This course will introduce students to the main issues, methods, and figures within Black Studies, an interdisciplinary field that focuses on the histories, lives, and culture of the African Diaspora. Students will read canonical texts in Black Studies (Hartman, Edwards, Moten, Spillers, Gilroy, hooks, Hall, etc.) and assess the current state of the field. We will also consider how art historians have incorporated lessons from this field into their work and thus explore the possibilities Black Studies offers art historical research at the level of both topic and method. Potential topics include: the legacies of slavery, the practice of history, the definition of aesthetics, the status of the "object," fugitivity, and diaspora.