Black Canadian Studies Certificate (BCS) students take 24 credits in courses reflecting the certificate’s specific humanities and fine arts approaches (cultural studies, history, literature, and music) and professional application component.
The 24 credits include:
- 15 required credits in Humanities;
- Six required credits in History; and
- Three additional credits at the 3000 or 4000 level from the Black Canadian Studies placement course, or courses in English, Music, Public Policy & Administration, and Business & Society.
About the courses:
Prerequisite:
A required course at the first-year level (AP/HUMA 1300 9.0 Cultures of Resistance in the Americas) provides a broad and critical survey, acquainting students with the historical and cultural experiences of Black peoples across the Americas. The prerequisite will not count for credits toward the certificate but is required to proceed through the program. Students interested in the certificate are encouraged to take this course toward their first-year General Education requirements.
2000 level required course:
The second-year core course (AP/HUMA 2310 6.0 The Caribbean and Canada) introduces the connections between Canada and the Caribbean—a region from which the majority of African Canadians in Toronto originate.
3000 and 4000 level required courses:
Required courses at the third-year level offer students a more comprehensive understanding of specific aspects of Black cultural production and Black histories. These are taught from interdisciplinary humanities (AP/HUMA 3165 3.0 Griots to Emcees: Examining Culture, Performance and Spoken Word; AP/HUMA 3315 3.0 Black Literatures and Cultures in Canada; AP/HUMA 3318 3.0 Black Popular Culture) and historical perspectives (AP/HIST 3535 6.0 African Canadian History OR AP/HIST 4830 6.0 Blacks in the Americas).
3000 and 4000 level optional courses:
One course required from the focus levels. These courses allow students to concentrate on either the expressive arts (FA/MUSI 3406 3.0 History of Gospel Music; FA/MUSI 3510 3.0 African American Popular Music; AP/HUMA 3316 3.0 Black Women’s Writing; AP/HUMA 4306 6.0 Imagining Slavery and Freedom; AP/EN 3410 3.0 Caribbean Literature) or a professional development component where they apply their knowledge of Black cultures in Canada beyond an academic setting (AP/HUMA 4305 3.0 Black Canadian Studies Practicum; AP/PPAS 4052 3.0 Race, Ethnicity and Social Policy—same as AP/MIST 4052 3.0); and AP/SOSC 3043. 3.0 Comparative Perspectives on Social Exclusion and Business).
Search our Courses
Browse through the courses below to explore courses that will fulfill certain degree requirements in the Black Canadian Studies program.
When registering for classes on the Course Timetable website, be sure to carefully read through the “Notes/Additional Fees” section of each course you select.
AP/HUMA 1300 9.00 Cultures of Resistance in the Americas: The African American Experience
This General Education course addresses the ways in which diasporic Black peoples have responded to and resisted their enslaved and subordinated status in the Americas. It focuses specifically on the cultural experiences of Black diasporic …
AP/CMDS 2210 3.00 Race, Racism, and the Image
How have audiences learned to perceive and understand ‘race’ in visual mass media? How do photographic and cinematographic technologies shape our understandings of ourselves, others, and the world? This course uses anti-racist and decolonial approaches …
AP/EN 2231 6.00 African American Literature
An introduction to the African American literary tradition across genres, from its slavery-era origins until today, exploring representations of selfhood, consciousness, solidarity, conflict, power, literacy, voice, heritage, and destiny.
