Franklin College reserves the right to cancel any course during a given semester or to re-schedule courses for subsequent semesters. Similarly, some courses may be offered only periodically or in alternate years. Definitive course listings are published prior to each semester. All courses carry three academic credits unless otherwise specified.
ARC 200 Practicum in Archaeology
Each summer, students are immersed in the practical and theoretical aspects of field archaeology at the Etruscan site at Poggio Civitate (Murlo) near Siena, Italy. Under the supervision of a staff of professional archaeologists, students participate in the actual excavation, documentation, and conservation of archaeological material. The program includes readings and lectures about Etruscan civilization and about the Murlo site itself plus: analysis, conservation, cataloguing, photography, and other related tasks. (The dates of the 2010 Etruscan field experience are June 29 to August 6, 2010 and the course is 6 credits.)
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AHT 101 The Roots of Western Artistic Tradition
This course is a writing-intensive introduction to Western European Art from the ancient world to Picasso's Demoiselles d'Avignon. Instead of the purely formalistic approach of a general survey, it will direct the attention to the depiction of the body in the Western tradition. Topics include the tension between naturalism and idealism in classical Greece, hybrid figures on Gothic facades, the nude in Renaissance painting, religious ecstasies in Baroque sculpture, the birth of the modern spectator in the nineteenth-century, and the deconstruction of the body in cubism and its aftermath in action painting and video art. A series of short essay assignments will be given in order to develop visual literacy and critical writing in art. Accompanying films will give further insight into the topic.
AHT 199 First Year Seminar
Seminar topics change year to year. Please consult the Schedule of Classes for current seminar offerings.
AHT 200 Psychology of Art
An investigation of the creative process with particular reference to painting and drawing, and divided into two areas: (1) Childhood: the development of self-expression in normality and in retardation. Free expression, spontaneity and inspiration. The schema, kinesthetic imagination, image and sign. Non-visual modes of expression. (2) Beyond childhood: perceptual abstraction and art. Gestalt theory of expression. Artistic symbology. Visual perception. Professional and non-professional expression, naive painting. Art of the mentally ill, and the boundaries of sanity in artistic expression.
AHT 211 Collecting and the Art Market in the Age
In May 2007 at Sotheby's in New York, a 1950 painting by Mark Rothko sold for $72.8 million, the highest price ever paid for a work at a contemporary art auction. The globalization of the market and the search for status symbols of new collectors has driven art prices through the roof. Are these prices higher than they should be? Who really knows how to scientifically convert cultural into monetary value? Is the modern art market, by offering a Raphael and a Lucien Freud at the same price, promoting the production of art for financial speculation? Do artists produce for the market or for poetic reasons? What are the implications for museums and its art-interested public? Is the art market fostering the illicit trade of stolen and looted antiquities? These are some of the ethical issues the course addresses, together with looking at collecting from a historical point of view: princely and scholarly collections in the Renaissance, the Wunderkammer, the birth of the public art museum and the invention of the private art market. Students will furthermore be encouraged to explore topics such as women collectors, the Venice Biennale, and the major art fairs.
AHT 212 The Villa: Country Houses from Palladio
Placing the world's most famous country house - Andrea Palladio's Villa Rotonda in Vicenza - at its center, the course studies the concept of villeggiatura through the ages. It traces the roots of the villa to ancient Pompei and the writings of Vitruvius and examines the international legacy of Palladio in the works of Inigo Jones, Thomas Jefferson, Frank Lloyd Wright, Le Corbusier, and Carlo Scarpa. Further topics of discussion include the dialectic between nature and culture in villa garden architecture, fresco decoration, and interior design. Field trips and academic travel to Pompei, Tuscany, and the Palladian villas in the Veneto will provide an opportunity to experience ancient villeggiatura.
AHT 213 The Seeing Eye: Vision in Art from the R
The course departs from the question if vision is simply what the external world imprints on our retina or if it is a cultural construct. Is it purely physiological or can we speak of a history or histories of the eye? How does culture, science and ethnicity influence what we see and how we see it? Are we subject to optical illusions? Do we have an optical unconscious? Keeping these questions in mind, the course studies aspects of perception in the arts from a historical point of view: the discovery of perspective in the Renaissance, the invention of the Baroque theater, gender and gaze in modernity, and optical instruments of the Enlightenment as precursors for modern photography and film.
AHT 214 Live Art
The course title 'Live Art' can be read in two ways: as an adjective, for example, as in 'Live Music' or 'Live Aid', 'Live' gives the sensation of a performance, to be witnessed or experienced live; or as an imperative like 'Live your life' or 'Live for the moment', it invites the student to experience art, let art be the teacher, to realize that art and life are inseparable. Such activities as drawing and/or making works of art in various media, studying from life/real art in museums or exhibits, going to see art in Lugano and the vicinity. By focusing on figures who come from or have settled in the area (J. R. Rahn, H. Hesse, W. Schmidt, S. Butler) and visiting the studios of local contemporary artists enable students to discover art in an entirely different, out-of-the classroom way. A supplementary fee is required for studio materials, museum entrance and public transportation.
AHT 231 Renaissance Art & Architecture in Italy
Note: This course may carry an additional fee for weekend field trips.
This course follows the evolution of early Renaissance architecture, sculpture and painting in Florence as exemplified in the works of Brunelleschi, Alberti, Donatello, and Masaccio, before taking up the principles of High Renaissance art and its major exponents: Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and Raphael. The course is designed to define the objectives of individual artists and to discuss to what extent these objectives are indicative of Renaissance thought.
AHT 233 Renaissance in Venice and Northern Italy
An in-depth survey of the Renaissance in Venice and Northern Italy, areas where, once the innovations in Central Italy took hold, produced artists who were extremely influential for later developments throughout Europe, espe- cially Mantegna, Giorgione, Titian, Tintoretto, and Veronese.
AHT 252 Classical Modernism: Impressionism to Po
Beginning with Impressionism, the course traces the development of painting in the modernist period. The emphasis is on man's creative impulse and the development of this impulse into the creative processes. The movements studied include the following: Impressionism, Seurat and New-Impressionism, The Post-Impressionists, Symbolism Art Nouveau, Fauvism, early Picasso and Braque, Analytical and Synthetic Cubism, Edvard Munch and expressionism, the Worringer thesis, Die Brucke, Der Blaue Reiter, Abstraction, Surrealism, the Bauhause painters, de Stijl, Abstract Expressionism, Pop and Op art.
Students who have earned credit for AHT 352 may not enroll for AHT 252.
AHT 256 Women in Art
The course will consider the topic from two distinct perspectives: the representation of women in art and successful woman painters, sculptors, and architects. Clarifying and explaining the original purposes of female representations, beginning with pre-historic fertility figures, the course will focus on some of the most important images of women created in the history of art. A division between a representation's physical and spiritual intent will be explored as well as its original social purpose and later misinterpretations in popular culture. Concepts of power, beauty, and idealism, of goodness and malevolence, of motherhood, saintliness and prostitution, of prophecy and witchcraft, of war and protection - all of which are closely associated with the power of the female image - will be part of the discussions. From the other side, the course will look at powerful women creators, from Artemisia Gentilleschi to Zaha Hadid, the challenges they face(d) and superb works they produce(d).
Students who have earned credit for AHT 356 may not enroll and earn credit for AHT 256.
AHT 301 Towards New Forms in Twentieth Century A
A course dealing fundamentally with developing parallels in twentieth century creative thought, and embracing literature, film, music, science, architecture, photography; and industrial and graphic design, with painting acting as the basic continuum. An important part of the discussion is on the social and political environment in which creative thought flourished or perished in any given period. The periods of each of the World Wars will be particularly discussed. Topics include: The North/South division; Impressionism; Post-Impressionism; decadence at the turn of the century, and the relationship between sickness and creativity; psychic sensitivity and the Germanic mind - Edvard Munch, German Expressionism (Die Brucke and Der Blaue Reiter); the architecture and design of the Bauhaus and the Weimar period. Also included are Italian Futurism, Dada and the First War, Surrealism, Abstraction and Pop Art.
AHT 302 Advanced Psychology of Art
(Advanced)
An investigation of the creative process with particular reference to painting and drawing, and divided into two areas: (1) Childhood: the development of self-expression in normality and in retardation. Free expression, spontaneity and inspiration. The schema, kinesthetic imagination, image and sign. Non-visual modes of expression. (2) Beyond childhood: perceptual abstraction and art. Gestalt theory of expression. Artistic symbology. Visual perception. Professional and non-professional expression, naive painting. Art of the mentally ill, and the boundaries of sanity in artistic expression.
Students who have earned credit for AHT 200 may not enroll or earn credit for AHT 302.
AHT 307 Ancient Art and Archeology
This courses - taught on request as a tutorial - is available to a single individual or to a small group of seriously interested students with some background in art history. The tutorial would be taught by Dr. Erik Nielsen, who, apart from being the President of Franklin College, is also responsible for the Etruscan archaeological site at Murlo, near Siena.
AHT 320 Anthropologies of Art
The course is taught in collaboration with the Museo delle Culture Extraeuropee of Lugano (www.mcl.lugano.ch) and takes place in the classroom at Franklin College and in the galleries of the museum at Villa Heleneum. It is not so much about the history of art but about the relations between artifacts and people in history. Treating topics such as the power of and in images, art and religion, art and social life, and art and communication, we will discuss how the deep structure of the human mind creates, relates to, and is reflected in artifacts of the Western world. At Villa Heleneum we will have the chance to study masks and other cult objects and their relations to the peoples from Oceania, Africa, and Asia together with museum curators. Classes will take place in front of exhibits and are structured around specific topics, including the meaning and value of the ethnical work of art, and photography and film in anthropology.
AHT 345 Picasso: His Life and Work
The course attempts to examine the work of the child prodigy through to the final works and the impact and influences of this artist on painting in the twentieth century. The course follows the evolution of Picasso's work throughout his lifetime along the lines of chronological breakdown suggested in the Penrose Biography, i.e. Origins and Youth 1881-95, Barcelona l895-l901, the Blue Period l901-04, the Rose Period and first Classical Period l904-06, Les Demoiselles d'Avignon l906-09, the creation of Cubism l909-l4, First World War 1914-1918, Beauty must be Convulsive 1918-30, Boisegloup l930-36, Guernica l936-39, Second World War, Royan and Paris l939-45, Antibes and Vallauris l945-54, La Californie l954-58, Vauvenargues l959-61, Le Mas Notre Dame de Vie l961-70, and the Last Years l970-73.
AHT 352 Classical Modernism: Impressionism to Po
Beginning with Impressionism, the course traces the development of painting in the modernist period. The emphasis is on man's creative impulse and the development of this impulse into the creative processes. The movements studied include the following: Impressionism, Seurat and New-Impressionism, The Post-Impressionists, Symbolism Art Nouveau, Fauvism, early Picasso and Braque, Analytical and Synthetic Cubism, Edvard Munch and expressionism, the Worringer thesis, Die Brucke, Der Blaue Reiter, Abstraction, Surrealism, the Bauhause painters, de Stijl, Abstract Expressionism, Pop and Op art.
Students who have earned credit for AHT 252 may not enroll or earn credit for AHT 352.
AHT 356 Women in Art (Advanced)
In special circumstances, a student may request to take this upper-level version of AHT 256 Women in Art (see course description). Students in AHT 356 attend all meetings of AHT 256 and are responsible for additional and more in-depth work, to include an oral presentation and tutorials with the instructor.
Students who have earned credit for AHT 256 may not enroll and earn credit for AHT 356.
AHT 361 The Visual Culture of Disaster
The destruction of Pompeii after the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, the plague, the Sack of Rome, Hiroshima, and 9/11 are some examples with which The Visual Culture of Disaster will examine the impact of natural and man-made catastrophes on the visual world. How have painters, sculptors, photographers, architects, and filmmakers come to terms with these disasters? Did the devastation have a tabula rasa effect, meaning in what manner did it destroy an existing and produce a new visual culture? In addition to the historical perspective, the course will place a focus on the contemporary world. It will investigate how real-time media, such as television, has influenced the visual culture of disaster; and it will probe how art can contribute to the prevention of disaster by looking at the iconographies and aesthetics of sustainable energies ? sun, wind, and water ? and to what extent they have been incorporated in contemporary architecture, art, and film.
AHT 371 Topics in Art History
Topics in Art History vary from year to year. They are advanced courses on specific topics not normally offered, and they may require additional pre-requisites or permission of instructor.
AHT 497 Senior Project
Senior or capstone project in Art History to be coordinated with the Department Chair.
AHT 498 Art History Internship
Internship experience working for a business or organization related to a students Art History major to be coordinated with the Department Chair, Academic Advisor, and the Dean of the College.
AHT 499 Art History Thesis
Thesis proposals to be coordinated with Department Chair and Academic Advisor.
AHT COMP EXAM Art History Comprehensive Exam
Non-credit Art History comprehensive exam to be coordinated with the Department Chair.
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STA 105 Introduction to Sculpture
An introductory course intended to develop the students' awareness of the third dimension. The course uses the five platonic solids as a vehicle of discovery of three dimensional space. Beginning with the construction of a "space frame" in the form of either a tetrahedron or a cube using wood doweling, the students analyze and describe the space inside the volume without the use of curved lines, using easy manageable materials. The students then move on to consider cylinders, cones and spheres, and work with curves, both simple and complex. They study natural forms that they themselves find and select to work from, starting a new project creating one or more structures from these things, giving them a basic knowledge of working in metal, pexiglas, plaster, clay, wood and glass.
(This course carries a nominal fee for art supplies)
STA 106 Intro to Printmaking
This experimental, introductory course will explore the creative possibilities of media that have often been considered largely mechanical and reproductive processes. Comments on the history of printing will be integrated in lessons on relief and intaglio printing processes (monoprints, linoleum cuts, wood block prints, embossing, drypoint). Visits to museums, exhibits or ateliers may be organized if possible. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 107 Introduction to Digital Photography
A digital camera needed. Single-lens reflex camera preferable, but compacts with the possibility of switching to manual also usable.
A course in digital photography which will introduce to the beginner the elements of digital photography. The following will be the two areas of concentration:
(1) Image capture and manipulation using digital imaging technology
(cameras and editing software).
(2) Photograph design (crafting a photograph that reflects your intention using composition, framing, lighting etc.).
Throughout the course emphasis will be placed on the artistic value of photographs rather than the technicalities of digital imaging. Photography is one of the various artistic media available for self-expression and much emphasis will be put on precisely that. Students will synthesize these elements to create a portfolio of work that reflects not only their newly developed skills but also an appreciation and understanding of photography as an art medium. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 111 Introduction to Drawing
An introductory course aimed at mastering the rudiments of drawing (light and shadow, perspective, proportions, texture, pattern and design) and investigating the discipline of drawing as a cognitive tool. A variety of media, styles and genre will be explored, such as still life, landscape, figure drawing and abstraction. Studio sessions will be integrated with slide presentations and videos, and visits to museums, exhibits or ateliers may be organized if possible. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 112 Introductory Watercolor Techniques
This introductory course will explore basic watercolor painting techniques. Starting with exercises aimed at understanding the nature of the medium, students will then move on to investigate various aspects of watercolor painting (direct methods, tonal and color layering, color theory, sketching and painting en plein air, sources of inspiration). Visits to museums, exhibits or ateliers may be organized if possible. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 114 Drawing Related Media
The course will explore various media related to drawing, like pen and ink, charcoal, colored pencils, felt tip markers, tissue paper and glue, collage, crayons, oil and watercolor pastels, watercolor, tempera, gouache, spray paint. There is virtually no limit to the media that may be employed during the semester. At the same time, the course also reinforces the rudiments of drawing, but with primary emphasis on materials and new media rather than theoretical questions. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 115 Introductory Painting
An introductory course to explore basic painting techniques, this theory and studio course attempts to assist the development of visual awareness through various experiments and media, thus providing a foundation for further art study. With a combination of theory and studio practice, the course investigates the properties of color, line, point, plane, texture, etc. in an effort to free the student from dead convention and at the same time encourage the creative abilities of the individual. The course will incorporate structured exercises on the nature of paint and the rudiments of color theory, while encouraging students to study the painting of past and present artists to develop their own creative identity. Visits to museums, exhibits or ateliers may be organized if possible. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 172 Introduction to Gilding
This studio art course will include some lectures on the history of gilding from its beginnings in Egypt over 4000 years ago, through its development in Europe documented by the Renaissance master Cennino d'Andrea Cennini, to the modern era. Field trips will be taken so students can observe various techniques of gilding in situ, including architectural, iconographic, fine and decorative arts, and modern signage. Students will complete several projects using the traditional techniques, recipes and tools of the ancient art of water gilding. They will learn to prepare rabbit skin glue, gesso, bole, and gilding liquor. They will lay 23k gold leaf, burnish and patinate it. We will also explore other methods using gold and metal leaf such as oil gilding, verre eglomise (gilding on glass), and illuminated manuscripts. The last week of class students will be expected to produce an original work of art of their own design using some of the gilding techniques they have learned. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 179 Photography on location in Europe
Aimed at beginning and intermediate students exploring the countryside, towns, villages, and interiors of Ticino, this digital photography course concentrates on the dynamics of composition through the use of color and natural light.
(Students in this course must provide their own tools for some of the techniques, and the course carries a nominal fee for art supplies and equipment).
STA 200 Computer Graphics in Advertising
An introductory course to graphic design software and to the principles and practices of advertising graphics. Once the basics have been learned, the course covers the following
aspects of graphic design: the psychology of advertising, the brief from the client and the working relationship between client and designer, font styles and typographic design, the company logo, letterhead, business cards etc., house-styling, company reports,
brochures, flyers, book covers, color printing and printing processes. The course requires that initial design concepts be taken from the early stages through to finished art-work, i.e. the quality of finish required for presentation to the client.
