ENROLL

Yaron Klein

Yaron Klein

The concept of adab as the liberal arts education of the premodern Arab world presents itself most vividly in the adab anthology. Authors writing in this genre collected and classified the knowledge of their time, drawing on material from a large variety of disciplines: literature (poetic, proverbial, historical-anecdotal), Religion (Quran, prophetic tradition, jurisprudence, theology), linguistics, as well as philosophy and the sciences. This encyclopedic genre represented the ideal of a broad-based erudition, and the perception that education should be entertaining as it is edifying. In this class we will read excerpts from the works of some of the major premodern anthology writers: Ibn Abd Rabbihi, Abu l-Faraj al-Isfahani, al-Ibshihi and al-Nuwayri.

Prerequisite: Arabic 206 or equivalent

Ross Elfline

This course will survey the art and architecture of African peoples from prehistory to the present. Focusing on significant case studies in various mediums (including sculpture, painting, architecture, masquerades and body arts), this course will consider the social, cultural, aesthetic and political contexts in which artistic practices developed both on the African continent and beyond. Major themes will include the use of art for status production, the use of aesthetic objects in social rituals and how the history of African and African diaspora art has been written and institutionally framed.

Mike Flynn

This course is an introduction to several aspects of Japanese society, taking advantage of the location of the Linguistics OCS seminar in Kyoto. It consists of readings and lectures about important events in historical and contemporary Japan, and will include visits to sites that illuminate those events in important ways. In addition to Kyoto and nearby places, there will be excursions to Tokyo and Hiroshima. 

Participation in Carleton OCS Linguistics in Japan Program

Jay Beck

This course is designed as a critical study of global filmmakers and the issues surrounding cinema and its circulation in the twenty-first century. The class will emphasize the close reading of films to study different cultural discourses, cinematic styles, genres, and reception. It will look at national, transnational, and diasporic-exilic cinema to consider how films express both cultural forms and contexts. Aesthetic, social, political, and industrial issues also will be examined each week to provide different approaches for cinematic analysis.

Extra Time Required, evening screenings

David Tompkins

Have you just returned from Asia, Africa, Europe, or South America? This course is an excellent way to keep in touch with the culture (and, when appropriate, the language) you left behind. Relying on magazines and newspapers around the world, students will discuss common topics and themes representing a wide array of regions. You may choose to read the press in the local language, or read English-language media about your region, meeting once each week for conversational exchange. (Language of conversation is English.)

Prerequisite: Students must have participated in an off-campus study program (Carleton or non-Carleton) or instructor permission

Scott Carpenter

Travelers write. Whether it be in the form of postcards, text messages, blogs, or articles, writing serves to anchor memory and process difference, making foreign experience understandable to us and accessible to others. While examining key examples of the genre, you will draw on your experiences off-campus for your own work. Student essays will be critiqued in a workshop setting, and all work will be revised before final submission. Some experimentation with blended media is also encouraged.

Prerequisite: Students must have participated in an off-campus study program (Carleton or non-Carleton) or instructor permission

Lei Yang

Behind the skyscrapers and the modern technology of present-day China stand the ancient Chinese philosophers, whose influence penetrates every aspect of society. This course introduces the teachings of various foundational thinkers: Confucius, Mencius, Laozi, Sunzi, Zhuangzi, and Hanfeizi, who flourished from the fifth-second centuries B.C. Topics include kinship, friendship, self-improvement, freedom, the art of war, and the relationship between human beings and nature. Aiming to bring Chinese wisdom to the context of daily life, this course opens up new possibilities to better understand the self and the world. No knowledge of Chinese is required.

In translation

Lin Deng

This course selects a range of popular comics as reading materials, including stories based on traditional novels and fantasies, science fiction, children’s literature, and non-fiction. Students will gain important cultural and historical knowledge about China, expand vocabulary on a variety of cultural and societal topics, and most importantly, develop proficiency in producing descriptions and third-person narratives both orally and in writing.

