This course provides an examination of intellectual and creative productions, developments, and events that have come to be recognized as the discipline of African American Studies. The course explores literature, history, popular culture (music, television, magazines, newspapers, movies, film documentaries), and politics as a way to identify the historical and political origins and objectives of Black Studies and the 1960s Black Liberation struggles, the early academic and social concerns of Black Studies advocates, the theoretical and critical approaches to Black Studies as a discipline, and the early objectives of Black Studies in relation to present goals of multiculturalism.
This course aims to provide a panoramic view of the operations of race and culture in the literature of a racially ethnic community of the Americas, from early oral traditions through the first written and published works. Captivity narratives, autobiographies, poems, prose, and different genres of resistance writing, allow students to examine anew, colonial, emancipatory, anti-colonial, and pivotal modern socio-political and aesthetic movements and eras. Cultivating an informed sense of the complexity of issues of race and culture in the creation of Ethnic Literature, and the geographical itineraries and impact of such cultural production processes, national and global senses, are major objectives of this course.
This course provides historical understandings alongside the analysis and discussion of contemporary Black popular culture with a focus on its artistic value. Pop culture is authentic, as opposed to commercial culture. African American culture was formed under the reign of white supremacy. A very under-observed component to African American cultural expressions is the artisan work needed to create and perform them. The freedom often denied to African Americans to move and express themselves, meant that they were especially creative in forming their culture, which produced what is often appropriated by the oppressor, but what African Americans will always see as their everyday culture and life. From food, language, dance, and music, to hair care and styles, fashion and non-verbal communication, these cultural aspects make up a culture that has created some of the most artistic aspects of today's global popular culture. This course focuses on appreciating the art of Black pop culture, by understanding how and why African American culture was created, and when and where it appears. Artistic traditions include: African American Language, Soul Food, Dance, Music, Sports, Digital Presence, Television, and Film. Major course resources include popular culture items, academic commentary, and commentary from pop culture creators.
Environmental justice can only occur with rich and complex understandings of the intersections of culture, ecology, politics, history, and community. This course seeks to understand the persistence of environmental racism in an inclusive and historicized landscape, one that considers multiple forms of knowledge and expertise and embodies the idea that imagining a more equitable, sustainable future is not possible without a grounded notion of the past and its present articulations. The course will use transdisciplinary perspectives to trace economic and environmental processes over time, situate them within rich cultural bodies of knowledge, and consider the differential impacts of inequalities on a range of regions and peoples. Students will undertake place-based case studies, examinations of broad patterns, commodity- and resource-specific process tracing, and engage with the surrounding human and natural environment. Consequently, this course demands a full critical engagement across disciplines and landscapes, and with each other and the local community.
This course is designed to be both an introduction and a deep dive into the interconnectedness of African Americans and Capitalism within the United States. Capitalist ideologies are continually at the foundation of the captivity (oppression) of African Americans. Emphasis is on the ways in which African Americans have financed the capitalist gains in this country, and the ways that capitalism in the U.S. has harmed African Americans. The necessities of life--healthcare, education, job and food security--are more accessible to some than all, and one's status within the U.S. economy is a major determinant. This inequity becomes very apparent during national emergencies. This course focuses on the economic intricacies within U.S. systems, using a social impacts approach to engage with the inequity of the U.S. economy. Major areas of economic oppression potentially to be covered include: The Slave Trade & U.S. Slavery, Mass Incarceration (free labor), Education (Student Loan Debt), Sports and Music (Black culture/White Ownership), Housing policies (Redlining/Blockbusting), Medical Industry (Health Advancements/Black Bodies), Drug Industry (Marijuana), Lottery (The Numbers), and Pandemics and Natural Disasters (Hurricane Katrina & COVID-19).
This course is an integrative course in the humanities that explores various constructions of black female identity. The course looks at black womanhood as it's represented in the public imaginary, feminist theories, critical race theories, and in literature and literary criticism written by black women writers. One of the questions the course asks is: How have scholars and writers addressed fundamental questions of black female identity? To answer this question, students read and view a wide survey of materials including novels, essays, memoir, and film. Through this investigation, students consider how studies of race, feminism, and gender connect to personal lives.
This special topics course is dedicated to an international Black population with the additional course component of a faculty-led study abroad after the semester concludes. It provides students the opportunity to connect the literature-based course curriculum, along with additional content on historical, environmental, political, health, and gender related materials, with a guided experience within the African Diaspora. West African novels provide the primary curriculum of this course, covering various time periods and experiences. The course content also incorporates supplemental materials to guide in course discussions. Materials provide students with a general understanding of the past and current contexts of West Africa. Students gain a new perspective into the African American experience by reading and experiencing the culture and history of Africa. AFAM 310 provides students with alternative narratives of African experiences. It provides students tools to engage with persons from non-western societies in a productive, respectful, and culturally aware manner that will guide them in collaborating cross culturally.
This course is designed to be an introduction to major racial and ethnic groups which comprise the population of the United States. Emphasis will be according to the history and culture of racial/ethnic peoples in America as well as the role of race and nationality in the pursuit and achievement of the "American Dream." Also highlighted will be an exploration of the linkage between social power and the concepts of race and ethnicity in the United States and how this linkage affects personal identity formation and worldview assumptions. Discussion of the formation of myths and stereotypes and contemporary issues will be highlighted.
Police, Race, and Society examines the role of law enforcement within American society, emphasizing history, theoretical tools of analyses, public perceptions, administration, organizational culture, ethics, and police deviance. This course uses historical and contemporary documents related to policing, alongside media, academic texts, and experiential narratives, to analyze the systems of policing and its impact on communities with emphasis on Black Americans. Students engage with social justice initiatives from the Black Panthers to Black Lives Matter to unpack the impact of community resistance on law enforcement from its policies to its everyday policing approaches. Law enforcement is only one component of the U.S. criminal justice system, thus this course must simultaneously interrogate laws, judicial processes, incarceration (jail, prison, detention centers), and life after incarceration (economic impacts, voting rights, societal perceptions) to provide a holistic understanding of policing.
The purpose of this course is to enhance students' understanding of diversity issues as they relate to the study of communication. The course looks at how the media, its images and discourses, shape one's understanding of experiences, shape the experiences of women, and the experiences of people of color. The course also explores the ways in which elements of the media socially reproduce prejudice and foster resistance to prejudice. As a result of engagement in the course, students gain the ability to critically analyze and evaluate media products. They also become aware of critical professional issues in relation to a diversified workforce as it relates to the production, distribution, and consumption of media products.
Cross-listed as AFAM/COMM 370.
Special Topics in Race & Ethnicity provide students with content related to racial and ethnic groups not primarily covered in African American Studies (AFAM) courses, while using the foundations of the discipline to interrogate the experiences, knowledge, impact, and engagement of different peoples with the plight and knowledge of Black people. The course topic is determined by the instructor. Courses under this theme provide an in-depth examination of particular racial or ethnic groups alongside unique transdisciplinary theoretical approaches to interrogating their experiences. As a breadth course in AFAM Studies, topics show a distinct relationship to African American studies; allow application of methods and theories from AFAM Studies; and expands lenses and extends contexts for understanding on topics instructive to African American experiences. Through these courses, students gain a critical appreciation for the range and relevance of the conceptual frameworks of African American Studies as a discipline as they engage with additional racial identities, their histories, and current impacts of their oppression, resistance, collective voice, and strategies of critique and transformation.
This course is the primary methods course for the major. The course provides students with a thorough grounding in the interdisciplinary literatures and research approaches within African American Studies. In this course students are taught to understand and investigate historical and contemporary phenomena through thoughtful reflection on their positionality and community experiences. Assignments give students practice in integrating the three main facets of the field of African American Studies, scholarship, education, and advocacy that are expected of them as upper-division participants in the African American Studies tradition. AFAM 398 is intended to be taken in the junior or senior year with the purpose of writing a proposal for the AFAM 402 Research Capstone. Students minoring in AFAM or majoring in other disciplines looking for research approaches centering marginalized communities are also welcome.
This is the African American Studies Program course in public scholarship. It provides students the opportunity to connect their coursework with the Race and Pedagogy Institute. One of the tenets of African American studies is the production of scholarship and public programs that effects change and impacts lives especially for communities historically underserved by official state and national institutions (i.e., public scholarship; some prefer the term civic engagement). The Race and Pedagogy Institute articulates these tenets in its various initiatives. The African American Studies program builds on the synergy evolving between the Institute's various activities including its Community Partners Forum, and debates and events in the larger community to provide students with unique opportunities for dynamic engagement with social and cultural challenges. This course provides students with the necessary educational scaffolding for the production of public scholarship and then offers them the opportunity to contribute their work as part of ongoing critical efforts to confront and transform historical disparities in power, and privilege between different communities especially among local, regional, and national communities.
The 1619 Project is a signal development in the social, political, and intellectual life of the United States. This New York Times Magazine special project, a brainchild of The New York Times staff writer Nikole Hannah-Jones has sparked widespread conversations, reconsiderations, and controversies concerning the national narrative about the founding and development of the United States of America. This course addresses The 1619 Project, its subjects, and impact and as such is a study of racial inequalities, racism, and antiracism. Students in the course will explore the range of issues addressed by The 1619 Project through an examination of select artifacts from the broad range of materials that make up this dynamic and expanding project. These issues include slavery, racism, electoral politics and democracy, capitalism and economics, and popular culture, including music, literature, and photography. As an African American Studies course, AFAM 400 employs a critical interrogative approach that considers the contexts and counterarguments essential to a full understanding of The 1619 Project, its reception, and its impact. The course therefore incorporates an examination of the critics and counter-programs challenging The 1619 Project.
In this course students employ the range of methods and understandings gained through AFAM 101 and further studies in the major to complete an independent research project/paper.
Advanced seminars are intended for African American Studies majors and minors with junior or senior standing and are designed to facilitate in-depth examination of a specific topic on a focused experience of Black people in the Americas and/or in diasporas beyond. Course topics and emphases for advanced seminars are determined by the instructor. Such courses provide students with content that necessitates a substantive level of comprehension of African American Studies' (AFAM's) methods and theories and the ability to apply knowledge gained in AFAM Studies to critical analysis and interrogation of the seminars' topics. Through advanced seminars, students strengthen their AFAM Studies lenses in such a way that enables them to understand, in more depth, the roles race, power, privilege, and oppression have in knowledge production, and societal interactions and conditions. Additionally, students as AFAM majors or minors, expand the knowledge and interpretive capacities to grow into informed and active participants in the broader society. Please consult the department website for information on current and upcoming topics.
This required core course in Accounting is split into two parts. Part I covers the essential topics in Financial Accounting and Part II covers the essential topics in Managerial Accounting.
In Financial Accounting, students examine the accounting principles and methods (GAAP) used in the preparation of the four principal financial statements, understand how transactions affect a firm's financial statements, and analyze and interpret financial statements.
In Managerial Accounting, students examine how a manager uses accounting information within his or her organization. In this part of the course, students explore how a firm determines the cost per unit of the products and services it sells; how it formulates and decides strategy based on accounting numbers; and how it plans, controls, and evaluates its operations.
This course provides students with a basic understanding of the global environment in which organizations operate. The course also aims to equip students with the research and analytical tools needed to scan and assess the global environment. The growing interconnectedness of countries, organizations and individuals present organizations with innumerable opportunities and challenges; and thus, it has become essential for students in business and other fields to have a basic understanding of the global environment and its impact on organizational activities. The course is guided by two themes: First, the course focuses on the differences and similarities of operating in developed versus developing or emerging economies. This requires an understanding of the context of countries from multiple perspectives (i.e., geographic, historical, political, economic, and sociocultural). Second, the course approaches issues from the perspective of a socially and environmentally responsible organization, challenging established views of the roles businesses play in the economic and social development of countries, and grounding the course on a multiple stakeholder perspective. The course is relevant to students interested in both for-profit and not-for-profit organizations, as its focus is on exploring the complexity and multidimensionality of the global environment to improve decision
making.