(This course carries a nominal fee for computer supplies)
STA 205 Intermediate Sculpture
Continued exploration of basic sculptural methods, the students choose something that has particularly caught and absorbed their interest from the information touched on in the introductory course. They select a major project and investigate this chosen area much more thoroughly, developing a more substantial awareness along with more technical proficiency regarding materials. They can choose to construct, carve, or model and cast, and either to work from a personal idea or, if they prefer, using a model, they can make a portrait head and cast it in plaster: the stage at which it could be realized in bronze by a foundry. Students will be encouraged to visit exhibitions and become aware of both historical and current tendencies in art.
(This course carries a nominal fee for art supplies)
STA 206 Intermediate Printmaking
Intermediate course aimed at further developing the basic printing skills learned in STA 106. More techniques of printmaking may be explored (for example, silkscreen or collagraph). The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 207 Intermediate Digital Photography
A more advanced course where students who have completed STA 107 may take their work further. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 211 Intermediate Drawing
Intermediate course aimed at further developing the basic skills learned in STA 111. More emphasis will be placed on developing individual projects, exploring various media and investigating drawing and perception. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 212 Intermediate Watercolor Techniques
Intermediate course aimed at further developing the basic skills learned in STA 112. More emphasis will be placed on developing individual projects and exploring watercolor-related media. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 213 Architecture in Fashion and the Fashion
The course takes place in the MAC lab and is a studio course in design of interiors and/or fashion lines. Students will explore the influence of fashion on architecture and vice versa through different avenues and design challenges. Each week specific assignments are given to stimulate students' creativity; the final product is the design of a clothing line and its featuring runway and/ or retail store. Students will work with freehand sketches, as well as with Photoshop and CAD programs to prepare their portfolios and presentations. As a final assignment, they will sew one of their designs. This course requires studio fees.
STA 214 Drawing Related Media
Intermediate course aimed at further developing the basic skills learned in STA 114. More emphasis will be placed on developing individual projects. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 215 Intermediate Painting
Intermediate course aimed at further developing the basic skills learned in STA 115. More emphasis will be placed on developing individual projects and exploring different media and genre as students work towards finding a personal identity through creative experience. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 300 Computer Graphics in Advertising, Adv.
This course is fundamentally a follow-on from STA 200 Computer Graphics in Advertising.
Students in this advanced course are expected to complete the four following projects throughout the semester to a finished state: a twelve-page company brochure, a book-cover, a poster, and a three-dimensional package design.
(This course carries a nominal fee for computer supplies)
STA 305 Higher Sculpture
The level of this course presupposes that students have already acquired some knowledge
of historic and current tendencies in art which they will consider in relation to their own semester?s work. The project (or projects) undertaken will be a continued exploration
of sculptural methods using both additive and subtractive techniques aimed at producing well conceived three dimensional works and experimentation with diverse materials.
(This course carries a nominal fee for art supplies)
STA 306 Advanced Printmaking
A higher course aimed at further developing the basic printing skills learned in STA 206. Emphasis will be placed on developing individual projects, and more techniques of printmaking may be explored (for example, silkscreen or collagraph). The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 311 Advanced Drawing
A higher course aimed at further developing the basic skills learned in STA 211. More emphasis will be placed on developing individual projects, exploring various media and investigating drawing and perception. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 312 Advanced Watercolor Painting
A higher course aimed at further developing the basic skills learned in STA 212. More emphasis will be placed on developing individual projects and exploring watercolor-related media. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 314 Drawing Related Media
A higher course aimed at further developing the basic skills learned in STA 114. More emphasis will be placed on developing individual projects. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA 315 Higher Painting
Continuation of the previous painting courses to more advanced levels. The course carries a fee for art supplies.
STA CORE Studio Art Core Requirement
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BUS 115 Financial Accounting
This course is designed to provide students with a basic knowledge of financial accounting
concepts, procedures, analysis, and internal reports as an essential part of the decision-making process. The focus is on the three basic steps of the accounting process: recording, classifying, and summarizing financial transactions. Emphasis is placed on the general accounting
activities leading up to the preparation of financial statements.
BUS 135 Introduction to Business Systems
The course introduces the business system in its economic and social environment. A conceptual approach relating business and its legal forms to society as a whole. It includes scope, function, organization of business, fundamental concepts, principles, decision making
and multi-national business. The course offers a survey of functional areas of organization,
accounting, production, human resource, marketing and finance.
BUS 136 Marketing in a Global Context
This course is an introduction to the tools and concepts used in the marketing process for consumer and industrial products as well as for services. The focus is on the basic marketing
concepts (product, place, price, promotion) as they relate to the field of global marketing.
Emphasis is placed on the increasingly important role of interdisciplinary tools to analyze economic, cultural and structural differences across international markets. Specific
consideration is given to the development of integrated marketing programs for a complex, global environment.
BUS 199 First Year Seminar
Seminar topics change year to year. Please consult the Schedule of Classes for current seminar offerings.
BUS 240 Principles of Advertising
The emphasis of the course is placed on advertising's role in today's economic and social environment. The course takes a contemporary approach to the field, highlighting how recent and rapid evolutions in the social, business and technological environments are forcing advertising specialists to make major changes in the way they reach their markets. Students will learn about the growing importance of sociology, psychology and cultural anthropology in the way companies are marketing and advertising their products. Additionally, team projects will allow students to develop advertising campaigns and media plans.
BUS 285 Integrated Marketing Communications
This course introduces students to an integrated approach to communications in both consumer and industrial markets. The course explores the application of market analyses to the planning, development and evaluation of integrated marketing communication strategies in complex global environments. The use of advertising, public relations, sales promotions, interactive/internet marketing, personal selling, direct marketing and other techniques in communications programs will be analyzed.
BUS 286 Product and Services Management
This course is designed to provide an understanding of how to manage both products and services over their life cycles. This course is designed to build on the conceptual tools covered in the introductory marketing course by applying them to management issues related to products and services. The course will be divided into two parts. The first half will focus on issues related to product management, moving from new product design and development to product line and product category decisions. The second half will focus on services marketing strategies to increase customer satisfaction, improve customer retention and create dominant service brands.
BUS 306 Quantitative Methods and Dynamic Forecas
This computer based course covers statistical estimation theory as applied to dynamic and volatile business systems. It addresses sampling distributions, population parameter estimation, hypothesis testing, statistical quality control, statistical model building, multiple regression analysis, Box-Jenkins autoregressive models, seasonal models and dynamic forecasting. Ultimately students are asked to write a research paper: "Dynamic Statistical Modeling in Business and Economics using Web based Resources".
BUS 315 Managerial Accounting
This course considers the nature, concepts and techniques of the managerial accounting sector, the preparation of management reports, and the uses of accounting data for internal decision-making. Topics include the identification and reporting of costs in various business structures and environments, manufacturing operations, job order costing, process costing, activity based costing and management, CVP analysis, and budgeting formats and techniques.
BUS 326 Managerial Finance
This course examines the principles and practices of fund management in organizations. Attention is given to managerial financial decisions in a global market setting concerning
such questions as how to obtain an adequate supply of capital and credit, and how to evaluate alternative sources of funds and their costs. Topics include the management of assets and liabilities, working capital management, capital budgeting, equity versus debt financing, capital structure, and financial forecasting.
BUS 340 Management Science
This course is an introduction to quantitative decision making. Problems covered include production scheduling, transportation problems, project management, media selection, optimum decision strategies, portfolio construction and inventory management. Theoretical methods include linear programming, integer linear programming, sensitivity analysis and complex decision trees. Case problems based on the software "Management Scientist" stress real world applications. Students are asked to write a research paper based on the real data analysis.
BUS 353 International Management
An analysis of international and multinational business management practices; principles of management in the international environment and an exploration of the primary ways international management practices differ across cultures. Emphasis on interdependence issues and the impact of culture on management behavior, because doing business in another
country requires managers to understand something about the nature and culture of the country, this course draws upon concepts from the field of business, and the areas of anthropology, sociology, geography, political science, and history.
BUS 357 Global Information Systems
This course addresses the impact of modern information technology and data management concepts at the functional levels of international business, especially in the areas of finance, marketing, accounting and resource management. The computer-based section of the course provides methodology and software tools, advanced EXCEL modeling and DBMS -FoxPro, necessary to develop and evaluate Decision Support Systems, Management Information Systems, and Transaction Processing Systems. Case-based learning is utilized to stress how international firms can gain a competitive advantage by leveraging information technology. Students are asked to complete a six-week-long project related to system analysis and design.
(Recommended CPT 105 and BUS 326)
BUS 367 Portfolio Management & Fin. Modeling
The course emphasizes a computer-based approach to portfolio management. Topics include portfolio construction, optimization and evaluation. The portfolio construction component includes a review of important macroeconomic determinants of security selection and an exploration of fundamental and technical analysis as well as earnings and price forecasting methods. The portfolio optimization component introduces the mean-variance portfolio method and weighted calculations. The third component deals with portfolio performance evaluation, to include measures such as Jensen, Treynor and Sharpe indices. Students will download historical security data, calculate beta, test CAPM, calculate efficient frontiers and monitor bond and stock portfolio performance. A research paper on portfolio performance using web-based resources is a further expectation of the course.
BUS 373 International Entrepreneurship
This course develops attitudes, concepts and skills that enable entrepreneurs and managers to pursue opportunities in spite of uncertainty. The course examines how entrepreneurs and business innovators acquire and manage resources for new ventures and change within organizations. The course also explores current problems and issues in entrepreneurial ventures and change management. Course activities include the preparation of a new venture business plan. (Recommended BUS 326)
BUS 379 Topics in International Management
Special Topics course that is designed to cover varying topics that change from semester to semester.
BUS 382 Global Sales Management
This course explores the organizational methods used in sales force management as well as effective sales techniques. Students will learn to create sales pitches and to make sales presentations. They will also explore the need to understand cultural differences, and will learn how to apply motivational techniques, evaluate performance, use databases, displays and pricing techniques, match clientele with sales people, close deals and follow up with clients. The issues of relationship marketing and negotiation skills will also be explored.
BUS 384 Global Marketing Strategies
This course investigates contemporary thinking on the subject of strategic marketing and its natural relationship with corporate culture and structure. Students will learn about the importance of ideas and their relevance to the building and maintenance of strong brands and companies. Case studies allow students to solve problems facing companies by performing SWOT analyses, creating marketing plans, and applying financial feasibility analyses. These tasks are applied to issues such as product development, branding, customer relationship building and global marketing.
(Junior status recommended)
BUS 385 Consumer Behavior in Intl. Marketing
This course focuses on the understanding of the consumer as fundamental to marketing efforts. The course includes observational research in the community where students develop a greater understanding of consumers' consumption and decision-making behavior. Areas of focus include the consumer decision making process, research techniques, learning and motivation, segmentation and targeting, the impact of lifestyle and values, the role of society and culture in consumption, and ethical issues in consumer relationships.
BUS 410 International Organizational Behavior
This course analyzes the principal cross-cultural relationships between employee characteristics, cultural characteristics, and managerial effectiveness. Topics include: cross-cultural communications, practical issues of management in foreign cultures, leadership dynamics, group motivation, and comparative management techniques based on the patterns of organizational behavior in different countries.
(Junior status recommended)
BUS 414 International Legal Environments
This course is intended to expose business students to the critical relationship between business and law. The course acquaints students with fundamental concepts and principles of law that may concern them in their day-to-day business or organizational activities. Specifically, the objectives are to: familiarize the student with legal language and concepts, increase the student's understanding of the legal system and how it functions, develop the student's appreciation of the international legal environment in which organizations must operate, to expose the student to legal reasoning and develop his/her ability to apply legal concepts and to encourage the student to do critical thinking of the international legal implications present in business and other organizational activities.
BUS 415 Country Risk Assessment
The goal of the course is to have the student develop a better understanding of the types of risks that are relevant for country analysis, with special emphasis given to financial and investment risk. The course explores both the traditional quantitative and qualitative methodologies for evaluating country financial and business risk from the perspective of external investors of both financial capital and physical assets. It also provides comprehensive coverage of related topics including the analysis and reporting of sovereign creditworthiness, political risk, current account analysis, statistical credit-scoring methodologies, loan valuation models, analysis of currency instability, competition from state-owned enterprises, patent and trademark protection, and regulatory supervision. The course also discusses the interrelationship between ratings and economic development. Real world case studies will be used to substantiate theoretical analysis.
BUS 426 International Financial Management
This course deals with financial problems of multinational business. Topics include sources of funds for foreign operations, capital budgeting and foreign investment decisions, foreign exchange losses, and evaluation of securities of multinational and foreign corporations. Particular emphasis is placed on international capital and financial markets.
(Recommended: BUS 306)
BUS 455 Global Strategic Management
This course, is intended as a capstone to the International Management major, should come after students have studied all basic aspects of management. The course focuses on multinational corporate strategies. Using the case study method, students are required to apply the concepts of accounting, finance, marketing, management science and organizational behavior to the development of a strategic plan. Emphasis is placed on the development of a global strategy and its implementation on a world-wide basis as well as the integration of strategy, organizational structure and corporate culture.
(Senior status strongly advised)
BUS 485 Global Research Strategies
This course focuses on new developments and trends in research methodology. The class also reviews standard topics, such as the use of surveys and statistical research, secondary data research, organization of research, sample size and basic statistics. Additionally, the course covers the creation of effective methods of research, including chi-square analysis, Factor Analysis, ANOVA and MANOVA. Students learn about experiments, observations, focus groups, telephone surveys, mail surveys and panel data. A large component of the class involves the creation of a good survey, including its organization, question development, use of scales, coding and tabulation and writing of a clear and concise research report.
(Recommended: BUS 385)
BUS 498 International Management Internship
This course involves a company-based internship experience. The internship can be with an organization anywhere in the world, with in-company supervision approved by the instructor. On the basis of experience gathered during the internship, each student prepares a report to a professional standard, and presents this formally to an audience of students and professors; both report and presentation are evaluated.
BUS 499 International Management Thesis
The International Management Thesis is a written research project that is chosen in a student's primary field of study, such as Management, Finance, Marketing, Quantitative Methods or Management Information Systems, and is intended to demonstrate the ability to do mature work within the field of study.
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COM 105 Introduction to Communication and Media
This course introduces students to the fundamental concepts and theories of
communication and media studies as they apply to the ever-increasing
intercultural interactions of a contemporary world. In particular, students will
learn the basics of intercultural/international communication processes, gaining a foundation for developing intercultural communication competence.
COM 180 Public Speaking
This course provides an introduction to the key concepts and skills involved in the art of public speaking, argumentation and deliberation. In this course, students will learn how to use public speaking both as a means to argue and defend a position as well as to better understand and resolve issues of social significance. In addition to focusing on one-directional public speaking, this course also explores speaking in more dynamic situations that involve interaction and deliberation.
COM 199 First Year Seminar
Seminar topics change year to year. Please see current FYS offerings.
COM 201 Fundamentals of Media Studies and Critic
This course explores the substance and social significance of media from a critical-cultural perspective. In this course, students will learn how to identify, define, describe, and critique media artifacts using a variety of critical approaches. In order to capture its complexity, we will examine media in terms of technology, form, content, production processes/political economy and consumption exploring how various media artifacts get produced, transmitted, articulated, and consumed. (COM 105 recommended)
COM 202 Fundamentals of Interpersonal Communicat
This course introduces students to theories, concepts, and research in the study of interpersonal communication. From a scholarly perspective, students will gain a fundamental knowledge of how interpersonal communication processes work. In addition, students will develop skill in analyzing the interpersonal communication that surrounds them in their everyday life.
(COM 105 recommended)
COM 203 Communication Research Methods
This course introduces students to quantitative and qualitative research methods as they apply to communication and media studies. Students will acquire skill in examining various communication and media issues by conducting an original research project.
COM 300 History of Mediated Communication
Is textual literacy fundamental to political involvement? Have cell phones changed the nature of private and public space? Has the Internet democratized the production of culture? These are the kinds of questions we will explore in this cultural and historical survey of mediated communication. Traveling through the ages, we will explore both how media technologies are culturally situated and influenced as well as their significant and lasting implications on cultures, societies, and individuals.
COM 301 Globalization, Media, and Representation
This course examines media in the context of globalization. Most broadly, we will explore what constitutes globalization, how globalization has been facilitated and articulated by media, how media have been shaped by the processes of globalization, and perhaps most significantly, the social implications of these complex and varied processes on politics, international relations, advocacy and cultural flows. In order to map this terrain, we will survey the major theories that constitute this dynamic area of study.
COM 302 Intercultural Communication: Theory, Res
This course examines intercultural communication theories and research in order to gain a deeper understanding of critical issues we encounter in intercultural interactions. It seeks not only to develop a sophisticated level of intercultural communication competence but also to cultivate the skills of putting the knowledge into practice (e.g., conducting intercultural communication workshops, publishing articles that raise cultural awareness of a target audience, and so on).
COM 310 Fundamentals of Journalism
This course examines the nature and definition of news, and introduces students to the fundamentals of gathering and writing news, interviewing, meeting deadlines and editing copy. It also explores the ethical and legal boundaries of journalism and the responsibilities of journalists. Students are required to produce several writing assignments.
COM 320 The Art of Persuasion: Social Influence
Persuasion is a critical part of our everyday lives. Whether in the context of our interpersonal relationships, interaction with media, involvement in politics or professional duties, our success and happiness is often dependent upon the ability to both produce and understand persuasive messages across varied contexts. In spite of the overwhelming faith in communication to solve social, professional, and personal problems, communication and persuasion are often given abstract and incomplete treatment. This course provides a detailed exploration of theories of persuasion with an eye toward practice. In this vein, this course will illuminate theories of persuasion by having students apply them to issues, problems, and tasks they find both personally and professionally interesting. This is an ideal course for students seeking practical experience crafting persuasive messages and ideas for careers in public relations, advertising, journalism, politics, business, and social activism, to name just a few. This course is based in the belief that persuasion doesn't just "get you what you want," if done well, it also improves business, community, and lives by aligning interests in mutually productive ways.
