American Studies

Photo of Sydney Rotman
Photo of Sydney Rotman

Sydney Rotman

Why American Studies?

 I have a wide variety of interests and did not want to be confined to a single discipline. I love the interdisplinary aspect of the major and that a concept I’ll learn in one of my courses connects to another in AMST. I really enjoyed AMST 200-Race Matters, MCS 360-News Analysis, and History of Jazz.  Analyzing film, literature, and other media really fascinates me. The most memorable moment I had was creating an anthology/book about a subject in AMST200; compiling my sources and decorating our books for display was a lot of fun! Mine was on display in Myrin Library. I wrote about the Rise of the KKK in the early 1900s.

Major

American Studies with an MCS concentration

Minor

Spanish

Activities

  • UCTV Live! (Ursinus College Television Live!)
  • Escape Velocity Dance Troupe
  • Jazz Ensemble
  • Summer Fellows
  • General Manager of UCTV
  • Dancer in Escape Velocity
  • Flutist in Jazz Ensemble 

Research

Currently, I am constructing an honors project on Minstrelsy in Contemporary Media. I learned about blackface minstrelsy in my history of Jazz class sophomore year and I became really interested in the subject of race in the United States and its portrayal in popular culture. I started my research over the summer during the Summer Fellows research program.

Study Abroad 

I studied abroad in the fall semester of my junior year in Florence, Italy. I took classes in photography, painting, Italian, and sociology/anthropology, while receiving credits for graduation. I traveled to various cities in Italy and I went to Morocco, Prague, Germany, and Israel.