Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Studies
LGBT 340 - Rural Sexualities and Genders
Global LGBTQ politics and historiography have produced a dominant narrative that celebrates urban centers and Western metropolises as the spaces in which queer life and communities thrive. However, non-normative sexualities and expressions of gender have long been cultivated in rural spaces. This course draws on theoretical, literary and cinematic works that engage with the challenges and complexities of being queer in rural spaces, particularly when compounded by poverty, racism, the degradation of the environment, and exploitation of natural resources. Furthermore, this course explores the potential of rural LGBTQ communities to offer new models and definitions of queerness that are anti-consumerist, anti-urban, decolonial and sustainable. Students are prompted to understand gender and sexual diversity as intimately tied to issues such as environmental justice, biodiversity, and indigeneity through examples taken from around the world and in upstate New York.
Credits: 1 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No First-year Area of Inquiry: Human Thought and Expression Liberal Arts CORE: None
The course examines the effects of the U.S. legal system on the lives of the LGBTQ communities; the influence of religion, science, and culture on the laws affecting LGBTQ individuals; and the processes by which LGBTQ citizens may advance their legal rights. Constitutional theories such as equal protection, privacy, due process, liberty interests, and states’ rights are applied to issues such as consensual sodomy, same-sex marriage, LGBTQ parenting, employment rights, military policy, and freedoms of public school students. The power of the U.S. Supreme Court to shape laws concerning LGBTQ issues not only for the present society but for future generations is also examined. Cases studied are supplemented with secondary works. These works include writings by traditional legal scholars as well as works by feminists, race-based scholars, and queer theorists to create a fuller perspective. Through this exploration into the legal reality of a marginalized group, students see how the U.S. legal system continues to evolve in its struggle to provide equality for all of its citizens.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No First-year Area of Inquiry: Social Relations,Inst.& Agents Liberal Arts CORE: None
LGBT 355 - Partners and Crime: Queer Outlaws in Literature and Film
An intersection of sexuality and legality in literature and film. Beginning with topics of LGBTQ activism, homosociality and homonormativity, students will analyze how certain bodies and sexualities come to be on the right or wrong side of the law and how these sexual norms are quite literally policed. Focus will shift to literary writings and films from artists whose queer protagonists choose not to seek acceptance but rather to move outside of the law. Through bank robbery, border crossing, terrorism and homicide, these figures threaten not only the sexual order but also structures of class, race, and national security. Students will inquire into the true nature of these crimes, and determine how their crimes are sexualized and their sexualities criminalized. These will be analyzed together with critical works on queer and dissident genders and sexualities. The course may vary between semesters to focus on different regions or periods.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No First-year Area of Inquiry: Human Thought and Expression Liberal Arts CORE: Global Engagements
Opportunity for individual study in areas not covered by formal course offerings, under the guidance of a member of the faculty.
Credits: variable Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: None Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: None
Opportunity for individual study in areas not covered by formal course offerings, under the guidance of a member of the faculty.
Credits: variable Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: None Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: None
Students seek to understand the lived experiences of Haitians in Haiti and other particular geographically distinct regions of the world, with a focus on different enclaves in the Dominican Republic and United States. Students critically examine the multiple forms of social life and analyzes the ways in which the Haitian society functions as a unified whole and yet encompasses multiple, sometimes conflicting identities (based, for example, on gender, race, color, status, class, religion, and immigration status). Interdisciplinary in focus and materials, students study the geography, history, politics, sociology, and economics as well as their languages, literature, film, art, music, and religions, students will develop a comparative, historical frame of reference between Haiti and the communities to which they belong.
Credits: 1 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
An introduction to the cultural diversity and vitality of Senegal. Focusing on postcolonial Senegal and the diaspora, we will study the lived experiences of and theoretical scholarship on gender, sexual, religious, racial, national, and class categories and identities. The course asks how these are informed by shifting political economic agendas including decolonization, nationalism, and global capitalism. Employing a decolonial perspective, we will pay particular attention to the afterlife of French colonialism, based on the premise that “postcolonial” describes not the end but the shifting nature of European domination. The objectives are to unpack how Senegalese people of various identities are positioned in the world, to understand the constructed nature and fluidity of intersecting identities, and to encounter the ways in which individuals and communities creatively respond to identity-based oppression.
Credits: 1.00 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
An investigation of the contemporary dispersal of African-descended people throughout the world. While students focus primarily on dispersion to the Americas, some attention is also given to Africa, the Caribbean, Europe, and the Indian Ocean Basin. Recognizing the value of a complex diasporic lens that includes race, gender, sexuality, immigration status, and class, students are introduced to diasporic encounters African descendants have experienced, the formation of transnational social movements, black internationalism, Pan Africanism, post-1965 immigration, and contemporary Black life. To this end, coursework will challenge and expand students’ understandings of the diverse and complex history of people of the African Diaspora, what it means to be Black in the 21st Century, and how contemporary Black life is been informed by cultural exchanges in addition to migration, colonialism, slavery, and the quest for political enfranchisement.
Credits: 1 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
A single island, both divided and unified by distinct languages and colonial legacies, students explore the complex negotiations of race and nation in Haiti and the Dominican Republic. By studying works of literature, film, cultural studies, history, and politics from both sides of the border and its diasporas, students consider how the various articulations of colonial and postcolonial identities by states and different social actors have affected the national and international narratives of what it means to be from Hispaniola. Throughout the course, students ponder how physical and notional borders are employed as both tools of exclusion and sites for cooperation and exchange, while considering the complex processes by which national identities are constructed, disputed, and negated. In particular, students focus on discourses of race, language, gender, class, and migration as key to understanding the complexity of these issues, both on the island and in its diasporas.
Credits: 1 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
The Native people of the Great Plains are among the most familiar, yet least understood, cultural groups in all of North America. This course seeks to understand Plains Indian people beyond the simplistic renderings of Hollywood films. How have Plains people adapted to their unique environment, and how have their livelihoods changed over time? What historical processes underlay Plains Indian people’s relationship to settler society, and how can we understand changes to plains life through lenses like race and gender? And what is happening in Plains Indian communities today? With these questions in mind, this Core Communities and Identities seminar will trace the experiences of Plains Indian people from the colonial era through the present day.
Credits: 1 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
A multidisciplinary introduction to the Appalachian region of the United States, with a particular focus on representation, culture, sense of place, the history of the labor movement, and issues of social and environmental justice. Books, articles, movies, songs, and art that engage the reader critically with the history, people, environment, and economy of central Appalachia will serve as the texts for this course. The course seeks to complicate and challenge popular myths and stereotypical renderings of the Appalachian region, which typically portray its people as devastatingly and deservedly impoverished: economically, intellectually, and culturally. Through the works of Appalachian authors, filmmakers, songwriters and musicians, artists, storytellers, and scholars, students develop a deeper understanding of Appalachian identity, an appreciation for the phrase “sense of place,” and a new critical lens through which to view American society and their role within it.
Credits: 1 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
As the world’s fourth most populous country, modern Indonesia is home to over 260 million religiously and ethnically diverse individuals. Despite its substantial population and rich regional cultures, Indonesia is often overlooked both in American popular discourse and at American universities. This course pushes back against this unfortunate pattern of neglect. Students approach Indonesia as a valuable window into a whole host of global issues including: the legacy of European colonialism, the complexities of nation-building, cultural evolution, religious revivals, literature and the arts, economic development, and climate change. The vibrancy and paradoxes of modern Indonesian lives are highlighted.
Credits: 1 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Introduces students to the history of the major countries of Southern Africa. The course emphasizes that these countries are connected by patterns of culture, migration and economic exchange, political contingencies and warfare. It ranges from the precolonial period, through the time of the British, Portuguese, Belgian and German Empires, to conflicts in the region during the independence and Cold War eras. It seeks to give a picture of the cultures of these countries, and their political, social and economic conditions, today. There is a particular focus on interactions between nations, and issues of migration and transborder initiatives. South Africa has a central place in the course but attention will particularly be given to Mozambique, Angola, Zimbabwe, Namibia, and the ‘Copperbelt’ region of northern Zambia and Katanga/Shaba.