COM 326 Online Communication: Theory & Strategy
Online (web) communication is fundamental in today's businesses and, indeed, all organizational contexts. This course explores key dimensions of online communication, namely what makes online communication a unique form of communication and how communication practitioners and business professionals can more effectively use this new medium. In addition to exploring important theories as they concern web communication, design, and business strategies, students in this class will learn how to:
- Plan and develop effective strategies for web communication
- Manage all aspects related to online projects (business models, management, costs, resources, etc.)
- Take advantage of the Web 2.0 revolution
- Design the user experience (interaction design)
In addition to learning basic theories and practices, students will make practical use of knowledge by working in design teams in which they will both conceptualize and implement effective and professional online projects.
COM 327 Producing Digital Media: Communication a
This course explores the impacts and capacities of new media technologies in producing social worlds and advocating social issues. Following an exploration of the key concepts in new media theory, students in this course will spend the bulk of the semester producing a digital short story about an issue of social interest. As a course in applied media and communication, students will have a hand in the entire process of producing, marketing, and showing the film.
COM 340 Argumentation and Media Ethics
This course explores the complex contours of media ethics from an argumentation perspective. In the course, students will learn what constitutes argumentation, the structural components of arguments, and the cultural dynamics of argument spheres, fields, and strategies. With this skill set, students will investigate and articulate positions on various issues in media ethics, especially as they are complicated by our increasingly global and digital media scape.
COM 345 Principles of Public Relations
An introduction to the theory and practice of public relations. This course examines the tasks, responsibilities and objectives of public relations pro- fessionals. It outlines practical solutions to communications challenges through needs assessment techniques and effective planning strategy.
COM 347 Organizational Communication
This course examines the dynamic process of organizational communication. Situating communication as an essential part of "organizing" in our everyday life, it seeks to understand how we can participate in the creation and recreation of effective organizations. Students will learn key issues of organizational communication research such as communication channels, networks, organizational climate, interpersonal relationships within organizations, and organizational cultures. They will also learn how to apply the theoretical/conceptual knowledge to their present and future organizational life through case studies and communication audits.
COM 350 Mediated Relationships
This course examines the impact of emerging communication technologies
on human communication. By critically examining current theories and research in the field, students will analyze present and future of technologically-mediated relationships as these pervade their everyday life.
COM 352 Environmental Discourses
This course examines the distinct modes of representation that have come to color how we think and act upon the natural world. Given the increasing importance of the environment in local, national, and global politics, this course is invested in helping students understand the significance of language in creating, defining, mitigating, and negotiating environmental issues and controversies. During the course of the semester, we will investigate (1) the socio-cultural history of environmental discourse, (2) the dominant discursive constructions of the environment, (3) the implications of these on, and the status of, contemporary environmental politics and advocacy, and (4) the importance of studying environmental discourse from a cross-cultural perspective. In order to explore the ideologies and attitudes at the heart of varying environmental discourses, we will analyze texts from various disciplines and spheres (e.g. political, scientific, activist, and popular), genres (e.g. films, books, newspaper articles, image events, policy briefs, and speeches) and rhetorical strategies (e.g. metaphors, tropes, and ideographs).
COM 365 Media Regulation and Policy
New media and the processes of globalization have profoundly altered the landscape of media regulation and policy. In an effort to better understand this new terrain, this course explores the major media systems, policy issues, legal frameworks and political institutions that govern global media policy with special attention to the growing impact of NGOs and IGOs. In addition to learning about these processes, students will leave this course with the ability to interpret and produce media policy.
COM 370 Special Topics in Communication and Med
Special topics in Communication and Media Studies vary each semester. Course description and pre-requisites are specified in the session course description.
COM 373 News Photography
The history of news photography-otherwise known as photojournalism or visual reportage-and its important role in broadcast and print news are explored in this course, which examines our understanding of the world's current events from photographs in news magazines and newspapers that have chronicled famine in the Sudan, the war in Iraq, the student revolt in Tiananmen Square, and historical milestones such as the Holocaust, 9/11 in New York City, and the Vietnam War. The course further explores the importance of socially responsible documentary photojournalism and its related ability to alter a government's public policy; the role of the internet and television multimedia in altering the way we consume news; and the future of news photography, given the transition from a printed world toward a digital world.
COM 374 Art Journalism
Various aspects of art journalism, including criticizing and reviewing popular culture and fine arts offerings such as films, television, pop and classical music, theatre, visual art, photography, dance, restaurants, and architecture are considered in this course. Material for reviews includes newspapers, magazines, and broadcast media. Assignments will on occasion require students to attend local art events and write about them.
COM 375 Cultural Journalism for the Arts
Various aspects of art journalism, including criticizing and reviewing popular culture and fine arts offerings such as films, television, pop and classical music, theatre, visual art, photography, dance, restaurants, and architecture are considered in this course. Material for reviews includes newspapers, magazines, and broadcast media. Assignments will on occasion require students to attend local art events and write about them.
COM 376 Sports Journalism
(ENG 100 or COM 201 recommended pre-requisite) Students will develop an appreciation and understanding of sports journalism as they also learn the basics of reporting and writing on events and subjects in that realm. We will discuss reporting practices for everything from athlete profiles to game coverage, including interviewing and Internet research, and review basic techniques for composing stories once all the information is gathered, sometimes with very tight deadlines. Students can expect to produce several stories of varying sizes during the session. They should also count on reading the works of some highly regarded sports writers and discussing those pieces with the class. Field work is a must, and we can count on attending local sporting events during the session and reaching out to area athletes in the preparation of stories.
COM 37X Topics in Communication and Media Studie
Topics in Communication and Media Studies vary from year to year. These are advanced courses for students who have had experience in at least one other upper-division COM course.
(Course number and titles vary according to the topic, and may require different prerequisites.)
COM 497 Senior Research Seminar in Communication
This seminar provides students with a capstone experience in synthesizing their theoretical and methodological knowledge in the form of a high-quality research paper. Some of the major areas of research and theories in the field of communication and media studies will be reviewed and discussed in class as students work on their own research project. At the end of the semester, students will present their final research paper to an audience of students and professors. Students will also be encouraged to submit their paper to an appropriate conference venue around the world.
(Prerequisite: Senior status)
COM 498 Internship in Communication and Media St
This course provides students with a capstone experience in applying to professional contexts key approaches and theories of communication and media studies. The internship
site can be private, public or non-profit organizations anywhere in the world. Throughout the internship period, students should ensure close in-company supervision.
At the end of the internship, students will prepare a detailed report analyzing
their experience and present it formally to an audience of students and professors. Both written report and presentation will be critically assessed.
COM 499 SR Thesis in Communication & Media Stud
Communication and Media Studies thesis proposal to be coordinated with the Department Chairs.
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CLCS 100 Reading Literatures: Intro to Comp. Lit.
This class will introduce students to methods of reading, authorship, and reception. Typically students will read a literary text followed by a theoretical text that shapes their understanding of literature as a cultural form. Close attention will be paid to issues such as the shaping of identity, forms of representation, gender, and the construction of knowledge and power.
CLCS 110 Reading Cultures: Intro to Cultural Stud
This course has two primary goals: to introduce students to the history and theoretical writings of various strands of cultural studies, and to acquaint them with some of the intersecting axes - race, class and gender - that energize the field. Close attention will be paid to issues such as the shaping of identity, forms of representation, the production, consumption and distribution of cultural goods, and the construction of knowledge and power in a host of cultural practices and cultural institutions.
CLCS 199 First Year Seminar
Seminar topics change year to year. Please consult the Schedule of Classes for current seminar offerings.
CLCS 200 Theories and Methods in Gender Studies
This course presents an interdisciplinary introduction to key concepts in gender studies. Focusing on the way in which gender operates in different cultural domains, this class investigates the manner in which race, culture, ethnicity, and class intersect with gender.
CLCS 210 Deception
Deception, in all its forms, including eavesdropping, adultery, cheating, and trickery, functions as a narrative motor in the nineteenth- and twentieth-century novel and film. This class examines this notion of deception in literary and visual cultures. In particular, this class will focus on the strategies of narrative structures in the European novel and film from 1840s through the late twentieth century. We will consider eavesdropping, lying, adultery, cheating, gender switching, and their narrative consequences relating to gender and class through the course of the semester. European Realism, with its focus on the every-day and the darker side, signals a shift away from the Romantic and will introduce our study of deception in a cross-cultural context.
CLCS 220 Inventing the Past: The Uses of Memory
The construction of memory is one of the fundamental processes by which the workings
of culture can be studies. Every country, every culture and every community has a specific memory culture that finds expression in a congruence of texts: of literature and film, of law and politics, of memorial rituals, and historiography. The aim of this course is to enable students to recognize different forms of the construction, representation and archiving of memory; to analyze processes of individual and collective identity formation through memory; and to understand the power differentials operant in the negotiations and performance of a national memory.
CLCS 230 Science / Fiction: Envisioning the Possi
Science fiction narratives may be defined as speculative fictions, ideal allegorical vehicles eliciting theoretical reflection on the state of contemporary culture and society and motivating social reform. As such, the main objective of this course is to consider several major contemporary socio-cultural issues through the unique lens provided by writers and filmmakers of the science-fiction tradition. The issues, allowing for variances from year to year, will include questions regarding gender and Otherness, the deterioration of the man-world bond, Modern apocalyptic anxieties, genetic engineering, alienation and communication technologies. Authors and filmmakers may include: Mary Shelley, Jules Verne, H.G. Wells, Isaac Asimov, Philip K. Dick, Ursula Le Guinn, Aldous Huxley, George Orwell, William Gibson; Ridley Scott, Stanley Kubrick, Andrew Niccol, Jean-Luc Godard, Larry and Andy Wachowski.
CLCS 240 Comparative Institutions: Families
An examination of the ways in which societies around the world define the meanings of institutions, and in particular, the family. This course will focus on how institutional interdependencies and power hierarchies influence the development of diverse systems of long term, intergenerational, primary relationships and their recognition as legitimate family forms. In particular, we will examine the development and acceptance of such marriage and family arrangements as cohabitation, same sex marriage, and single parenting. This course will also examine the diverse ways that families are internally organized around the world with respect to marital and parenting roles and the ways that the structures of gender, class and race outside the family affect this internal organization. Finally, we will look at how welfare policies and legal practices play critical roles in the ways that families are socially constructed and legitimated.
CLCS 297 Faculty Fellows Summer Program
Faculty Fellows Program courses are offered in the Summer sessions. Specific course offerings vary from year to year.
CLCS 300 (Re)Defining Masculinity
This course aims at (re)-defining masculinity, in other words at exploring what it is to be/ exist as a man in today's society. To paraphrase Simone de Beauvoir, is one born a man or does one become a man? (Re)-defining masculinity focuses on the recent developments of gender studies, namely the study of masculinity to include male power, sexualities, intimacy, families, language, sport, rap culture, etc.
CLCS 310 The Culture of Cities
(THIS COURSE WILL BE HELD IN ZURICH) Ever since its formation in the nineteenth century the metropolis has functioned as a multivalent metaphor for the experiences of "modern" life. Portrayed at once as a space of disruption and of stability, of danger and of creativity, the city has as found a place in the modernist and postmodernist imagination that reflects how a people's surroundings influence thought pattern and social practices. At the same time of course the needs of ever-evolving groups of inhabitants form the shape cities take. Taking Zurich as our case study, we will ask how overlapping and interacting slices of urban culture, ranging from the material (buildings, squares, streets and bridges), to the symbolic (narratives, myths and legends), and the performative (music, theater and film) shape our urban experience.
CLCS 320 Culture, Class, Cuisine: Questions of Ta
Food carries social, symbolic, and political-economic meaning that differs across cultures, and hence cuisine represents a focal point for studying divergent cultural practices. In that sense, this class examines the sociological, anthropological, literary, and cultural dimensions of food. We will explore people's relationship to food with regard to the environment, gender roles, and social hierarchy, from French haute cuisine to the fast food phenomenon.
CLCS 330 The Politics of Mobility: Exile and Immi
Beginning with the post-colonial theory of Edward Said and Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, this class will examine the ideas of exile and immigration in a colonial and post-colonial context. This course will explore exile vs. expatriatism, language and power, movement across cultures, narrative agency and authority, and voices in the new immigrant narrative. By approaching the topic from a comparative perspective, students will be ex- posed to a polyphony of voices and the variety of experiences associated with exile and the construction of identity. We will examine, in particular, the variations on the autobiographical form in the context of this experience.
CLCS 340 Fashion and Popular Culture
"The focus of postmodernity on surface phenomena and diversity, its concern with the personal, the subjective and with identity have worked to make fashion a field of studies that has gained importance in the last 15 years. Aiming at getting past the age-old belief in the essential frivolity of fashion, this course examines how fashion draws upon recurrent instabilities of men and women (masculinity vs femininity, youth vs elderliness, domesticity vs worldliness, inclusion vs exclusion etc...) to thrive and express its creativity, how its ever constant shifting nature results in the notions of gender, ethnicity and class status to be ever more fluid, how it has been redefining the body and its image, in particular with the advent of the supermodel in the eighties, and last but not least, how it relates to and signifies within so many aspects of our daily life and environment, whether it be space (work vs domesticity, urban vs non-urban), photography (static vs dynamic), music (alternative vs pop) and sexuality."
CLCS 370 The Culture of Intimacy: Reality TV
This course addresses the sweeping phenomenon of reality TV, which includes all programs that train cameras on non-actors in situations that represent 'real life', however simulated. We begin with the roots of the genre in documentary and real-crime shows, move through docu-soaps, elimination formats, makeovers and family/marriage shows, before concluding with shows that cross over with the leisure industries, such as music, fashion, design and cuisine. We will be considering international as well as US formats and discussing theoretical topics such as surveillance, privacy/publicity, voyeurism, affect, media convergence and celebrity.
CLCS 371 Law and Culture
The course Law and Culture aims to investigate law's place in culture and culture's place in law. This focus proceeds from the realization that law does not function in a vacuum but exerts a powerful influence on all manner of cultural practice and production, even as it's own operation is influenced in turn by various forms of culture. Given this increasing porosity and interpermeability of Law and different forms of culture, the focus of this course is on the mutual influence between law and other discursive practices, such as literature, TV sit-coms and film. In studying a number of prominent legal cases such as Brown v the Board of Education, we will explore the following questions: What are the mechanisms by which popular representations and cultural practices find their way into legal processes and decisions? How does law in turn bleed into and influence cultural processes? Does law act as a buffer against societal assumptions about, and constructions of, gender, age, ability, sexuality and ethnicity, or does it re-enforce and re-inscribe existing social norms? Students of this course will have the opportunity, if desired to participate in the upcoming CLCS conference "Intersections of Law and Culture".
CLCS 372 Tales of Catastrophe
The cultural debris that results from political and natural catastrophes is made up of narratives that contain both implosion and creation, wreckage and renewal. In that sense disasters mark pivotal turning points in the way we conceptualize and understand human phenomena and cultural processes in a number of disciplinary perspectives from psychoanalysis to literature, from environmental science to religion and from ethics to aesthetics. In this course we will read the narrative fallout in fiction, science, and film that emanate from distinct disaster zones ranging from the petrified texture of Pompeii to the generative force field of ground zero.
CLCS 497 Senior Seminar
The Capstone Seminar is required of all majors in Comparative Literary and Cultural Studies. As a class, we will consider the theories fundamental to the post-colonial world and post-colonial travel, in particular as they pertain to notions of identity formation. Individual students will then work to position themselves within that discourse. Early in the term, students will choose a research topic or project to pursue in their own particular area of interest in Comparative Literary and Cultural Studies, one related to the theory and practice of travel and/or crossing boundaries. As a result, this capstone seminar will not only bring together work done in other courses in the CLCS major, but will offer a chance to reflect on and integrate academic travel courses into their final product. Possible final projects include a thesis, a performance, an art exposition, a video essay, or a portfolio of creative work. Projects will be designed and completed in consultation with the instructor and the student's major advisor.
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CPT 105 Introduction to Computing
Students in this course are offered an overview of modern computer applications, with an emphasis on data processing and information management techniques. Hands-on experience is used to emphasize the importance of practical computer software packages. Computing theory and ethics are also discussed.
CPT 106 Advanced Office and Web Applications
After a brief overview of computers and computing concepts, this course will give an in-depth treatment of certain office applications and web techniques. Advanced topics in Excel and Access (as macros, the macro language, pivot ta- bles, goal seeker, lookup and reference functions, forms, queries and SQL), will be treated in the first half of the course. Then the students will learn HTML, and also the basics of JavaScript and ASP (or PHP) as two examples of pro- grams that are executed on the client computer (JavaScript) or on the server (ASP, PHP). In all these cases, after the introduction of concepts, students will learn by working on projects either in groups or on their own. These formal computing concepts introduced (SQL, macro language, HTML, JavaScript, ASP) will give the students a solid background to understand other related lan- guages easily, and also to move further into high-level programming languages if desired.
CPT 107 Web Design
The growing world of multimedia design is introduced to students in this class. The objective of this course is to introduce students to multimedia and publishing tools used in support of web design. Students will create visuals to strengthen corporate stories
and brand-building processes as well as create websites from concept to publication.
Although little design and marketing background is required, some familiarity with basic software is recommended.
CPT 108 Advanced Webpage Techniques
After a brief overview of computers and computing concepts, this course will give an in-depth treatment of web techniques. The students will learn basic web page design using HTML, CSS, and also the basics of JavaScript and PHP as two examples of programming languages for programs that are executed on the client computer (JavaScript) or on the server (PHP). In all these cases, after the introduction of concepts, students will learn by working on projects either in groups or on their own. These formal computing concepts introduced (HTML, JavaScript, PHP) will give the students a solid background to understand other related languages easily, and also to move further into highlevel programming languages if desired.
