We live in the age of ethnicity. The surge of ethnic conflicts after the collapse of the Soviet Union has brought dramatically to the fore the importance of ethnicity as a motive for social action, often violent. Ethnic difference is a key factor employed to explain social inequality in the Global North. In the United States, ethnicity and race are official categories applied by governmental agencies in dealing with discrimination and poverty. In this course, students will look at ethnicity as a historical phenomenon that happens in different times and places, and become familiar with theories and methods as well as case-studies.
