Academics

The program provides an opportunity to earn three hours of graded credit.

This program satisfies Experiential Education (EE) for those in the Making Connections curriculum and HI-ABROAD for those in IDEAs in Action.

Political Science 275H: Nationalism, Immigration and the Politics of Identity (3 Credits)

Approach: Philosophical & Moral Reasoning (PH)
Connection: North Atlantic World (NA)
IDEAs in Action: FC-VALUES

This course is about boundaries, with its aim to understand the interplay between national identity and immigration in Western democracies, with a focus on Britain and Germany. While nationalism is viewed by many as a natural part of the world, it is in fact a modern phenomenon. This course will begin with theoretical understandings of nationalism and immigration in the West. It will then move in a more concrete and political way to the construction of national identity in Britain and Germany, and then to the contemporary challenge of immigration. Can immigrants be integrated into the nation-state? Must they assimilate to integrate? Why does immigration provoke some of the current citizens to hold onto more tightly to their vision of national identity? We will examine the differences in how immigrants have been integrated in the UK and Germany, and how they have changed the national identity of each country. As the course progress, we will move from the theoretical to the more specific.