CPT 109 Advanced Office Application Skills
This course provides students with skills in advanced features of certain office applications like Excel, Word, Power Point, and Access. Examples of techniques covered are macros, pivot tables, goal seeker, lookup and refer- ence functions, forms, queries, SQL, mail merges, audio/video media man- agement, and maybe VBA. The class also provides basic knowledge about computers and computing. Part of the class time will be spent on work on student's projects.
CPT 150 Intro Computer Programming: Visual Basic
An introduction to computer programming using the high level language VISUAL BASIC. Emphasis is on structured programming techniques and general problem solving skills in both numerical and non-numerical applications, pro- gram design; control structures; objects and events; user interface construction, documentation, and program testing. Students will be able to formulate, represent, and solve problems using the computer. Special emphasis will be places on EXCEL - Visual Basic.
CPT 199 First Year Seminar
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ECN 100 Principles of Macroeconomics
This is an entry-level course in economics, covering fundamentals of macroeconomics and aimed at students who choose it as an elective or plan to continue their studies in economics. Together with ECN 101, it provides the necessary prerequisites for any other upper-level course in economics. It is a program requirement for the majors in International Banking and Finance, International Economics, International Management, International Relations, and Environmental Science. It is also a prerequisite for Economics as a combined major as well as a minor. This course helps students develop basic analytical skills in economics and macroeconomics. It provides the fundamental theoretical vocabulary for the study of economics with a major emphasis on macroeconomic issues. After an introductory part focused on production possibilities and opportunity cost, the course is concerned with the definition and the theory of determination of national income, employment, business fluctuations, and price level. It also introduces students to the functioning of a payment system based on bank money. The instruments and the functioning of public policy aimed to stabilize prices and maintain high levels of output and employment are discussed in the current macroeconomic context of major world economies. Selected economic news is constantly watched.
ECN 101 Principles of Microeconomics
This is an entry-level course in economics, covering fundamentals of microeconomics and aimed at students who choose it as an elective or plan to continue their studies in economics. Together with ECN 100, it provides the necessary prerequisites for any other upper-level course in economics. It is a program requirement for the majors in International Banking and Finance, International Economics, International Management, International Relations, and Environmental Science. It is also a prerequisite for Economics as a combined major as well as a minor. This course helps students develop basic analytical skills in economics and microeconomics. It provides students with a basic understanding of the market system in advanced capitalist economies. It examines the logic of constrained choice with a focus on the economic behavior of individuals and organizations. After a theoretical analysis of the determinants and the interaction of supply and demand under competitive conditions, alterna- tive market structures will be investigated, including monopolistic and oli- gopolistic forms. The course examines the conditions under which markets allocate resources efficiently and identifies causes of market failure and the appropriate government response. The introduction to the role of government includes its taxing and expenditure activities as well as regulatory policies.
ECN 199 First Year Seminar
First Year Seminar topics vary from year to year. Please see the current course schedule for specific information.
ECN 204 History of Economic of Thought
This intermediate-level course studies the evolution of economic ideas from the early Eighteenth century to modern times, with emphasis on the differing conceptions of economic life and the methodological underpinnings of three main strands of thought: Classical economics, the Marginalist revolution, and the Keynesian revolution. Discussion is organized around four main themes: the source of wealth, the theory of value, economic growth in the capitalist system, and the notion of equilibrium in economic analysis. The course aims at providing a systematic conceptual framework to investigate the development of economic ideas, in their intersections with philosophy and the political and historical evolution of societies, hence highlighting the nature of economics as a social science. At the same time, the course stresses the methodological features (in terms of a rigorous and formalized language) peculiar to the economic reasoning.
ECN 225 Issues & Cntroversies in Macroeconomics
This intermediate-level course in macroeconomics builds upon the introductory two-semester sequence and, in conjunction with ECN 256, prepares students to upper-level economics. It is a program requirement for the majors in International Banking and Finance and International Economics, as well as for Economics as a combined major. It is also one of the options towards Economics as a minor. It is designed to provide the student with an appreciation of current economic issues and questions in modern macroeconomics, through the recognition of economics as a controversial subject. Full employment equilibrium conditions, lack of demand problems, unemployment and inflation are discussed within mainstream as well as unorthodox theoretical frameworks. Insights are used to appraise current macroeconomic issues and discuss controversies in policy-making.
(Recommended MAT 200)
ECN 255 Political Economy of Growth and Distribu
Attempts to explain the origins of economic growth as well as the determinants and effects of particular income distributions lie at the very center of economic and political research, yet answers to questions of growth and distribution remain as elusive today as they were two hundred years ago. This course will introduce students to that broad, yet unified, range of analytical models, which attempt to explain variations in economic growth rates and patterns of income distribution across nations. Particular attention will be devoted to exposing students to the fullest range of political-economic thinking so that they may, first, appreciate the strengths and weaknesses inherent to each approach and, second, possess the judgment and analytical acumen to critically evaluate and modify policy proposals that target economic growth, inequality, or poverty.
ECN 256 Managerial Economics (Intermediate Micro
This intermediate-level course in microeconomics builds upon the introductory two-semester sequence and, in conjunction with ECN 256, prepares students to upper-level economics. It is a program requirement for the majors in International Banking and Finance and International Economics, as well as for Economics as a combined major. It is also one of the options towards Economics as a minor. This course completes the theoretical background on microeconomics and introduces students to more advanced topics, with an emphasis on the practical relevance and application of theory. The essence of the course is, in particular, the study of the interaction between rational individual decision-making (e.g. consumers, firms, the government) and the working of economic institutions like markets, regulation and social rules. Topics covered include an introduction to game theory, strategic behavior and entry deterrence; analysis of technological change; the internal organization of the firm; economic efficiency; public goods, externalities and information; government and business.
ECN 270 Globalization and Labor Market Integrati
While globalization is often mentioned with respect to capital flows, less attention has been devoted to the movement of people. Nonetheless, international migratory flows are a key element behind the increasing integration of the world economy. The course is focused on the main sources of the migratory flows and on their effects, both at the individual and at the aggregate level. Particular emphasis is placed on the different regulations to enter the main areas of immigration: the U.S., the U.K., the Euro area and Australia. In fact, different regulations mirror different forms of protectionism.
ECN 297 Social Capital Markets-Investing for Soc
Social entrepreneurs-individuals designing and running organizations for the purpose of solving social or environmental problems-makeup a rapidly growing sector of the global economy. Financing for these social enterprises has grown similarly, recently topping $500 billion worldwide by some estimates. This course looks at this phenomenon from the perspective of both the investor and the social enterprise. Topics covered include microfinance, social venture investing, financing new green businesses, community development investment, "bottom of the pyramid" (BOP) ventures, as well as metrics and measurements for assessing social/environmental impact and valuing social ventures. Particular attention will be paid throughout to the potential application and misapplication of traditional methods of financial/economic analysis to social/environmental issues, with the overall goal of developing a more appropriate, systemic approach to analysis.
This course should be of interest to anyone aspiring to work in organizations that focus on social/environmental impact (non-profits or for profits using the double or triple bottom line, all of which are often referred to as social entrepreneurs) or work in the organizations that invest in or otherwise finance the former. No prior understanding of finance, entrepreneurship, or social entrepreneurship is assumed for this course.
Individual class periods will blend discussion of readings, student presentations and class discussions of case studies of real-world impact investors and social entrepreneurs, and student-led discussion/critique/evaluation of real-world business models of impact investors and social entrepreneurs.
ECN 303 Development Economics
The course will introduce students to the evolution of theory and practice in economic development in three stages. First, models of economic growth and development including work by Harrod-Domar, Robert Solow, Arthur Lewis, and Michael Kremer are compared to provide students with a feeling for how economists have conceived of the development process. The class then proceeds to examine particular development issues such as population growth, stagnant agriculture, environmental degradation, illiteracy, gender disparities, and rapid urbanization to understand how these dynamics reinforce poverty and deprivation. In the final stage, students will read work by supporters as well as critics of international development assistance and use the knowledge and perspective they have gained thus far to independently evaluate efficacy of a specific development intervention.
ECN 305 The Economics of the European Union
This course applies economic theory to some key economic institutions and policies of the European Union. It addresses some key issues in the process of European economic integration, under three broad groups: the degree of economic integration historically achieved with the common market and the European Monetary System; an analysis of the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) regime; an economic analysis of the changes related to EU enlargement, both for old and new members. Questions discussed include the question whether there is an economic case for EMU, current issues with respect to fiscal, monetary, and labour market policies, and the problems that lie ahead until broader adoption of the euro.
(Recommended ECN 256)
ECN 320 Game Theory, Information, and Contracts
The course investigates in a simple but rigorous way some of the fundamental issues of modern microeconomics, exploring the main concepts of game theory, as well as the basic elements of the economics of information, and of contract theory. A solid background on these topics is essential to the investigation of strategic decision making, the assessment of the relevance of asymmetric or incomplete information in decision processes, and the design of contracts. These, in turn, are among the most important issues that firms and individuals commonly need to face in all situations in which the consequences of individual decisions are likely to depend on the strategic interactions among agents? actions, and on the signaling value of information. Proceeding from intuition to formal analysis, the course investigates the methodological approach of game theory (allowing for a systematic analysis of strategic interaction) and the main concepts of the economics of information mitting to assess the effects of asymmetric or incomplete information on agents? decisions).
Further, it combines both game theory and the economics of information to provide an introduction to the essential elements of contract theory.
ECN 325 Money, Banking and Financial Markets
This course introduces students to the meaning and consequence of monetary relations, the banking system, financial markets, and central banks in the context of aggregate economic activity. The first part covers financial asset returns, the determination of the risk and term structure of interest rates, bond and stock price formation under different hypotheses of market behavior. The second part covers banks' and central banks' management of information problems and financial risks. The conduct and goals of monetary policy are discussed with reference to the practice of the US Fed and the European Central Bank. This course is ideally the first part of a two-semester sequence including ECN 328.
(Recommended: ECN 225 and ECN 256)
ECN 328 International Banking and Finance
This upper-level course in economics course introduces students to the major analytical and policy issues raised by international monetary and financial relations in real world economies. It is ideally the second part of a two-semester sequence including ECN 325. This course is a program requirement for the major in International Banking and Finance. It also fulfils group requirements towards the majors in International Economics and International Relations, and Economics as a combined major as well as a minor. This course is designed to provide the student with an appreciation of the meaning and consequence of international financial relations, the use of currencies subject to different monetary, banking and financial conditions, in the context of interrelated economic systems. The first part covers balance-of-payments and international payments issues, the causes and consequences of international financial flows, the market determination of foreign exchange rates, exchange rate arrangements and their consequences for real and financial stability. The second part covers the question of macroeconomic interdependence, the causes and consequences of international and global imbalances, and their effects on national, regional, and world economic activity. This course is ideally the second part of a two-semester sequence including ECN 325.
(Recommended: ECN 225, ECN 256, ECN 325)
ECN 341 International Economics
This course will introduce students to the major theories and tools used in the study of international trade. Particular attention will be paid to deriving, analyzing, and assessing the empirical evidence for and against the Ricardian and Heckscher-Ohlin conceptions of comparative advantage, the Stolper-Samuelson Factor-Price Equalization Theorem, and New Trade Theories based on assumptions of imperfect competition. Students will become skilled at using a variety of graphical devices including offer curves to describe the effect which variations in government policy, factor dynamics, country size, technology, tastes, and transport costs will have on the terms of as well as the magnitude and distribution of the gains from trade.
ECN 350 Industrial Organization in the European
This course studies the market behavior of firms with market power. Topics like oligopoly, price discrimination, vertical relations between firms, product differentiation, advertising and entry barriers represent the core of the course. These concepts will be applied to the specific case of European firms, which live in an economic and monetary union. We will study the principles of European competition policy and some famous European antitrust cases. A Comparison with American antitrust will be made.
ECN 365 Investment Analysis I
This course revolves around the basic concepts of value and risk, and explores the principles that guide strategic investment decisions. Major emphasis is placed on the notion of net present value, the evaluation and pricing of bonds and stocks, and the definition and measurement of risk. The concepts of portfolio risk and expected return, as well as the role of portfolio diversification are carefully investigated. Students are then introduced to market efficiency, portfolio theory and the relationship between risk and return in the context of alternative theories, mainly the capital asset
pricing model and the arbitrage pricing theory.
(Recommended: ECN 225, ECN 256; Strongly Recommended: MAT 200)
ECN 366 Investment Analysis II (Corporate Financ
This course focuses on the financing decisions of firms. After an introduction to the questions related to the definition of debt policy and the capital structure of the firm the course investigates the problems related to the issue of securities and dividend policy, as well as the impact of corporate taxes and the costs associated to bankruptcy, financial distress and conflicts of interest. In the second part, the course studies the fundamentals of option pricing theory and the valuation of options, with several applications to warrants and convertible bonds, and provides an introduction to the use of derivatives for hedging financial risk.
ECN 387 Introduction to Econometrics
The course introduces the basic principles of econometrics as a set of tools and techniques to quantitatively investigate a variety of economic and financial issues. The application of econometric methods allows to study the relationships between different economic and financial variables (measuring their signs and magnitudes), hence providing a natural way to test and confront alternative theories and conjectures, as well as to forecast and simulate the effects of different economic and financial policies. The course approach is mainly focused on applications. A discussion of the main theoretical issues and a systematic analysis of econometric tools are prerequisites for the investigation of a series of problems that are of particular relevance for economic and financial applications.
ECN 490 Senior Research Project in IE
Research proposals are to be coordinated with the Department Chair.
ECN 492 Internship in International Economics
Internship experiences are to be coordinated in advance with the Department Chair.
ECN 494 Internship in Intl Banking and Finance
Internship experiences are to be coordinated in advance with the Department Chair.
ECN 495 SR Research Project in IBF
Research proposals are to be coordinated with the Department Chair.
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ENG 100 Writing in the Humanities
A freshman-level course in expository writing designed to enable students to express themselves with greater clarity and force in their writing. Readings based on a wide variety of contemporary issues will be used as a basis for expository essays. The essential goal is to create a more expressive, analytical style of writing. An acceptable research paper is required to pass the course. This course should be taken during the first year at Franklin. (For students in EAP 130 this course must be taken in the following semester.)
ENG 199 First Year Seminar
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ENG 220 Creative Writing: Fiction
The short story is the focus of this course on creative writing. "Exercises" emphasizing dialogue, setting, time sequencing, character development, closure, and style are used in an attempt to break down fiction into its constituent elements. The goal of the class is the synthesis of those elements in short story form. The aim throughout this course is also to relate the writing of fiction both to the writers' personal experiences and to their creative imaginations. The orientation of the course may vary according to the instructor.
ENG 225 Creative Writing: Poetry
This course seeks to give reality and definition to creative writing by insistently placing what is an essentially mysterious activity in a variety of concrete contexts. Participants, of course, write poetry throughout. The course begins by exploring the ways in which language is grounded in sensory experience, looking at methods by which "abstract" language and "concrete" experience can be married and moves on to pursue this delineation of relationships in poetry's sister arts: painting, sculpture, music and film. Students then look at a small anthology of poems in the light of discoveries so far made, and relate these to their own developing practice. The experience amassed is then focused on technical questions of concrete poetic practice, related throughout to students' work and to the poems studied previously. In the final week readings and debate of the work is undertaken.
ENG 232 Creative Writing: Non-Fiction
In this experiential, hands-on workshop, we will explore how to begin translating one's personal experience into literature. Using guided writing assignments-both inside and outside the classroom-students will practice the fundamentals of creative nonfiction writing as well as take on some of the genre's essential questions: What exactly is creative nonfiction? How much liberty can we take with the "truth?" How do we make a personal experience relevant for an audience? Using the textbook Tell it Slant: Writing and Shaping Creative Nonfiction (Brenda Miller and Suzanne Paola, 2003), as well as the online magazine Brevity (http://www.creativenonfiction.org/brevity/), students will be provided with many different models and avenues for writing their own pieces of creative nonfiction.
ENG 320 Advanced Creative Writing: Fiction
This advanced course in creative writing is based on the principles elaborated in English 220, Creative Writing: Fiction. The focus is on the short story, but at a more sophisticated level. There will be additional "exercises" on dialogue, chronology, character development, depth of meaning, narratorial intervention and style. Short stories and movies will be studied with respect to their modes of making fiction. Student work will be read and discussed in class on a regular basis. The goal of the course will be the production, during the course of the semester, of a portfolio of short stories and a longer, more sophisticated novela.
ENG 325 Advanced Creative Writing: Poetry
This advanced course in creative writing will be based on the principles elaborated in English 225, Creative Writing: Poetry. The focus is again on poetry in English, in all its forms and coming from its multifarious traditions, but at a more sophisticated level. We will be reading and writing poetry throughout the course and considering such matters as the relationship between self and language, the place of the lyric impulse in the tradition and in participants' own work, poetry and narrative, poetry and translation, drama and character in the short poem, and so on. Student work will be read and discussed in class regularly. The goal of the course will be twofold: the production, over the semester, of a portfolio of poems and, running concurrently with this, the pursuit of a personal project to be defined in consultation with the professor.
ENG 499 Senior Project: Creative Writing
The Senior Project in Creative Writing is an extension - a widening and deepening - of the kind of work done in either ENG 320 AdvancedCreative Writing: Fiction or ENG 325 Advanced Creative Writing: Poetry. The precise nature of each project is arrived at by the student in consultation with his/her Project Director.
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EAP 120 Academic Writing
(1.5 credits)
The aim of this course is to help students to improve their written study skills, espe-cially in the areas of information intake and organization. This means that the course concentrates on developing students' note-taking and exam-taking techniques and their academic writing skills, with special emphasis on essay structure, paragraph develop-ment and sentence-level issues. This course is taken in conjunction with EAP 125.