Credits: 1.00 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
A multidisciplinary survey of the varied communities and identities of France. It focuses on France as a leading member of the European Union, as a former major colonial power, and as a leader in the arts. Using history, films, photography, literature, and journalism, the course will examine France’s efforts to come to terms with its colonial past; its self-examination through the “politics of memory”; the different “communities” within France itself–youth, religious groups (e.g., Jewish, Muslim, Catholic), the communities of refugees and immigrants and the divisions within those groups; and its vibrant culture, with a particular focus on French cinema. The course will also examine the current political landscape in France.
Credits: 1.00 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Understand the cultural, political and social complexities of Puerto Rican identity, with particular attention given to the effects of Spanish and U.S. colonialism on gender and race relations in the stateless nation. Students will study how the colonial discourses that shaped the earliest modern Puerto Rican imaginary continues to inform current political discourse. Through the study of a wide-ranging body of Puerto Rican work that includes literature, cinema, history, and politics, students seek answers to how national identity is articulated in a colonial context, how migration to the mainland has altered the cultural landscape and what kinds of collective cultural and political movements have emerged in response to the island’s socio-economic and political problems. Focused on issues of gender and sexuality to understand how these, along with issues of race and class today are linked to the island’s colonial legacy, in order to develop a framework for understanding the complex relationships between nation, gender and race on the island and within Puerto Rican communities in the U.S.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
The term “Maya” typically conjures images of ancient pyramids and/or ancient civilizations that are now found in ruins. Some forms of popular media, particularly science fiction, even go as far as describing the Maya people as a civilization that mysteriously disappeared sometime around AD. 900. The Maya currently total over 7 million people in what is today Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, and El Salvador. Furthermore, the word “Maya” serves as an umbrella term that refers to a number of diverse populations, each with distinct culture, language, and material culture. This course will focus on both the construction of the pan-Maya identity, and the numerous populations included within the concept, such as the Tzel Tal, Tzotzil, Kaqchikel, K’iche’, Chantal, and the Lacandon, just to name a few. Each of these groups has distinct histories, which often demonstrated significant clashes with colonial and modem national hegemonies. This course also highlights how tradition, language, and identity are preserved under the forces of colonial and nationalistic domination and will also delve into the subject of changing traditions, as these Maya movements of resistance have integrated social media, rock music, and hip-hop to engage younger generations. Ultimately, the Maya provide a means of deconstructing the concept of identity itself by demonstrating how shared identities are constructed, contested, and negotiated.
Credits: 1.00 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Explores how the idea of “Latin America” came to be and the various political purposes it has served from the colonial encounter to the contemporary moment. This is not a traditional survey course that gives an overview of the regional mosaic we have come to call “Latin America.” Instead, it illuminates how the very notion of Latin America as a discrete world-region has been conjured and politicized at key historical moments, emphasizing the underlying social inclusions, exclusions, and global relations fueling these multiple (re)inventions. In addition to the central themes of race, nature, and anti-imperialism, the crucial role of the United States as an interventionist foreign power also looms large in this story.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
The archipelago of islands and mainland nations called the Caribbean constitutes a complex montage of races, ethnic groups, languages, and nations. Stretching from Guyana in South America to as far north as the Bahamas, minutes from the coast of Miami, the region is joined by a common history of slavery, imperialism, and resistant self-definition. This course studies literature, film, and music of the region to trace a socio-cultural history of the Caribbean. What are the continued effects of slavery and imperialism on the Caribbean? How does African-Creole culture in particular respond to these continued effects? How do tourism, advertising, music, and film inform/construct people’s relationship to the Caribbean in the global present?
Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
From gauchos in the Pampa, to immigrants in Buenos Aires, to oil workers in Patagonia, Argentina offers a fascinating place to examine the creation, transformation and contestation of identities and communities. This course introduces students to some of the events, institutions, people and sites that have been important for the development of Argentina, from before the land’s European colonization, to the rise of populism, dictatorship and resistance in the 20th century, to neoliberal globalization in the current moment. In the process, students gain new ways to understand identity, community, nation, and culture, which they can use wherever they encounter people different from themselves. The course is interdisciplinary and draws from anthropology, history, geography, literature, film, and related disciplines.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
China has the distinction of being one of the world’s oldest continuous cultures, with 5,000 years of rich, complex history. Today, it is also a rising international power with the second largest economy on the globe. CORE 165C approaches China not as a monolithic entity, but as a complicated place and people best understood through diverse perspectives, including but not limited to history, economics, geography, literature, art, politics, environment, society, ethnicity, gender, migration, and diaspora. Students also gain indispensable research skills as they develop their own projects.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Offers a wide-ranging and challenging introduction to contemporary India–its famed social, political and cultural diversity, its conflicts and contradictions, its literature and history. India as it is known today, with its population of more than a billion, is a recent creation, a product of the partition of the South Asian colonies of the British Raj (Empire). How has such a diverse region come together, and been held together, as one nation? How have its conflicts and contradictions—of class, caste, ethnicity, language, religion and politics—been managed by its rulers and politicians? How have these conflicts and contradictions been captured in novels and on film? The course goal is to subject the “Idea of India” to a detailed investigation, beginning in the present, and working through a process of excavation, discovery, and critique.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Engages in dialogue with popular discourses, scholarly literature, and primary information sources of Japan and those who live in the island nation state. Focuses on key social and cultural issues that characterize contemporary Japan while also paying attention to its historical experiences and traditions that variably shape the present. Examines such topics as changing ‘western’ views on the Japanese, diversity in Japanese society, socio-demographic challenges, literature and religion, Japanese political economy and globalization, societal response to natural disasters, and popular culture. Employs a wide range of learning methods, including lecture, class discussion, films, hands-on experiences (e.g., calligraphy), and intensive projects which require students to collect, analyze, and synthesize a wide range of scholarly and non-scholarly sources. Ultimately aims to nurture students’ ability to understand and empathize with the logic (and illogic), experiences and emotions of the Japanese people; that is to say, to understand them as you would understand yourselves.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
A multidisciplinary examination of the ways in which community and identity have been formed, are politicized, and remain relatively static over time. This is not a course about the 1994 genocide, but rather one about how such an event could have happened. This world-defining event is historically situated and culturally contextualized as a way to study Rwanda’s past and the questions it raises about its future. The experience of Rwandans and consideration of how they understand themselves are analyzed. Assesses the historical and social implications of being ethnic Hutu, Tutsi, or Twa in Rwanda, whether at particular watershed moments — in for example 1894, 1931, 1959, or 1994 — or during periods of so-called ‘normalcy’ that the country has enjoyed in the past and is experiencing at the moment.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Surveys the varied ethno-national and religious identities and communities of Islamic North Africa, or “the Maghreb”: Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia, and sometimes Libya, Western Sahara, and Mauritania. Students briefly survey pre-modern Maghreb history from the 7th-century advance of Islam to 19th-century French colonialism. Students focus on the modern Maghreb from the colonial 19th century to the global 21st. Pursuing central CI themes, students examine the region from “the natives’ point of view,” i.e., from North Africans’ perspectives on Islam and politics, European and American imperialism, authoritarianism and democracy, technological media, gender, and class. Central to this discussion are the recent Arab revolutions and their continuing aftermath.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