This course is a primer in sound personal financial management. Students are introduced to the financial challenges that occur over a life-time: cash budgeting, credit management, debt management, personal income taxes, evaluating mortgages and installment loans, investing in the financial markets, and planning for retirement. In addition, current articles related to personal finance topics are analyzed and discussed. May not be used to satisfy a requirement in the Business major or minor.
A broad introduction to the field of management including such topics as planning, motivation, group dynamics, decision-making, organizing, and group organizational change. The course challenges students to adapt management techniques to a diverse global environment. The course includes case studies and emphasizes critical thinking.
This is a survey course designed to provide an overview of main concepts and theories in the field of marketing. The course introduces students to marketing concepts that are fundamental to the decision-making processes of marketing management. Students have ample opportunities to apply these concepts to problem situations and projects.
This accounting course examines the creation and use of information to support the execution of strategy and evaluation of performance within organizations. Managerial accounting information plays a vital role in the planning and control functions. It is also used to motivate and direct behavior. Topics include cost concepts, systems design, cost behavior, cost-volume-profit analysis, variable costing, profit planning, and strategic performance measurement and evaluation. The course also examines the concept of shared value and sustainability reporting.
This course introduces students to fundamental issues in both corporate financial management and investment management. Students learn one of the most fundamental principles in corporate and personal finance: the time value of money. Students are introduced to the basic features of stocks and bonds and how they are priced. Students work with information reported in the financial press on such items as bonds, equity, interest rates, and foreign exchange rates. They learn how to identify the relevant cash flows for a proposed investment, evaluate that investment, and use financial information to estimate the required rate of return. Students examine the relationship between risk and return and the implication of diversification.
Corporations are undeniably influential actors in modern society, through the creation of goods, services, and jobs. They also have tremendous resources at their disposal. Many factors influence how and in what manner those resources are used, including the internal decision-making processes of the organization, fiduciary duties of the organization's principals, the statutory and regulatory environment, and stakeholder interests and influences. To the extent that corporations step outside of their ostensibly traditional role to merely maximize shareholder returns, and they dedicate at least a portion of their resources to the betterment of issues of societal concern, they are engaging in some form of corporate social responsibility (CSR). This course examines questions about CSR: What is it? Who or what may practice it? What are the factors that create tensions concerning the allocation of business resources? What does our law require of organizations with respect to fiduciary duties, the allocation of their resources, and societal expectations? Should organizations have legal obligations to engage in CSR? Students will examine these questions from a legal perspective.
This course examines legal and public policy issues arising in the fashion industry. These issues include intellectual property concerns (e.g., counterfeit, piracy), various other statutory and regulatory concerns, freedom of expression and its limits, and its negative externalities (e.g., environmental, human rights). We focus on legal categories most germane to these broad perspectives, including intellectual property law, employment law, environmental law, contracts, and constitutional law. This is a discussion-based course, requiring active student participation. Prior coursework in law or legal studies is recommended.
The course expands students' knowledge and understanding of financial reporting and analysis by examining key questions of economic significance within the context of real companies and their reported financial information. The course includes analysis of U.S. companies that follow U.S. GAAP and global companies that use International Financial Reporting Standards. The underlying objective of financial analysis is to measure and compare risk and return characteristics of alternative investments when making investment and credit decisions.
This course introduces students to the external constraints that society places on business activity and behavior. The most obvious are those constraints imposed by law in its various forms: case law from courts, statutory law from legislatures, and regulations from government agencies. However, in addition to these formal systems there are the informal, but extremely powerful constraints imposed by generally accepted moral beliefs and norms of ethical behavior. In this course students explore the relationship between legal and ethical standards to critically analyze and evaluate the behavior of business owners, managers, and employees.
As corporations grow in size and influence, their impact on both social wellbeing and the natural environment has increased. Understanding interactions between corporations and the social and natural environments plays a large and growing role in effective management. This course provides an overview of the opportunities and challenges that established US businesses face regarding sustainable business. Students investigate corporations' ethical, regulatory, and financial interests in relation to the social and environmental values of the communities in which they operate. Students are expected to master key concepts related to sustainable business and to develop the ability to think critically about sustainable topics.
To create a successful triple bottom-line organization (people, planet, profits), human resource management (HRM) practices that support this focus must be implemented. This course explores both traditional and transactional, as well as transformational HRM practices that address organizational talent management systems (work/job design, recruiting and staffing, training and development, performance management and appraisal, rewards and recognition, and employee health and well-being), leadership (development and alignment), HRM strategy, and organizational culture and work systems (organizational development, communications, innovation and engagement, knowledge management, and HR planning).
The base of the pyramid (BOP) refers to the billions of people living on very low incomes ($2-4 per day). Currently, various approaches exist as to how best to align business activity with the needs and potential of this segment of the global population. Those at the BOP can be seen as a large untapped market of demanding consumers, as creative entrepreneurs, as business partners, and as innovators. This course examines the various BOP perspectives to need satisfaction, poverty alleviation, and economic growth through business activity. The focus is on emerging business models that address individual and social needs in an innovative, profitable, sustainable, and socially-responsible manner. This course integrates concepts of development economics, international business, and strategy. Cross-listed as BUS/IPE 361.
This course develops understandings of the dynamics and consequences of power differentials, inequalities, and divisions among cultural groups through the lens of criminal and civil law in US state and federal law. In both criminal and civil contexts, students examine the feasibility of legal pluralism in three types of cases: intra-cultural, inter-cultural, and no-longer accepted cultural practices in an intra-cultural event. In the criminal context, students consider criminalization of culturally appropriate acts of non-mainstream cultural communities, the "cultural defense," and the role of law as an instrument of tolerance or tyranny. In the civil context, students examine taboo language, reappropriation or reclaiming of words, and law. Students examine law as a cultural artifact, including who it favors and who it silences or punishes, in tandem with its production of knowledge related to "right and wrong." This course promotes critical engagement with the nature of law, the role of the state and its police powers to regulate disputes between diverse groups, and institutionalized power. This is a seminar-based course, requiring active student participation. Students learn to discuss cultural differences in the legal context and consider their own cultural perspectives vis-a-vis "the law." Satisfies the Knowledge, Identity and Power graduation requirement.
This course introduces students to the most important theories that guide the field of international business strategy, and to key concepts and models related to the formulation and implementation of global strategy. The course provides students with analytical and planning tools for adapting a company's business model to global markets, specifically assessing opportunities and risks in the global environment, identifying current and potential positioning spaces within a competitive environment, and developing strategies that suit different organizational, sectorial, and geographical contexts. The course also explores the interplay between organizational stakeholders, including trade-offs between financial and market goals and the ethical and social values of organizations (i.e., balancing economic and non-economic objectives). Finally, global strategic management requires moving beyond analysis into the realm of strategic action. The course addresses the various combinations of systems (e.g., information, control, reward), organization structures, and people necessary to execute a strategy that is internally cohesive.
Arts organizations and artists face many challenges that could benefit from an entrepreneurial mindset. Entrepreneurial thinking requires focusing primarily on finding the right questions rather than finding the right answers. In this course, students develop an entrepreneurial mindset by focusing on an issue in a local arts organization, identifying the concepts that help them understand the issue, de-constructing and re-constructing their knowledge, and creating a feasibility study that tests their potential solution against reality. Students work to develop solutions that local organizations and artists are truly interested in implementing: The classroom learning directly benefits the arts. Topics covered in this course include entrepreneurship, the entrepreneurial mindset, questioning, interviewing and analysis, research, feasibility studies, and presenting findings. These topics are covered through readings, interaction with community arts organizations and artists, class activities and discussion, and students' hard work.
This course provides students with an introduction to the art and science of the leadership process. It is not limited to business leadership. Topics include organizational culture and climate, motivation, performance, power, tactics, ethics and values, personality traits, and intelligence. Students develop skills necessary to effectively analyze historical, contemporary, and even fictional leadership case studies. A primary aim is to help prepare students to meet the challenges of "life's leadership situations."
Marketing research is the common currency in modern business practices as business and marketing decisions rely on research to make informed choices. This course helps students: explore the critical role of marketing research in business; learn the language of marketing research; learn how to design and implement a research plan using key marketing research techniques (e.g., surveys, experiments, focus groups); analyze and interpret marketing research data; and report the results of marketing research. Students develop skills in research design, data collection, statistical data analysis, and communication of results through hands-on experience.
This course is concerned with understanding the psychology of consumer behaviors by focusing on the factors that affect the consumers' pre-purchase, purchase, and post-purchase processes. An in-depth analysis of the components of the consumer decision making process is presented in order to illustrate and integrate theoretical and empirical knowledge from a variety of perspectives. Emphasis is placed upon the evaluation of the relevance of such data and the application of what is learned in the classroom to the solution of real world marketing problems.
This course is designed to introduce students to the field of integrated marketing communications (IMC), which includes communication tools such as advertising, promotion, sales, and public relations, among others. The development of an IMC strategy requires an understanding of the overall marketing process, consumer behavior, and communications theory.
This course is designed to provide a broad range of tools and frameworks to understand how marketers can interact with sustainability issues. Students explore sustainability issues in today's marketplace and learn about marketing skills that meet sustainable market opportunities. In addition, students gain the knowledge and skills to develop a successful marketing strategy and branding approach for sustainable products, services, and companies.
This course introduces students to major sectors of the financial markets, focusing on the money market, the primary market, the capital markets for debt, and the secondary markets for equity. The qualitative aspects of these markets are stressed, including their legal and economic frameworks.
This course is designed to introduce students to quantitative techniques for managing investment assets. These techniques are illustrated through the development of three main topics: portfolio theory, fixed-income portfolio management, and option valuation. Economic factors affecting investment management, particularly efficient markets concepts, are stressed. Satisfies the senior research seminar requirement for business majors.
This course begins with a macroeconomic perspective and introduces students to international financial markets. Students examine the economic and governmental factors that influence exchange rates and study currency derivatives which are commonly traded to profit from or hedge against expected changes in foreign currencies. The perspective is then microeconomic. Students examine financial issues faced by managers of firms that are engaged in international business. These include: the measurement and management of exchange rate risk, multinational capital budgeting, and the assessment of both domestic and foreign sources of funds to finance long-term projects. Current issues in the international market and real-life problems in decision oriented cases are analyzed.
This course introduces approaches to the valuation of public and private equity, including free cash flow, residual income, economic profit, and relative valuation models. Critical analysis of financial statements is highlighted, and applications to real-world companies is stressed. Course content is informed by the Chartered Financial Analyst curriculum. Students complete a sell-side equity research report on a public company. Course is recommended for students competing in the CFA Investment Research Challenge and for students managing the Puget Sound student-managed fund.
The course expands students' knowledge and understanding of financial reporting and analysis by examining key questions of economic significance within the context of real companies and their reported financial information. The course includes analysis of U.S. companies that follow U.S. GAAP and global companies that use International Financial Reporting Standards. The underlying objective of financial analysis is to measure and compare risk and return characteristics of alternative investments when making investment and credit decisions. This class requires a major, independent research project that requires you to research an accounting standard, understand it, investigate its economic consequences, compare the US standard with its IFRS counterpart, and learn how to make a IFRS company's financial statements comparable to those of a US GAPP company.
In this highly experiential course, students learn to generate new venture ideas and evaluate their viability. Lean start-up and business planning methodologies are utilized. Students develop creative problem solving, research, analytical and presentation skills. Students deepen their understanding of entrepreneurship and build their self-efficacy through reading, writing, experimenting and job shadowing. The in-depth job shadow results in the creation of a short documentary film.
This course explores how people and organizations can innovate to fulfill our social and environmental needs efficiently and effectively. Using innovative business models as the foundation, each student selects a social sector to study throughout the term on the local, national, and international levels. Research includes reading articles, examination of financial data, and interviews. A series of research papers results in in-depth knowledge of the chosen sector. Knowledge is shared through public displays and presentations. Insights into how to solve difficult social and environmental problems will be gained through the research and the course. Additionally, the class reflects one social issue and enacts tangible solutions to this issue through the practicum, enabling students to participate in hands-on social entrepreneurship.