Prerequisite: Chinese 206

Jake Morton

Greek religion played a crucial role in how the ancient Greeks understood the world around them. Mythology and cosmology shaped their understanding of how the world worked, while the ritual of sacrifice formed the basis of the social fabric underpinning all aspects of Greek society. In this course we will learn about Greece's polytheistic belief system--its gods and religious rites--as well as examining how religion shaped the daily lives of ordinary Greeks, often in surprising ways. We will read the works of ancient authors such as Homer and Hesiod, study the archaeological remains of sacred sites, inscriptions, and curse tablets, as well as engage with experimental archaeology.

Ethan Struby

Prerequisite: Economics 110

Pierre Hecker, Andrew Carlson

This interdisciplinary course, taught in conjunction with a full-scale Carleton Players production, will explore one of Shakespeare’s most celebrated and performed works, Much Ado About Nothing. We will investigate the play’s historical, social, and theatrical contexts as we try to understand not only the world that produced the play, but the world that came out of it. How should what we learn of the past inform a modern production? How can performance offer interpretive arguments about the play’s meanings? Mixing embodied and experiential learning, individual and group projects may include a combination of research, assistant directing, choreography, music direction, dramaturgy, design, exhibition curation, and work in Special Collections.

Arnab Chakladar

Tsegaye Nega

Prerequisite: Biology 125 and 126

Paul Petzschmann

"Ideology" is perhaps one of the most-used (and overused) terms of modern political life. This course will introduce students to important political ideologies and traditions of modern Europe and their role in the development of political systems and institutional practices from the mid-nineteenth century to the present. We will read central texts by conservatives, liberals, socialists, anarchists and nationalists while also considering ideological outliers such as Fascism and Green Political Thought. In addition the course will introduce students to the different ways in which ideas can be studied systematically and the methodologies available.

William North, Victoria Morse

Through a range of interdisciplinary readings, guest lectures, and site visits, this course will provide students with opportunities to analyze important aspects of Italian culture and society, both past and present, as well as to examine the ways in which travelers, tourists, temporary visitors, and immigrants have experienced and coped with their Italian worlds. Topics may include transportation, cuisine, rituals and rhythms of Italian life, urbanism, religious diversity, immigration, tourism, historic preservation, and language. Class discussions and projects will offer students opportunities to reflect on their own encounters with contemporary Italian culture.

Prerequisite: Participation in OCS Rome Program

OCS Rome Program

Eva Posfay

This course seeks to deepen students' knowledge of contemporary French culture through a pluridisciplinary approach, using multimedia (books, newspaper and magazine articles, videos, etc.) to generate discussion. It will also promote the practice of both oral and written French through exercises, debates, and oral presentations.

Prerequisite: French 204 or equivalent

Requires participation in OCS Program: French and Francophone Studies in Paris

Cathy Yandell

Keep up your French while learning about current issues in France, as well as world issues from a French perspective. Class meets once a week for an hour. Requirements include reading specific sections of leading French newspapers, (Le Monde, Libération, etc.) on the internet, and then meeting once a week to exchange ideas over coffee with a small group of students.

Prerequisite: French 204 or instructor approval

Sophomore Priority

Waitlist for Juniors and Seniors: FREN 210.WL0 (Synonym 64772)

Cherif Keita

Reading and discussion of literary works, with analysis of social, historical and political issues, with an emphasis on cultural and literary movements such as Négritude (El Negrismo, in Cuba) and their role in shaping ideas of self-determination, Nationalism and Independence in the French colonies of the Caribbean and Black Africa. We will read works by Aimé Césaire (Martinique), Léopold Sédar Senghor (Senegal), Léon Gontran Damas (French Guiana), Jacques Roumain (Haîti), Laye Camara (Guinea), Mongo Béti (Cameroun), Simone Schwartz-Bart (Guadeloupe) and Alain Mabanckou (Congo). Conducted in French.

Prerequisite: French 204 or the equivalent

Eva Posfay

Home of some of the finest and best known museums in the world, Paris has long been recognized as a center for artistic activity. Students will have the opportunity to study art from various periods on site, including Impressionism, Expressionism, and Surrealism. In-class lectures and discussions will be complemented by guided visits to the unparalleled collections of the Louvre, the Musée d'Orsay, the Centre Pompidou, local art galleries, and other appropriate destinations. Special attention will be paid to the program theme.