An interdisciplinary introduction to the history, people, art and cultures of Mexico, a country of diverse ethnic, sexual, gendered, class, and political identities that shares a 2,000-mile border with the United States. How does Mexico’s colonial past inform the present? On what terms has a Mexican national identity been defined and who is included or excluded from rights and citizenship? Objectives are to examine Mexico’s complex history and social fabric; to study Mexican identities, politics, and cultural expressions with relation to this history; and to gain a general understanding of contemporary Mexico in the context of current events and Mexico’s relationship to the United States.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Examines the fabric of California’s syncretic cultures in historical, geographic, sociologic, artistic, racial, literary, political, and economic contexts. The diverse settlement patterns, environmental and economic challenge/opportunity, explosion of art forms, and continuous creation of new communities often foreshadowed trends of the entire nation. Readings explore major themes and issues of California history, while literary and personal narratives provide insight into social and political realities, including the struggles of successive waves of immigrants to interact with the established populations. Artistic and architectural expressions that document cultural phenomena offer tangible examples of the creative forces that shaped Californian intellectual and physical communities. Sociological case studies as well as economic, political, and environmental reporting assist students to understand the challenges, failures, and victories of the composite California culture. Underlying all of this is a continuous study of the variegated geography of California, which has both offered and required substantial human choices.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Surveys the culture, religion, communities, history, and socio-economic developments of Ethiopia from the ancient times to the modern period. Ethiopia is home to over 80 ethnic groups with striking cultures that are distinct from Western traditions. Major themes include peoples and languages; traditional customs and beliefs; Christianity and Islam; marriages; community service organizations; literature, novels; education; ethnic relations; traditional art and music; colonial resistance; sports; socio-economic developments; natural resources usage; Ethiopia and Europe; the Ethiopian revolution; Ethiopian immigrants in the United States; traditional harmful practices; and politics. Emphasis is also given to contemporary issues. Lectures are supplemented by discussions, film presentation, group activity, and coffee ceremony.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Provides an overview of North American Indians by drawing on case studies from four groupings: New England tribes; Iroquois; Cheyenne; and Pueblos. These cultures are studied in terms of their historical and political relationship to Anglo-American society and institutions, attending to Native Americans’ resistance to attempted conquest by European or American powers, the creation of reservation systems, and the use of institutions (e.g., the Bureau of Indian Affairs, schools, missions) to change Native American cultures. Students also examine the response of Native Americans to outside pressures. Students explore other issues, such as sovereignty, identity, gambling, repatriation, land claims, and education, and their impact on North American Indians. Videotapes and Native American artifacts are studied throughout the semester.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
The Latin American country Peru evokes dramatic and conflicting images of spectacular natural settings, ancient ruins, cosmopolitan cities, shantytowns, street children, poverty and more. It is a country of extremes. This course offers an interdisciplinary inquiry into this ecologically and culturally diverse land. The course begins by exploring the distinct geography and ecology of the central Andean region (rainforest, mountains, desert, and ocean) in order to understand how these features have shaped the societies that inhabit the region of present-day Peru. This involves analyzing the evolution and organization of Pre-Columbian societies, paying special attention to the Inca civilization. It also examines the ideologies, institutions and practices introduced with the Spanish conquest and era of colonialism in order to understand their impact on indigenous society and their relevance to the state of underdevelopment that characterizes contemporary Peru. Study of present-day Peru juxtaposes rural and urban life, the ties between the two spheres, and the crisis conditions that enveloped both ways of life until recently. Specific issues include the internal armed conflict, the coca culture and cocaine economy, shantytowns and land invasions, oil extraction and indigenous resistance, among other compelling issues. Throughout the term, this course emphasizes the many paradoxes of this intriguing land.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Designed for students to explore the culture of Korea/Corea. In order to engage in critical learning and dialogue, students look at a wide range of academic and non-academic materials from an interdisciplinary approach. Throughout the semester students delve into issues that have had a deep impact upon post-modern society, which include the cultural-historical and sociocultural foundations of Corea (i.e., social and political history and religious influence), international relations and influences on the economy, the social and political identities, and current cultural structures of North and South Corea. Some of the topics covered may include but are not limited to the Opening of Corea in 1882, Japanese colonial years (1910-1945), division and reunification of Corea (1945-present), the Korean War (1950-1953), North Korea’s Juche Policy, South Corea’s attempts at democracy and current governmental system, educational reform in South Corea, women’s movement in South Corea, and globalization’s impact on higher education in South Corea. The main objective is to draw the students’ interests towards understanding the world from multiple perspectives, the impacts globalization has upon these multiple systems and institutions, and their individual role in the ever changing world.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Martinique, a 400 square-mile island, is an official part of France today despite being 4200 miles away from mainland France. French is the official language but most Martinicans freely express themselves in Creole. The majority of Martinicans will declare that they are, first and foremost, citizens of the French Republic, but will also readily admit that they are Martinican by culture. What is striking about Martinique is the dizzying array of cultural signifiers that seem to coexist in a veritable braided community, in which it can be genuinely difficult to tell where one cultural identity strand ends and another begins. Martinique is thus a fabulous lens through which this process of negotiating and renegotiating of cultures, languages, and identities can be viewed, and can be considered a precursor to modern-day globalization.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
A multi-disciplinary introduction both to the region conventionally referred to as the Middle East, and also to the academic discipline of Middle Eastern Studies. In other words, it is a study of the people, religion, history, and culture of the region, and also about the politics of studying that region. One of the presuppositions is that a careful, rigorous, and critical study of cultural studies can help one understand one’s own assumptions, presuppositions, etc. Among the topics students examine are the multiple interpretations of religion, including sects within Islam, that exist in the region; a variety of cultural practices and various languages; and the effect of imperialism and colonialism on the area. Readings include what current native commentators are saying on cultural, economic, and social debates.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
The Danube is Europe’s second largest river: from its beginnings in the German Black Forest to the Romanian and Ukrainian shores where it meets the Black Sea, the Danube flows through and/or borders ten countries, while its watershed covers four more. The river serves as a unifying artery of economic, cultural, and international exchanges in the diverse region of central and southeastern Europe. The course structures its multidisciplinary inquiry around the river to examine the region’s long-standing history as a neglected, maligned, and contested multilingual, multicultural, and multinational space. Culturally mapping the region by focusing on the river’s peoples, their intertwined histories, and their cultural imaginaries, the course traces the turbulent history of the region from antiquity, with an emphasis on the 19th century up to the present, to explore the Danube as a quintessential site of cross-cultural engagement in the New Europe.
Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
CORE 187C - Russia at the Crossroads of East and West
Examines Russian society, culture, and identity through eras of Tsarism, revolution, social engineering, war, and societal transformations. Explores Russia’s distinctiveness - its place in the world, struggles, and successes - looking at how Russians themselves understand and contest this heritage. Examining the roots of Russian identity, students consider the images of leaders from Peter the Great to Stalin and Vladimir Putin, as well as the work and legacies of artists, writers, and composers. Another major focus is peoples’ everyday lives during political and social upheavals. Students examine what life was like during the Stalinist 1930s, through the traumas of World War II (“The Great Patriotic War”), Perestroika in the 1980s, and the post-Soviet present. Students learn about the dynamic ways that culture, history, politics, and identity intertwine in any society.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Examines the archaeology, culture, history, economics, religion, literature, arts, politics, law, and individual lives of the Iroquois (Haudenosaunee) Indians - Colgate’s closest Native American neighbors - from the period before European contact to the present day. Students place Iroquois experiences in North American Indian contexts (comparing the Iroquois, e.g., to the Cherokee), especially regarding the loss and persistence of tribal sovereignty; and investigate Iroquois relations with New York State and the United States, especially in regard to competing land claims.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
An introduction to the interdisciplinary study of Africa and to the African Studies major and minor at Colgate. The goal is to introduce students to a major world area with which many, even highly educated, Westerners are unfamiliar. Africa is the original home of the human species, and the intellectual contributions of the continent and its people to the concept of a common humanity are tremendous, including agricultural and industrial technologies, artistic and aesthetic principles, and religious and philosophical ideas. Due to early patterns of globalization and European colonization in the western hemisphere, the Atlantic slave trade, and ultimately colonialism on the continent itself, Africa was configured as “the Dark Continent” in European discourses of the nineteenth century.
Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Aims to provide students with an overview of the social, cultural, political, and economic dynamics that have shaped life in South Africa. Students and faculty work together to better understand the way in which the country of South Africa came into being, how that national identity has been a site of struggle and contestation, particularly in the case of the struggle to overcome Apartheid, and how South Africans are working to overcome the legacy of racism and oppression that has marked much of the social and cultural experience of South Africa. In doing so, students investigate the changing dynamics of race, gender, and culture in South Africa, with a particular focus on understanding the ways South Africans are actively reshaping and unsettling existing social identities and distinctions.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Covers diverse aspects of “Spanish” society, history, and culture, past and present. Tracing Spain’s cultural self-image and national identities through its encounters with war, fascism, democracy, and societal transformations during our global era, students explore its place in the world, its collective struggles, its encounters and negotiations of diversity, and how these have been understood and contested by “Spaniards” themselves. Drawing on fictional works, art, music, and ethnographic texts, a significant portion of the course examines peoples’ everyday lives in contexts of violence, war, and socio-cultural change. In sum, students grapple with an inherent paradox in the study of “Spain”: the failure to create a homogenous national identity and a coherent, commonly shared historical memory.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Examines communities and identities in Brazil, the largest nation in Latin America. Focuses on the formation of communities under the constraints of Portuguese colonialism, within slavery, in the vast interior of the country, under conditions of extreme violence and poverty, and in the realm of Brazil’s vibrant popular culture. Particular attention is paid to the role of individuals in forming and maintaining communities, and to the complex processes of regional and national identity formation. Spans the colonial period to the present, with readings drawn from history, anthropology, literature, ethnography, and journalism, as well as a range of visual sources.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
In contrast to Western journalists’ focus on Africa’s underdevelopment and widespread disease, West Africa stands out as an area of remarkably vibrant culture. West Africa has always been a space of much social interaction between its various peoples, with many shared cultural practices. In this course, students examine how the pre-colonial and colonial histories shaped social identities. Using an interdisciplinary approach, students analyze how people in West Africa express and reinvent their identities through art, music, dance, clothes, and food. The course draws further on film and literature to understand the specific experiences of West African peoples.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Examines the formation of a Tibetan identity. This is largely a recent phenomenon brought about unwittingly by the ethnocentric policies imposed throughout the Tibetan Plateau by the modern Chinese state. However, earlier processes were already under way before the People’s Liberation Army entered Tibet in the 1950s, which made the transition from a constellation of feudal polities to a nation possible. These included a common written language, common subsistence patterns (farming, pastoralism, and trade), Buddhism, participation in common rituals and festivals (especially religious pilgrimage), a certain respect for the authority of the Dalai Lamas, and so on. Students examine these processes as well as the consequences of China’s political and economic incorporation of Tibetan areas into its nascent nation-state. Specific topics to be explored include “the Tibet Problem” (i.e. contemporary Sino-Tibetan relations and conflict), the historic colonial and religious ties between China Proper and Tibet, religious life and everyday Tibetans, “nomadism” (or pastoralism), polyandry and women in Tibet, and Tibetans’ encounter with modernity and the West.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Examines the complex geographic, historic, social, racial, literary, political, and artistic fabric of Cuba. Historical readings explore major themes of Cuban history, while literary and personal narratives provide insight into social and political realities. These themes are complemented by a study of Cuban film, dance, and music as agents of identity formation.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
A multidisciplinary look at communities and identities in Bolivia, a country in the heart of South America that has captured transnational attention for its Andean panpipe music, its majority indigenous population, and its social movements. The course uses music, dance, film, history, memoir, political documents, policy reports, anthropology, and journalism to grasp different community articulations in Bolivia. Along with historical understandings of Bolivian communities, the course takes a special look at thematic issues that, while locally grounded, have global resonances: indigenous rights, water, resource extraction, neoliberalism, coca and cocaine, and Andean music and dance.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Communities & Identities
Explores ancient texts that articulate perennial issues: the nature of the human and the divine; virtue and the good life; the true, the just and the beautiful; the difference between subjective opinion and objective knowledge. These texts exemplify basic modes of speech, literary forms, and patterns of thinking that establish the terminology of academic and intellectual discourse and critical thought across many different societies: epic, rhetoric, tragedy, epistemology, science, democracy, rationality, the soul, spirit, law, grace. Such terms have shaped the patterns of life, norms, and prejudices that have been continually challenged, criticized, and refashioned throughout history. To highlight both the dialogue and conflicts between the texts and the traditions they embody, this course, taught by a multidisciplinary staff and in an interdisciplinary manner, focuses on both the historical contexts of these texts and the ongoing retellings and reinterpretations of them through time. Moreover, the course includes texts from the ancient Mediterranean world that have given rise to some of the philosophical, political, religious, and artistic traditions associated with “The West,” emphasizing that Western traditions were not formed in a vacuum but developed in dialogue and conflict with other traditions, some of which lie beyond the geographical area of “The West.” Common to all sections of this component are classic works such as Homer, the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, Plato, and a Roman text. Complementary texts or visual materials from the ancient period, in and beyond the Western world, and/or response texts from the medieval or contemporary periods are added in individual sections or groups of sections. Thus, some groups of sections may have particular themes. These themes will be identified at registration every term.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Legacies of Ancient World
Modernity is a crucial element of the intellectual legacy to which we are heirs. A matrix of intellectual, social, and material forces that have transformed the world over the last quarter millennium, modernity has introduced new problems and possibilities into human life. Within modernity, issues of meaning, identity, and morality have been critiqued in distinctive ways. People of different social classes, racial groups, ethnic backgrounds, genders and sexual identities have contributed to an increasingly rich public discourse. The human psyche has been problematized, and the dynamic character of the world, both natural and social, has been explored. Urbanization and technological development have transformed the patterns of everyday life. Imperialism has had a complex and lasting impact on the entire globe. The human capability to ameliorate social and physical ills has increased exponentially, and yet so has the human capacity for mass destruction and exploitation. In this course, taught by an interdisciplinary staff, students explore texts from a variety of media that engage with the ideas and phenomena central to modernity. To ensure a substantially common experience for students, the staff each year chooses texts to be taught in all sections of the course. This component of the Core Curriculum encourages students to think broadly and critically about the world that they inhabit, asking them to see their contemporary concerns in the perspective of the long-standing discourses of modernity.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Challenges of Modernity
The goal of the distinction seminar is to complement major work in departments and programs by giving select students the opportunity to reflect on the broader, interdisciplinary contexts of their research of creative projects. Through readings assigned by the seminar instructors, students explore the methodologies of their own and other disciplines. Each student writes a substantial interdisciplinary paper relevant to the student’s departmental honors work. This requirement may be satisfied in one of the following ways: 1) by extending a departmental honors project to explore interdisciplinary perspectives on the project topic or to examine the social implications or historical foundations of the project; 2) by self-consciously considering the generation and evaluation of knowledge in the major; or 3) by collaborating with one or more members of the seminar to explore themes common to the students’ departmental projects. If selected to enroll in the distinction seminar, students must achieve a 3.33 (B+) or better GPA in the five Core components: Legacies of the Ancient World, Challenges of Modernity, Scientific Perspectives on the World, Communities and Identities, and Global Engagements. For students who repeat or complete multiple courses with a Common Core component, only the grade in the first course is considered. A cumulative grade for all Global Engagements courses completed is averaged in the Core GPA. To earn Distinction in the Liberal Arts Core, students must earn an A- or better in the distinction seminar, earn departmental honors with the completion of the department honors project, and achieve an overall GPA of 3.33 or better at the time of graduation.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: None Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: None