This course examines how individuals behave in and around organizations and how organizations themselves behave. Every day, individuals share time with others and operate within organizations. When people understand the behavior of individuals and organizations in their lives, they can better establish expectations, operate efficiently, and achieve goals. This class examines concepts and develops perspectives that help students effectively manage individuals and organizations. At the level of the individual, students learn about self-presentation, career planning, giving and receiving, feedback, personality, decision making, resilience, and creating success. At the level of the organization, students learn about teamwork, structure, culture, identity, change, resistance to change, and overcoming resistance to change. In addition, Organizational Behavior challenges students to develop skills in writing, presentation, and working in groups.
Supply chain management encompasses the planning and management of all activities involved in sourcing and procurement, conversion, and all logistics management activities. Importantly, it also includes coordination and collaboration with channel partners, which can be suppliers, intermediaries, third party service providers, and customers. In essence, supply chain management integrates supply and demand management within and across companies. This course prepares the students to manage modern supply chains, both domestically and globally.
This course introduces students to the business environments and practices of East and South East Asia and may focus on specific countries of the region. The countries of this region are viable trading partners and destinations for foreign direct investment, and the course considers pertinent historical, cultural, macro-economic and political factors that impact business activity in the region. The course focuses on business opportunity and risk assessment, and introduces students to appropriate managerial, organizational, and strategic planning skills and methods for successfully doing and growing business in the region. The course relies on various teaching methods, including lectures, readings, case studies, class discussions, videos, independent research, and guest presentations.
This course introduces students to the business environments and practices of Latin America. The countries of this region are viable trading partners and destinations for foreign direct investment, and the course considers pertinent historical, cultural, macro-economic and political factors that impact business activity in the region. The course focuses on business opportunity and risk assessment, and introduces students to appropriate managerial, organizational, and strategic planning skills and methods for successfully doing and growing business in the region. The course relies on various teaching methods, including lectures, readings, case studies, class discussions, videos, independent research, and guest presentations.
The class focuses on two primary forms of non-litigious dispute resolution: negotiation and mediation. Students learn and develop the substantive, procedural, and communication skills necessary to utilize these models 'successfully,' both personally and professionally.
This course introduces students to the business environments and practices of India and South Asia. The countries of this region are viable trading partners and destinations for foreign direct investment, and the course considers pertinent historical, cultural, macro-economic and political factors that impact business activity in the region. The course focuses on business opportunity and risk assessment, and introduces students to appropriate managerial, organizational, and strategic planning skills and methods for successfully doing and growing business in the region. The course relies on various teaching methods, including lectures, readings, case studies, class discussions, videos, independent research, and guest presentations.
This course introduces students to the business environments and practices of Europe. The countries of this region are viable trading partners and destinations for foreign direct investment, and the course considers pertinent historical, cultural, macro-economic and political factors that impact business activity in the region. The course focuses on business opportunity and risk assessment, and introduces students to appropriate managerial, organizational, and strategic planning skills and methods for successfully doing and growing business in the region. The course relies on various teaching methods, including lectures, readings, case studies, class discussions, videos, independent research, and guest presentations.
This course discusses and analyzes historical and current legal issues shaping amateur and professional sports in the United States. For clarification, the "amateur" sport discussion is largely limited to Division I inter-collegiate athletics and "professional sports" focuses on sports played in exchange for compensation in the United States. We undertake this analysis to understand the legal aspects of what is, often, the "business of sports". We recognize, at all times, that though this course is grounded in sports, its true base is traditional areas of law including, but not limited to: employment, contract, tort, labor, intellectual property, and criminal law. This class requires a major, independent research project. Satisfies the Senior Research Seminar requirement for the business majors.
This class examines domestic and international environmental law and natural resource law to better understand how those laws relate to businesses in the United States and internationally. Students consider issues related to environmental and natural resource legislation and regulation. These issues include the tension between business and the environment, sustainability, the goals of environmental regulation, the problems of monitoring and enforcement, and the roles of science and risk assessment, including valuation of environmental injuries and environmental benefits. Students use case method studies, statutes, and legal cases to explore these concepts in contemporary situations. Students are responsible for substantial class leadership responsibilities including leading discussions and substantively contributing to each class session. Students identify suitable topics for exploration, formulate research questions, conduct independent research, write a substantial research paper, and present their work to the class. Satisfies the Senior Research Seminar requirement for the business majors.
This course focuses on the major trends and developments shaping the field of international business (IB), thus giving students a general overview of the many challenges and opportunities facing international businesses now and in the near future. The course gives students an opportunity to explore the nature, scope, and relevance of specific topics in IB in areas to include: Digitalization and artificial intelligence, diversity, migration, sustainable development, climate change, and emerging markets. The course addresses the implications of these various topics on international entrepreneurship, talent management, global strategy, resilience and business model adaptation, and global operations and supply chains. Students are challenged to integrate knowledge they have gained from other business core courses and apply their accumulated knowledge to assess strategic and managerial responses to contemporary trends and issues in international business.
This course focuses on how organizations can achieve a sustainable competitive advantage. Strategic management involves a foundation of research and analysis of an organization's internal and external environments, followed by the identification of strategic choices, and the development and implementation of strategic plans. A resource-based view of the firm provides the theoretical underpinning for case analysis and the strategic consulting projects. Students work in small consulting teams with local organizations to develop successful strategies in these projects. Satisfies the Senior Research Seminar requirement for the business majors.
This is a senior research course in leadership that builds upon the foundational course, "BUS 385 Paradigms of Leadership." Its overarching theme is that astute business leaders are liberally educated, able to comprehend and benefit from the interconnectivity of business leadership and the liberal arts. This cross-disciplinary course culminates with a substantial research paper and presentation. Satisfies the Senior Research Seminar requirement for the business majors.
This seminar is organized around topics that reflect the particular field of research or expertise of the instructor. Each offering is on a unique topic. Multiple sections of BUS 493, covering different topics, may be applied to the major. Contact the School of Business and Leadership Director or a Business advisor to learn which special topics courses fulfill which requirements.
The class serves as an introduction to the Crime, Law and Justice Studies minor through an interdisciplinary approach. The course uses approaches from history, sociology, ethnography, critical theory and literature to examine the sequence of events that occur in the criminal legal system to address the following questions and topics: Is our system just? What is crime, and what are some theories that claim to explain "criminality"? How did the US criminal legal process and procedures emerge, and how do they function today? What is the history of policing and the police, and what are current issues that shape policing today? What happens once a person is caught up in the criminal legal process, and what role do judges, prosecutors, defense attorneys and forensics play in that process? In the small percentage of cases that proceed to trial, what happens, and what are the options for the person? What happens after, and do prisons administer just punishment? What about after prison?
The driving question of the course is what it means to have and create a just system and for whom, and how does race, gender, sexuality and other categories of identity shape how a person experiences this sequence of often inevitable events. To understand complex issues like Crime, Law and Justice, we will use numerous case studies and stories such as Kalief Browder, a 16-year who spent years in Rikers Island Prison without a conviction, and whose case spurred the movement to close Rikers. We look at how judges and prosecutors make decisions in a Cleveland Courthouse, how one man experienced the death penalty, and read short stories that imagine societies with different ways of administering justice. This class will have multiple class visits including a Juvenile Prison superintendent, a police officer, people who have been in prison, a lawyer with the Clemency project and others.
Prisons worldwide are widely acknowledged as institutions that impose strict limits on individual autonomy and mobility. Yet people's freedoms are regulated through spatial and disciplinary technologies that exceed the prison. This course will explore
how prisons and carceral systems are interconnected and operate globally. We will ask questions such as why are young women in India's university hostels subject to routine surveillance and "curfew" hours? How are state energy projects for environmental conservation implicated in the confinement of marginalized fishing communities in Rwanda? To explore these we will look at how technologies of surveillance, bodily regulation, time, and labor popularly associated with the prison
are exported to different domains of our everyday lives. And how families, communities and institutions engage, embrace, resist, and reinvent these technologies from a cross-cultural and dynamic perspective. The course will pay attention to how they interact with structures of caste, and race that differentially
impact people across a range of institutional and intimate sites such as psychiatric institutions, shelters, homes, and neighborhoods.
This course is designed as an introductory course on face-to-face communication in our social and personal relationships -- our acquaintances, friendships, romantic partnerships, and relations with other loved ones. The basic premise of the course is to position one to maximize communicative effectiveness in these relationships with knowledge about how communication functions combined with analysis about one's own and others' communication practices and experiences. As a social scientific approaches course, this class will emphasize an understanding and application of various theories of interpersonal communication.
This course provides students with an introduction to the field of organizational communication as it exists within the discipline of Communication Studies. Through a survey of traditional and contemporary theories used to study the relationship between communication and organization, students are asked to analyze, compare, and apply theory to gain an appreciation for how communication scholars ask questions and study modern organizations in contemporary society. Specific theories covered include bureaucracy, rationality, power, systems, inter-organizational relationships, culture, conflict, race, gender, technology, and globalization. Throughout the course, theory will be applied to examples from a range of organizations including for-profit, government, educational institutions, civil sector, and virtual organizations.
This course introduces the discipline of Communication Studies through the allied fields of media and cultural studies. Students gain foundational understanding in methods and critical approaches to contemporary media. The course begins with a survey of media structures and institutions (questions of media's role in democracy), media texts and genres (questions of media's form), and media and identity (questions of representation). The course transitions from this overview into specific analysis of media texts.
This course uses rhetorical and argumentation theory to introduce students to the discipline of Communication Studies. Students gain foundational understanding of the concepts, theories, and methods related to the study of American civic rhetoric. This course begins with a brief introduction to key concepts in rhetorical studies and then examines key examples of American civic rhetoric that have shaped the political culture of the United States throughout its history.
This course uses critical and cultural studies approaches to introduce students to the discipline of Communication Studies. Students gain foundational understanding in methods and critical approaches to public culture, including media. The course begins with a survey of key concepts, public culture, democracy, identity, and communication, and then moves to a topical study of discourse as part of public culture in the struggle to maintain or advance concepts of democracy within the context of competing identities related to issues of race, class, gender, and political affiliation.
This course provides an introduction to the fields of human communication and technology, computer-mediated communication, and internet studies as they exist within the discipline of Communication Studies. The course covers a broad range of theories and applies them to the modern use of existing technologies and newer media in an effort to uncover how these technological systems affect today's communication climate. Specific areas may include the following: online impression formation and self-presentation, mobile communication, personal relationships, political communication, language use and memes, online celebrity, and harassment and cyberbullying. Students will be introduced to social science research, scholarly argument, and empirical observation.
This course introduces the Communication Studies discipline through the interpretation and analysis of cinema across historical, geographic, linguistic, and cultural contexts. Students will come away with a foundational understanding of the power of visual media in the form of film, as well as a variety of critical approaches used in communication inquiry. The course begins by surveying introductory readings in the study of film. The course then transitions toward explorations of film as a vehicle of visual communication throughout 20th-century globalization. The course concludes by discussing the present and future of cinema in the Digital Age. Students are expected to engage in conversations that question contemporary global cartography in both the historical and technological development of cinema, as well as the implicit politics found in visual representations of other cultures.
This course is designed to introduce students to the role that theory plays in different types of communication research. The course looks at the different motives scholars have for studying communication, and the different types of theory they develop to pursue these motives. In addition, the main areas of communication scholarship are reviewed with respect to the theories that can inform research in those domains. The class is divided into six general topical foci: Individual/sender processes, receiver-based processes (message processing), relational processes (dyads and social networks), media, gender/culture/society, and organizations/groups. Students are expected to engage in practices of close reading, critique, and evaluation of these theories within the communication science tradition.
Academic communication criticism (or critical inquiry) typically differs from popular forms of criticism in the amount of attention it devotes to descriptive analysis. Rigorous descriptive analysis is the foundation of critical inquiry in communication studies. This course introduces students to some of the basic analytic concepts that communication critics employ to analyze film, prose discourse (essays, speeches), and visual images. Course concepts include media grammars and styles, figurative language and visual tropes, narrative forms, and genre. Throughout the course students will learn how to prepare close readings of multiple texts.
