The Cultural Crossroads course is one of many digital classes offered by COPLAC, or the Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges. This is a multi-campus, team-taught course that uses many digital tools to produce outward-facing, transparent research thanks to the generous support of the Mellon Foundation.
Cultural Crossroads is especially important today, as:
Migration is a constant in human history and is laden with cultural implications. In virtually any locale the movement in of people has occurred, but these migrations are not always at the forefront of the historical memory of a place. In this course students will investigate migration into the community or communities surrounding their campus. Once an in-migration group is identified the students will work to discover the cultural contributions brought to bear on their communities. This movement may have happened at any time in the community’s history. By thinking creatively and broadly students will find groups in their regions and identify the contributions of those one-time newcomers to the life and culture in those places.. Students are asked to consider how migrant culture broadly defined may have influenced music, culinary traditions, labor relations, craft and art, agriculture, architecture, or religion. By bringing to life these stories the students’ Crossroads projects will rescue forgotten local history from obscurity. (Find out more about the course here).
Up Next: Acknowledgements