In today’s world of sports, how is knowledge obtained? On what principles are strategy determined, personnel decisions made, and honors awarded? The advent of computers and the availability of large statistical databases have moved the source of knowledge away from conventional wisdom to more scientific and testable ideas. Questions of strategy and team decisions can now be addressed in an empirical fashion, causing a major impact in sports. Behind this revolution lies the scientific method of inquiry, including the notion of falsifiability and the relationship between theory and observation. This course explores these ideas using examples in sports to illustrate more general scientific concepts. Students explore the impact of empirical knowledge on the games themselves, and how it has caused changes in strategies and team decisions. Finally, the students ask their own sports questions and answer them in a scientific fashion.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Our current use of energy is unsustainable. Fossil fuels, which were deposited on Earth over hundreds of millions of years, will largely be exhausted over the course of just a few hundred years. Global climate change makes our situation even more unsustainable—we need to stop using fossil fuels long before they run out if we want to avoid catastrophic environmental change. This course takes a quantitative approach to learning about our current energy use, so that students can understand how our personal choices and lifestyles affect energy use. Discussion includes how our energy needs are met in the future through renewable resources: what technologies are available now, what are their costs, and how much energy can they provide.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
When reduced to fundamentals, virtually all of our environmental problems deal with chemicals in the wrong place: noxious and reactive gases in our atmosphere, insecticides and toxic metals in our ground and drinking water, and spilled nuclear wastes. Unfortunately, many citizens in our society do not understand the fundamentals of these environmental problems. This course – designed for students without experience in other university-level science courses – explores the chemistry behind some of our more pressing environmental dilemmas. Topics include some consequences of fossil fuel combustion (the greenhouse effect, acid rain, urban smog), the ozone hole, nuclear energy/wastes, and groundwater contamination. The emphasis is on the science behind these problems, what we know about how the problems have come about, and what we can do, if anything, to ease the problems. This course is for the student who has not taken college-level chemistry, but is concerned about our threatened environment.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Remote sensing is the art and science of obtaining information about a phenomenon through a device that is not in contact with the object. The remote sensing process involves collection and analysis of data about energy, reflected from or emitted by an object. Remote sensing is used to better understand, measure, and monitor features and human activities on Earth. After an introduction to the interplay among science, technology, and remote sensing, students examine the development of remote sensing technology. Students focus on the physical principles upon which remote sensing is based, explore the basic tools of photography and photograph interpretation, and consider the principles of acquiring and interpreting data collected by non-photographic sensors. Throughout the semester, students consider how remote sensing has improved our understanding of biophysical processes using a case-study approach to demonstrate the theoretical underpinnings. Finally, consideration is given to the ethical implications of remote sensing.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 105S - The Science and Potential Implications of Nanotechnology
Imagine repairing your body without surgery and no longer burning fossil fuels. Imagine enjoying abundance with no manufacturing costs and taking an elevator to the moon. Imagine also the loss of all personal privacy and the irreversible poisoning of the environment. Such are the hopes, hype, and fears of nanotechnology — the study of materials and devices with dimensions on the nanoscale (1 x 10-9m, the realm of assemblies of molecules). This course provides an introduction to the science and potential implications of molecular nanotechnology. Scientific and sensationalist visions of nanotechnology are critically examined through a combination of readings, lectures, discussions, and presentations. The course forges an appreciation for the nanoscale, an understanding of the excitement and the challenges, and an awareness of the societal and ethical implications. Through the lens of nanotechnology, students gain insights applicable to the broad landscape of emerging technologies — and encourage curiosity towards the future.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 106S - Saving the Appearances: Galileo, the Church, and the Scientific Endeavor
Four hundred years ago, Galileo Galilei turned his modest telescope skyward. The universe he discovered was a stark contrast to the universe described by the ancient Greek philosophers whose cosmology had held sway for over a millennium. Some 60 years after the publication of Copernicus’ treatise “On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres,” Galileo used his newfound insight into the nature of the heavens to support the heliocentric model of the universe. In so doing, Galileo challenged not only the authority of Aristotelian cosmology, but also the religious tradition and interpretation of the scripture by the Holy Fathers of the Catholic Church. This episode in the history of western science and the development of the Church is often cited as one of the original clashes between modern science and religious traditions. The discoveries, writings, and trial of Galileo Galilei will serve as both a focus and backdrop for students to explore the practical development of scientific thought and the near simultaneous invention and re-invention of the Church. In addition to readings, written responses, and classroom discussions, the course requires students to repeat many of the ground-breaking observations Galileo made using a hand-held refracting telescope similar in size and shape to the one he built.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Colors are all around and people tend to take them for granted. Throughout history, humans have employed colors in artistic and creative expression, particularly in jewelry, ceramics, textile and metal art and in paintings. Some colorants occur naturally. Other colorants are manufactured, and thus the result of scientific and industrial development. In this course, students explore the history and material science of colorants. The interplay between artistic expression and science/technological discovery is considered with emphasis on the materials used in textile art and in paintings. In the process, students find out how science can be used to authenticate artwork. Is a work of art an original by a “famous artist,” have parts been reworked by someone else, or is it a forgery? In addition to lectures and discussions, students participate in small group hands-on projects.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 109S - In Data We Trust: The Promise and Perils of a Data-Driven Society
Examines fundamental concepts related to data processing and automated analysis. Students are expected to develop a conceptual understanding of how algorithms for processing and analysis work and apply this understanding in lab-like activities. The latter part of the course examines potential implications for society and contemplates questions relevant to the use of data in everyday life. Representative examples include the following: What are the consequences of massive data collection on privacy and liberty? How does one judge the fairness of a decision made using sophisticated data analytics? If a decision making process is shown to be biased, who is accountable?
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Examines some of the major questions that inform human understanding of the living world. Covering long-standing biological questions as well as questions emerging from the latest discoveries, students explore the great diversity of life and how organisms adapt and change. Students use this framework to tackle new and relevant issues arising from our study of biology. The approach is student-active and hands-on; students work together to explore a few of the mysteries of the natural world.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 111S - The Artful Brain: An Exploration in Neuro-aesthetics
Consists of an exploration in the aesthetic experience of art as it relates to the sensory and perceptual mechanisms of the brain. Many of the topics discussed are centered on the view that the function of art and the function of the visual brain are one and the same. Students thus consider that the aims of the artist in rendering a particular piece of art essentially constitute an extension of the processes of the visual brain. By taking this point of view (through an introductory understanding of the sensory and perceptual processes of the visual brain) students discuss possible outlines of a theory of aesthetics that is biologically based. Students are required to read chapters from different textbooks devoted to sensory and perceptual processes as they relate to visual art, as well as review articles from professional journals.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Close relationships are central to our lives; friends, parents, siblings, romantic partners, acquaintances, and coworkers have an enormous influence on one’s thoughts, feelings, and behavior. The purpose of this course is to understand the processes that regulate human relationships using a scientific perspective. It will include an overview of social psychology theories of relationships research and an exploration of the current literature. Students will be exposed to a variety of research methods and will have the opportunity to design their own experiment about relationships. Topics include attraction, intimacy, attachment, friendship, interdependence, communication, dissolution and loss, love, and maintaining relationships.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
If one were a highly developed, extraterrestrial scientist with advanced technology to engineer organisms from other planets, how would one build a human baby? What kind of brain would one design? What kinds of social, emotional, and cognitive predispositions would be included? What kind of environment would one provide? To answer these questions, one must determine what is innate and what is learned in human development. Although this “nature-nurture” question can be traced back to ancient philosophers (right here on Earth!), modern-day science has made great strides in exploring (and reformulating) this question. In this class, students first explore some pop-culture approaches to this issue. Then, they briefly trace the history of the debate to its foundations in classical and modern philosophy. Finally, students compare these philosophical and pop-culture perspectives to modern-day scientific approaches. This is accomplished through primary and secondary readings, class discussions, and group presentations. In the end, students may discover that the answers to the “nature-nurture” question are not on a planet far, far way - but rather closer to home than they have ever been.
