Metadata
Title
Understanding the Richness of American Cultures
Category
undergraduate
UUID
0f8051e94f944e71bee4b1f2ddcbad6c
Source URL
https://americancultures.berkeley.edu/advisors/understanding-the-richness-of-ame...
Parent URL
https://americancultures.berkeley.edu/
Crawl Time
2026-03-10T04:34:58+00:00
Rendered Raw Markdown

Understanding the Richness of American Cultures

Source: https://americancultures.berkeley.edu/advisors/understanding-the-richness-of-american-cultures Parent: https://americancultures.berkeley.edu/

About

This section offers advisors a comprehensive deep dive into the key components of the American Cultures requirement and its associated programs. Learn more about the opportunities that the AC curriculum and pedagogy offer students, and review highlights of the AC Center's work, past and present.

Topics

Introduction to the American Cultures Requirement (2022)

AC Highlights: Past and Present

History of the AC Requirement

Unlike other requirements on campus, students organized and protested for the campus graduation requirement that would eventually become the American Cultures Requirement. After a successful campaign to divest billions from South African businesses, students fought for ways to "desegregate the campus" and "the curriculum." The result was the American Cultures requirement, a curriculum that constitutes a new approach that responds directly to the problem encountered in numerous disciplines of how better to present the diversity of American experience to the diversity of American students whom we now educate. The AC Center encourage advisors to watch our short video that discusses the history and intent of the AC Requirement and its connection to the South African Apartheid Divestment movement. Learn more

Spotlight on AC Courses

Unlike other requirements on campus, students organized and protested for the campus graduation requirement that would eventually become the American Cultures Requirement. After a successful campaign to divest billions from South African businesses, students fought for ways to "desegregate the campus" and "the curriculum." The result was the American Cultures requirement, a curriculum that constitutes a new approach that responds directly to the problem encountered in numerous disciplines of how better to present the diversity of American experience to the diversity of American students whom we now educate. The AC Center encourage advisors to watch our short video that discusses the history and intent of the AC Requirement and its connection to the South African Apartheid Divestment movement. Learn more

AC Latest Updates

The American Cultures Center is always eager to share our latest events, news, and upcoming developments with faculty, staff, students, and community partners. All American Cultures Center newsletters since December 2013 are archived on our newsletter page. To request to be added to the newsletter, please email americancultures@berkeley.edu.

Creative and Community-Engaged Scholarship

American Cultures Engaged Scholarship Program

American Cultures Engaged Scholarship (ACES) courses also offer students and faculty the opportunity to work with community organizations to develop cutting edge research projects associated with some of the challenges pressing society. Please visit our ACES Student Projects page to learn about some of the powerful projects growing from the collaborative understanding and effort developed in UC Berkeley's ACES courses. Check out this page to view a collection of our growing ACES course offerings and previous student projects from these community-learning classes Learn more

The Creative Discovery Fellows (CDF) program supports instructors and students to exercise their creativity in ways that challenge existing assumptions, beliefs, and power structures; that propel discovery and meaningful self-reflection; and that contribute to and strengthen Berkeley's mission as a public institution. Check out this page to view a collection of student projects that showcase the work supported by the program. Learn more