AP/HUMA 2310 6.00 The Caribbean and Canada: Culture, Identity and Diaspora
This course examines the cultures and identities of Caribbean peoples and their influence on the Caribbean Diaspora in Canada. It explores the transformations the Caribbean has undergone and the way this has impacted Canada, focusing …
AP/SOSC 3043 3.00 Comparative Perspectives on Social Exclusion and Business
This course examines systemic social exclusion and intersectional inequalities embedded in business in Canada and in other industrialized countries. The course rethinks social exclusion and examines how excluded groups, particularly racialized groups, respond to structural …
AP/HUMA 3165 3.00 Griots to Emcees: Examining Culture, Performance and Spoken Word
This course explores the form, function and content of spoken word, in terms of language, rhythm, historical developments, social-political contexts, as well as key artists of poetry, rap, dub, slam, lyricism and spoken word as …
AP/HUMA 3300 3.00 Black Canadian Film
This course examines the burgeoning corpus of Black Canadian film to consider the ways in which Black cinematic culture in Canada has developed in the last 40 years and continues to develop today. It addresses …
AP/HUMA 3302 3.00 Hood Feminisms: Black Women's Fugitivity
This course centres “the nowhere of the ghetto and the nowhere of utopia” (Hartman, xiii) to understand the social, historical and political contexts of the wayward practices of Black Women. It uses key issues and …
AP/HUMA 3315 3.00 Black Literatures and Cultures in Canada
This course is concerned with the study of Black Canada, principally through literature, drama and film. Using the work of film makers Clement Virgo, Martine Chartrand, Dana Inkster, and others; writers Dionne Brand, Wayde Compton, …
This course introduces students to the body of literature being produced by black women writers in the Caribbean, Canada and the US after the 1970s. While black women engage the particular concerns of their individual …
AP/HUMA 3318 3.00 Black Popular Culture
This course analyzes Black popular cultural forms and expressions in the Americas including music, film, television, style, contemporary visual arts, and as taken up in Black cultural theory. Understood as an analysis and response to …
FA/MUSI 3406 3.00 History of Gospel Music
This course explores the development of African-American gospel music with special emphasis on the 1930s onwards. It explores the musical, sociological, political and religious influences of gospel music eras and styles. Using a variety of …
AP/EN 3410 3.00 Caribbean Literature
This course concentrates on the poetry, short stories and novels of the British Caribbean and essays written by authors. The course looks at how the literature negotiates representations of gender, race, class, sexual politics, marginalization, …
FA/MUSI 3510 3.00 African American Popular Music
The course surveys the history of African- American popular music from spirituals to hip hop, focusing on the role of black music in the quest for survival, respect, dignity and equal citizenship. Issues explored include …
AP/HIST 3535 6.00 African Canadian History
This course begins in the seventeenth century with an examination of free and enslaved Africans in New France and the British colonies. It explores the experiences of Black Loyalists, enslaved and free persons of African …
AP/PRWR 4000 3.00 Writing, Rhetoric, and Social Action
Students in this course analyze various activist rhetorics from around the world, engage with critical theory about the forms and functions of politically effective discourses, and learn to produce their own activist rhetorics.
AP/PPAS 4052 3.00 Race, Ethnicity and Social Policy
This course explores the ways that ideas and discourses about race and ethnicity shape how social policy is debated, adopted and implemented. Identifying the uneven policy effects on different social groups, it seeks a critical …
Explores the many ways people of African descent contributed to building the Province of Ontario. By piecing together clues from such sources as archival documents, archaeological site reports and material culture, coupled with critical analysis …
AP/HUMA 4305 3.00 Black Canadian Studies Practicum
This course provides practical experience analyzing issues through the lens of Black Canadian Studies. Placement will be in the offices of school trustees and MPPs.
AP/HUMA 4306 6.00 Imagining Slavery and Freedom
This seminar combines creative texts—novels, music, and the visual arts—alongside slave narratives, nonfiction and theoretical works in an examination of questions of Transatlantic slavery, the imagination, and the idea of freedom. Beginning with slave narratives, …
AP/HUMA 4307 3.00 Black Toronto Sounds
This course considers how Black peoples and Black artists shape and encounter the city of Toronto through sound. It uses analytical frameworks and key areas of concern in Black Studies and Sound Studies to understand …
AP/HIST 4830 6.00 In Slavery and Freedom: Blacks in the Americas
This course examines and compares the responses of Africans and their descendants to the experiences of enslavement, racism, colonialism and imperialism. It begins with an examination of sub-Saharan African societies, the sources of enslaved populations …