Credits: 1.00 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Explores the ways in which scientific concepts, such as deep geologic time and Earth history, biological evolution and co-evolution, and ecosystem dynamics can inform humans about radical moral stances (e.g., biocentrism, deep ecology). Also investigates whether a scientific perspective, in and of itself, is sufficient to resolve pressing environmental problems, most of which are the outcome of complex social, economic, political, philosophical, and historical forces that operate on regional and global scales.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 119S - Environmental Activism, Science, and the Arts
For several decades, artists using a variety of media have consciously been using their art to promote environmental activism. There is an even longer history of art reflecting and perhaps affecting people’s appreciation of and understanding of the relationships between humans and nature. Using examples from painting, photography, sculpture, music, film, dance, theater, poetry, and other media, including multimedia performances and installations, this course examines two questions about the relationships among environmental activism, science, and the arts. First, how do activist artists use scientific understanding in their environmental arts? Second, does activist environmental art affect environmental attitudes, perceptions, beliefs, and/or behavior? By addressing these questions, the course explores scientific perspectives, connects them to a topic outside the natural sciences and mathematics, and contrasts them with other ways of knowing.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Management of the Earth’s energy, mineral, and water resources is a subject of ongoing controversy and debate. This debate revolves around two related issues: the diminishing supply of some resources and the environmental cost of resource extraction and energy production. This course examines the origin and geologic setting of Earth’s resources, and how these factors influence resource exploration, extraction, and use. Environmental and economic aspects of resource extraction are explored. Students examine the public debate about resource management and conservation, as well as the roles of politics and the media in shaping this debate. This course emphasizes student-led discussions of case studies dealing with current resource-related topics. The purpose of this course is to create a framework in which resource issues can be evaluated, integrating the scientific and social issues inherent in resource development.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 122S - Life in the Universe: A Cosmic Perspective
Examines the historical debate on the concept of whether extraterrestrial life exists. Students examine what astronomy and physics tell about the origin and evolution of the Universe, the production of elements that make up living matter on Earth, the evolution of stars like the Sun, and the formation of solar systems. Also examined are the astronomical, geological, chemical, and biological conditions that were responsible for the origin and evolution of life on Earth, and speculate about the possibility of life on other planets in our solar system or on planets around other stars. How would one detect the presence of life on other planets in the solar system; in the galaxy? The development of intelligent life and the possibility of contact between civilizations are examined.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
As the “Global Warming Summit” made clear, anthropogenic activity has the potential to dramatically alter global climate. The increased introduction of greenhouse gases, sulfate aerosols, and dust through human activities may result in a variety of regional responses, including warming and cooling, changes in precipitation and drought patterns, and rising sea level. Climate change as a force driving human history, however, is not unique to the 20th century. The primary objectives of this course are to present case studies that demonstrate the strong role of climate in driving human evolution, adaptation, and societies; and to assess the relationship between climate forcing and man, with a view toward understanding the potential consequences of modern anthropogenic impacts.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
The fusion of sperm and egg cells to form a single-celled zygote is the initial step in development in most multi-cellular organisms. In humans, repeated divisions of this single fertilized egg are responsible for the production of more than 70 trillion cells of greater than 200 different types. In this course students examine how a fertilized egg undergoes division, how the stem cells produced by these divisions become “determined” to form cells of particular types, and how these determined cells finally differentiate into the highly specialized cells that make up most tissues and organs. As this process is examined, students also explore the relationship between cells and developmental patterns, and investigate how genetic and environmental factors can influence (and alter) cell fate. Biological, social, and ethical aspects of the human manipulation of development are also considered, including examination of such topics as cloning by nuclear transfer, reproductive technology, fetal surgery, stem cells, and embryonic gene therapy.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 126SL - Computers in the Arts and Sciences Lab
Required corequisite to CORE 126S.
Credits: 0.25 Corequisite:CORE 126S Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: None Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Our planet is currently undergoing a level of abiotic and biotic change that is unprecedented in recent history and the scientific consensus is that it is anthropogenic. This course introduces students to the recent data on climate change and inferred causes and consequences of that change. Throughout the course, the way in which humans influence these changes and also the ways in which these changes impact humans are explored. The main focus of the course is the carbon cycle, specifically on human energy consumption, food production, and water use, and how they are linked to biodiversity loss. The many sides of issues (e.g., biofuels) are explored and debated throughout the course. The immediate consequences of global change are demonstrated in a required weekend field trip to the Adirondacks in the third week of the classes to learn about the effects of pollution and climate on our local ecosystems.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 129S - Dangerous Earth: Science of Geologic Disasters
Geologic disasters, such as floods, earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions, serve as dramatic reminders of the power of nature and the catastrophic impact that these disasters have on society. As recent events such as the 2003 tsunami in Sumatra demonstrate, these disasters can exact a terrible cost in both economic terms and loss of life. Society has a clear interest in understanding what causes these disasters and how to reduce their impact on human populations. Geology provides a scientific framework for understanding the potential risks and effects of geologic disasters. This course examines the science behind four disasters that pose major risks to society: floods, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and meteoric impacts. Students examine significant case studies to understand the types of data collected to study these disasters, ambiguities in the data, and how risk is estimated. Students also examine potential ways to reduce the damage caused by such hazards and the scientific, economic, political, and societal implications of these approaches.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
The fossil record reveals that Earth has experienced five cataclysmic events, or mass extinctions, which in each instance had a profound effect on its history by redirecting the course of evolution. As detectives attempting to solve the world’s greatest murder mysteries, students of this course examine when each of these catastrophic events occurred, what caused ecosystems and evolutionary processes to be disrupted, why and where biological diversity was greatly diminished, and who survived to begin the evolutionary repair of life during subsequent recovery and radiation phases. In the final part of the course, students use their knowledge of these past events to hypothesize about and investigate the severity of the Sixth Extinction. The course addresses modern conservation practices and specific actions that hope to enhance the future existence of a biologically diverse planet.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
The relationship between the mind and the body has been a topic of speculation and controversy through human history. This course explores this relationship by examining how psychological and social factors influence human health. Proponents of Western medicine have frequently dismissed a mind-body link as folklore; others, especially writers for the popular media, have claimed that the mind has miraculous power to cure disease. In recent years, scientists have conducted numerous studies aimed at discovering how thoughts and emotions actually influence physical health, and what mechanisms underlie this influence.
Students evaluate this literature, learning about the effects of beliefs, emotional states (depression, anxiety), personality characteristics, and stress on people’s susceptibility to and recovery from illnesses. Students also explore literature suggesting that psychological approaches can prevent or treat physical conditions. By doing hands-on experimentation, students learn how to measure stress and even how to control their own physiological responses to it. The course emphasizes the value and limitations of using Western scientific methodology to gain knowledge, and contrasts this approach with ideas from “alternative” and Eastern approaches to medicine.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Examines the scientific evolution of nuclear weapons and the historical context in which they were developed. World War II made urgent the exploitation of atomic power for military purposes. Topics include the scientific thought that made harnessing nuclear power possible, the political pressure that shaped that process, the ramifications of the bomb for science and politics during and immediately after the war, and the subsequent impact of nuclear bomb use on the population and the environment. Includes consideration of post-WWII developments of nuclear weapons, weapons testing, and nuclear power generation, with an emphasis on their environmental impact.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 139S - Election Methods and Voting Technology
How should we elect our president and other officials? What is the best way to cast and record our votes? This course surveys different methods of conducting elections. We develop tools to assess the fairness of our election methods in this country and how they might make policy decisions related to elections. These policies concern the ways of casting our votes (voting technology) and the election methods. One part of the course compares different ways of electing candidates and the mathematical theory behind these methods. The second part of the course considers different ways that votes can be cast. This includes the history of different methods of voting and their vulnerability to fraud. This leads to current debates about voting technology: How effective are different modern systems, such as electronically scanned ballots and direct recording electronic (DRE) voting machines, for accurately and securely recording votes and protecting against voting fraud?
