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Welcome to International Studies


Regional Focus: Africa (ISAF)


With Africa being the world's second most populous continent, second to Asia, this region takes an interdisciplinary approach to the study of the African continent and its peoples, their complexity and diversity. Latin America

 Africa

 

This regional focus will explore changing disciplinary and interdisciplinary perspectives on the study of the African continent and its peoples. The course examines how an understanding of the African experience, far from being exotic or distant, reaches to the core of academic struggle and intellectual debate.

A variety of scholarly and literary sources are used to provide the student with a varied and balanced view of this complex region.

It explores problems and themes that are cultural, historical, political, and geographical, and that address fundamental issues in the construction and expression of identity and knowledge.Africa

Regional Coordinator

Kofi Agorsah  agorsahe@pdx.edu

(503) 725-5080

**For an associated faculty member, regional adviser, and/or PSU faculty members with regional expertise, please visit our Africa Faculty page.

For a different regional coordinator, please visit our Faculty page.

Regional Focus

At least 24 upper-division credits (with a grade C or above) from adviser-approved, area-specific courses appropriate to the student's regional focus; selected from departments and programs in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, the School of Business Administration, the Graduate School of Education, the School of Fine and Performing Arts, and the College of Urban and Public Affairs.

For an updated list of courses, please follow this link: http://www.pdx.edu/intl/forms-lists

Foreign Language

A common misconception is that globalization has reduced the value of knowledge of languages other than English.

The International Studies major requires that students demonstrate third-year proficiency in one language appropriate to the regional focus.  For students taking courses at PSU, third-year proficiency is defined by successful completion of the terminal course in the third-year language sequence or completion of an upper division equivalent.  For students admitted to PSU in Fall 2007, or later, the terminal course for most languages is 303. 

***Since this requirement is met by proficiency and not credit hours, you may have learned the foreign language outside of a classroom, for example, from relatives or by living abroad. If this is the case, please contact the World Languages and Literatures department for information on how to satisfy this requirement by third-year proficiency demonstration.

Adviser-Approved African Languages:

  • French
  • Swahili

(Others upon coordinator approval)

 

Education Abroad

There is not an education abroad requirement associated with the International Studies major; however, our students are encouraged to pursue international experience opportunities. Portland State University's Education Abroad Office offers study abroad opportunities in the following countries in Africa:

  • Botswana
  • Egypt
  • Ghana
  • Morocco
  • Senegal
  • South Africa
  • Tanzania
  • Tanzania - Uganda (Carpe Diem)
  • Tunisia
  • Uganda

For more information on any of these programs please visit the Study Abroad office in East Hall 101.

Need a reason to study abroad??  . . . just read this article and it will inform you of many of the benefits of an intercultural academic experience!