cultural identities and histories of those who live, study, and work here while encouraging students to intentionally engage with those whose experiences and perspectives are different from their own.
Undergraduate Research
Leah Yonemoto-Weston’s work captures firsthand narratives of anti-detention activism and delves into the significance of coalition building and leveraging collective histories of oppression.
Featured Courses
CAST 229
How We Look: Visualizing U.S. Identities
This course examines how visual media–like paintings, magazines, television, and Instagram feeds–teach us to look at one another. What processes cause some bodies, activities, and forms of life visually coded as “normal” while others are marked as “different?” What techniques can be used to subvert these conventions? Students will learn to conduct visual analysis, as well as to creatively experiment with modes of resisting the visual constructions that shape their own lives.
- Taught by
- Carmen Merport Quiñones
CAST/GSFS 207
Introduction to Queer Studies
What is queer theory? LGBTQ studies? In this class, students explore LGBTQ history alongside contemporary queer cultural studies. They explore how historical, social, political, and economic systems have shaped and reshaped what it means to be queer or claim queer identity in the United States and abroad.
- Taught by
- KJ Cerankowski
CAST 335
Latina/o Oral Histories
Why are interviews useful as a research tool, and how can oral histories deepen how we understand Latinx experience in Northeast Ohio? In this class, students gain background and training in conducting oral histories, collaborate with community partners, and contribute to a growing archive of Latino oral histories in Lorain.
- Taught by
- Gina Pérez
CAST 339
Indigenous Activism, Environmental Justice, and the State
This course examines the intersectional scope of Indigenous environmental activism within the broader context and histories of Indigenous sovereignty and decolonial movements in North America. It centers Indigenous frameworks of political resurgence, politics of decolonization, and visions for an ecologically just and emancipatory alternative to the destructive logics of the settler state.
- Taught by
- Jess Arnett
Student Profiles
Truman Scholarship Recipient
Henry Hicks ’21, a comparative American studies and creative writing double major, has been awarded the Truman Scholarship, the premier graduate fellowship in the United States for those pursuing careers as public service leaders.
From Oberlin to Brazil on a Fulbright
At Oberlin, Davíd Zager ’17, a comparative American studies and Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies double major, studied Portuguese language and Capoeira. Now has been awarded a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship for Brazil.
Helping Others Find Their Voice
Country Singer Eli Conley ’08 found his voice at Oberlin as a musician and student of comparative American studies. Now he’s helping LGBTQ singers and carving a space in country music for queer people.
What does Comparative American Studies at Oberlin look like?
The comparative American studies department often collaborates with El Centro Volunteer Initiative, a student-run program connecting students, faculty, and community members with Latinx residents in Lorain through community engagement.
Photo credit: Jennifer Manna
Professors Meredith Gadsby, Gina Perez, and Shelley Lee collaborated on “Sanctuary Practices: Race, Refuge, and Immigration in America,” a StudiOC learning cluster.
Photo credit: Jennifer Manna