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
What is the relationship between language and cognition? To answer this question this course explores the interrelation between verbal expression and such cognitive faculties as bodily experience, imagination, memory, categorization, and abstract thought. The study of language as a cognitive phenomenon is a relatively new discipline. It originated in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Since then, cognitive linguistics has been a rapidly growing field that has both benefited from and contributed to its allied disciplines of cognitive psychology, cognitive anthropology, and cognitive neuroscience. The course begins by examining the advantages and shortcomings of the cognitive perspective on the different levels of language (e.g., sounds, words, sentences, texts, etc.). Students explore the connections of cognitive linguistics with the related fields that are broadly referred to as the “cognitive sciences.” No background in linguistics is required, but interest in linguistics is expected.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 141S - From the Atkins Diet to the Kyoto Treaty: Science, the News Media, and You
Many of the important issues that confront society, from health-related concerns to environmental protection, are scientific at their core, and society relies almost exclusively on the news media for information about them. However, a lot can happen to scientific data on its way to becoming a headline. Politicians, industries, and other groups have a stake in the perception of scientific issues and can potentially influence the content and presentation of news. This course dissects the forces that control perception of scientific news and provides strategies for obtaining more detailed information. The course comprises a series of self-contained units that each focus on a single issue and may include such disparate topics as the Atkins diet, the Kyoto Protocol, nanotechnology, the human genome project, and space exploration, as well as some of the students’ choosing. Each unit begins with a general introduction to the underlying science, moves on to explore social, political, and economic aspects, and culminates with a writing assignment or class-wide participatory event.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Introduces students to statistical thinking by examining data collected to solve real-world problems. A wide range of applications are considered. Topics include experimental design, descriptive statistics, the normal curve, correlation and regression, probability theory, sampling, the central limit theorem, estimation, hypothesis testing, paired observations, and the chi-square test. Particular emphasis is given to the models that underlie statistical inference. This course is no longer crosslisted as MATH 102.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: Three years of secondary school mathematics Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Restrictions: Not open to students who have either received credit for or are currently enrolled in MATH 416. Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 147S - Emerging Global Challenges: Science, Technology, and Culture
In the 21st century, global citizenship will require a comprehensive understanding of key challenges on a planetary scale, including global warming, diminishing energy resources, population pressures (adequate water and food supplies, humane living conditions), urbanization, and the impact of natural disasters. This course will explore the underlying scientific concepts essential to developing a thorough understanding of the phenomenon and developing a healthy skepticism and critical analysis of complex, global-scale processes. Through the application of design-thinking project-based learning, students will assess the potential global ramifications of selected global issues, develop their own interpretations, and propose creative solutions.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Willpower allows people to delay gratification, resist temptations, and reach challenging long-term goals. This course is devoted to the study of this unique human capacity to regulate behavior. Students explore the psychological mechanisms underlying willpower from a scientific perspective. While reading relevant theoretical and empirical works, students test the ideas under study through laboratory exercises. Discussions explore the broader implications of research findings and apply these principles to the self-regulatory challenges that one faces every day. Assignments focus on developing strong writing and scientific-reasoning skills, and gaining useful insight into one’s own motivational tendencies. A final research project allows students to investigate empirically an original idea on the nature of willpower.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 153S - Acid Rain: A Persistent Environmental Problem
Acid rain surfaced as an environmental problem in the 1960’s and a multitude of studies were conducted in the Northeastern US, Canada and much of the United Kingdom and Europe that examined the sources and scope of the problem as well as the impacts on terrestrial and aquatic environments. The Adirondack Mountains are particularly sensitive to acid deposition because of their geology and topography. Many different collaborative studies were conducted with geologists, biologists, hydrologists and atmospheric scientists, and their results led legislators to enact the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments. Twenty five years later, we examine how scientists addressed skeptical concerns about the extent of the acid rain problem, how effective the legislation has been in recovery of lakes, streams and forests as well as efforts to mitigate the effects of acid deposition through lime applications that neutralize acid and restore chemistry to lakes, streams and forests. Students will gain an understanding of linkages between soils, forests, streams and lakes, and we will compare how scientists and legislators addressed the acid rain problem versus our current actions to address climate change. Students compare restoration “success” in the Adirondack Mountains to changes in precipitation chemistry and biota in other parts of the world such as Canada, different European countries, the United Kingdom and Asia.
Credits: 1.00 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Drugs, used recreationally and medicinally, can have physiological and behavioral consequences that are important to both the individual and society. The processes in the brain and nervous system that mediate drug-induced effects on behavior and physiology are examined with emphasis on the strategies and methods used to evaluate, scientifically, the effects of drugs. This course is designed for students with no background in the field of neuroscience.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
How could a collection of atoms, tethered together to form molecules, have played such important roles in colonization, health, environment, lifestyle, and so forth? We will look at 13 of the most intriguing molecules in history. As we explore these interesting histories, we will catalogue a few of the relevant scientific observations and molecular structures that give rise to the important characteristics of particular “world rocking” molecules. Molecular modeling, demonstrations, and lab-like exercises will illustrate the connection between structure and function. Students will also suggest and research other molecules that have impacted history or might be projected to have a profound influence in the future.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 159S - Ecology and the Quality of the Environment
A mix of interlocking problems is reaching crisis levels on our planet, which is the only home for us and a rich diversity of other life forms. The bad news is the growing evidence that we are depleting the Earth’s natural capital at unprecedented and accelerated rates by living in ways that are eventually unsustainable. This course introduces students to a variety of ecological principles that explain the nature of the environment. Topics include human population dynamics, matter and energy resources, ecosystems, and others. The master ecological concepts are applied to current world environmental problems to help explain water pollution, hazardous waste disposal, renewable and nonrenewable resources, etc. Environmental degradation and pollution are approached from an ecological perspective, but students also search environmental ethics and economic and political aspects for potential solutions.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Food is essential for all of us to survive but we often take food and food preparation for granted. Have you ever wondered why some food tastes as it does or how food preparation can alter the taste of consistency of a dish? What is a balanced diet and why do we strive to have one? In this course students explore how understanding the science of food and cooking enhances our enjoyment of it as well as our benefit from it. Students look at the history and culture of human nourishment, and explore some controversial aspects of food and food technology, such as use of additives, genetically modified organisms, and diets and weight loss programs. If you have an appetite for learning or are just food motivated, this course may appeal to your senses.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 163S - This Old Earth: Scientific and Cultural Perspectives on the Discovery of Deep Time
The antiquity of the Earth is geology’s most important contribution to science. In the late 18th and 19th centuries new findings about the Earth’s history and fossil record came into conflict with religious and cultural understandings of creation, evolution, and the place of man in the universe. These issues have been debated since Darwin first articulated his theory of evolution by natural selection. More recently, controversy over anthropogenic climate change has provoked similar questions: How long has our present climate lasted, and what has been the scale of climate change in the past? Knowledge of the Earth’s vast age has reached past scientific debates and influenced all aspects of life, including religion, poetry, art, and architecture. In this course, students explore the changing cultural and scientific views of the age of the Earth and how these longstanding debates influence how science is seen by non-scientists.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Weather and climate command our attention because they deeply affect life on Earth. Now more than ever, life on Earth also affects atmospheric conditions, with vitally important scientific, political, cultural, and ethical implications. Course readings, discussions, and lectures examine the atmosphere from microscopic and macroscopic points of view, exploring the atomic basis for atmospheric properties such as pressure, temperature, and transparency; investigating the physical processes behind weather patterns and disturbances; and examining some of the complexities of global climate change. The course emphasizes interactions between the atmosphere and humans, as well as interactions between science and other human endeavors. Students better their understanding of the atmosphere, weather phenomena, climate change, and the power and limitations of scientific inquiry. A term project allows students to study an atmospheric phenomenon of their choosing and to strengthen their knowledge through written, oral, and visual presentations.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 168S - Stem Cells, Gene Therapy, and Bionics: The Making and Remaking of the Human Body
Examines several topics on the cutting edge of regenerative science. Initially focuses on the body’s ability to repair itself. Students examine the nature of stem cells, as well as the limitations and potential for future work with these cells. Students then explore how gene therapy techniques have the potential to repair a wide variety of genetic disorders, but may also bring about the possibility of selective improvement in normally functioning bodies. Finally, students look at how scientists are developing techniques to grow organs in the laboratory to replace damaged or injured organs, and how bionic parts are being investigated increasingly as alternatives to biological replacements. Along the way, students consider the ethical and social concerns that surround each of these approaches, and explore whether current definitions of humanity will apply well to a future where we can increasingly manipulate fundamental aspects of the human body.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Uses a social scientific approach to examine the effects that media exposure has on audience members. Students develop an understanding of how the media affects audience members’ physiology, cognition, beliefs, attitudes, affective states, and behavior. Key media topics studied include violence, sex, politics, and portrayals of groups. Key types of media studied include television, music, video games, and social media.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 172S - The Biology of Women: Sex, Gender, Reproduction, and Disease
Myths regarding the female body have been circulating for centuries and still influence human behavior throughout the world. Though female and male anatomies differ, the underlying genetic material of each is very similar. This course investigates the historical and environmental construction of gender, the biological aspects of sex, the unique characteristics of female anatomy and reproduction, and the effect of sexually transmitted diseases and cancer on female health. Lectures, discussions, and in-class exercises explore the scientific methods used to acquire our current understanding of hormonal signaling, genetic inheritance, development, microbial pathogenesis, and cell biology that underlie these topics. Social and ethical issues that exist and are raised by the biological differences between males and females are also discussed, including hormonal therapy, in vitro fertilization, prenatal genetic testing, female genital mutilation, and the use of birth control to prevent AIDS transmission. This course is open to both men and women.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 176S - Natural Disasters: Science, Media and Movies
Natural disasters are part of the normal processes that shape the Earth, but can have dramatic and tragic impacts on human populations around the globe. Many citizens, however, are only exposed to these phenomena through media coverage seeking high viewership or movies optimized for spectacular special effects. This course will introduce the science behind many natural disasters – including earthquakes, asteroid impacts, storms, volcanic eruptions, and tsunamis – while also considering how media stories and films present, frame, or incorporate disaster science. Students will gain a practical understanding of natural disasters, and learn to critically analyze the representation of science in popular media.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Examines a key global health issue, such as AIDS or Cancer, from an interdisciplinary approach. The readings introduce students to the history, politics, science, and public health issues of the disease. Students will examine the epidemiology of the disease, examining how geography, socioeconomic status, and other factors influence transmission and treatment, and statistical measures used to analyze data about causes, cures and spread of disease will be introduced. Finally, the impacts of the disease on communities at different scales will be examined.
