Local/Global Internships in Seattle: Agency, Theory, and Change

Submitted by Comparative History Of Ideas on

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Info Session on Tuesday, 3/29 from 12:30-1 pm in the UW Q Center (450 Schmitz Hall) for CHID's Local/Global Internships in Seattle: Agency, Theory, and Change Summer 2011

Local/Global Internships in Seattle: Agency, Theory, and Change

Summer 2011 - The CHID 2011 Local/Global Internships in Seattle: Agency, Theory, and Change provides a unique opportunity for selected undergraduates to earn full-time, academic credit while exploring the connections between global ideas and local work.  Over an 8-week period, students will both work in local organizations with a transnational focus and participate in seminars which will provide a space for reflection on how to incorporate theory into practice.

This is an accessible option which fulfills the Cultural and Historical Engagements CHID major requirement under the Local/Global Engagements course description.  This 12-credit program enables students to have a transnational experience without leaving Seattle.  As they build relationships within our local community, students are encouraged to be self-reflexive of their own local position/situation/context while thinking critically about their work experience and exploring the links between local and global systems.  In these internships, students will trace local and global intersections in areas such as transnational identity politics, human rights, immigration, indigenous issues, legal rights, and violence.

The program is designed to help students explore how to make positive changes within structured systems that also recognize power inequalities and local/ global implications. We will examine the role of the individual unit within the scope of systems of power, privilege, dominance, oppression, agency, and resistance so that students may understand their position/situation/context within these systems of privilege and oppression. With a better understanding of their situated nature, students can then learn how they can activate their agency within those systems.

Students will be expected to volunteer 10 hours/week (or 80 hours total). The program is responsible for placing the students into appropriate internship positions. Students may suggest their own placements, but it is not necessary. The internship themes include: identity politics, animal rights, human rights, immigration, indigenous issues, legal rights, and violence.

We will meet as a group on Mondays and Tuesdays, and the remainder of the week will be spent individually working at internships, reading, writing, and researching.  The course work will consist of theoretical readings, a theory journal, and a sequence of weekly writing assignments which will culminate into a final project and presentation at the end of the quarter.

Contact any of the following with questions:

Instructors                                                                                         

Christina Wygant, PhD, cwygant@uw.edu
Jennifer Self, PhD, jms13@uw.edu
Konstantine Kyriacopoulos, PhC, kostak@uw.edu

 Teaching Assistant

Leoule Goshu, leoule@uw.edu

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