AAAS415

We will use the HBO television series, The Wire, as a thread to integrate topics that form the basis of a thorough understanding of urban politics. Each week will have a different thematic focus - i.e., community development, inequality, crime, incarceration, policing, labor, education, and racial relations - and will couple scholarly work with in-class discussions to examine the social and political dynamics that emerge in the series. All of the assignments work together to expose students to social science, how social science is conducted, and how political science can help us better understand the world around us.