Prerequisite: French 204 or the equivalent and Participation in OCS Paris Program

Requires participation in OCS Program: French and Francophone Studies in Paris

Eva Posfay

Through literature, cultural texts, and experiential learning in the city, this course will explore the development of both the "Frenchness" and the hybridity that constitute contemporary Paris. Immigrant cultures, notably North African, will also be highlighted. Plays, music, and visits to cultural sites will complement the readings.

Prerequisite: French 204 or the equivalent and participation in OCS Paris program

Requires participation in OCS Program: French and Francophone Studies in Paris

Scott Carpenter

The rise of newspapers and magazines in the nineteenth century promotes a variety of short genres that will remain popular to the present day: short stories, prose poetry, vignettes, theatrical scenes. In this short course (first five weeks of the term) we'll study short works by such authors as Diderot, Sand, Balzac, Mérimée, Flaubert, Allais, Tardieu, Le Clézio. Conducted in French.

Prerequisite: One French course beyond French 204 or instructor permission

1st 5 weeks

Scott Carpenter

Decried as scandalous, heralded as the first "modern" novel, Gustave Flaubert's Madame Bovary (published in 1857) sparked debate, spawned both detractors and followers, and became a permanent fixture in French culture and even the French language. In this five-week course we will read the novel, study its cultural context and impact, and see how it has been variously re-interpreted in film and other media. Conducted in French.

Prerequisite: One French course beyond French 204 or instructor permission

2nd 5 weeks

Eva Posfay

Through literature, cultural texts, and experiential learning in the city, this course will explore the development of both the "Frenchness" and the hybridity that constitute contemporary Paris. Immigrant cultures, notably North African, will also be highlighted. Plays, music, and visits to cultural sites will complement the readings.

Prerequisite: French 230 or beyond and participation in OCS Paris program

Requires participation in OCS Program: French and Francophone Studies in Paris

Juliane Schicker

In this course, we survey significant developments in German-language culture, broadly defined, from the Enlightenment to the twentieth century. Students of all disciplines and majors are invited to receive an overview of the music and culture of Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, starting in the 1750s and tracing its impact into the present time. The course includes literature, film, music, language, history, habits, news, etc., and surveys major figures, movements, and their influence on the world’s civilization. The course encourages critical engagement with the material at hand and provides the opportunity to compare it with the students’ own cultural background. Taught in English.

In Translation

Kiley Kost

"...many will say: even 1920 is not so horrible. This is how it is: the human being is a machine, culture is in shreds, education is arrogance, spirit is brutality, stupidity is the norm, and the military is sovereign" (Adolf Behne, reporting on a Dada art exhibit). In this class, taught in German, students examine cultural products and visual media of and about the Weimar Republic to understand a critical time in German history and explore how art has been used to cope with societal turbulence. Offered at both the 200 and 300 levels; coursework will be adjusted accordingly.

Prerequisite: German 204 or equivalent

Offered at both the 200 and 300 levels, coursework will be adjusted accordingly.

Kiley Kost

"...many will say: even 1920 is not so horrible. This is how it is: the human being is a machine, culture is in shreds, education is arrogance, spirit is brutality, stupidity is the norm, and the military is sovereign" (Adolf Behne, reporting on a Dada art exhibit). In this class, taught in German, students examine cultural products and visual media of and about the Weimar Republic to understand a critical time in German history and explore how art has been used to cope with societal turbulence. Offered at both the 200 and 300 levels; coursework will be adjusted accordingly.

Prerequisite: German 204 or equivalent

Offered at both the 200 and 300 level, coursework will be adjusted accordingly

Jordan R Rogers

While ostensibly a dialogue about how to manage one’s household (oikos), Xenophon’s Oeconomicus provides valuable insights into the ideology of land-ownership in classical Greece. In this class, we will read significant portions of Xenophon’s Oeconomicus in Greek as well as other texts, in English and Greek, that explore household economics. Throughout, we will consider what Xenophon’s text reveals about perceptions of gender roles within the home, notions of citizenship, the role of education, and the institution of slavery in the ancient world. Students will also work together to produce a student commentary of the text.