EAP 125 Academic Reading & Vocabulary
(1.5 credits)
The aim of this course is to help students to improve their comprehension of written English, and to develop strategies for approaching the written word. Special emphasis is placed on note-taking strategies and vocabulary development, and on critical analysis of academic texts. This course is taken in conjunction with EAP 120.
EAP 130 Academic Research Skills
Intended primarily for students for who English is not their first language, this course provides further development of critical analysis and note-taking skills, including paraphrasing, summarizing and other techniques for avoiding plagiarism. It looks at evalua-tion of information (including resources for research and other types of academic es-says) and includes techniques for sharing information gathered, in both written and oral form. Discussion and presentation skills will also be addressed. Students take EAP 130 for a total of three elective credits and may enroll in an additional four regular degree courses plus academic travel. Upon completion of EAP 130, students must take English 100, Writing in the Humanities, in the subsequent semester.
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HIS 100 Western Civilization I: Ancient and Medi
This course is an introduction to themes and trends in the political, economic, social, and intellectual history of the West from the Neolithic Revolution to the seventeenth century with emphasis on the relationship between ideas and institutions. Students are introduced to the reading and analysis of primary sources, and attention is devoted to historiography and recent trends in scholarship.
HIS 101 Western Civilization II: Modern
This course is an introduction to themes and trends in the political, economic, social, and intellectual history of the West from the seventeenth century to the present with emphasis on the relationship between ideas and institutions. Students are introduced to the reading and analysis of primary sources, and attention is devoted to historiography and recent trends in scholarship.
(It is recommended that HIS 100 be taken prior to HIS 101)
HIS 104 Global History I: From the Beginnings t
This course is an introduction to themes and trends in the political, economic, social, and intellectual history of pre-modern civilizations in global perspective. It covers the development of civilizations in the Near East, the Mediterranean, India, China, Japan, and the West from the Neolithic Revolution to the "Columbian Exchange" with emphasis on the emergence and diffusion of ideas and institutions. Special attention is devoted to the impact of encounters between civilizations. Students are introduced to the reading and analysis of primary sources, and attention is devoted to historiography and recent trends in scholarship.
HIS 105 Global History II: From the Sixteenth C
This course is an introduction to themes and trends in the political, economic, social, and intellectual history of modern civilizations in global perspective. It covers developments in Europe, India, China, and Japan as well as in Africa and the Americas from the "Columbian Exchange" to the twenty-first century with emphasis on the emergence and diffusion of ideas and institutions. Special attention is devoted to the impact of encounters between civilizations. Students are introduced to the reading and analysis of primary sources, and attention is devoted to historiography and recent trends in scholarship.
(It is recommended that HIS 104 be taken prior to HIS 105)
HIS 199 First Year Seminar
Seminar topics change year to year. Please consult the Schedule of Classes for current seminar offerings.
HIS 202 History of Switzerland
Due to characteristics such as linguistic diversity, cantonal authority, direct democracy, and armed neutrality, Switzerland is commonly regarded as an exception to the rule of national development and of limited importance. This course analyzes the political, economic, social, and intellectual development of Switzerland as a coherent and significant part of the history of ancient, medieval, and modern Europe.
HIS 204 History of Italy from the Renaissance to
Italy in many of its aspects can be considered to be a laboratory of Western
modernity. The peninsula had a leading role in Western affairs during Antiquity and the Middle Ages, but this role was lost by the end of the fifteenth century. During the modern age, however, Italy continued to provide a central point of reference in the European mind. This course focuses attention on the cultural, social and political developments in Italian history in their European context since the Renaissance. Themes include the struggles over national identity in the absence of a unified nation state, the differing regions and competing centers, the interplay of culture and politics, and the relation between religion and politics.
HIS 210 The Cold War
This course examines the causes and effects of the confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union with special reference to Europe between the end of the Second World War in 1945 and the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. Synthesizing political and intellectual history, attention is focused on connections between international and domestic affairs including consideration of science, literature, and music.
HIS 221 History of Modern Russia
This course focuses on themes and trends in the political, economic, social, and cultural history of Russia since the mid-nineteenth century. Following consideration of basic social, cultural, and environmental aspects of Russian history, attention is devoted to late Tsarist Russia and the First World War. There follows a detailed analysis of the related period of the Russian Revolutions and the ensuing Civil War with the personality of Lenin at its center. Thereafter attention is devoted to the Soviet Union under Stalin including the Second World War and the Cold War, analyzing her interactions with allies and foes during the ninety years of her existence. The reforms of Gorbachev and the dissolution of the Soviet Union are concluding considerations marking the emergence of contemporary Russia. Themes discussed are the struggles between tradition and modernization, the roles of authority and violence, the theory and practice of Communism, and the interplay of authoritarian policy, industrialization, and the role of nationalism.
HIS 240 History of Modern Germany
This course focuses on the central issues raised in the study of modern German history. The main historical themes and trends of political, economic, social and cultural development are analyzed. Special attention is paid to the role of Bismarck, the Weimar Republic and the Third Reich as the historic legacy of contemporary Germany.
HIS 243 Worlds of Islam
This course is an introduction to the multifaceted civilization of Islam as both a religion and a historical phenomenon. After a survey of the background and context of the emergence of Muhammad as a spiritual leader in the Arabian peninsula, the course analyzes the rapid spread of Islam to Spain in the west and India to the east in less than a hundred years. It follows the divergent paths of the emerging different Islamic cultures in the Arabian and Mediterranean regions, in Persia, India, Turkey and Africa, and it follows also the Muslim diaspora in the Christian West. The guiding question is the relation between "normalcy" and variety as manifest in the tensions between the importance of the holy text of the Qur'an and the impact of interpretation and tradition. The course concludes with a consideration of contemporary Islam, focusing attention on both fundamentalist approaches and open-minded ones that seek a role for Muslims in peaceful relations with the West today. (Fall 2008)
HIS 252 Vienna and the Habsburg Empire in the Lo
As the major successor of the Holy Roman Empire following the Napoleonic Wars, the empire of the Habsburg dynasty in central and eastern Europe with Vienna as its capital was one of the great European powers during the "long" nineteenth century. At the same time, as a multi-national, multi-lingual, and multi-religious empire in an era of national awakening, it had to face severe tensions between its numerous national groups, which at the end of the First World War proved fatal to its existence. Nevertheless, the empire was and is considered by many to be an ideal solution to the problem of providing a political framework for a region of different cultures and ethnic groups closely intermingled. This course will analyze the development of relations between the government and the different groups within the empire as well as the relations between the different groups themselves. Special attention is devoted to the impact of the Napoleonic Wars, the revolutions of 1848, and the First World War. An in-depth study focuses on the different social and cultural strata in Vienna around the year 1900.
HIS 255 America in the Sixties
This course focuses on the political, economic, social, and intellectual dimensions of America in the Sixties in historical perspective. During the period from the late Fifties to the early Seventies, the people of the United States were confronted with challenges both at home and abroad, such as racism, poverty, alienation, and war, and were transformed by responses which demanded re-evaluation of ideas and institutions, such as the Civil Rights Movement, the Great Society, the New Left and the protests against the Vietnam War.
HIS 256 The Making of Modern America
Since the late nineteenth century, the United States has been transformed from a regional
to a global power with political, economic, military, and cultural influence. This course analyzes the emergence and development of modern America with reference to themes and trends such as industrialization and big business, progressivism and imperialism, the First World War, isolationism and prosperity, the Great Depression, the New Deal, the Second World War, the Cold War, liberalism and conservatism in the fifties and sixties, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Civil Rights movement, neoconservatism and interventionism in the seventies and eighties, and globalization and neoimperialism in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries culminating in the Iraq War.
HIS 260 The Holocaust
This course examines those aspects of the history of the Jews in Europe that may be useful in throwing light on what is considered one of the most heinous crimes ever committed in human history, the genocide practiced against the Jews by Nazi Germany in the period of Nazi power. The historic development of anti-Semitism and other forms of racism in Europe from Roman times to the twentieth century are also studied. The class considers how genocide was put into practice by the perpetrators and their collaborators and how they organized the modern industry of mass murder. The fates of other groups that were given similar treatment are also studied as are the effects on the survivors and the rest of the world. Several documentary films and feature films are shown.
HIS 271 History of Modern France
From absolute monarchy to the Fifth Republic, from the Enlightenment to existentialism, France has been central to European affairs in revolution, war and peace. Paris itself has been called "capital of the nineteenth century" and pacemaker for many aspects of twentieth-century culture. This course analyzes the political, social, and cultural history of modern France with special attention to the tensions between the urban center and the rural periphery, the often violent struggles between tradition and modernization, and the European dimension of its identity and influence from the late-eighteenth century to the present.
HIS 280 History of Modern India
Following a survey of the early foundations of Indian civilization and the roles of Hinduism and Islam, this course focuses first on the decline of the Mughal Empire and the establishment of rule by the British East India Company in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries leading to the Indian Mutiny of 1857 and the consequent establishment of direct rule by the British Crown. There follows focus on the nationalist movement of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries associated with the Indian National Congress and the Muslim League and the non-violent civil disobedience campaigns for independence led by Mohandas K. Gandhi between the First and Second World Wars. The independence and partition of India and Pakistan in 1947 is studied with reference to the communal violence
which resulted, followed by a survey of the domestic and foreign affairs of India under Jawaharlal Nehru, his daughter Indira Gandhi, and her son Rajiv Gandhi from the 1950s to the 1980s during which period India be- came a nuclear power within the context of the Cold War. Recent relations between Hindus and Muslims within India and between India and Pakistan are considered, concluding with an assessment of contemporary Indian de- mocracy and economic development in global perspective.
HIS 302 Intellectual History of Modern Europe Si
Through contextual analysis of primary sources, and with attention devoted to methodological considerations, this course focuses on the content and context of modern European thought since the Scientific Revolution with emphasis on the dichotomy of faith and reason. Attention is devoted to historiography and recent trends in scholarship.
HIS 304 The European Reformation: Churches and S
In Europe during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the Christian doctrine and authority of the Roman Catholic Church were directly challenged leading to the establishment of rival Protestant churches, a conflict which influenced the subsequent political, economic, social, and cultural development of the states of modern Europe. Following a brief survey of the ancient and medieval foundations of doctrine and authority in Augustinian Christianity and Scholasticism and the critical challenge of Humanism, the course focuses on the sixteenth century and analyzes the Protestant ideas and institutions associated with Martin Luther in Germany, Huldrych Zwingli in Switzerland, and John Calvin in Geneva, followed by the Catholic ideas and institutions of the Counter Reformation associated with Ignatius Loyola in Spain and the Papacy in Rome. Attention is devoted to the consequent conflicts between Catholic and Protestant forces in England, France, the Netherlands, and Scandinavia, which culminated in the Thirty Years' War in the Holy Roman Empire in the seventeenth century. Emphasis is placed on the political and economic dimensions of the Reformation and its transatlantic significance.
HIS 305 Living in a Diaspora: The Case of Judais
The Greek term "diaspora" refers to those "scattered", who were forced or induced to leave their traditional homeland and to settle elsewhere and to the ensuing developments in their culture. This course raises the question of the conditions for the persistence of such a diasporic situation, focusing on Jews and Judaism as its prime example. Since the Babylonian Captivity and even more so since the destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 CE, the Jews today can be considered to be the oldest culture in a diaspora. Attention is devoted to religious, cultural and social developments that made Judaism survive from Antiquity and the Middle Ages to the present and to different reactions to their environment. The course concludes with the rise of a Jewish center in Palestine in the twentieth century and the ensuing tensions between this center and the persisting diasporas.
HIS 313 Diplomatic History of Modern Europe Sinc
This course focuses on the relations between European states during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Inevitably it is concerned with the vital issues of war and peace. The course examines all the major wars of the period and the diplomatic conferences which followed them (including the Congress of Vienna, the Versailles Conference and Yalta-Potsdam), and the current structure of European state relations since 1945.
HIS 314 The Roman Republic as Empire from the Pu
The study of empire has become a central issue of historiography in recent years. Covering the Mediterranean world, the Roman Republic provides a prime example of a democracy governed not by a monarch or emperor but by an elected body, the Roman Senate. This course begins with an analysis of the factors that led to the rise of the city of Rome, starting with her victory over her rival, the city of Carthage, and the subsequent extension of her power throughout the Mediterranean. Further attention is devoted to the methods of republican government and administration, which maintained Roman power even in times of crisis and unrest. The course concludes with an analysis of the period of the civil wars, associated with the rise and fall of Julius Caesar. Within this context special attention is devoted to the question of how and why the empire survived while the Republic perished, giving way to the Principate of Augustus and the imperial monarchy.
HIS 342 Palestine from Ottoman Rule to the Found
The history of Palestine is as contested as control of the land itself. This course offers an in-depth study of the background and the development of one of the most violently contested regions of the Middle East today. After a discussion of the different religious traditions of holiness in the region, the course focuses on its administration under the Ottoman Empire during the nineteenth century and follows the different attempts to gain increasingly more control by Zionist settlers, Arab nationalists, and British imperialists. The impact of Zionism, the First World War and the period of the British mandate with its clashing aspirations and interests until the escalation of the conflict during the Arab uprising of 1936/1939 are studied from various perspectives, leading to study of divergent narratives of the events of the Second World War, the foundation of the State of Israel, and the Catastrophe for the Palestinian people. In pursuing the political, social and cultural history of Palestine during these years, the course raises the issue of the instrumentalization of maps and statistical data for political purposes as well as the role of history itself in the political battlefield of one of the most dramatic conflicts in the contemporary world.
HIS 351 Nationalism and Ethnic Conflict in Europ
This course undertakes an in-depth discussion of the origins and development of nationalism as an ideology, as a political movement, and as a source of internal and international conflict in Europe. Following an introduction to important approaches in the theory of nationalism, special attention is devoted to the periods of the Napoleonic Wars, the First World War and its impact, and the period after the end of the Cold War in 1989.
HIS 353 Victorian Britain: Democracy and Empire
During the nineteenth century Victorian Britain faced issues of political, economic and social reform in England and Ireland and of imperial expansion in Africa and India. During this period debate over democracy and empire was dominated by William Gladstone and Benjamin Disraeli, both of whom entered Parliament as members of the Conservative party in the 1830s but differed over the policies of the Conservative Prime Minister Robert Peel in the 1840s. Subsequently both served as Chancellor of the Exchequer in the 1850s followed by becoming Prime Minister, Disraeli leading two Conservative governments in the 1860s and the 1870s and Gladstone leading four Liberal governments between the 1860s and the 1890s. This course focuses on the rivalry between Gladstone and Disraeli with emphasis on the relation between political theory and party politics in Victorian Britain through contextual analysis of primary sources.
HIS 354 The Enlightenment: Reason and Revolution
During the eighteenth century in Europe and America the methods and principles of the seventeenth-century Scientific Revolution, such as rationalism, empiricism and natural law, influenced the transformation of political, economic and social ideas and institutions. Theories and policies of natural rights, free trade, republicanism and secularism were directed against divine right, mercantilism, feudalism and church authority, contributing to reforms and revolutions in various states and empires which often were associated with international wars. The resulting modern polities, including the United States, continue to be of dominant influence in the world today. This course focuses on the eighteenth-century Enlightenment through contextual analysis of the writings of numerous thinkers such as Voltaire and Montesquieu in France, Kant in Germany, Vico in Italy, Paine and Bentham in England, Hume and Smith in Scotland, and Franklin and Jefferson in America, among others. Attention is devoted to methodological considerations and recent trends in scholarship.
HIS 355 The World & the West in the Long 19thCen
The world today has been shaped to a large extent by Europe and America in the long nineteenth century between the Enlightenment and the First World War. During this period dramatic changes in social, economic, political and cultural ideas and institutions were related to changes in how people in the West conceptualized the world around them. Although Europeans and Americans exerted global influence through industrialization and imperialism, in turn they were influenced by people beyond the West from Africa to the Far East. Thus globalization is not a recent phenomenon. With emphasis on Christopher Bayly's recent book The Birth of the Modern World, 1780-1914: Global Connections and Comparisons, among other works, this course will focus on major themes in the study of modernity such as political ideologies and the roles of science and religion as related to the development of the idea of "Europe" or "the West" with special reference to the British colonies, Egypt, the Ottoman Empire, and Japan. It is intended to provide not only a broad view of a crucial period in modern history but also a functional knowledge of themes and concepts necessary for understanding the contemporary world. Students read primary as well as secondary sources, and attention is devoted to methodological considerations and recent trends in scholarship.
HIS 401 Western Historiography: Ancient, Medieva
This course is a history of history. Modern as an academic discipline, history as a literary form is ancient, and the course begins with its Western sources in the secular writings of Greek and Roman historians, followed by Jewish and Christian religious interpretations of human affairs. After consideration of medieval chronicles of European kings and the Catholic church, attention is turned to the sixteenth century and devoted to modern attitudes to secular history in the Florentine Renaissance and religious history in the Protestant Reformation. The approach to history as a scientific discipline during the seventeenth century is treated, followed by the application of the rational idea of progress by Enlightenment historians during the eighteenth century. The nineteenth-century establishment of history as an empirical discipline in European and American universities is analyzed with reference to ideological interpretations of human affairs, leading to consideration of twentieth-century paradigms of political, economic, social, intellectual, and cultural history.
HIS 402 Religion and Society in History
During the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, religion and its role in society was considered to be a receding phenomenon. In recent years, however, this view has been radically altered. Events and developments such as 9/11, the rise of Islamic fundamentalism, the resurgence of the religious right in the United States, and the popularity of the Papacy have demonstrated that religion remains a social phenomenon of great importance for an understanding of the contemporary world. Through analysis of primary and secondary sources, this course seeks to deepen the understanding of the role and influence of religion in society and the interplay between the two. In discussing writings by Karl Marx, Max Weber, Karl Jaspers and Mircea Eliade, among others, the course also devotes attention to different concepts of "religion" in history.
