Why Iowa?
Explore how American institutions, values, gender and ethnic relations, artifacts, popular and fine arts, and everyday life have developed over time to define what we know as America.
See yourself here
Critically examine the complex connections between past and present culture and history to understand the impact people have on American society.
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Write your story
Prepare for a wide range of careers in the arts, education, and public service through interdisciplinary inquiry into the central role power and struggle have played in American culture.
News and announcements
In Memoriam: Dr. Lauren Rabinovitz
Monday, September 15, 2025
The Department of American Studies mourns the passing of our cherished colleague and friend, Dr. Lauren Rabinovitz.
Elizabeth Rodriguez Fielder receives funding to continue research and writing her manuscript
Tuesday, June 17, 2025
Elizabeth Rodriguez Fielder is an assistant professor in the Department of English and in the Latinx Studies Program. She is a scholar of the 20th and 21st century transnational American literature and culture.
She will continue research and writing her manuscript Corporis Fabrica: Encountering the Body through the Book, which seeks out the relationship between the development of anatomy science and moveable books. Rodriguez Fielder argues that their interconnected history has shaped how we understand our bodies.
Jose Fernandez receive funding to pursue summer research projects
Tuesday, June 17, 2025
Jose Fernandez is an assistant professor in the Latinx Studies program. Fernandez’s research interests include American, African American, and Latinx literary histories, Black and Latinx literatures after the 1960s; Latinx intellectual history; and Mexican American literature of the Borderlands.
He will conduct archival research at three university library collections in California: the Tomas Rivera Papers at UC-Riverside, the Helena Maria Viramonted Papers at UC-Santa Barbara, and the Norma Alarcon Papers at the Bancroft Library at UC-Berkeley.
This work will contribute to a book, A Publisher’s Revolution: Arte Publico Press and the Making of Latinx Literature.