Prerequisite: Greek 204 or equivalent

Meera Sehgal

In this course we will examine whether there are feminist and/or queer ways of knowing, the criteria by which knowledge is classified as feminist and the various methods used by feminist and queer scholars to produce this knowledge. Some questions that will occupy us are: How do we know what we know? Who does research? Does it matter who the researcher is? How does the social location (race, class, gender, sexuality) of the researcher affect research? Who is the research for? What is the relationship between knowledge, power and social justice? While answering these questions, we will consider how different feminist and queer studies researchers have dealt with them.

Amna Khalid

Celebrated as the bedrock of democracy, freedom of expression is often seen as an American or western value. Yet the concept has a rich and global history. In this course we will track the long and turbulent history of freedom of expression from ancient Athens and medieval Islamic societies to the Enlightenment and the drive for censorship in totalitarian and colonial societies. Among the questions we will consider are: How have the parameters of free expression changed and developed over time? What is the relationship between free speech and political protest? How has free speech itself been weaponized? How does an understanding of the history of free speech help us think about the challenges of combating hatred and misinformation in today’s internet age?

Applies to multiple history fields, consult the instructor

Seungjoo Yoon

Poetry has been playing an important role in politics from early China down to the present. Members of the educated elite have used this form of artistic expression to create political allegories in times of war and diplomacy. Students will learn the multiple roles that poet-censors played in early imperial China, with thematic attention given to issues of self and ethnic/gendered identity, internal exile and nostalgia, and competing religious orientations that eventually fostered the rise of Neo-Confucianism. Students will write a short biography of a poet by sampling her/his poems and poetics (all in translation) from the common reading pool.

Seungjoo Yoon

This course tackles an evolving meaning of democracy and sovereignty in postwar Japan shaped by the transformative power of its social movements. We will place the anti-nuclear movement and anti-base struggles of the 1950s, the protest movements against revision of the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty of the 1960s, and environmentalist movements against the U.S. Cold War projects in Asia to see how they intersect with the worldwide “New Left” movements of the 1960s. Topics include student activism, labor unionism, Marxist movements, and gangsterism (yakuza). Students will engage with political art, photographs, manga, films, reportage, memoirs, autobiographies, interview records, novels, and detective stories.

Pedro F Quijada

Latin American popular music is traditionally studied through the lens of anthropology and ethnomusicology as a folkloric expression. This course, however, explores the social dynamics and historical meaning of the music. Through the analysis of popular musical pieces, related scholarship and course projects, we will learn about the historical background, the socio-political and cultural contexts and meaning of different musical expressions, relevant composers, performers and musical instruments of the region. We will also learn about the presence and legacy of Latin American music in the United States.

William North

Through site visits, on-site projects, and readings, this course explores the ways in which individuals and communities attempted to give physical and visual form to their religious beliefs and political ambitions through their use of materials, iconography, topography, and architecture. We will also examine how the material legacies of imperial Rome, Byzantium, and early Christianity served as both resources for and constraints on the political, cultural, and religious evolution of the Italian peninsula and especially Rome and its environs from late antiquity through the twelfth century. Among the principal themes will be the development of the cult of saints, the development of the papal power and authority, Christianization, reform, pilgrimage, and monasticism.

Prerequisite: Acceptance to Carleton Rome Program

OCS Rome Program

Victoria Morse

This course will explore the lived experience of the city of Rome in the twelfth-sixteenth centuries. Students will study buildings, urban forms, surviving artifacts, and textual and other visual evidence to understand how politics, power, and religion (both Christianity and Judaism) mapped onto city spaces. How did urban challenges and opportunities shape daily life? How did the memory of the past influence the present? How did the rural world affect the city and vice versa? Students will work on projects closely tied to the urban fabric.