HIS 499 History Senior Thesis
Senior Thesis proposals are to be coordinated with the Department Chair.
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LIT 100 Introduction to Literature, Pt I
This course is intended to introduce students to some of the great works of Western literature and to familiarize them with new ways of analyzing and appreciating these works. The course covers the period from Ancient Greek literature to the end of the Middle Ages. There is emphasis on works of Homer as well as representative Greek tragedies and comedies (These works are directly related to the itineraries of both of the Academic Travel Programs to Greece.) The second main component is medieval and early Renaissance literature with emphasis on the tension between the religious and the secular. Dante's Divine Comedy and French Arthurian Romances are juxtaposed with authors of a more secular orientation like Chaucer and Boccaccio.
LIT 101 Introduction to Literature, Part II
This course aims to introduce students to some of the major works of literature written in English between the sixteenth and twentieth centuries and, through these, to the notion of a critical appreciation of language and literature in general. The texts are chosen to represent the major lines of development in British and American literature from the Renaissance to the present day and are drawn from poetry, fiction and discursive prose. Through the texts, students learn to recognize the relationships between a work of art and the age in which it was produced, to develop analytical skills for the interpretation and comparison of texts, and to more fully appreciate the beauty and significance of the literary arts.
LIT 105 World Literature
This course is designed to introduce students to some representative major works of non-Western literature and of literature outside the European mainstream. There will be a strong emphasis on Oriental literature. Possible texts, or selections thereof, include: The Tales of Genji, The 1001 Nights, The Ramayana, the poetry of Li Po and Tu Fu, poetry of Derek Walcott, Milosz and/or Hol- ub, fiction of Kipling, V.S. Naipaul, Danilo Kis, Mahfouz, Pamuk,, Tagore and possibly supplemented with Ray's movies about India. The focus may vary according to the instructor.
LIT 204 Romanticism in European Culture
This course examines the Anglo-Germanic origins of the Romantic revolt against Neo-Classicism and the Enlightenment. The diverse richness of Eng- lish Romantic poetry represented by Blake, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Byron and Keats is examined in depth. The second half of the course is devoted to prose. Frankenstein, as well as works by Austen, Constant, Hardy, the Brontë sisters, Hugo and Flaubert, are studied. The questions of when and why the Romantic Movement was supplanted by other literary forms of expression that came after it are also addressed. The primary goal of the course is to elaborate a working definition of Romanticism and to learn to appreciate the diverse literary production of the period.
LIT 208 Shakespearean Drama
An introduction to Shakespeare, and Shakespeare studies, across the full range of his work: poetry, history play, comedy, tragedy, and "romance". The Shakespearean universe is approached through a consideration of the society and thought of his time in an endeavor to place the work in its living context. Special consideration is given to the texture and detail of Shakespeare's language and its relation to characterization and theme in the plays.
LIT 211 17th Century English Literature
This course gives students the opportunity to study a selection of representative works - prose and poetry - from English literature's greatest period, and to examine the ways in which that achievement relates both to literary tradition and to a society in times of revolutionary change. Authors studied will include Shakespeare, Milton, the Metaphysical Poets, the translators of the 'King James' Bible, John Bunyan, Francis Bacon and Sir Thomas Browne.
LIT 212 Rise of the Novel
This course examines some of the major phases in the evolution of the novel. It begins with a brief introduction to the Spanish picaresque novel as well as Cervantes' major work. Watt's theory about the rise of the eighteenth century English novel is discussed in conjunction with Robinson Crusoe and the epistolary novel. After focusing on the great novels of the nineteenth century, like Balzac's Lost Illusions, for ex- ample, the course concludes with a study of the contemporary novel. Greater attention is paid to literary theory than in LIT 100. Works of Cervantes, Voltaire, de Laclos, Diderot, Carpentier, and Kundera are studied.
LIT 240 Modern American Literature
This course examines American literature from the beginning of the nineteenth century to the present. It begins with an evocation of the frontier. Attention is also given to Emerson's call for a truly American literature, a call answered by Whitman's Romantic poetry. Further themes analyzed are: the growth of American cities, slavery, money, women's roles in literature, and America's entry onto the international scene. Works of Beecher-Stowe, Faulkner, Fitzgerald, Wharton, Hemingway, Toni Morrison and others are studied.
LIT 242 Contemporary African Literature: Between
This course focuses on contemporary literature from essentially four African cultures. The points of departure are the images of pre-colonialist Africa such as those presented in Achebe's monumental Things Fall Apart. The focus then turns to literature reflecting the problems engendered by the clash between nationalism and colonialism as depicted, for example, in Achebe's No Longer at Ease and Ngugi's representation of Kenya at the time of the Mau-Mau revolt. Works of Gordimer, and Brink are used to illustrate the South African writers' attempts to deal with apartheid. Finally, through the work of writers such as the Egyptian Nobel Price winner, Mahfouz, and the Algerian novelist, Assia Djebar, the literary representation of the role of Islam in North African literature is also discussed.
LIT 245 Modern Women Writers
Drawing on European, American, Caribbean and African authors, this comparative course focuses on literature written by women. A short introduction centers on the problems of nineteenth century women writers such as Kate Chopin and South African writer, Olive Schreiner. The course evaluates the unique voice, perspective, and/or subject matter of literature written by women. Texts by Toni Morrison, Alice Walker, Jamaica Kincaid, Julia Alvarez, Maryse Condé, Edwidge Danticat and Mernissi are studied.
LIT 249 Latin American Literature
This course serves as an introduction to modern Latin American literature and begins with the fascinating short fiction of Alejo Carpentier and García Márquez, Borges and Cortázar. Texts from the innovative and extremely influential movement of ?Magical Realism? are dealt with in detail. There are texts by the Cuban poet, Nicolá s Guillén, but the primary focus is on the works of contemporary prose writers who have left their mark on the nature of the fiction of our modern age. Additional texts by MarioVargas Llosa, Isabel Allende, Christina García, Clarice Lispector, Borges, Machado de Assis.
LIT 251 Modern Russian Literature
This course traces the evolution of Russian literature from Pushkin through the present and begins with Pushkin's ground-breaking Eugene Onegin. It continues with key works of nineteenth century Russian literature such as Gogol's Dead Souls, Dostoyevski's, The Brothers Karamazov etc., and works of Tolstoy, Gorky, Chekhov, Pasternak, Solzhenitsyn and others.
LIT 253 Caribbean Literature
This multi-cultural course focuses on contemporary Caribbean writers. There will be excursions into Caribbean history, the origins of the Carib- bean people, Caribbeanness, Caribbean literary criticism (Glissant), gender roles in the Caribbean, etc. The course understands the Caribbean in a very large sense and will accentuate connections to North America, Colombia, and Venezuela. Authors likely to be included: Maryse Condé , Simone Schwartz-Bart, Alejo Carpentier, Jacques Roumain, Edwidge Danticat, Gabriel García Má rquez, Caryl Phillips,et. al.
LIT 260 Modern French Literature
This course explores the evolution of modern French literature from Zola, Gide, and Proust to the present day. Beginning with the innovative works of Huysmans, Gide, and Proust, the course proceeds to the literature of the period be- tween the two World Wars and the early existential texts of Sartre. This course also deals with the Sartre-Camus confrontation and discusses plays by Ionesco and Beckett as illustrative of French theater of the post-war period.
LIT 279 Irish Literature
This course attempts to demonstrate how the great Irish writers of this century attained real "universality" precisely by virtue of cultivating the local, the particular, and the seemingly parochial. The course traces the history of Irish Literature in English from the Gaelic Revival of the 1890s up to present day and explores the relationship of Irish national consciousness to the developing literature, focusing on the striking inter-relatedness and interdependency of that 100 years of writing, and on the ways in which Irish writers' - frequently intense - focus on place combines with a truly cosmopolitan breadth of artistic vision.
LIT 300 Modernism
This course explores the meanings of "Modernism," the artistic tendency which sprang up in a profusion of forms in the Europe and America of the 1910s and 1920s, and focuses on its Anglo-American representatives in the literary world. Modernism in poetry fiction and literary criticism is considered. Principal figures studied include: T. S. Eliot, James Joyce, Ezra Pound, Wyndham Lewis, Wallace Stevens and William Carlos Williams. Consideration is also given to the modernists' predecessors and successors, and to the relationships between literary Modernism and that found contemporaneously in music and, most crucially, in the visual arts. An important aspect of the Modernist project was its critical and re-evaluative relationship to the tradition, and the critical pronouncements of these writers are explored in some depth - issues which continue to resound in the work of today's critics.
LIT 311 Zola & the Naturalists
This interdisciplinary course, using the novels, art criticism and journalism of Emile Zola as a springboard, examines the explosion of artistic production during the reign of Napoleon III, such as the works of Manet and Baudelaire as well as Zola's vision of that society in his series of novels Les Rougon-Macquart. Zola's ideas on science and naturalism are also discussed in an international context. The course concludes with Zola's "J'accuse" and the Dreyfus Affair.
LIT 313 Politics & the Modern Novel
This course examines various modern novels with a special eye to their political content and political ideals. The novels represent a wide spectrum of ideological and cultural perspectives. Much of the course is devoted to women writers. Authors include Dostoyevski, Roumain, Kundera, Vargas-Llosa, Alexis, Julia Alvarez, Edwidge Danticat , V.S. Naipaul and Solzhenitsyn.
LIT 333 The Art and Aesthetics of Proust
This course gives students the opportunity to savor the brilliant chef d'oeuvre of Proust. It is designed to elaborate the psychologically and socio- historically determined destinies of Proust's characters, work out his theory of art, and discuss his ideas on love. Additional consideration is focused on Proust's representation of music (Franck/Vinteuil) and the many references to art (Botticelli, Giotto, Carpaccio, Vermeer, Elstir, etc.) that enrich his dis- cussion of aesthetics. The historical and cultural context in which Proust's text, Remembrance of Things Past, is situated, is also examined.
LIT 340 Great American Novel
This course centers on the problem of the "greatness" of the American novel. What criteria are to be used to evaluate the "greatness" of the American novel? How are we to evaluate the novels of the present with respect to those of the past? Several works have been considered as points of reference in dealing with the problem. They include: Moby Dick, The Sound and the Fury, The Sun also Rises, The Bluest Eye, etc.
LIT 499 Independent Senior Thesis
Senior Thesis proposals are to be coordinated with the Department Chair.
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MAT 102 Intermediate Algebra
This course reviews basic concepts and attempts to enhance competency in problem solving. Topics include linear equations and inequalities, polynomials, factoring, exponents and radicals, fractional expressions and equations, and quadratic equations.
MAT 103 College Algebra
The first part of this course reviews the basic concepts of algebra, real numbers, first-degree equations and inequalities, rational expressions, exponents and radicals, and polynomials, systems of equations and inequalities. The second part strongly emphasizes
graphs and functions. The most important functions for applications are introduced,
such as linear, quadratic, exponential, logarithmic, and rational functions.
MAT 107 Ideas in Mathematics
This course discusses some of the fundamental and successful ideas and concepts that evolved over the centuries in mathematics and so deeply influenced society. The topics lie in areas as logic, number theory, graphs, topology, combinatorics, and others. Mathematical concepts like abstraction, proofs, modeling, existence, and the role of technology for mathematics will also be discussed. While the treatment will be rather non-formal, thinking and problem-solving skills will be emphasized. An attempt will be done to relate the mathematics presented to the world outside of mathematics by discussing applications of these ideas, the biographies and life circumstances of mathematicians, and influences from society to mathematics.
MAT 109 Introduction to Game Theory
This course is an elementary introduction to Game Theory. It focuses on how to analyze situations and make rational decisions based on the information gathered. We will analyze parlor games, gambling, and real-world situations. As mathematical basis for the analysis, Probability Theory and some Algebra are needed, but will be developed in detail.
(Not open to students who have completed MAT 199)
MAT 199 First Year Seminar
Seminar topics change year to year. Please consult the Schedule of Classes for current seminar offerings.
MAT 200 Calculus
The course begins with a review of functions and their graphs, after which students are introduced to the concepts of differentiation and integration. Understanding is reinforced through extensive practical work, with a strong emphasis on applications in economics, statistics and management science.
MAT 201 Introduction to Statistics
Basic concepts of descriptive statistics, such as random variables, random sampling, histograms, central tendency measures, variance and standard deviation, probability rules, and correlation coefficients, are presented in this course. The most important probability distributions, binomial and normal, are introduced. Inferential statistics and sampling distributions are briefly covered in order to introduce statistical model building and linear regression analysis.
MAT CORE Math Core Requiremnt
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MAT CORE2 Math Core Requirement
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Franklin College offers courses in three modern languages: French, German and Italian. The structure of the courses for the first four semesters is the same in all languages. A minimum of 6 credit hours above the 301 level is required for a minor in any language. Prerequisites can be waived depending on placement test results.
A minimum of 6 credit hours above the 301 level is required for a minor in any language. Prerequisites can be waived depending on placement test results.
FRE 100 Introductory French, Part I
The beginning courses stress the understanding and speaking of the lan- guage. As students progress through elementary conversation, more gram- mar study is introduced, and reading and composition skills are developed.
FRE 101 Introductory French, Part. II
The beginning courses stress the understanding and speaking of the lan- guage. As students progress through elementary conversation, more gram- mar study is introduced, and reading and composition skills are developed.
FRE 199 First Year Seminar
First Year Seminar topics vary from year to year, please see the current course schedule for specific information.
FRE 200 Intermediate French, Part I
For students with one year of language study. The course presents short readings inviting conversation and a review and expansion of written command of basic grammatical structures. Communicative and meaningful use of the language is stressed.
FRE 201 Intermediate French, Part II
For students with one year of language study. The course presents short readings inviting conversation and a review and expansion of written command of basic grammatical structures. Communicative and meaningful use of the language is stressed.
FRE 300 Advanced French, Pt. I
For students who have completed at least two years of college-level language studies or the equivalent. This sequence offers cultural readings from a variety of sources, including some literary pieces, as well as magazine and newspaper articles reflecting the contemporary scene in the countries where the language is spoken. Vocabulary expansion and development of techniques of expression are accomplished through oral and written exercises.
FRE 301 Advanced French, Pt. II
For students who have completed at least two years of college-level language studies or the equivalent. This sequence offers cultural readings from a variety of sources, including some literary pieces, as well as magazine and newspaper articles reflecting the contemporary scene in the countries where the language is spoken. Vocabulary expansion and development of techniques of expression are accomplished through oral and written exercises.
FRE 302 Advanced French Conversation
This course uses techniques of oral expression to develop greater conversational fluency and accuracy. Conversational practice uses outstanding French films as springboards for classroom French-language discussion and instruction in the full range of language proficiencies in an array of different contexts and situations.
FRE 303 French Translation
This course introduces students to translation theory: its basic principles and methods. It is designed to increase knowledge of the French language by means of vocabulary building and the study of idiomatic expressions and grammatical structures. It aims to sharpen awareness of the distinctive characteristics of both the French and English languages and culture by means of practice in the translation of literary and non-literary texts, radio and television programs.
FRE 310 Paris and the Nineteenth Century
This course presents a thorough introduction to the literature and culture of the city, and particularly Paris, in the nineteenth century. This class will focus on the historical and cultural factors that contributed to the rise of the city as well as on the literature that shapes our understanding of this period. Close attention will be paid to issues such as social class, gender, mobility, and space.
FRE 320 Writing the Self: French Autobiography a
In the mid-70s, while the literary critic Philippe Lejeune was trying to de- fine the autobiographical genre, several writers were, through their writing practices, questioning that very same genre, offering new ways to write (about) the self. Since then, the word autobiography has been replaced by autofiction, a genre that has become so popular in France that it has lost the meaning his initiator, Serge Doubrovsky, had theorized shortly after his first autofiction was published. This course explores the evolution of the auto- biographical genre since the mid-70s and tries to answer questions such as how one writes about oneself, what it means to write about oneself, the (im)possibility to write the self through the study of writers such as Georges Perec, Serge Doubrovsky, Annie Ernaux, Camille Laurens.
FRE 330 Contemporary Novel in French
Since the beginning of the 1980s, the French novel has experienced a re- markable renewal. The rejection of the character, the suspicion towards subjectivity, the impossibility to represent reality, the self-reflexive dimension of the 60s and 70s French novel have given way to a literature that is interested anew in the literary character, the story and the representa- tion of reality. Far from being a return to traditional forms, the novel is on the contrary questioning our world to give birth to a literature that is disconcerting, a literature that escapes the cultural ready-to-think. Among the novels published from 1980 up to now, there has appeared a current that reassembles writers such as Amé lie Nothomb, Marie Darrieussecq, Marie Redonnet, Ré gis Jauffret and Gé rard Gavarry among others, who all bring forth the cracks and crevices of postmodern reality and explore its unheimlich.
FRE 350 French Civilization
This course focuses on parts of French history, French geography, French politics and French culture in order to have students understand twentieth- and twenty-first century France.
FRE 362 Gender, Culture, and Society: Francophon
This course examines women's writing from the Francophone world in its colonial and post-colonial theoretical contexts. In particular, we will explore the concept cultural identities as presented in texts by women authors from sub-Saharan Africa and the French-speaking Caribbean. We will consider the intersections and divisions of social class, race, and gender in all of our analyses.
FRE 370 Topics in French Literature
Topics in French literature vary from year to year. Topics studied offer an
overview of selected major works and periods, while also allowing the study of a unifying theme or genre in greater depth. Possible seminar topics include: The Representation of the Shoah in Francophone Novels, The Representation of Masculinity in French Novels Since The 1980's, French Novels and Their
Cinematic Representations, and Travel Literature in the Francophone World.
Note: Titles and authors may vary according to the topic and may require certain prerequisites.