This course offers a focused review of organizational communication in terms of historical roots, metatheoretical commitments, conceptual and theoretical approaches, and contemporary research. The first half of the course is devoted to a consideration of the organizational communication discipline in terms of history, metatheory and methodology, and important conceptual and theoretical approaches to understanding organizing and organizations. The second half of the course is devoted to discussions of a range of contemporary research on specific topics that are currently of interest to organizational communication scholars. Topics include, but are not limited to, work-life balance, emotional labor, power, and resistance in organizations.
This is a critical writing course which focuses on how popular film narratives (independent and mainstream) function in American culture. Students study visual and narrative composition of film, the politics of film aesthetics and production, and the competing rhetorics of American film directors and genres. The discussion of each film is contextualized through attention to visual and narrative construction of gender, race, ethnicity, nationality, sexuality, and social class. Course materials include readings and videostreamed films. Additionally, students select a film of their own choosing for intense study. Not appropriate for first year students.
This advanced course addresses the cultural influences of American television from 1946 to present day. In particular, the course examines the intersections of the television medium with politics and government, social movements, cultural conflicts, film aesthetics, advertising and consumerism. Some of the topics covered in the course include the changing character of broadcast news (from Edward R. Murrow to Jon Stewart), women and feminisms in television, television genres, and television and race.
The main goal of this course is to introduce students to the social scientific tradition of communication research. Over the course of the semester, students will be responsible for developing an interesting and novel research question and/or hypotheses based on scientific literature and theory. Students will learn how to critically evaluate empirical research and employ the scientific method to investigate issues and questions that arise within the study of human communication. Students will become familiar with survey research, experimentation, and techniques for data analysis.
This course introduces students to the ideology, designs, implementation, and analytic techniques of qualitative research that enable them to describe and explain social phenomena related to social and personal relationships and health. Students will learn experientially throughout the semester and, upon successful completion of this course, will be able to draw on the appropriate qualitative methodological tools to best answer original research questions.
This course examines theories of argumentation to explore how communities arrive at decisions. To that end, this course develops the skills of reason-giving and critical evaluation that are central to competent participation in a democratic society. In this course, students actively engage the formal structure of arguments. Students learn to evaluate the rhetorical claims of others while constructing their own claims with reasoning adapted to the constraints of the situation. Students learn to question, analyze and critically engage the claims, grounds, warrants, evidence and reasoning of public discourse and will grasp the major theoretical trends in the field of argumentation. While the course focuses on the major theoretical trends of argumentation, it does so through grounded topic areas to understand the relationship between theoria and praxis. Primarily, the course covers theories of the public sphere, the body, visual argument, feminist argumentation, collective memory, and critical approaches to argumentation.
An advanced course that examines the evolution of rhetorical theory during the past twenty-five hundred years and the cultural forces that have given rise to variations in the classical paradigm. Students of the language arts, classics, philosophy, as well as communication, should find the course a useful cognate in their academic programs.
Rhetoric appears in everyday contexts through popular culture artifacts such as books, comic books, films, TV shows, music, music videos, YouTube videos, TikToks, memes, social media posts, and more. Using rhetorical theories and tools, this class investigates the ways in which rhetoric can be used as a mode of analysis to discover and describe the rhetorical power of popular culture. Students will engage contemporary artifacts through the lens of rhetorical theories at the intersections of fandom and folklore.
For most of recorded history, the study of law and the study of rhetoric were linked. The professionalization and specialization of legal education in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries severed a connection that had persisted for two thousand years. Over the past few decades, rhetorical scholars in communication departments and scholars in other academic disciplines (including political science, literary studies, and the law itself) have begun to forge a new link among the law, legal advocacy, and rhetoric, and this course introduces students to this relatively new interdisciplinary movement. The course concentrates on three intersecting themes: the law as language, the law as argument, and the law as constitutive rhetoric.
Public Discourse: This course analyzes the creation, reception, and impact of American public discourse over the last five decades. Course material focuses on the process of rhetorical advocacy as it occurs in key political and cultural events and significant public controversies. Through detailed analysis of message construction, the course enhances students' appreciation of the range of strategic choices available to public advocates, increases students' understanding of the limitations and constraints that confront public advocates, and nurtures students' ability to analyze and evaluate public discourse. Through the reconstruction and analysis of important episodes and controversies in recent American history (including decisions to drop the atomic bomb, the cold war, Vietnam, civil rights, and feminism), the course develops students' knowledge of the role of public discourse in historical events and illustrates the relationship between rhetorical practice and American public culture.
African American Discourse: This course analyzes the tradition of African American public discourse from the late eighteenth to the early twenty-first centuries. Through detailed analysis of message construction, the course enhances students' appreciation of the range of strategic choices available to African American advocates, increases students' understanding of the limitations on constraints that have confronted public advocates, and nurtures students' capacity to analyze and evaluate various forms of public discourse. Course topics include: the emergence of an African American public voice in late eighteenth-century America (e.g. Benjamin Banneker, Absolom Jones), African American abolitionist voices (e.g. David Walker, Frederick Douglass, Henry Highland Garnet), the advocacy efforts of African American women (Maria W. Stewart, Sojourner Truth, Ida B. Wells), African American public discourse in the reconstruction and post-reconstruction era (e.g. Joseph Rainey, Booker T. Washington, W.E.B. DuBois), the twentieth-century civil rights movement (the Brown decision, Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, "black power" advocates), and various contemporary civic controversies (e.g. reparations, affirmative action).
This course examines the historical development of "the rhetorical presidency," the genres of presidential and judicial discourse, the argumentative dynamics of legal interpretation (how people argue about the meaning of texts), and the process of policy deliberation in the legislative branch. The course also explores the idea that political communication constructs or constitutes our culture's "social reality" (our shared values, traditions, behavioral norms, etc.). The course prepares students to become more sophisticated and literate consumers of political communication.
Many orientations to the social world are formed from our experiences that extend from family identities; in particular, the ways individuals relate and communicate with others are profoundly affected by our familial relationships. Furthermore, understanding the family as a communication system is imperative in an era when family issues are at the forefront of national concerns in governmental, educational, health, and religious arenas. This class regards the examination of "family" as fundamental to a comprehensive understanding of relational communication. This upper level course is intended to help students understand how communication helps people develop, maintain, enhance, or disturb family relationships. Students learn to think, write, and speak critically about what "family" means, and about the various forms, functions, and processes of family communication. This course is designed to help students better understand family communication in their own lives, both theoretically and practically.
This is an advanced relational course, ideal for students who have previous exposure to relational theory and constructs. This course introduces a variety of 'dark side' topics and issues that are often neglected as important phenomena in the scope of human relationships. The course includes a critical examination of the 'dark side' of communication moving beyond the Pollyanna-like perspectives that pervade much of interpersonal communicative research, (i.e., be attractive, open, honest, good-humored, etc.) in an attempt to achieve a more realistic and balanced view of human interaction.
Health communication campaigns are coordinated, large-scale efforts to promote health and reduce health risks. Campaigns are traditionally rooted in 1) persuasive approaches which focus on altering attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors and 2) communicative approaches that evaluate multiple levels of communication, different channels, and diverse communication technologies. This course introduces the historical perspectives of health campaigns, provides insights into various theories which inform campaign work, and reviews the methodological considerations of researching, implementing, and evaluating health campaigns. In this course students explore the design and analysis of health campaigns blending theory, practice and methods to critique past, present, and future campaigns. This course stresses practical application as students develop a hypothetical health campaign by which they come to fully understand the ways that campaigns are planned, organized, executed, and evaluated. This course covers a wide range of theories and topics on health campaigns including but not limited to: Agenda Setting, Agenda Building, Uses and Effects, Cultivation, Parasocial Interaction, Edu-tainment, Social Marketing, Diffusion of Innovations, Health Belief Model, Social Norms, Stages of Change, and Knowledge Gap. Applies to the Bioethics (BIOE) program.
This course will survey a number of topics relevant to the institutional settings of medicine (e.g. patient-provider interaction, health care team interactions), intercultural factors that influence health care (e.g., divergent needs, preferences, and access based on culture), the interpersonal ramifications of illness (e.g. coping, social support), and societal concerns regarding health and healthcare delivery (e.g., health insurance system, technological influence in healthcare, crises communication). Students will have an opportunity to explore and better understand the role communication plays in healthcare delivery, health promotion, disease prevention, environmental and risk communication, media and mass communication, and technology.
Using a variety of different organizational lenses (i.e. culture, workgroup, and agent), students learn to think through issues in modern organizations. Course materials encourage students to take the role of organizational agents as they face ethical dilemmas in examining contemporary organizational issues such as gender, language, class, and technology. Students can expect a variety of theory and application, integration through intensive class discussion, ethics case papers, and an in-depth group project, which includes a 40-minute professional presentation. Other assignments focus on developing writing skills that are appropriate for typical business and professional settings. The goal of the course is to encourage student reflection on how everyday communication (e.g. writing a simple memo) can affect and construct a system of interaction with profound organizational and social consequences.
Using a variety of different organizational lenses (e.g. culture, workgroup, and agent), students learn to think through how social identity issues materialize in modern organizational policy and practice. Course materials encourage students to take the role of diverse organizational agents as they face ethical dilemmas in examining contemporary social identity issues such as gender, race, class, and age. Students can expect a variety of theory and application integration through intensive class discussion, reflective and analytic writing assignments and a final research project. The goal of the course is to encourage students to identify issues of organizational power and practices of oppression, particularly as these practices may result in disparate material consequences of economic health and well-being.
Since organizations cannot exist without communication and interaction, organizational life is filled with communication activities that intersect with personal boundaries. Management and coordination, training, decision-making, and conflict are only a few examples. On another level, organizations are themselves the products of the constant processes of organizing. Thus, communication forms and maintains organizations by enabling the process of organizing. This course is designed to give students an intensive inquiry into systems theory as a way of understanding organizations as a function of communication and environment. Initially students review a variety of approaches which inform their understanding of organizational communication as it is practiced in the everyday life of organizations; however, the lion's share of the semester is spent studying intersections of communicating about and across systems and considering the impact of that communication on stakeholders. The course closes by considering the very basis for which the use of systems theory began'to understand the relationship of organizations to the environment. Of course how people conceptualize what counts as environment changes over the years so in particular the course focuses on the impacts organizational practices impose on our natural environment and how management might change those practices to create a sustainable environment.
The purpose of this course is to enhance students' understanding of diversity issues as they relate to the study of communication. The course looks at how the media, its images and discourses, shape one's understanding of experiences, shape the experiences of women, and the experiences of people of color. The course also explores the ways in which elements of the media socially reproduce prejudice and foster resistance to prejudice. As a result of engagement in the course, students gain the ability to critically analyze and evaluate media products. They also become aware of critical professional issues in relation to a diversified workforce as it relates to the production, distribution, and consumption of media products.
Cross-listed as AFAM/COMM 370.
The course focuses on critical understanding and evaluation of Disney as a constitutive element of contemporary culture both in the United States and globally. Through analysis of Disney animated films, Disney corporate reach and marketing, and Disney theme parks ("Where dreams come true") students engage questions highlighted by Henry Giroux about Disney, "such as what role [Disney] plays in (1) shaping public memory, national identity, gender roles, and childhood values; (2) suggesting who and what qualifies as an agent; and (3) determining the role of consumerism in American Culture around the globe" (The Mouse that Roared, p. 10, 2010). The course draws heavily on literature and theory from rhetorical criticism, media criticism, and cultural studies to engage the textual productions of Disney, Disney's historical location in U.S. culture, Disney's corporate structure and self-presentation, and its experiential vacation through theme parks, resorts, and vacation clubs. Disney broadly, and its theme parks specifically, offers highly orchestrated and managed immersive entertainment spaces. A clearer understanding of Disney cultural reach allows the course to enter discussions about citizenship, identity production including race, gender, ethnicity, and nationalism, labor and capital flow, ideology and interpellation, cultural appropriation and homogenization, consumerism and commodification, hyperreality, narrative, and resistance. Satisfies the Knowledge, Identity, and Power graduation requirement. Prerequisite: COMM 240.