Prerequisite: Enrollment in OCS program

OCS Rome Program

Amna Khalid

Brendan LaRocque

This course will examine the history of religious beliefs, practices, and community, European imperialist and Orientalist ideologies, and the socio-political implications of anti-colonial nationalist movements in India. We will address questions including: How did the European powers justify their imperial undertaking through specific concepts of race, religion, science and technology?  How did the imperial experience impact Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism, and caste, race, and gender in India?  In the post-colonial period we will examine the powerful growth of low-caste and anti-caste social movements and political parties, as well as religious nationalist, pluralist, and secular mass-movements.

David Tompkins

This course will grapple with the difficult and complicated phenomenon of the genocide of the Jews of Europe. We will explore anti-Semitism in its historical context, both in the German-speaking lands as well as in Europe as a whole. The experience of Jews in Nazi Germany will be an area of focus, but this class will look at European Jews more broadly, both before and during the Second World War. The question of responsibility and guilt will be applied to Germans as well as to other European societies, and an exploration of victims will extend to other affected groups.

Mike Flynn

Prerequisite: 100-level Linguistics course

Participation in Carleton OCS Linguistics in Japan Program

Mike Flynn

Prerequisite: 100-level Linguistics course

Participation in Carleton OCS Linguistics in Japan Program

Gao Hong

The ensemble will use indigenous instruments and a Chinese approach to musical training in order to learn and perform music from China. In addition to the Wednesday meeting time, there will be one sectional rehearsal each week.

Prerequisite: Previous experience in a music ensemble, Chinese Musical instruments or instructor permission

Participants will learn basic playing techniques, drum patterns, and polyrhythmic structures by playing in djembe-centered percussion ensembles based on repertoire from Mali. The teaching and learning style will be primarily oral/aural and "by doing". Course objectives include an informal public performance toward the end of the semester. A highlight will be rehearsing and a brief but intense joint performance with a group of professional guest artists from Mali, who will share their concert stage with us for a piece.

Prerequisite: Prior experience in drumming/percussion is helpful but not required. A division into subgroups (e.g., beginners and advanced) is possible according to need.

Class meets 6-7pm Mondays and/or 5:30-6:30 pm Wednesday (meeting times depends upon the student's musical background), no previous musical experience is required however.

Daniel Groll

How should we live? This is the fundamental question for the study of ethics. This course looks at classic and contemporary answers to the fundamental question from Socrates to Kant to modern day thinkers. Along the way, we consider slightly (but only slightly) more tractable questions such as: What reason is there to be moral? Is there such a thing as moral knowledge (and if so, how do we get it)? What are the fundamental principles of right and wrong (if there are any at all)? Is morality objective?

Hope Sample

Philosophical problems are motivated by human concerns that are often shared across cultures. In this course, we will analyze how philosophers from different traditions have approached problems concerning the structure of reality, the nature of knowledge and experience, and how we ought to live. We will identify how their cultural context impacts their resolution of metaphysical, epistemic, and ethical problems. Moreover, beyond comparing and contrasting, we will consider how philosophers from different philosophical traditions could have learned from or inspired one another if they had engaged with one another. By engaging in this cross-cultural and critical investigation, we will gain a broader view of how philosophy has been used to make sense of the world and its limitations and prospects.

Huan Gao

Sophomore Priority

Waitlist for Juniors and Seniors: POSC 120.WL0 (Synonym 65119)

Greg Marfleet

Extra time: Departmental Simulation Evening May 19th and Daytime May 20th

Huan Gao

2nd 5 weeks Description: How will Russia's invasion of Ukraine end? Will new conflicts break out across the Taiwan Strait? How will a backsliding Turkey and a highly volatile Syria evolve in response to the devastating Kahramanmaras earthquake? This course provides a forum to discuss and analyze such important current global affairs through reading and debating news headlines. We will follow major news stories chosen by students, analyze reporting from multiple sources and perspectives, and conduct individual research. The goal of this course is to encourage students to think deliberately about current events, and to practice the research and analytical skills needed to gain a deeper understanding of global affairs. Students will also leverage course readings and discussions to produce their own editorial articles or detailed research proposal for future inquiries at the end of the course.