FRE 374 Introduction to French Cinema
This course examines French films from aesthetics, historical, political, sociological, and psychoanalytical points of view. It therefore provides students with analytical tools to enable them to develop their own personal approach when viewing a film and/or writing about a film. It studies movies from an inter-cinematographic perspective, showing how cinematography from different countries echo and respond to one another. It finally explores the seventh art as the art of illusion.
FRE 376 French Cinema: The New Wave
The French New Wave was a major turning-point in the history of French Cinema. It gave birth to a new way of approaching cinematography as a whole. This course centers on New Wave film directors Chabrol, Truffaut, Resnais, Godard and Varda, and examine closely their cinematographic creed, theoretical preoccupations, similarities and differences.
FRE 497 Senior Seminar in French Studies
The Senior Seminar in the French Studies major at Franklin College represents a culmination of the multicultural experience at Franklin College. The seminar will create a forum for the research and presentation of an original senior project in French. This capstone seminar will not only bring together work done in other courses in the French Studies major, but will offer a chance to reflect on and integrate academic travel courses and study abroad into their final product. Possible final projects include a thesis, a performance, a video essay, or a portfolio of creative work. Projects will be designed and completed in consultation with the instructor and the student's major advisor.
FRE SEM ABROAD French Semester Abroad
The French Studies Major advanced study option requirement can be fulfilled by taking 12 credits during a Semester Abroad in the French-speaking world.
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A minimum of 6 credit hours above the 301 level is required for a minor in any language. Prerequisites can be waived depending on placement test results.
GER 100 Introductory German, Pt I
The beginning courses stress the understanding and speaking of the language. As students progress through elementary conversation, more grammar study is introduced and reading and composition skills are developed.
GER 101 Introductory German, Pt II
The beginning courses stress the understanding and speaking of the language. As students progress through elementary conversation, more grammar study is introduced and reading and composition skills are developed.
GER 200 Intermediate German, Pt. I
The sequence completes and expands upon students' command of the structural foundation of the language. Communicative and meaningful use of the lan- guage is stressed through interactive activities using short texts, scripting and videotaping of presentations, etc.
GER 201 Intermediate German, Part II
The sequence completes and expands upon students' command of the structural foundation of the language. Communicative and meaningful use of the language is stressed through interactive activities using short texts, scripting and videotaping of presentations, etc.
GER 300 Advanced German, Pt. I
For students who have completed at least two years of college-level language studies or the equivalent. This course offers cultural readings from a variety of sources, including some literary pieces, as well as magazine and newspaper articles reflecting the contemporary scene in the countries where the language is spoken. Vocabulary expansion and development of techniques of expression are accomplished through oral and written exercises.
GER 301 Advanced German, Part II
For students who have completed at least two years of college-level language studies or the equivalent. This course offers cultural readings from a variety of sources, including some literary pieces, as well as magazine and newspaper articles reflecting the contemporary scene in the countries where the language is spoken. Vocabulary expansion and development of techniques of expression are accomplished through oral and written exercises.
GER 302 Advanced German Conversation
This course uses techniques of oral expression to develop greater conversational fluency and accuracy. Conversational practice is based on topics in the culture and contemporary civilization related to the language.
GER 370 Topics in German Literature
Topics in German literature vary from year to year. These are advanced courses for students with full comprehension of written and spoken German. Topics studied offer an overview of selected major works and periods, while also allowing the study of a unifying theme or genre in greater depth. If this course is available in English translation it may be taken as LIT 236. Note: Course number, title and authors may vary according to the topic.
GER 373 German Film as Medium of Culture
This course examines important issues in the cultural life of Germany through the medium of film, to which the German contribution has been foundational and continuously innovative. Texts are included to provide background, context or a look at parallel literary expression.
GER 374 Strangers in Paradise?: Historical and C
This course will trace the different waves of immigration into Switzerland through the lens of cultural and political texts produced in German (or translated into German) over the last thirty years, both by those who have immigrated to Switzerland and by Swiss natives in reaction to the immigrants' presence. We will begin our examination of the various tensions immigration has engendered with Rolf Lyssy's film Die Schweizermacher, a comedy about the hurdles facing would-be naturalized citizens in the mid-seventies. Next, in a variety of literary, filmic and legal texts, we will look at the situation of Italians, Spaniards,Tamils, Turks, immigrants from Balkan countries, and, most recently, from Iraq. Finally, we will study the contemporary campaigns of the Swiss People's Party (SVP), and the heated debates fueled by their right-wing provocations about who does and does not belong in this "paradise" known as Switzerland.
This course is taught in German.
GER 375 From Bluebeards to Jilted Wives: Myths
This course introduces students to folklore and fairy tales from the German-speaking world and beyond. During the semester, we will be reading folktales ranging from Doktor Faustus to the Grimms' fairy tales and, at the same time, students will be introduced to the main theoretical approaches employed in interpreting the tales, e.g. including Marxist, feminist, psychoanalytic, and structuralist models. In addition, we will delve into the history of folkloric studies and the aesthetic, political, religious, and social values of the particular eras that the tales represent. Although it is not required, it would be helpful if students had a general background in Literary Studies and/or Cultural Studies. Some of the scholars we will read are Freud, Propp, Bettelheim, Gubar, Zipes. The investigation of filmic adaptations of folktales will also be an integral part of the course.
This course will be taught in German; some of the theoretical readings will be in English.
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A minimum of 6 credit hours above the 301 level is required for a minor in any language. Prerequisites can be waived depending on placement test results.
ITA 100 Introductory Italian, Pt. 1
The beginning courses stress the understanding and speaking of the lan- guage. As students progress through elementary conversation, more gram- mar study is introduced and reading and composition skills are developed.
ITA 101 Introductory Italian, Pt II
The beginning courses stress the understanding and speaking of the lan- guage. As students progress through elementary conversation, more gram- mar study is introduced and reading and composition skills are developed.
ITA 200 Intermediate Italian, Pt I
For students with one year of language study. The sequence presents short readings inviting conversation and a review and expansion of written command of basic grammatical structures. Communicative and meaningful use of the language is stressed.
ITA 201 Intermediate Italian, Pt II
For students with one year of language study. The sequence presents short readings inviting conversation and a review and expansion of written command of basic grammatical structures. Communicative and meaningful use of the language is stressed.
ITA 202 Intermediate Italian Conversation
This course is intended for students who have had at least one year or more of Italian and feel they want to put greater emphasis on speaking practice. The course may be taken together with ITA 201 as an elective. It begins with practicing functional conversations such as those required in order to communicate in everyday situations, and leads up to the possibility of addressing responses to more elaborate topics related to the media and current events.
ITA 300 Advanced Italian, Pt. I
For students who have completed at least two years of college-level language studies or the equivalent. This course offers cultural readings from a variety of sources, including some literary pieces, as well as magazine and newspaper articles reflecting the contemporary scene in the countries where the language is spoken. Vocabulary expansion and development of techniques of expression are accomplished through oral and written exercises.
ITA 301 Advanced Italian, Pt. II
For students who have completed at least two years of college-level language studies or the equivalent. This course offers cultural readings from a variety of sources, including some literary pieces, as well as magazine and newspaper articles reflecting the contemporary scene in the countries where the language is spoken. Vocabulary expansion and development of techniques of expression are accomplished through oral and written exercises.
ITA 302 Advanced Italian Conversation
This course uses techniques of oral expression to develop greater conversational fluency and accuracy. Conversational practice is based on topics in the culture and contemporary civilization related to the language.
ITA 350 Italian Civilization
The land and the people of Italy: historical, social and cultural evolution; major developments
and achievements in the arts (literature, music, opera, figurative arts, theater and cinema). Aspects of contemporary Italy are also covered.
ITA 360 Intro to Italian Literature, Part I
This course examines the development of Italian literature through the analysis of major
literary works from the origins to the Age of Enlightenment. After an introduction to the linguistic evolution from Latin to Italian and to the early documents of the Italian
language, the course analyzes the first literary schools: ?La Scuola Siciliana?, and ?Il dolce stil novo?, and continue with the masters of medieval literature: Dante, Petrarca, Boccaccio, and the Renaissance. The course terminates with a discussion of literature during the Counter-Reformation and Goldoni?s theatrical reform.
ITA 361 Intro to Italian Literature, Part II
This course examines the development of Italian literature through the analysis of major literary works from Romanticism to the present. After the study of the general trends of the Romantic movement through works of Foscolo, Manzoni and Leopardi, "Verismo," "Decadentismo," the writings of Verga and D'Annunzio are studied. The "Crepuscolari" poets and the Futurist movement are followed by an introduction to some modern authors: among these Pirandello, Svevo, Montale, Vittorini and Pavese.
ITA 370 Readings in Italian Literature
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ITA 373 Italian Film & Society
Aspects of political, social and cultural history of twentieth century Italy are studied through documentaries and some of the major accomplishments of Italian cinema. Some novels adapted into film are also examined. Most of the films are in Italian (some with English subtitles).
ITA 374 Italian Cinema
The aim of this course is to introduce students to the major accomplishments of Italian cinema from "neorealism" through the "commedia all'italiana" to the present. Emphasis is placed on film as an artistic, aesthetic and theoretical medium for an exploration and interpretation of issues related to contemporary life. Some of Italy's major film directors will be considered, such as Rossellini, De Sica, Visconti, Antonioni, the Taviani brothers, Scola. Particular attention is dedicated to the films of Fellini.
ITA 375 Italian Film Adaptation: From the Page t
The course introduces the student to the development of Italian cinema through close study of the relationship between Italian literature and film adaptation. The selected books and films will offer a unique opportunity to analyze and discuss crucial issues related to the historical, political, and cultural evolution of Italy from its Unification to the present. Among the adaptations we will be looking at will be: Antonio Fogazzaro's Malombra as interpreted by Carmine Gallone (1917) and Mario Soldati (1942), Luchino Visconti's 1963 rendering of Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa's The Leopard, Vittorio De Sica's 1970 adaptation of Giorgio Bassani's The Garden of the Finzi-Contini, Alberto Moravia's The Conformist, as adapted by Bernardo Bertolucci (1970), Giovanni Boccaccio's Decameron, adapted by Pier Paolo Pasolini (1971).
ITA 379 Mad Love: Italian Poetry and the Feminin
Italian poetry, from its origins, posits as its principle inspirational nucleus the discourse of love and the celebration of woman. Woman, however, is generally not present in her concrete reality as a distinct Other, but, rather, becomes immortalized an ideal projection of the male poet's needs and desires. Tracking the transformation of the "feminine phantasm" in Italian poetry, from the Sicilian School to the present, affords us a privileged point of view for better understanding the role of women in contemporary Italian society.The course is conducted in Italian.
ITA 380 Italian for Business
Intended to help students acquire a good knowledge of the language applied in the business world: commercial correspondence, terminology and vocabulary, through exercises and directed composition.
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SPA 200 Intermediate Spanish, Part I
For students with one year of language study. The sequence presents short readings inviting conversation and a review and expansion of written command of basic grammatical structures. Communicative and meaningful use of the language is stressed.
SPA 201 Intermediate Spanish, Part 2
For students with one year of language study. The sequence presents short readings inviting conversation and a review and expansion of written command of basic grammatical structures. Communicative and meaningful use of the language is stressed.
SPA 300 Advanced Spanish, Part I
For students who have completed at least two years of college-level language studies or the equivalent. This course offers cultural readings from a variety of sources, including some literary pieces, as well as magazine and newspaper articles reflecting the contemporary scene in the countries where the language is spoken. Vocabulary expansion and development of techniques of expression are accomplished through oral and written exercises.
SPA 301 Advanced Spanish, Part II
For students who have completed at least two years of college-level language studies or the equivalent. This course offers cultural readings from a variety of sources, including some literary pieces, as well as magazine and newspaper articles reflecting the contemporary scene in the countries where the language is spoken. Vocabulary expansion and development of techniques of expression are accomplished through oral and written exercises.
SPA 302 Advanced Spanish Conversation II
Techniques of oral expression are used in this course to develop greater conversational fluency and accuracy. Conversational practice is based on topics in the culture and contemporary civilization related to the language.
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MUS 179 Music, Words, & Images
Listening to music and being aware of music are not the same thing. The pur- pose of this course is to increase awareness, starting with the actual experience of listening that captivates most students. The awareness of music is enhanced by undergoing an analysis of music in several contexts; the emphasis is on relationships between musical sounds and other artistic and extra-artistic forms of communication. Over the five weeks of instruction the following topics are explored: The Italian Opera of the XIX, Jazz and Afro-American Culture, The Role of Music in Movies and T.V., The Love Song in Rock Music, and Music Between Poetry and the Visual Arts.
MUS 206 From Mozart to Mahler
This course shows the development of modern awareness in European music history, following the affirmation of individualism from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It singles out various levels of the formal innovations that were produced.
MUS 208 Music in Film
This course traces the influences on both Pure and Scenic music from the end of the Nineteenth Century up to the present. It follows the history of film from the sonoral standpoint and the real problem of the development of sound and image synchronization through the Twentieth Century from the silent film days onwards. It underlines the different compositional approaches required of the composer when moving from one medium to another (concert, ballet, opera, stage film and television) both compositionally and technically showing the various kinds of instrumentation from very small to very large used to fit each individual situation. It discusses music from the composers' and musicians' point of view. The course is illustrated with a wide range of recorded and video examples not always available commercially as well as information derived from personal experience as a film composer both in Hollywood and Europe.
MUS 215 History of Jazz
This experimental, introductory course is designed to explore the wide variety of music that can be considered "Jazz" and will place special emphasis on the Blues and on Gospel Music to satisfy the new awareness of the genre developed during 2003, "The Year of the Blues". The course is intended to develop the student's awareness of jazz as the "Sound of Surprise" with reference to the international contemporary scene and of the depth of popular culture expressed in the blues form. Students will be encouraged to listen intensively to CD and video recordings and will be taken to concerts.
MUS 220 (A)Live in Europe : Classical (Lugano/Mi
Students will attend numerous performances in and around Lugano and Milan, including soloist, chamber music, opera, and symphonic presentations. These performances and the classroom lectures and discussions in preparation for them will lay groundwork for understanding and appreciating the European musical tradition.
MUS 225 (A)Live in Europe: Jazz and Blues
Students will be introduced to the history of jazz and blues and to the contemporary European scene through class listening and discussion and by going to clubs in Lugano and Milan such as the Blue Note and attending local jazz festivals. The course is intended to develop the student's awareness of jazz as the "Sound of Surprise" with reference to the international contemporary scene. Students will also be introduced to the art of recording techniques.
MUS 295 Faculty Fellows Summer Program
Faculty Fellows Program courses are offered in the Summer sessions. Specific course offerings vary from year to year.
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PHL 100 Introduction to Philosophy
This course considers central problems of Western philosophy with emphasis on epistemology and metaphysics through analysis of writings by influential philosophers in historical context. After a brief survey of ancient and medieval systems of thought, such as Platonism and scholasticism, attention is focused on modern systems of thought, such as rationalism, empiricism, idealism, pragmatism, existentialism, and logical positivism.
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POL 100 Introduction to Political Science
Basic concepts of the discipline are discussed in this class with a focus on the evolution of the state and the role of the individual from historical, ideological, and comparative perspectives .
POL 101 Introduction to International Relations
This lecture course is designed to equip students with the basic analytic tools necessary for the understanding of international relations. After a brief introductory discussion of the traditionalist and behaviorist approaches to the study of international relations, the course concentrates on the analysis of fundamental concepts, such as national power, foreign policy, deterrence, international organizations, international law, change, and conflict.
POL 102 Introduction to Political Philosophy
A lecture-seminar course designed to familiarize students with the major currents of political thought from Plato to the present. The reading of primary sources provides the basis for in-depth class discussion of the ideas of major political philosophers and how they relate to the historical, political, economic and social developments of their times.
POL 104 Government and Politics of the United St
The structure of the American polity is examined in theory and practice. Its salient characteristics are analyzed from historical, sociological and economic standpoints with a focus on current issues.
POL 150 Mass Communication in Politics & Society
An introduction to mass communication from national and international perspectives, this course focuses on the history, evolution, and contemporary aspects of mass communication in North America and Europe. Particular stress is placed upon the political and social influence of mass media in modern societies and international systems.
POL 199 First Year Seminar
Seminar topics change year to year. Please consult the Schedule of Classes for current seminar offerings.
POL 202 Governments and Politics of Western Euro
A lecture-discussion course organized around a comparative analysis of the political systems of several European states and how they have developed historically. The objective is not only to achieve a more profound understanding of contemporary politics in these countries, but also to gain insight into the fundamental problems common to most modern societies and diverse attempts to come to terms with them. Emphasis is placed on Germany, France and Italy.
POL 203 Governments and Politics of Eastern Euro
A lecture-discussion course surveying political and economic developments in Eastern European countries since the end of World War II. Particular attention is given to economic and social changes and to the development of internal political struggles and how these are related to the international environment. This provides the perspective for understanding the radical changes of 1989-90 and moves towards joining the European Union and NATO.
POL 204 Government and Politics of Latin America
This survey course will introduce students to the historical, cultural, social, and economic dimensions that have characterized the founding, development, and contemporary evolution of the political systems of Latin America. Special attention will be directed toward a comparative approach to the politics of Mexico, Brazil, and Argentina.
POL 253 United States Foreign Policy
This course will describe and analyze the political, strategic and economic dimensions of American foreign policy. Special focus will be directed toward the issues that have confronted American decision makers since 1939. Examples and case studies drawn from American relations with the USSR, Europe, the Far East, the Middle East and Latin America will be studied in detail. The global implications of American influence and hegemony in the international system will be analyzed from the standpoint of trends and developments since the end of the Cold War and the attack on the Twin Towers.