This course introduces students to the methodological and theoretical approaches of cultural studies and does so with attention to both the interrelationships of race, gender, and class as well as the contemporary politics of social justice. Although this course is, in general, not canonical in its orientation, the suggested readings do point students toward some key scholarship in cultural studies. Beyond seeing cultural studies, as traditionally viewed by academics, as developing out of Western academic critiques of culture and philosophy, this course examines the multiple locations, and politics of these locations, that gave rise to cultural studies. The course has many goals: to introduce the nascent field of cultural studies scholarship, to encourage analysis of the 'politics of location' of cultural studies research, to provide a broad understanding of the history of cultural studies, and to help students ground their own perspectives within an area of cultural studies scholarship with particular and particularistic assumptions, perspectives, and approaches.
This course is part of the human communication and technology curriculum. This course explores issues and questions about computer-mediated communication in multiple contexts, in order to understand the psychological, interpersonal, professional, social, and cultural implications of computer-mediated communication. The objective of Communication and the Internet is to develop a critical view of online communication by applying the processes and principles of social scientific theories and research to issues and patterns of Internet communication. Lectures, discussions, and assignments are designed to give students insight into the way technology currently impacts their daily lives, and how it may affect them in the future.
Deception occurs in communication behavior across species, and lying (i.e., intentional deception) is a pervasive phenomenon in human communication. This course explores the many varieties of deceptive verbal and nonverbal behaviors as well as their motives and consequences, and provides an overview of the research into deception as it has occurred in the field of Communication. Research into deception in a variety of contexts is explored, including but not limited to interpersonal and romantic relationships, online interactions, politics, advertising, journalism and media, and security/policing. Other topics may include the language of deception, cultural norms regarding deception, and deception across species.
Upper level courses in various areas of the communication discipline. Course content varies with each offering.
This course is the capstone of the media studies curriculum. Students have the opportunity to study the historical, technological and economic contexts within which images of the human body have been circulated, regulated, and negotiated.
This course is the capstone of the rhetorical studies curriculum. As such, it presupposes that students grasp the analytic techniques introduced in COMM 244 and the conceptual issues introduced in COMM 344. Its purpose is to examine exemplary forms of scholarly inquiry in rhetorical studies in order to better prepare students to engage in independent and creative scholarly inquiry.
This course is the capstone of the relational and behavioral studies and health communication curricula. Students will review current research that intersects interpersonal, family and health communication, considering its methodological, critical, and practical implications. Students taking this course should be knowledgeable about relational and health theories and research reviewed in other related courses.
This course is one possible capstone of the organizational studies curriculum. Students consider how communication and collaboration technologies influence the creation, content, and pattern of knowledge networks within and between organizations. The course focuses special attention on recently emerging organizational forms including the virtual organization, the network organization, and the global organization. The remainder of the course examines how communication technology systems are changing the very fabric of our work experience in the twenty-first century. Discussion focuses on the relationships between technologies and social practices at the individual, group, organizational, interorganizational and global levels, as well as organizational and societal policy issues.
This course is a capstone of the Organizational Studies Curriculum. Students have the opportunity to explore a variety of qualitative inquiry methods as applied to the study of anticipatory socialization, entry, assimilation, and expectations of work/life balance in organizations.
This advanced course focuses on describing, explaining, and predicting communication processes that occur within the context of close relationships, with a focus on the effects of technology on these processes. The field of personal relationships is interdisciplinary, with scholars from areas such as communication, family studies, and social psychology all contributing to knowledge about communication in relationships. Similarly, mediated communication research is conducted by scholars in various fields -- including communication, computer science, and sociology. Therefore, this course emphasizes communication but also includes concepts and theories from other fields. The overall goal of the class is to help students better understand some of the factors affecting relationships and technology, and to appreciate the impact of communication on their relationships in a variety of contexts. This course balances an in-depth examination of several classic studies in the field of relational communication with close readings of cutting-edge research published in the past five to ten years. Each week, students read articles that consider topics in both online and offline contexts. Students demonstrate mastery of material from each of their previous communication classes -- particularly their courses in social scientific methods and theory -- to enter into the scholarly conversation surrounding the examination of communication in relationships.
This is the first course in the economics two-semester introductory sequence. It introduces students to the market model and macroeconomics. Topics explored in the market model unit include supply and demand, incentives, opportunity cost and comparative advantage. Topics in macroeconomics include national income determination, inflation, unemployment, fiscal and monetary policy and key macroeconomic institutions.
This is the second course in the economics two-semester introductory sequence. It introduces the student to the microeconomic concepts of consumer choice, demand theory, consumer and producer surplus, the theory of the firm, perfect competition and market failure.
This course utilizes the tools of elementary economic analysis to explain basic issues in American economic history. In general, the course is organized chronologically. The course begins with discussions of the colonial and revolutionary periods, then continues with analysis of banking development, slavery, the Civil War, and industrial and labor market changes in the later nineteenth century. The course concludes with an analysis of the causes and effects of the Great Depression.
The development of economic thought from late eighteenth century to the early twentieth century. The relation of economic thought to other social, political, and scientific thought is emphasized. The class focuses primarily on seven major figures in the history of economic thought: Smith, Ricardo, Mill, Marx, Marshall, Veblen, and Keynes. Readings are from original and secondary sources.
This course introduces economic perspectives on modern environmental issues. Students study economic theories related to natural resources and the environment. The first half of the course focuses on general concepts and theory, including markets and market failures, non-market valuation, benefit-cost analysis, and dynamic optimization of resource use over time. The second half shifts to applications including renewable and non-renewable resources, pollution, global climate change, fisheries, water, and concepts of sustainability.
This course introduces students to the economics of interregional and international migration. The tools of microeconomics are applied to understand the theoretical and empirical aspects of migration decisions and their implications on regional growth. Using economic models the course explores and understands the causes and effects of migration on receiving and sending regions. While this course primarily focuses on interregional and international migration in the United States, it also includes additional discussions on current applications and topics concerning migration issues in other countries in the world. The final section of the course includes a discussion on immigration policies in the U.S. and abroad and the issues concerning them.
The tools of microeconomics are applied to understand the theoretical and empirical topics in urban and regional economics. The course begins with a discussion about the different definitions of regions, followed by topics on location theory of firms, labor markets, and household migration decisions. The second part of the course focuses on the urban sector of the economy exploring urban growth, land-use patterns, and externalities associated with urban areas. The final section of the course includes a discussion on regional economic policies and its implications on economic growth.
This course is an analysis of gender and race inequality, using the theoretical and empirical tools of economics. Topics include work and family issues, the labor market, occupational segregation, and discrimination. The students gain an understanding of what the market economy can and cannot do, its differing gender and racial impact, and how economic policy can lead to greater equality.
This course combines Economic and IPE approaches to understand and compare different governments' choices to influence markets and how those choices affect incentives and the behavior of economic agents (consumers, suppliers, laborers, employers, policymakers, etc.) in markets which are "misbehaving". In one way or the other, the markets considered in this class do not meet the economic goals of efficiency, equity, stability, or growth, requiring government action. This action, however, often creates distortions of its own. By considering nations' differing approaches to common problems, the successes and failures of government policy can be evaluated. The purpose of this course is to identify the need for market intervention, apply and evaluate policies which seek to achieve national goals, and identify optimal government action in the context of both economic, political, and cultural realities. Policy areas considered include healthcare, environmental protection, education, taxation, and equity.
In this course, students learn tools for analyzing critical issues in global development. Students work with data from low-income countries to examine the economic strategies of households and the policy choices of governments. Examples range from using household-level data from Mexico to identify the effect of central government policies on poverty and inequality to examining how market failures and unremunerated household labor lead to underinvestment in the education of girls and women.. The course draws heavily from the book Poor Economics for rich narratives about the lives of the poor and for recent insights from behavioral economics that can inform development policy.
This course examines the role of money in a modern economy. The focus is on the role of money and financial institutions. Topics covered include interest rate determination, asset and liability management, the role of the Federal Reserve System, and the importance of monetary policy in the macroeconomy.
The objective of this course is to explore the many ways that countries interact and explores some of today's most pressing international economic policy issues, such as the return to protectionism, currency manipulation, and trade deficits. In particular, the course explores the question of whether countries should be more open or less open to trade, the impact of protectionist policies on producers and consumers, understanding the foreign exchange market and how foreign exchange rates are determined, and the interconnection between trade and capital flows.
This is a course dedicated to an in-depth study of poverty and inequality in the United States. It covers the measurement of poverty and inequality, trends over time, the underlying causes and resultant consequences of poverty and inequality. We will then consider how our views of the poor shape public policy. Our examination will include theories of the culture of poverty, social stratification and discrimination, concentrated poverty and the underclass, economic and family structure drivers as well as institutional causes of poverty such as education and incarceration. The class draws together some of the most influential research, as well as more up-to-date articles and data that have influenced the evolution of social policies in the United States. This class is intended to offer students the opportunity to apply economic and empirical skills learned in their previous introductory economics courses. While the course primarily focuses on the economics of poverty and inequality and utilizes a significant amount of statistical and quantitative analysis, we will cover this terrain from many vantage points: historical, political, philosophical, sociological, and anthropological.
This course concerns application of statistical theory to the analysis of economic questions. Students learn the tools of regression analysis and apply them in a major empirical project.
This course uses tools from economics and psychology to address individual decisions which are hard to account for with traditional, rational economic theory. Using both theoretical and laboratory methods, students explore topics involving both bounded rationality and bounded self-interest. These topics include the influence of altruism, trust, and emotion in economic decisions and alternative explanations for 'irrational decisions': choice anomalies, bias in risk attitudes, and heuristics. Students participate in and develop controlled experiments to examine these issues empirically.
This course develops and extends the methods of microeconomic analysis. Topics include consumer-choice theory, models of exchange, the theory of the firm, pricing models, and general equilibrium analysis.
The basic principles of national income determination are studied from a theoretical perspective. Various models of macroeconomics are analyzed with emphasis on effects of monetary and fiscal policy. Particular emphasis is placed on understanding the causes and consequences of unemployment, inflation, and economic growth.
Global climate change is considered by many to be the most significant environmental challenge of the 21st century. Unchecked, the continued accumulation of greenhouse gases over this century is projected to eventually warm the planet by about 6 to 14 °F, with associated impacts on the environment, economy, and society. This course explores the economic characteristics of the climate change problem, assesses national and international policy design and implementation issues, and provides a survey of the economic tools necessary to evaluate climate change policies. It is largely discussion-oriented and thus requires a high degree of participation by students in the classroom. Cross-listed as ECON/ENVP 327.
The major focus of this course is on the application of microeconomic tools to legal issues. The course considers the general issues of legal analysis and microeconomic theory as applied especially to the areas of tort, property, and contract law.
This course is an analysis of the labor sector in the U.S. economy with a focus on its gender dynamics. Topics include labor supply and demand, wage determination, structure and differentials, and their differing gender impacts. Macro-institutional forces related to labor markets are considered including labor force participation, evolution of the U.S. labor market, and unemployment. The course will also include discussions on trends, measurement, and analyses of labor productivity and mobility, labor market discrimination, poverty, income and gender inequality, and the role of economic policy in addressing labor market issues.
This course develops the connections between economic theory and the online dating market. Economic techniques are used to examine unique features of the online dating market, such as the significance of market thickness, the prevalence of cheap talk, and search theory. Features of the online dating market are explored to simultaneously provide insight on more broadly applied economic principles including adverse selection, network externalities, and matching markets. The course emphasizes microeconomic theoretical techniques to model these phenomena.
The meaning and significance of competition is developed from a variety of theoretical perspectives. The theory of the firm is developed, and the activities of firms in various market settings (competitive, monopolistically competitive, oligopolistic, and monopoloistic) are analyzed. The impact of firm behavior on social welfare is also discussed. Substantial emphasis is placed on game theoretical models and their applications, including collusion, product differentiation, entry deterrence, and dynamic firm interaction.