Jon R Olson, Ross L Wilson, Thomas R Hanson

This course covers the science and art of statecraft, which is the application of the tools of national power. Students will study how nations use diplomatic, economic, and military power to achieve stated national policy objectives. The course is team-taught by three career national security professionals. Case studies are used to assess the application of diplomatic, economic, and military power in the real world. Course readings, papers, and significant classroom discussion will deliver content to students and set the stage for the International Strategic Crisis Negotiation Exercise, which is a graded part of the course.

Extra time: Departmental Simulation Evening May 19th and Daytime May 20th

Juan Diego Prieto

This course examines the intersections between political and economic power: how markets are embedded in social and political institutions and how they in turn shape political life and institutions. It begins with a survey of classic and contemporary theoretical frameworks, followed by an overview of the history of contemporary market economies and the search for “development,” both in the global north as well as the south. It then analyzes the contemporary varieties of capitalism across the globe, with a focus on their varying responses to challenges like globalization, economic crises, technological transformations, and climate change.

Dev Gupta

At first glance, Eurovision, the decades-long, continent-wide singing contest, is nothing more than a mindless pop culture event. Dismissed as a celebration of (at best) mediocre music, Eurovision seems like it would be the last place to learn about serious politics. In this class, however, we will explore Eurovision as a place where art is deeply political and often engages in debates about gender and sexuality, race, the legacies of colonialism, war and revolution, nationalism, and democracy—not just within the context of the competition itself but how these discussions spill over into broader social and political dynamics.

1st 5 weeks

Paul Petzschmann

Why is the world divided territorially? Why are some states considered more powerful than others? What can be done about violent conflict? This course will introduce students with critical approaches to world politics that ask these and other big questions. Marxist, feminist, post-structuralist and post-colonial scholars have challenged classical approaches of thinking about the international in terms of states and power. They have also questioned the dominance of western conceptions of politics in the way political scientists view the world. In this course will read and debate their contributions and apply them to real cases. 

Extra time: Departmental Simulation Evening May 19th and Daytime May 20th

Alfred Montero

Democracy is in trouble worldwide. The most visible indicators are the rise of explicitly anti-democratic leaders and anti-liberal parties that employ populism and exploit ethnic and ideological polarization to acquire power. Democratic norms and institutions have eroded across the globe. Structures that undergirded the positive-sum linkage between industrialization, the rise of labor unions, and democratic parties in much of the West have been transformed in ways that undermine democracy. This course will analyze these and related trends that demonstrate that liberal democracy is suffering a global crisis. Instruction will cover cases across time and from all regions of the world.

Dev Gupta

Mihaela Czobor-Lupp

Is nationalism fundamentally flawed in its inclusionary capacity? Can the same power of imagination to bring strangers together, which made nation-building possible, be deployed for inventing post-national forms of solidarity? The course will explore representations of strangers and foreigners in Central and Eastern Europe, throughout the nineteenth and twentieth century, with a special focus on Roma and Jews. The aim will be to understand how these representations will work to legitimize different forms of exclusionary politics. An important part of the course will explore the role that exiled and displaced people can play in reimagining identities on a cosmopolitan level.

Participation in Carleton OCS Central & Eastern Europe

Mihaela Czobor-Lupp

The state and its cultural politics played a pivotal role in building the Romanian nation. The first part of the course will analyze the difficulties of nation-building in modern Romania, with a special emphasis on the incapacity of Romanian liberalism to prevent the rise of extreme right wing politics. The second part will explore different images of Romanian national identity that art provided both during the communist regime and in the post-1989 decades, also in a comparative perspective with Hungary, Bulgaria, and Serbia. The course will include visits to galleries, architectural sites and neighborhoods in Bucharest and its surroundings.