POL 274 Nuclear Non-Proliferation
Preventing the spread of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction (WMD) is an overriding objective of US national security policy and the policies of many other nations. Within the international system various cooperative measures, such as the Nonproliferation Treaty, the Nuclear Suppliers Group and UN Security Council actions reflect this goal. Multilateral cooperation has produced some significant successes. At the same time, a handful of nations have pursued WMD capabilities for geostrategic and political reasons while subnational or terrorist organizations also have expressed interest in and have in some cases attempted to acquire WMD capabilities. This course will explore ways in which nations have cooperated on nonproliferation issues. It also will explore the policies and at times conflicting domestic bureaucratic perspectives of the United States Government which has been particularly active in promoting nonproliferation policies. This course will contrast these efforts with the workings of extensive illicit networks that traffic in WMD expertise and technology on behalf of both rogue nations and terrorist groups. Case studies will be used to illustrate both the successes and failures of the international system to control WMD and students will be challenged to reach conclusions about ways to strengthen existing forms of nonproliferation cooperation.
POL 276 International Environmental Politics
It has become increasingly apparent in recent years that environmental problems have been proliferating and nation-states are not able to cope with them individually. International cooperation is essential to finding and applying solutions. This course will first examine the nature and the sources of the main environmental problems affecting the lives of nations, such as climate change and its effects, including the ozone layer and the greenhouse effect, acid rain, desertification, pollution, disposal of radioactive and chemical waste material, etc. Students will look at the environmental problems connected to trade globalization and the question of sustainable development and will study how states have tried to deal with these problems and the role of international organizations such as the UN and the EU and non-governmental organizations such as Greenpeace, etc. The effectiveness of international treaties such as the Kyoto Protocol and the problems in their application will also be examined.
POL 277 International Political Economy
The interplay between political and economic issues has become central to the study of international relations in the modern world. This course will examine the traditional theoretical foundations of International Political Economy (the views of the liberals, the Marxists, the nationalists, etc.) and their applicability to today's world. Using an inter-disciplinary approach, the course will look at both historical background and present-day issues and conditions. The problems of development and North-South relations and the question of sustainability will be examined. International trade issues, such as the relations between trade globalization and environmental and human rights concerns and the role of institutions such as, the WTO, the IMF and G8 meetings will be studied. Finally the course will also consider new problem areas such as the internet and its control and e-commerce and the emerging role of non-governmental organizations.
POL 278 International Energy Politics
Energy resources play a fundamental role in economic processes, growth and development. Energy crises in the recent past have demonstrated very clearly that no government can afford to ignore energy issues. For that matter, guaranteeing access to energy resources at reasonable costs is of such importance today that it has also become a strategic concern directly linked to national security. This course will examine the supply, the availability, the distribution and the use of energy resources internationally and the policies that states adopt to try to assure that their needs will be met. Students will also study alternative energy sources beyond the traditional reliance on hydrocarbon fuels and how states and international organizations try to develop and promote their use. The close relations of energy policies to environmental questions and the role of non-governmental organizations in these questions will also be considered. Finally, the role of international organizations such as the OPEC, the International Energy Agency and the International Atomic Energy Agency will also be analyzed.
POL 279 Politics and Film
Films are a popular medium for the transmission of political messages. But what makes a film "political" and how do movies enrich or distort our view of the political world? These topics and related film case studies such as security issues in the Middle East since 1945 are explored in this course.
POL 281 Sustainable Development in Africa: Pol
(4 credits to include 1 credit for academic travel).
This interdisciplinary course explores the politics and practice of sustainable development in Botswana, Malawi and Zambia (destination countries may change). Through a series of on-site explorations in the host countries, problem-based exercises, service learning and presentations by local university professors, public policy makers (to include NGOs) and experts in sustainable development, students will learn about the political, social, economic, environmental and cultural relationships that encompass the important field of sustainable development. Students will come to better understand how each country approaches sustainable development and natural resource management through participation in on-site expeditions and visits. Student research projects will include team-based case studies in the areas of sustainable agriculture, renewable energy, water and natural resource management, and sustainable housing in light of global environmental issues such as deforestation, water resource and human habitat degradation, threats to biodiversity, and conventional models of development. This three week course summer is conducted entirely in Africa.
Please note: The field portion of the course will include traveling in overland vehicles with experienced guides. Accommodations will be in either backpacker lodges (dormitory style beds) or in safari tents at campgrounds with hot showers and toilets.
POL 290 Govt and Politics of the Middle East
This course examines the political processes that shape conflict and consensus in Middle Eastern societies. From this perspective, main regional conflicts are analyzed. The confrontation between (1)Iran and the Arab World and (2)Israel and the region at large are surveyed in light of intra-Arab antagonisms and the historical great power rivalry for hegemony in the area. Special focus is directed toward an understanding of the politics of modernization and the clash between tradition and modernity.
POL 305 Dynamics of European Integration
A lecture-seminar course devoted to an in-depth study of the process and problems of European integration and the development of the European Union's relations with the rest of the world. The focus is the historical growth of European integration, the problems of specific policy areas of the Communities, enlargement and the development of the relations with Russia, the Middle East, and the developing states. The effects of the Maastricht Treaty are analyzed and the challenges of enlargement are assessed.
POL 310 International Law
This lecture-seminar course introduces students to the main elements of international law. The historical origins of the system, the sources of the law, the importance of territory, jurisdiction, recognition, treaties, claims and nationality, are studied both in theory and in applications. The examination of cases is emphasized.
POL 315 War and Contemporary Politics
The relationship among strategy, defense, and the dynamics of the nation-state is examined in light of international political developments since 1939 and the consequences of armed conflict for the configuration of power in the international system.
POL 321 International Organization
The focus of this course is the development of supra-national and international agencies and entities. The United Nations, the European Union, the IMF, the World Bank, trading blocs, and other specialized agencies are studied as examples-in light of increasing economic interdependence in the international system.
POL 400 Comparative Politics
The development of the modern nation-state is analyzed from a variety of theoretical viewpoints. The approach and methods of major social theorists are examined in detail.
POL 401 Theories of International Relations
This course concentrates on the major approaches, models and theories in the study of international relations. Micro and macro theories, deductive and inductive methods are explored from historical, political and economic perspectives. The relations between the major powers in the twentieth century are examined for their relevance in the study of international politics.
POL 407 Contemporary Russia
Since the end of World War II Russia has passed through and endured a series of seismic changes. Once the heart of the expansive Soviet empire, the Russian Republic that emerged in the 1990s after the breakup of the Soviet Union was beset by economic collapse, social decay and a new era of political corruption under Boris Yeltsin. Since 2000 and the rise to power of Vladimir Putin, the Russia of the 21st century is endeavoring to restore its influence in world affairs while using its vast natural resources to revitalize its sputtering economy. This course will examine the different phases through which Russia has passed since World War II, surveying the salient political, social and economic events that have shaped Russian domestic life as well as Russia?s changing relationship with other nations and regions, including the US, China and the Middle East.
POL 499 Political Science Thesis
Senior Thesis proposals are to be coordinated through the Department Chair.
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PSY 100 Introduction to Psychology
This introductory course is designed to provide an overview of the field of psychology, including theoretical positions, major research areas and methods of gathering data. Subtopics of psychology, such as physiological processes, developmental, abnormal behavior and social psychology are discussed.
PSY 101 Theories of Personality
The course addresses itself to a comprehensive in-depth study of the following question: What is personality? The major theories of personality which are prominent and important today in the field of psychology are considered individually in detail, chronologically and comparatively. These include the classical psycho-analytical theory of Freud, Jungian theory, existential/phenomenological theories, cognitive theories and behavior psychology.
PSY 201 Social Psychology
Introduction to major theories and research findings of social psychology in order to provide an understanding of the roles of cognitive and motivational processes in social behavior. The focus of this course is on how people's behavior, feelings and thoughts are influenced through social environment.
PSY 202 Developmental Psychology
This course surveys the major areas of developmental psychology - the science of individual human development. The overall aim is to introduce students to the fundamental questions, ideas and approaches in the psychology of development. The course emphasizes an understanding of the methods, terms, theories and findings in the field, traces human development across the entire lifespan, and explores the basic developmental theories including the biological influences on development, behavior and learning. To complete the study of human development, the course presents a multi-cultural perspective, examining the diversity of human adaptations to change across the lifespan, by cultures around the world.
PSY 301 Abnormal Psychology
A study of the major patterns of abnormal behavior and their description, diagnosis, interpretation, treatment, and prevention.
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SCI 100 Introduction to Biology: Cells and Organ
An introduction to the biological sciences. Topics include the scientific method, cell structure and function, photosynthesis, respiration, and plant and animal physiology (particular emphasis given to human physiology). Course includes occasional afternoon laboratory sessions.
SCI 101 Introduction to Biology: Genetics, Evolu
An introduction to the biological sciences. Topics include the principles of genetics, evolutionary theory, ecology, and conservation biology. Course includes occasional afternoon laboratory sessions.
SCI 108 Intro to Environmental Science
This course introduces students to the study of the environment and the interactions of humans with the environment. Topics include the functioning of the atmosphere, biosphere,
hydrosphere, and lithosphere. It also examines how human population growth, production, and consumption affect the environment. It ends with a discussion on environmental
justice issues. Includes laboratory sessions.
SCI 110 Introduction to Physical Geography
This course examines the various systems of the physical Earth, including the atmosphere, climatic regimes, landforms, soils, waters and life forms. This course includes several required field trips to local points of interest.
SCI 120 Chemistry and the Environment
This course introduces students to the science of chemistry through the context of environmental issues such as global climate change, ozone depletion, air pollution, water quality and alternative energy. Chemical concepts covered include stoichiometry, the mole concept, the behavior of gases, liquids and solids, acids and bases, thermochemistry, electronic structure of atoms, chemical bonding, and some basic organic chemistry. This course will include occasional lab sessions.
SCI 199 First Year Seminar
Seminar topics change year to year. Please consult the Schedule of Classes for current seminar offerings.
SCI 220 Perspectives on Freshwater Conservation
This course explores the issues involved with the conservation of freshwa- ter ecosystems. It includes an examination of the distinctive ecology of lake and river systems, the human use of these systems, existing conservation policy at the national level in different countries, and possibilities for restoration of degraded systems. This course includes several required field trips to regional lakes and rivers.
SCI 281 Physical Geography (Lugano/Malawi/Zambia
This course covers the fundamental concepts of earth systems, to include the Big Bang theory and the technologies and methods related to the analysis of geographic data. Modern mapping technologies, patterns of climate change, and the biogeography of tropical grasslands and savannahs are also included in the course. Field studies in Malawi and Zambia include local ecosystem analysis and the impact of human settlements from the paleogeographic period to the present. Lectures at the University of Malawi are also scheduled.
SCI 297 Faculty Fellows Summer Program
Faculty Fellows Program courses are offered in the Summer sessions. Specific course offerings vary from year to year.
SCI 301 Conservation Biology
This course considers the principles of biological diversity and the application of science to its conservation. It examines the historical roots of the current biodiversity crisis and modern conservation, as well as conservation concepts at the genetic, species, population, community, and landscape level. It discusses the impact of habitat fragmentation, approaches to re- serve design and restoration, and the importance of the landscape matrix. Lastly, it examines conservation case studies from around the globe. Required laboratory sessions.
SCI 310 Ecology
This course examines the interactions of organisms with their environment and each other, the dynamics of populations, the structure and functions of ecosystems, the role of biogeochemical cycles, and biodiversity. Required laboratory sessions.
(MAT 201 and SCI 100 strongly recommended)
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SEM 000 On-Campus Seminar
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SEM 227 The LIfe and Times of Winston Churchill
This seminar will examine the career of Winston Churchill within the context of the history of Britain and Europe in the twentieth century with emphasis on topics such as the welfare state, the First World War, Communism, the depression, Nazism, the Second World War, and the Cold War. Further, emphasis will be placed on the relationship between biography and the study of history. Throughout, speeches of Churchill will be primary sources.
SEM 233 US-Europe Relations: State of the Atlant
Having reviewed the historical background of US ? European relations, the Seminar will juxtapose the common transatlantic interests and the evolving national priorities of main Atlantic partners since the end of the Cold War. It will identify the conflict and cooperation interfaces between the United States and key European states, both within and outside the North Atlantic Area. Taking into account the evolving US ? Russia and US ? China relationships, the seminar will seek to outline scenarios for the evolution of the Atlantic Partnership over the next few years. Participants will role-play the decision-makers of key states involved and draft policy papers that will be graded as basis for course-credit.
SEM 234 The rise of BRICs (Brazil, Russia, India
The seminar will address the emergence of Brazil, Russia, India and China (the BRICs) into the center of the global political economy, highlighting the political, diplomatic and social implications of the ongoing structural change. It will discuss the capacity of the BRICs to influence global dynamics as a function of their ability to establish and maintain growth-supportive institutions and to conduct effective foreign relations with the west.
SEM 235 Modernity, Risk and Relationships: Looki
This course will examine issues and concerns in defining the self and managing intimate relationships in a modern social context through theoretical readings and the use of visual and content analyses to study cultural representations of these issues and concerns in honeymoon advertising and in personals ads. The first week will involve a discussion of theoretical readings in the context of analyzing a contemporary film on relationships (Living Out Loud) and a presentation on the instructor's recent research on honeymoons in North America. Students will also be given instruction on the use of visual and content analysis methodologies and will begin gathering sources of data on honeymoons and personals ads in Euorpean societies for analysis in the second week. The second week will involve a presentation on the instructor's recent research on personals ads and student work on the analysis of cultural data they have collected. Students will write a short paper based on their readings and research and present their results during the final class session.
SEM 236 Philosophical Issues and Thinkers
This course introduces key issues in metaphysics, epistemology and ethics, and invites students to engage with them and discuss them. Each session involves some work on the history of philosophy, the presentation of key concepts and conflicts, and class discussion. Students are also required to read short extracts of key philosophical source texts.
SEM 237 An Introduction to Ethics
This seminar begins with a discussion of the status of moral discourse and different approaches to ethical questions. General ethical theories and problems are discussed in the first week, while the second week is devoted to applied ethics with discussions of such topics as the sanctity of life, business ethics and bioethics.
SEM 370 Cosmopolitanism: from Humanist Ideal to
Thinkers in disciplines as diverse as philosophy, education, sociology, political science and anthropology as well as applied or interdisciplinary disciplines such as tourism and cultural studies or marketing and consumer studies have in recent years utilized the quite contested concept of cosmopolitanism to try to answer questions such as: What outlooks, values, responsibilities and social realities exist beyond national borders? As we learn to recognize the ways in which local and national belongings and identities become hybrid, multiple and "liquid," how can we understand new, emerging social categories and ways of understanding ourselves and others? In this Honors Seminar, we will trace cosmopolitan theory from its Greek roots in the West through to the contemporary debate over and analytical use of this contested concept, including the most recent attention to non-Western cosmopolitan roots and discourses. Students will be asked to take a critical approach as we read and discuss writing by the Stoics, Immanuel Kant, Kwame Anthony Appiah, David Held, Martha Nussbaum, Ulrich Beck, Jörgen Habermas, Richard Rorty, Craig Calhoun, Ulf Hannerz, Jacques Derrida, Zygmunt Baumann, Chris Rojek, John Urry and many others. Along the way, we will also meet many cosmopolitans, both as portrayed in works of literature, philosophy and travel narratives as well as through field work and interviews. We will explore the debate over cosmopolitanism as a positive humanist ideal or, conversely, an empty and potentially even dangerous neo-colonizing concept. We will also consider attempts at analyzing "really existent" cosmopolitanization as a grounded social category. Along the way, we discover that there are many different cosmopolitans, cosmopolitanisms and forms of cosmopolitanization.
SEM 371 Weimar Germany: Crisis or Crucible of M
The period in Germany history between 1918 and 1933, commonly referred to as ?Weimar Germany?, can be seen in many contradictory ways: as an era sandwiched between two authoritarian regimes as well as as the country?s first strong republic; this democracy kept struggling constantly with severe and sometimes violent attacks from the political extremes (and sometimes even its neighbors), and yet displayed remarkable endurance. As such, the Weimar Republic is a powerful example for the possibilities and limits of modern democracy, and for the interplay between politics and culture in the modern world. Starting with a discussion of different concepts of modernities, this interdisciplinary seminar will provide a detailed examination of the political, cultural, social and economical developments of the 1920s and early 1930s, and analyze their representation in the arts, in the contemporary media, and in architecture. (Prerequisite membership in the Honors program or permission of the professor)
SEM 37X Honors Seminar
Seminar topics change year to year. Recent topics include "Globalization Unbound" (Spring 2007) and "Cultural Anthropology" (Spring 2008).
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SOC 100 Introduction to Sociology
This course introduces students to the tools, methods and concepts used by social scientists to examine the human condition. The broad issues to be addressed are the basic questions of social science: i.e. What is "society"? What does its structure look like and how does it work? How does it change? Why does it change? How does the individual influence society and how does society, influence the individual? In attempting to answer these questions the course examines the concepts of culture, personality, socialization, stratification, social institutions and social change.
SOC 199 First Year Seminar
First Year Seminar topics vary from year to year. Please see the current course schedule for specific information.
SOC 210 Family in Society
This course will examine variations in marriage and family systems around the world and across major class and race/ethnic groups found in the United States and Western Europe. It will also examine interactional dynamics within western family systems with respect to partnering and relationship formation, marital dynamics, parenting and parent-child relationships, family dynamics in later life, and families in crisis (violence and divorce). This introductory course will take a scientific approach to sociology as a discipline through a discussion of important methodological principles in sociology and a review of empirical studies of the family.
SOC 296 Faculty Fellows Summer Program
Faculty Fellows Program courses are offered in the Summer sessions. Specific course offerings vary from year to year.
SOC 297 Faculty Fellows Summer Program
Faculty Fellows Program courses are offered in the Summer sessions. Specific course offerings vary from year to year.
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