Credits: 1.00 Corequisite: None Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives Formerly: CORE 116S and CORE 136S
Explores water technologies and their evolution through time, and how the technologies related to water distribution and treatment evolve with human’s understanding of and interaction with water. Through the lens of science and engineering, students examine the role water plays in human health, the environment, and sustainability. Focused on history of water transportation; water quality issues, coinciding with an improved understanding of water following advances in chemistry, biology, and physics; and modern and emerging problems related to water and water technology. Students cover topics on the application and limitation of scientific knowledge, and broader impacts that technology has on past and current societies.
Credits: 1.00 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Social inequality affects us all. This course will explore what the science of social psychology tells us about how social inequality shapes the ways we think, live, and die. Because social inequality is about the relative status of people based on their group memberships, we will begin the course by exploring social psychological theories that help explain the centrality of our group memberships to our identity. As we will see, these group memberships can be based on many different aspects of our identity: race, gender, socioeconomic status, among many others. Next, we will explore what experimental data tell us about the sources of, and consequences of, group-based disparities. In particular, we will examine the roles of limited resources, identity, power, morality, and prejudice in perpetuating inequality. Finally, we will discuss the emerging literature on how to coexist more peacefully in an unequal world.
Credits: 1.00 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
What is music? How do natural raw sounds become a musical phenomenon? Why are some combinations of sounds more pleasant than others? The answers to these questions are tightly related to the concepts of matter, energy, time and space. Where there is music, there is sound; and where there is sound, there is physics. This course is an exploration of the underlying principles of the musical phenomena, including acoustics of musical instruments, formation of scales and perception of sound.
Credits: 1.00 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Cooperation is the key to understanding many environmental problems and policies. When and how do humans cooperate with each other to solve environmental issues? What features make that cooperation easier or harder, and what can we do to encourage cooperation? This course explores the origins of cooperation from an economic, biological, psychological, and social perspective, with a particular focus on game theory. This knowledge is then applied to a variety of environmental issues, ranging from climate change to overfishing to the hole in the ozone layer.
Credits: 1.00 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Introduces students to interdisciplinary thinking: they learn the elements of computer programming in the context of visual art, developing problem solving skills that bridge disciplines. Students formally analyze the visual structure of paintings to create abstractions, sketches and collages, which provide templates that structure the computer programs they write.
Credits: 1.00 Prerequisites: No prior programming experience is expected. Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 183S - The Science Fiction Effect: Popular Science Writing and Science Fiction in Public Discourse
Combines popular science writing with works of science fiction in order to interrogate the ways in which science is presented, expressed, and translated into texts intended for lay people. Students will consider the role both kinds of work play in shaping public scientific literacy. Readings will include essays from Best American Science Writing, recently published nonfiction in the genre of popular science, assorted recent articles, as well as seminal and contemporary works of literary science fiction. Students will gain a deeper understanding of how science is practiced and written about today, as well as the ways in which fiction about scientific advances popularizes the science it addresses. Given what we learn through reading nonfiction, is fictional writing about real science a fruitful part of public scientific discourse?
Credits: 1.00 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Fire is the quintessential human technology. It is also a potent symbol whose meaning has become central to our national and community discourse. Fire is at the root of countless traditions, myths, and foodways, and through controlled combustion of fossil fuels, fire has grown to be the central process at the heart of modern industrial and agricultural systems. The deliberate release of energy through different forms of combustion has changed the course of human social- and potentially, biological evolution. But where does the energy in combustion come from? How do humans harness that energy to do work? And how do storytelling and cultural perceptions of fire influence the choices individuals and societies make about what resources to burn, where to burn them, and what to do with the waste products?
Credits: 1.00 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Takes a scientific approach to understand the sources and validity of information. Students focus on the roles of language, mathematics, and computation in the production, dissemination, and consumption of knowledge. Discussions include strategies for recognizing false or misleading information, and topics are considered through multiple lenses. This requires questioning one’s own expertise as well as understanding the lifecycle of information, for good judgment and intellectual humility are two sides of the same coin.
Credits: 1 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Applies rhetorical theories and methods to scientific discourse in the public and academic sphere. Students develop an understanding of the relationship between research and writing, and they practice these skills by examining historical and current scientific debates and controversies. Through looking at case studies, students will gain an increased understanding of how, where, and when scientific research is influenced by (and influencing of) different audiences and communities. Students will examine and work with qualitative research methods, genre theory, rhetorical style, and multimodal compositions.
Credits: 1 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
CORE 187S - The Things with Feather: Human’s Passion for Birds and Scientific Study of Bird Intelligence
Emphasizes an interdisciplinary approach to explore the historic journey of scientific studies of bird behavior and nature while celebrating the triumphs of these surprising and fiercely intelligent creatures. Students examine the study of intelligence of birds from behavior, brain mechanisms, to ecological and evolutionary adaptation. Students look at the history of ornithological study in the past centuries and examine the key social-cultural events and conceptual breakthroughs that advance scientific study of birds. Students also explore how these scientific findings can shed light on human behaviors and help us to better understand ourselves. Moreover, students examine the impacts of human-created environmental changes on the behavior, reproduction, and survival of these precious creatures, and how citizen science has helped contribute to numerous bird conservation projects.
Credits: 1 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
Dogs are a fascinating study organism. From their very beginnings their evolutionary history contains unpredicted effects across all levels of biological organization. From the social construct of being a wild animal (wolf), to becoming dependent on man (domestication), and colonizing our homes and our beds (inter-species bonding). The history of this single species provides a rich learning opportunity to introductory students. Readings and discussions include a brief introduction and exploration of most branches of biology, in an interdisciplinary manner: evolution, ecology, genetics, physiology, and behavior, with the underlying theme of how dogs are unique to each of those branches in biology. Emphasis is placed on the interaction between wild animals and early humans, and tracks that interaction through time as the domestication of the dog has progressed. Further exploration occurs on physiological aspects of canine biology that are beneficial for humans, for example, cancer research. Students are challenged to formulate questions about science and how science relates to the inter-species relationship we have created with “man’s best friend.”
Credits: 1 Prerequisites: None Major/Minor Restrictions: None Class Restriction: No Junior, Senior Area of Inquiry: None Liberal Arts CORE: Scientific Perspectives