Participation in Carleton OCS Central & Eastern Europe

Mihaela Czobor-Lupp

How do democracies react when confronted with massive bodies of immigrants? Do the problems that Eastern and Central European countries face in dealing with immigrants reflect deeper challenges to their capacity of thinking of the nation along inclusionary lines? We will explore the legal and political issues that EU countries and their societies, particularly, in Eastern and Central Europe, face when confronted with a migration crisis. Then we will look at Roma’s history of exploitation and injustice in Eastern and Central Europe. The course will include visits with community groups and NGOs, as well as encounters with minority rights activists.

Participation in Carleton OCS Central & Eastern Europe

Tun Myint

Extra Time required.

Kristin Bloomer

Hinduism is the world's third-largest religion (or, as some prefer, “way of life”), with about 1.2 billion followers. It is also one of its oldest, with roots dating back at least 3500 years. “Hinduism,” however, is a loosely defined, even contested term, designating the wide variety of beliefs and practices of the majority of the people of South Asia. This survey course introduces students to this great variety, including social structures (such as the caste system), rituals and scriptures, mythologies and epics, philosophies, life practices, politics, poetry, sex, gender, Bollywood, and—lest we forget—some 330 million gods and goddesses.

Sonja Anderson

Why do bad things happen to good people? Why do bad things happen, period? Could angels and demons have something to do with it? This course asks how cosmology—an account of how the universe is put together and the different entities that inhabit it—can be an answer to the problem of evil and injustice. We will start with a historical investigation of the demonology and angelology of ancient pagan, Jewish, and Christian texts and then move into modern practices such as exorcism and magical realist literature. Along the way, we will keep asking how these systems justify the existence of evil and provide programs for dealing with it.

Victoria Thorstensson

In this course we will the address the problem of Russophonia and the changing role of the Russian language in the post-Soviet world. Through discussions of theoretical readings, literary texts and cultural artefacts, we will explore spaces for creative dialogues among writers and artists in the post-Soviet states and the Russophone diasporas. Topics will include the post-colonial search for identity in contemporary art; linguistic, gender and cultural hybridity in prose and poetry; imperial legacies, trauma and (post)memory in historical and auto-fiction; and connections between creative communities and ecological and political activism. Taught in English.

Prerequisite: Participation in OCS program in Qazaqstan

Requires Participation in OCS program in Qazaqstan

Laura Goering

Fyodor Dostoevsky’s last novel, The Brothers Karamazov, is many things: a riveting murder mystery, a probing philosophical treatise, one of the best known novels in world literature, and a complex book worth reading and discussing with serious readers of diverse backgrounds. We will familiarize ourselves with the historical and philosophical context in which it was written, while grappling with the fundamental questions it raises: What does it mean to act morally? Why do humans so often act against their own best interest? How do we reconcile a world of chaos and suffering with the notion of a benevolent god? Conducted in English.

Prerequisite: No prerequisites and no knowledge of Russian literature or history required.

1st 5 weeks, in translation

Laura Goering

Against the backdrop of the Napoleonic Wars, Lev Tolstoy challenges readers to confront some of the most confounding questions of human existence: How can we reconcile the notion of free will with the seemingly ineluctable forces of history? Is individual moral action possible in war? How can we live a meaningful life in the face of inevitable death? And what might lie after death? In this course we read War and Peace in its cultural and historical context, while also considering how it continues to be relevant to our lives today. Conducted in English.

Prerequisite: No prerequisites and no knowledge of Russian literature or history required.

2nd 5 weeks, in translation

Constanza Ocampo-Raeder

Anthropology is the study of all human beings in all their diversity, an exploration of what it means to be human throughout the globe. This course helps us to see ourselves, and others, from a new perspective. By examining specific analytic concepts—such as culture—and research methods—such as participant observation—we learn how anthropologists seek to understand, document, and explain the stunning variety of human cultures and ways of organizing society. This course encourages you to consider how looking behind cultural assumptions helps anthropologists solve real world dilemmas.