Game theory is a technique for modeling and analyzing strategic decision-making processes in a world of interdependence. Game theoretic techniques are based on strategic interdependence, recognizing that an individual entity's payoff is dependent on the actions of others including consumers, producers, and regulators. The major focus of this class is to introduce and develop the tools of game theory for application to a variety of economic topics such as auctions, investment decisions, competitive behavior, trade, and environmental negotiations.
This course introduces students to the theory and practice of laboratory methods in economics. The course explores and identifies the range of issues in economics to which experimental methods have been applied. In addition, the course focuses on the principles of experimental design, as applied to these issues. Along the way, students participate in a range of classroom experiments which illustrate key ideas.
This second course in econometrics explores more advanced techniques for addressing empirical questions in the social sciences. The course emphasizes applied methods for both observational and quasi-experimental data. Students develop an independent empirical research project applying the skills they have acquired.
This course applies calculus and linear algebra to the analysis of microeconomic and macroeconomic theory. The tools of mathematical optimization and programming are developed with direct application to the analysis of the problems of consumer behavior, the theory of the firm, general equilibrium, and aggregate economic analysis.
This course applies calculus and linear algebra to the analysis of microeconomic and macroeconomic theory. The tools of mathematical optimization and programming are developed with direct application to the analysis of the problems of consumer behavior, the theory of the firm, general equilibrium, and aggregate economic analysis.
This senior seminar is an advanced study of current topics in economic theory and policy. Students undertake an original senior thesis. Note: Performance on a standardized field exam in economics constitutes one component of the senior research seminar.
Few issues press on the minds, hearts, and lives of upcoming generations as much as climate change. Driven by swiftly accelerating transformations in our global environment and unmistakable scientific projections, young people face forms of uncertainty and anxiety around our global future -- sometimes infused by anger, denial or despair. The rise of youth involvement in issues of climate justice signals the importance of educational spaces as locations of action, awareness and dialogue. The purpose of this course is to engage undergraduate students and potential educators in considerations of, and practices for, supporting children and youth in learning about and responding to climate change realities in developmentally appropriate ways, particularly from a stance of social justice. Through readings, conversation, writing, interaction with teaching materials, and in engaging beyond the classroom, students will develop a critical understanding of climate justice, explore ways to engage children and youth in climate awareness and justice-centered projects, and work with local educators to observe and reflect upon real world climate justice education in action. Successful completion of the course requires a 10 hour commitment to community-based activities related to themes of the course.
This course focuses on the ways in which educators, politicians, and the public view the state of American schools. Broad philosophies of education guide an analysis of schools, which include historical lenses as well as the current literature on classroom reforms. This course contrasts central issues of schooling as seen from the "outside" political domain and the "inside" experience of students. In particular, the course addresses how issues of race and social class as well as economic inequality surround current debates over the best way to improve schools in the 21st century. This course is intended both for prospective teachers and for students interested in examining critically the policies that shape one of the key institutions in American society. Required for the Education Studies minor and for admission to the MAT program.
The central topic of this course is the ways teachers view learning, instruction, classroom organization, and motivation. This course takes a micro-analytical approach focusing on classroom interactions and how a teacher plans for a range of student interests, experiences, strengths, and needs. Students in the course consider 1) how the teacher inquiry cycle of planning, teaching, and reflecting supports teacher identity development and improves instruction, and 2) how the interactions between teachers and students, and amongst students, are located at the intersections of issues of knowledge, identity, and power.
This is the capstone course and culminating experience for the Education Studies minor. Participants should have completed most or all of their Education Studies coursework before enrolling. During the course, students work with a mentor teacher to examine instructional practice and student learning in a classroom setting. Students learn about action research, and develop a study in their school-based classroom, identifying relevant questions, collecting and analyzing data, and developing practical implications.
This course focuses on the ways in which educators, politicians, and the public view the state of American schools. Broad philosophies of education guide an analysis of schools, which include historical lenses as well as the current literature on classroom reforms. This course contrasts central issues of schooling as seen from the "outside" political domain and the "inside" experience of students. In particular, the course addresses how issues of race and social class as well as economic inequality surround current debates over the best way to improve schools in the 21st century. This course is intended both for prospective teachers and for students interested in examining critically the policies that shape one of the key institutions in American society. Required for the Education Studies minor and for admission to the MAT program.
The central topic of this course is the ways teachers view learning, instruction, classroom organization, and motivation. This course takes a micro-analytical approach focusing on classroom interactions and how a teacher plans for a range of student interests, experiences, strengths, and needs. Students in the course consider 1) how the teacher inquiry cycle of planning, teaching, and reflecting supports teacher identity development and improves instruction, and 2) how the interactions between teachers and students, and amongst students, are located at the intersections of issues of knowledge, identity, and power.
This school-based field experience accompanies the elementary and secondary curriculum and instruction courses. MAT students observe and participate in elementary and/or secondary classroom teaching and learning experiences.
This course aims to prepare secondary teacher candidates to better understand adolescent experiences within and beyond school, using a variety of critical lenses and perspectives. The course emphasizes engagement with diverse student communities, and seeks to interrogate common assumptions surrounding student abilities, motivations, and literacies. Participants work with adolescents throughout the term, engage readings, complete case studies, and work toward curriculum and instruction that more consciously includes every learner.
This masters project seminar uses reflective analysis to reconsider pedagogical dilemmas emerging from student teaching. In professional collaboration, students explore questions relating to culturally responsive teaching: What does it mean to be a culturally responsive and antiracist practitioner? How do my experiences and intersectional identities impact my cultural responsiveness? What actions can I take to interrogate my biases and social location and to contribute collaboratively to the ongoing work of equity? As a result of their exploration, students develop projects and consider implications and action steps for future practice.
This is the required introductory course for the Environmental Policy and Decision Making minor/major, an interdisciplinary program designed to help students integrate their major area of study with an understanding of how individual and collective decisions interact with the environment. The course uses approaches from the natural sciences, social sciences, and humanities to introduce the ways in which human social, political, economic, and cultural systems interact with systems in the non-human environment. The concept of "sustainability" is explored by considering the tension between the limiting principles in our world and competing human values over the question of what should be sustained for the future.
This course provides a basic introduction to environmental policymaking in the U.S. system of government, which includes the processes by which laws, rules and regulations, agency guidelines, court decisions, and international agreements are established. The course explores several major areas of environmental concern. For each area, the class considers the human environmental impacts of concern, the political and policy history causing and addressing the concern, the way in which the current policies in this area work at various levels of government, and the way in which new legal interpretations and other forms of policy change might develop. Special attention is given to the way in which policy affects local and regional environmental issues here in the Pacific Northwest. Field trips and guest speakers are often incorporated into this class.
Environmental justice can only occur with rich and complex understandings of the intersections of culture, ecology, politics, history, and community. This course seeks to understand the persistence of environmental racism in an inclusive and historicized landscape, one that considers multiple forms of knowledge and expertise and embodies the idea that imagining a more equitable, sustainable future is not possible without a grounded notion of the past and its present articulations. The course will use transdisciplinary perspectives to trace economic and environmental processes over time, situate them within rich cultural bodies of knowledge, and consider the differential impacts of inequalities on a range of regions and peoples. Students will undertake place-based case studies, examinations of broad patterns, commodity- and resource-specific process tracing, and engage with the surrounding human and natural environment. Consequently, this course demands a full critical engagement across disciplines and landscapes, and with each other and the local community.
This course focuses on the decision making processes that shape the implementation of environmental policy in the United States. Environmental decisions are no longer the exclusive province of technical experts employed by government bureaucracies. Pioneering efforts to involve groups of environmental stakeholders (such as environmental groups, property owners, business interests, tribes, and officials at all levels of government) in environmental decision making began 30 years ago. Now environmental decisions are often held to a legal and public expectation that deliberations will be public and participatory. Students in this course will develop an understanding of the institutions shaping these decisions, the theory behind various decision making approaches, the relative effectiveness of different approaches, and the skills needed to make decisions in these complex policy contexts. This class includes group work on case-based projects and policy simulations.
This course focuses on the management of water resources. More specifically, it addresses the tensions and interactions between hydrological principles, economics, and politics during water management decision making processes. This course challenges students to develop an understanding of the interrelationship between different disciplinary fields of knowledge, including those in the physical and social sciences. Students learn about a wide variety of natural processes that determine the distribution and quality of the world's freshwater resources. Students also learn about the many ways that freshwater resources are affected by human activities at a global, national and local scale.
Conserving wild places through the creation of national parks is not only a reflection of environmental priorities, but a profoundly political undertaking that can bring significant changes to local landscapes. This course examines the intersection of protected areas and political priorities in local, regional, and global context, including discussion of issues such as tourism, human-wildlife conflict, forced displacement, and community-based conservation.
Global climate change is considered by many to be the most significant environmental challenge of the 21st century. Unchecked, the continued accumulation of greenhouse gases over this century is projected to eventually warm the planet by about 6 to 14 °F, with associated impacts on the environment, economy, and society. This course explores the economic characteristics of the climate change problem, assesses national and international policy design and implementation issues, and provides a survey of the economic tools necessary to evaluate climate change policies. It is largely discussion-oriented and thus requires a high degree of participation by students in the classroom. Cross-listed as ECON/ENVP 327.
This course examines the history of the Cold War era nuclear testing and uranium extraction in the American West, in order to understand the environmental, cultural, political, and health ramifications of these activities. Using nuclear history as a case study, it explores interdisciplinary methodologies for gathering and studying narratives about human relationships with the environment.
This course combines a field-based learning opportunity in conservation and development with training in how to conduct research on environmental issues in diverse cultural contexts. This means students will gain exposure to both scientific and social scientific fieldwork on environmental issues at the intersection of conservation and development. The course will include classroom meetings and preparatory research prior to spending 2-3 weeks at a field site of the instructor's choosing.
This course examines the intersections of a Buddhist worldview with environmentalism, broadly understood. It asks what affitnities exist between the two, and what the implications of such affinities might be for engendering a sense of both place and engagement in environmental context. The course explores these intersections both philosophically and experientially, engaging with local nature and Buddhist practice, to deepen the possibilities of understanding shared ground between the two.
Investigating issues related to environmental policy and decision-making requires a varied toolkit of interdisciplinary research and analysis methodologies that can be applied at the community level. This course introduces students to major social science methodologies and explores their applicability for EPDM research, including: historical and archival research, folkloric and narrative analysis, community based participatory research, and cultural geography. Each student designs and implements their own community-based field research project, making use of at least two of the methods introduced in the course.
The course examines the intersection of environmental issues with politics and policy-making on a global as well as a local scale. It explores international structures and efforts to deal with environmental problems, a wide range of particular environmental challenges such as climate change and conservation, and the different experiences of individual countries in trying to use and manage their natural resources. Throughout, the relationships between political and natural systems are explored, with a particular focus on the ways in which politics and policy can both produce effective strategies and new difficulties for handling environmental challenges.
This course analyzes one current environmental issue from the perspectives of the sciences, the social sciences, and the humanities. Students collectively examine the case from different disciplinary perspectives in an attempt to understand issues in their full complexity. Students conduct an in-depth research project on issues and present their findings in an open forum. Students formulate their own problem-solving approach to environmental problems and recognize how their approach connects to the work of others.
Work experience related to an academic program in environmental studies. Actual placements are determined by mutual agreement between the student and program faculty.
Work experience related to an academic program in environmental studies. Actual placements are determined by mutual agreement between the student and program faculty.
This course serves as an introduction to global development and provides an overview of several problems associated with development and globalization. There are two themes that run throughout the course. First, what are the tradeoffs inherent to the process of industrialization, globalization, and economic growth? Second, what are the political, social, and economic challenges faced by low-income countries? In pursuing these two themes, this course will cover several topics related to development and globalization: the historical trajectory and meaning of the development idea; the role played by colonialism in shaping the contours of the contemporary world; the policy dimensions of development and globalization; the tradeoffs associated with the modernization of agriculture; the causes and consequences of the debt crisis; patterns of health and illness in low-income countries; the environmental impact of industrialization and growing global consumerism; and the challenges faced by women in low-income countries. Crosslisted as IPE/GDS 211.
This capstone course allows Global Development Studies (GDS) minors to consolidate their knowledge and engage in meaningful conversations about that knowledge with other students in the program. Students in this seminar undertake an in-depth examination of a specialized topic of interest within the field of global development. Working both as a class and in small groups through the semester, students are expected to research, write, and present a senior thesis.
This course examines a period of upheaval and transformation in European history. Its major themes are the rise of the modern state, the emergence of secular thought, and the development of a modern economy. In order to examine these themes, students evaluate different kinds of historical sources such as fiction, memoirs and images. Topics include the absolutist state, colonialism and slavery, the Enlightenment, diplomacy and warfare, and the French Revolution.
This course is a survey of European history from the end of the Napoleonic Wars to the present day. It examines the emergence of distinctively modern phenomena and trends such as mass politics, industrialization and urbanization, imperialism, modern diplomacy and warfare, middle-class culture and gender roles, and intellectual and cultural controversies. Using a wide range of sources, students examine different responses to modernity in Europe. Topics include Napoleon, the age of revolutions, imperialism, modern nationalism, feminism, the World Wars, and fascism and communism.
Far from being a stagnant "dark age," the early Middle Ages were a time of sweeping changes that reshaped the political map of Europe, the Mediterranean, and Middle East and encompassed the rise of vibrant new cultures. The course begins with the transformation of the Roman Empire in the fourth and fifth centuries before moving on to explore the distinctive trajectories of Rome's three heirs: the Latin West, Byzantine Empire, and Islamic caliphates. As we trace these cultures' histories from c. 300 to c. 1050, we engage with a wide range of textual, artistic, and archaeological sources, and enter into ongoing debates over the "fall" of Rome, the impact of the early Islamic conquests, the nature of "feudal" society, and the emergence of a concept of "Europe" in the age of Charlemagne, as we meet a cast of colorful historical characters including martyrs and missionaries, pagan chieftains and Viking raiders, Muslim scholars and Carolingian princesses.
This course traces the history of Europe and the wider Mediterranean world in the later medieval and early modern periods, using the framework of material culture. Students explore a range of material sources such as domestic objects, clothing, coins, weaponry, and architecture in conjunction with contemporary texts to reconstruct major historical developments of the eleventh to seventeenth centuries, as well as changing values, intercultural exchange, and habits of consumption within Europe, Byzantium, and the Islamic civilizations of the Near East. In the process students consider questions and possibilities raised by the recent material turn in the study of history and practice material history as a class through the in-depth analysis of objects in their original contexts.
This course explores the experiences and values of America's diverse peoples. Students in it not only expand their knowledge of events of American history but also deepen their understanding of the meaning of those events in people's lives. Students learn how the social categories of race, gender, and class affected individual Americans' identities and opportunities; how America's natural environment shaped and was shaped by Americans' human culture; and how Americans' idea and ideals both influenced and reflected their economic, political, and social institutions. To investigate these themes, students read writings by modern historians and analyze a wide variety of historical sources from the past. American Experiences I focuses on the period from European colonization through the end of Reconstruction.
This course explores the experiences and values of America's diverse peoples. Students in it not only expand their knowledge of the events of American history but also deepen their understanding of the meaning of those events in people's lives. Students learn how the social categories of race, gender and class affected individual Americans' identities and opportunities; how Americans' ideas and ideals both influenced and reflected their economic, political, and social institutions; and how Americans defined and re-defined national identity in the context of the nation's changing role in the world. To investigate these themes, students read writings by modern historians and analyze a wide variety of historical sources from the past. American Experiences II focuses on the period from the end of Reconstruction to the Present.
This course is designed to introduce prospective majors to the discipline and Department of History. In it, students learn what history is and how historians think and work. The course teaches students to do the two things that historians do: develop interpretations from primary sources and critically evaluate the interpretations advanced by other historians. Emphasis is placed on the methods and skills of reading, analyzing, discussing, and writing history. Reading assignments expose students to a variety of current approaches to history. Writing assignments give students practice in the types of historical writing that are expected of them in upper-division history courses. History 200 is intended to be taken in the sophomore year or as soon as a History major is declared. At least one prior course in History is desirable but not required. Students minoring in History or majoring in other disciplines are also welcome.
This course covers Russian Imperial state and society; revolutionary movements; causes of the 1905 and 1917 revolutions; Russian and Soviet political cultures; Soviet Union and totalitarianism; Russian and Soviet foreign policy; the collapse of communism and the Soviet empire; post-communist Russian society and politics.
This course surveys the history of England from the Roman conquest to the end of the Tudor dynasty, following England's rise from remote imperial backwater to incipient world power. We begin by reconstructing the successive invasions of the island by Romans, Anglo-Saxons, and Normans, and assessing the impact of these conquerors on the people, culture, and institutions of England. The course then explores the later medieval and early modern English world in depth, reconstructing the experiences of many different groups--women and men, peasants and aristocrats, Christians, Jews, and heretics--and tracking major historical developments like urbanization, the rise of representative institutions, and attempts to extend English rule into Wales, Ireland, Scotland, France, and beyond. The course reconstructs the experience of life in premodern England through a wide range of textual and non-textual sources, including archaeological finds, architecture, law-codes, letters, and poetry, while assignments allow students to hone their research, writing, and analytical skills.
This course examines major themes in Chinese history from early times to the Song, Yuan and Ming dynasties of the late imperial period. Topics to be covered include major political philosophies, the development of the imperial state, and encounters with foreign cultures.
This course examines the emergence of modern Japan from before the Meiji Restoration (1868), through the triumph and tragedy of imperial Japan, and beyond postwar reconstruction. The consideration of ideas, principles, and values that informed Tokugawa state and society and the study of Japan's selective absorption of European and American ideas and forms enable understanding of the role of values, both Japanese and non-Japanese, in Japan's national integration, rapid industrialization, and achievement of international recognition and power.
In recent years, the status of monuments and the ways the United States remembers its history in public have come under intense public scrutiny. Statues have been toppled and debates have erupted over the way history is taught and remembered in this country. At the same time, new and more inclusive histories have flourished that challenge whitewashed versions of American history. In this course, we explore how major events and topics in the broad sweep of U.S. history have been remembered, represented and contested, and what these reveal about who "we" are as a nation and as individuals with different identities. These may include: Indigenous histories and settler colonialism; the American Revolution; slavery; the Civil War, other wars and battlefields; LGBTQ histories; the histories of different ethnic communities; massacre sites and sites of gun violence; local, environmental and urban history; the Civil Rights Movement and other social and political movements. We will consider how power and narrative function in creating and curating histories, the relationship between history and memory, and the ways that memory and history have been both trivialized and weaponized. While actual monuments will be a focus of the course, we will also explore the memorialization of U.S. history in a number of other forms, such as murals and artistic representations; film, podcasts and public performances; and museums and public history sites. This course is not a history of the making of the United States. Instead, it invites students to participate in exploring how and why the history of the United States has been made in the ways it has been--and to participate in the always ongoing and contested remaking of that history.
This course explores the historical experiences of African Americans in the United States from the colonial period to the present. The class studies the diversity of experiences that have constituted African American life, exploring the lives of individual African Americans, while also looking at the development and evolution of African American communities, and the interactions of African Americans with other Americans. Because racism has played such a significant role in shaping African American lives, students also explore the construction of the concept of "race," the interrelationship of the political, cultural, social, and intellectual forces that have given meaning to that concept, and the ways African Americans have responded to it across time. The course texts include not only the writings of contemporary historians, but also the historical writings, speeches, and artistic productions of African Americans, with particular emphasis on autobiographies.
This course is a survey of the early period of Latin American history, from 1492 to 1826. It begins with an overview of the European background and the major indigenous civilizations in what Europeans came to call the New World. The central focus is on the encounter of indigenous and Iberian cultures and the process of conquest, resistance and mutual transformation that ensued over the next three centuries. Attention is also given to the social and economic structures and institutions of the colonies themselves, the development in some regions of plantation economies using slave labor from Africa, and the evolving relationship of Spanish America and Brazil to Europe, culminating in the wars of Independence.
Beginning with the transition from colonies to independent nations and ending with the political transitions and implementation of neo-liberal policies in the 1990s, this course considers the Latin American region from the perspective of its subordinate incorporation into the world economy, its struggles for democratic institutions and equitable development, and the formation of identities of class, gender, race, and ethnicity.
This course introduces students to the major events and trends of the past two centuries of African history and explores how those trends and events shaped the experiences of people across the continent. Major topics include the ending of the Atlantic Slave Trade, colonial incursion, cultural change, economic transformations, the rise of nationalism and the challenges of decolonialization. Students consider how ethnic, gender, religious, and other identities shaped individual Africans' experiences and make comparisons both regionally and in terms of Africa's relationship to the world. Readings include a variety of historical sources as well as the work of contemporary historians.
This course offers students a broad outline of political, economic and social developments in Africa; topics covered will include ancient trade between Africa and the Mediterranean region, the rise of the great medieval empires of Ghana and Mali, the creation of a distinctive Swahili Coast culture and the impact of slavery and slave trade upon African societies. Second, the course will introduce students to the specific tools used by historians in the study of early Africa. In evaluating how best to write the history of non-literate peoples, students will consider, among other possibilities, the use of historical linguistics, archaeology and oral traditions. They will assess the usefulness of Islamic and European sources for African history.
This course explores the great cultural revolution known as the Renaissance from a number of perspectives, considering new developments in the arts, political theory, historical awareness, material culture, science, and technology as interrelated phenomena. Rather than approaching the Renaissance as an exclusively European phenomenon, the course considers this movement as a product of interactions between different cultures across the Mediterranean and Asia, including the Mongol and Ottoman Empires, Mamluk sultanate, and Italian city-states, as well as between European and Indigenous peoples in the Americas.
This course examines the construction of gender in European contexts from Late Antiquity through the medieval and early modern period, addressing historical continuity and change in understandings of femininities, masculinities, and gender nonconformity, as well as in related ideas about sexuality, marriage, family, and romantic love. Students gain an understanding of how gender intersected with social, economic, political, educational, and religious structures in premodern Europe, and consider the merits of various historical approaches to gender. Special topics to be considered include: gendered concerns with virginity and celibacy; marriage and domestic life; reproductive health; the location of LGBTQI+ identities in premodernity; courtly love and its paradoxes; gender and labor in preindustrial economies; and the gendering of educational institutions.
The military campaigns that comprised the Crusades lasted only two centuries, but their impact on Europe and the Middle East was far more lasting, and the post-medieval legacy of the Crusades continues to be debated. This course focuses on European military expeditions to the Levant between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries, attempting to understand these events and their consequences from a number of perspectives through firsthand accounts by Eastern and Western Christians, as well as Muslims and Jews. We begin by considering the world from which the first crusaders came, paying special attention to the social, political, and spiritual hierarchies which shaped their undertaking. After reconstructing the First Crusade in detail, the course then considers the crusader states of the eastern Mediterranean as a lens through which to explore medieval ideas about religious difference, race, cultural assimilation, and tolerance, before tracing the expansion of the crusading project in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. We end by considering crusading's long-term consequences, and assessing modern appropriations of the Crusades in service of a range of political and religious agendas.
Modern people tend to think of the Reformation in strictly religious terms, as the movement that divided the medieval church into Catholic and Protestant camps. The scope of what are more properly termed Europe's Reformations was, in fact, much broader: Luther's initial attack on the Catholic Church in 1517 touched off a series of revolutions that divided states, rulers, and neighbors against one another and ultimately altered the balance of power across Europe. The teachings of both Protestant and Catholic reformers transformed civic life, introduced new models of citizenship and government, and forever changed the family lives of early modern Europeans. This course focuses on Northern Europe during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, paying special attention to the course of the Reformation in the German states, Swiss cantons, the Netherlands, France, and England.