Sophomore Priority

Waitlist for Juniors and Seniors: SOAN 110.WL0 (Synonym 67044)

Elizabeth H Trudeau

Most of us “go to work” at some point in our lives. Whether it's a summer job, a side hustle or a life-long career, people invest a lot of our time and energy into planning to be, preparing for, and operating as members of the “workforce.” Work shapes all aspects of people’s lives from their ability to provide for basic needs to their personal and social identities. In industrialized societies work is often characterized by membership in complex formalized organizations. However recent history and sociological theory raise a lot of questions about how work and organized labor may be changing. How do we define success? Who makes the most money and why? Have recent events like the pandemic changed the way we approach work? This course will cover classic and contemporary research into social organizations and the shifting landscape of work in post-industrial society. Topics will include the rise of complex for profit and nonprofit organizations, inequality in the workplace, sex work and illicit labor, and recent trends in the labor force. 

Colin McLaughlin-Alcock

Through processes like colonialism, oil extraction, and the war on terror, the Middle East forms an important pivot, shaping global political and economic structures. This course will examine how the Middle East has developed in dynamic interaction with the wider globe. Yet, we will resist the urge to treat the Middle East merely as an object of Western intervention. Rather, we will explore how the West and wider globe are also shaped by this interaction. In particular, we will examine how ideas about modernity, secularism, and liberalism—key elements of contemporary Western identity—are shaped through dynamic interconnection with Middle East.

Colin McLaughlin-Alcock

Gentrification, a process of neighborhood-level class displacement, whereby devalued urban areas are redeveloped into trendy hubs, is one of the predominant modes of urban change in the twenty-first century. In this class, we will first develop a general understanding of how gentrification works. Then we will direct ethnographic attention to explore how gentrification takes place in specific contexts around the globe. We will examine how social boundaries, power relationships, and identities are reorganized through gentrification; how class and racial disparity are produced and enforced; how the social meaning of place impacts neighborhood change; and how communities have resisted gentrification.

Prerequisite: The department strongly recommends that Sociology/Anthropology 110 or 111 be taken prior to enrolling in courses numbered 200 or above

Constanza Ocampo-Raeder

The core of anthropological thought has been organized around the assumption that the production of complex cultural systems is reserved to the domain of the human experience. While scholars have contested this assumption for years, there is an emerging body of scholarship that proposes expanding our understandings of culture, and the ability to produce meaning in the world, to include non-human beings (e.g. plants, wildlife, micro-organisms, mountains). This course explores ethnographic works in this field and contextualizes insights within contemporary conversations pertaining to our relationship with nature, public health, and social justice movements that emerge within decolonized frameworks.

Prerequisite: The department strongly recommends that Sociology/Anthropology 110 or 111 be taken prior to enrolling in courses numbered 200 or above

Jorge Brioso

Prerequisite: Spanish 204 or equivalent

Silvia Lopez

An excellent opportunity to brush up your Spanish while learning about current issues in Spain and Latin America. The class meets only once a week for an hour. Class requirements include reading specific sections of Spain's leading newspaper, El País, everyday on the internet (El País), and then meeting once a week to exchange ideas over coffee with a small group of students like yourself.

Prerequisite: Spanish 204 or equivalent

Humberto Huergo

This course serves as a bridge between beginning (Spanish 204-208) and advanced courses (Spanish 220-300) in the Department of Spanish. It is designed to help students improve their written and oral skills while reading some of the best graphic novels about the Spanish Civil war published in recent years, including: Vida y muerte de Federico García Lorca, Soldados de Salamina, Tres heridas de Miguel Hernández, El arte de volar, La muerte de Guernica, and others. This course is ideal for students who have recently completed Spanish 204 and are ready to tackle an introductory history and literature course in Spanish.

Prerequisite: Spanish 204 or equivalent

Hector Melo Ruiz

This course will introduce the student to several production systems and aesthetic traditions in Latin American cinema, from silent cinema to current Netflix productions, allowing students to engage cinematic debates by situating them in their national, regional and global cultural contexts. Be prepared to be immersed in the moving image and its cultural significance through the viewing of many films and critical work on them. Recommended as a foundation course for further study.

Prerequisite: Spanish 204 or the equivalent

Jorge Brioso

Prerequisite: Spanish 205 or above