This course addresses war as a major force in European history from the early Middle Ages to c.1500, with a special focus on Northwestern Europe. Taking a 'war and society' approach, the course focuses less on strategies, tactics, and generalship than on the ways in which war has shaped, and been shaped by, variables such as social and political hierarchies, gender roles, and religious belief. Students explore the relationship between war and social, cultural, political, and technological change, and attempt to reconstruct the experience of war for combatants and non-combatants. Specific topics to be considered include the role of warfare in shaping early medieval polities, the rise of a knightly class and related social developments, the culture of chivalry and martial display, and the advent of new, increasingly destructive methods of waging war in the later Middle Ages. Students complete a substantial research project in the second half of the semester.
This course examines the British Empire both as a political and economic institution and as a lived reality for millions of individuals of widely diverse backgrounds. It acquaints students with those broad economic, political, social, ecological and technological factors that permitted the Empire's rise (and those that led to its more recent decline). It also examines the interactions and experiences through which new identities and cultures were created, both in Britain and abroad. The course includes material on the Caribbean, India, Africa, Southeast Asia, Australia, and to a lesser extent, North America.
This course examines the works and times of prominent intellectual critics of modern European society. It centers on the texts of nineteenth-century writers, theorists, scientists and revolutionaries who formulated far-reaching analyses of and challenges to modern cultures, practices, values and economies. Special emphasis is placed on the generation of ideas and ideologies of the period, such as materialism, psychoanalysis and Marxism, and their application in culture and the arts. Cross-listed as HIST/HUM 317.
This course examines the experience of the Cold War in Europe when Europe was divided between opposing Soviet and American spheres of influence. Students examine the origins of a polarized Europe and the crises on both sides of the Iron Curtain that threatened to unravel it. While the course has a transnational approach, the main focus is on the experiences of Germany, France, and East-Central Europe (Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Hungary). Seminar discussions of primary and secondary texts allow students to evaluate recent interpretations of the Cold War in Europe. The course culminates with the researching and writing of a substantial research paper on a topic of the student's choosing.
This course examines the political development of the fifteen states that emerged from the Soviet Union after its collapse in 1991. It focuses on different Soviet Republics in the last decades of Soviet rule and then charts how they emerged from the communist system and created new political institutions and ideologies to bolster their independence. In order to grasp the cultural, national and religious diversity of the Soviet empire and the post-Soviet space, the course examines European areas, the Caucasus region, and Central Asia. Major themes include the attempts of post-Soviet peoples to overcome and reform the institutions, political habits, and economic structures inherited from the Soviet system, ethnic conflict in the post-imperial landscape, and the renewed role of Russia in post-Soviet territory and the geopolitics of the region.
This course examines dictatorial regimes that had an enormous destructive impact on Europe and the world in the twentieth century: Stalin's USSR, Hitler's Germany, and Mussolini's Italy. Using the comparative method, it addresses central issues in the histories of the three states that scholars have often grouped together under the concept of totalitarianism: the rise to power of political movements; the harnessing of the vast powers of the modern state for ideological projects such as racial empire and communist utopianism; explaining collaboration, conformity and resistance with secret police agencies; and the impact of dictatorships on culture, gender, and everyday life. Readings include scholarly works and primary source materials such as diaries, letters of denunciation, and fictional works.
The course examines the fascist regimes of Europe in the twentieth century, with a focus on Hitler's Germany and Mussolini's Italy. The first part of the course explores the origins of fascist movements in nationalism, World War One, colonial racism, anti-Semitism, and notions of masculinity. The course examines several questions that have occupied historians of these regimes: what allowed what were initially fringe political movements to take power? How did Nazi Germany construct a state based on pseudo-scientific racist ideology? What shaped the actions of both perpetrators and victims of state violence? To address these and other questions, the course involves analysis of a wide range of scholarly and primary sources such as memoirs, speeches and images.
This course examines the history of the activities of intelligence services, with a focus on Europe and North America from the end of WWI to the present day. In today's world, few figures fascinate us (or disgust us) as much as the spy, a figure whose profession poses difficult questions about truth and deception, morality and deviance, personal and national betrayal, and the power of the modern state. Beyond the popular cult of spies, however, espionage has played a crucial role in the shaping of the twentieth-century world in a number of ways: spurring the fighting (or avoidance) of wars, shaping diplomatic and military policies, propelling and exploiting technological advancements, and creating political and mass cultures.
An international spotlight has fallen on the Chinese justice system in recent years due to a series of high-profile trials, detentions, and imprisonments. The names and images of Nobel Laureate Liu Xiaobo, "Barefoot Lawyer" Chen Guangcheng, and Chongqing Party Secretary Bo Xilai have graced the cover pages of newspapers and magazines around the world, and their journeys have been fodder for extended discussions and debates over the current state of the Chinese legal system. This course examines the history of law, society, and justice in China from the early imperial era to the present. During the first part of the semester students explore the philosophical underpinnings of traditional Chinese law and the late imperial civil and criminal justice systems. The second part of the course examines the evolution of law during the Republican period as well as the legal system established during the Mao era. The course concludes by using a series of high-profile cases to unpack post-Mao legal reforms, matters of human rights, and the contemporary state of Chinese justice.
Twentieth-century China bore witness to a political revolution, a social revolution and a 'cultural' revolution. This course will explore the causes and characteristics of those revolutions, as well as the varying patterns of protest, revolt, and rebellion that have taken place in China since 1800. Topics to be covered include peasant revolts, the role of religion in rebellion and resistance to state authority, and forms of resistance and protest in contemporary China during the age of the internet.
This course examines women's history and gender relations in both traditional and modern East Asia. Themes explored include the constantly evolving roles of women in the family and as workers, artists, writers, and revolutionaries.
This course emphasizes the following themes: the things that divided Americans from one another and the things that united them in rebellion; the incidents and ideology that convinced colonists that the British king, parliament, and people were conspiring to deprive them of their liberty; the reasons that some Americans remained loyalists while others became rebels; the relationship between imperial constitutional crisis and domestic social crisis; the consequences of the Revolution for women, African Americans, and Native Americans; the implications of the daring experiment in establishing republican government; and the legacy of the Revolution for subsequent American history. The aim of the course is to answer this question: How revolutionary was the American Revolution?
This course explores the United States in the transformative period from the end of the Civil War to the beginning of World War One. Investigations will be focused on three important domestic issues of the period--the reconstruction of the nation and of the concept of race in the aftermath of the Civil War; the development of an industrialized economy and the attendant changes in Americans' lives; and the politics of reform that emerged repeatedly during these years as Americans fought over the nature of citizenship, freedom, and justice in a rapidly changing nation. Implicit in all of these topics is the growth of the United States into a world power. All of these topics have been dramatically reconceptualized by historians in recent years, and this course emphasizes the exploration of these recent trends in the historiography of the era, including for instance new work in the history of race, gender, class, culture, the environment, and transnational relationships, as well as efforts to employ multiple historiographical lenses in intersecting ways that reflect more accurately the complexity of the past. Students also have the chance to work with a wide range of primary sources, and to conduct their own research. The course facilitates students' understanding of their own world as they discover the roots of contemporary American life in the structures and lived experiences of this earlier period.
This course explores the political and cultural frontiers between Indian peoples and Euro-Americans from contact to the present. Students use documents, autobiography, ethnohistory, ethnography, film, and literature to examine Indian-white relations from a variety of viewpoints. The approach moves beyond a simple narrative of what happened to Indians to a more complex consideration of how Indians have made their own history and how that history has been presented and contested.
This course investigates American involvement in Southeast Asia, particularly Vietnam. The course focuses on the years of the Second Indochina War (1954-1975), with particular attention to the meaning and experience of American involvement for Americans. At the same time, the course places these core subjects in the context of a larger history, including the history of Southeast Asia before and after US involvement there and the legacies of the war for the United States and its citizens. Some of the issues the course explores include: Why did the United States first get involved in Vietnam? What led to the expansion of American involvement? Who were the nation's allies? Enemies? What motivated them in their struggles? What motivated Americans who supported the war? What motivated those who opposed it? What were the experiences of the men and women who served in Vietnam? What is PTSD and why has it been such a serious problem for some veterans of this war? Why did the United States withdraw from the war? What were the broader geo-political consequences of American involvement? Withdrawal? How does the war affect the United States today? The course also explores closely the role of values in shaping this war, as well as the clashes between values that were both causes and consequences of the war. Includes a substantial research paper.
This course explores catastrophes in the United States in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, using these uncommon occurrences as a window into American culture and its practices. Following a roughly chronological path, the course is organized around different kinds of catastrophes Americans have faced--ranging from floods and forest fires to epidemics, from state-sanctioned violence to domestic terrorism, from warfare to violent crime--and the historical themes and issues these moments of crisis revealed, and shaped. The course does not claim coverage of every disaster but seeks instead to expose students to the range of historiographical approaches employed in the study of catastrophe, and the multiplicity of issues they allow historians to explore.
The course explores the complex relationship between the natural world and human societies and cultures in what is now the United States, with an emphasis on environmental justice, race, gender, and capitalism. We consider both the power of nature in shaping human societies and cultures and in turn how those societies and cultures have constructed nature in ways that reflect their interests, values, visions, and divisions.
This course provides a broad overview of the history of migration in the United States from the colonial era to the present day. The course begins by analyzing the contours and historiography of migration. The opening sections of the class consider the role of forced migration, Indigenous people, borders, and the early republic in an effort to understand the parameters of migration and citizenship. After establishing these debates and perspectives, the course moves into a series of case studies that overlap with major political and legislative shifts in the history of citizenship and migration. The course looks at how ethnicity, class, religion, race, foreign policy, and other factors have shaped the migrant experiences of various groups.
This course explores the politics and culture of United States imperialism from the nation's founding until the first decades of the 20th century. Focusing on westward expansion and the projection of U.S. power into Asia and the Pacific, the course considers how the ideas and policies supporting expansion and military conquest were developed, expressed, manifested, and contested. It examines how various peoples have confronted U.S. colonialism, including Indians, Mexicans, Chinese, Hawaiians and Filipinos. It also examines the economic underpinnings of expansion, its environmental impact, and the racial ideas that paradoxically were used both to justify and to criticize imperialism.
This course focuses on "world histories" of the Pacific North American West -- a globally connected set of Pacific Rim places including the states of Washington, Oregon and California, along with Hawai'i, Alaska, British Columbia, Mexico and many Indigenous Nations. It explores the many worlds of the Pacific North American West being made, transformed, and struggled over: Indigenous worlds; the imperial world of American Manifest Destiny; the worlds migrants and immigrants made, with special attention to the transpacific experiences of those from Asia (including Chinese and Japanese Americans); gendered worlds; worlds shaken by capitalism and modernity; and the natural worlds of land, water and air.
This course examines the history of multi-ethnic empire in Central Europe from the end of the Napoleonic Wars to the aftermath of World War One. It examines the rise of nationalisms in the Hapsburg Empire or Austria-Hungary, with a focus on Czech, German, Hungarian, Polish and Ukrainian national identities, as well as Bosnian, Jewish and South Slavic peoples. The course asks why national identities became hegemonic and examines the advantages and disadvantages of multi-ethnic empire in the troubled modern history of the region.
This course focuses on the rise of consumer culture and the way the media have influenced the formation of the American identity since 1865. The class explores the cultural significance of mass circulation magazines, advertising, photography, radio, film, television, and the internet. Particular attention is paid to the cultural construction of race and gender. Several films are screened outside of regular class time.
This course explores the history of sports in the United States and uses that history as a lens for investigating and understanding more fully the range of issues with which that history intersects. To interrogate the history of sports is to situate our current practices in their historical context. We will explore issues such as the following: the historical origins of spectator sports; the impact of major transformations such as industrialization, immigration and the nation's growth into a world power in shaping sports and the athletics industry; the commercialization of athletics and the role of media; racialized, gendered and sexual exclusion and the fight for inclusion in athletics; the relationship between sports and understandings and practices of gender, sexuality, class, race, and ethnicity; the economics of athletics and the athlete as laborer; health and athletics; the contested role of the athlete in American public life and politics; the tension between athletics and academics at educational institutions. All of these are questions that will help us explore important dynamics in the American past and present.
This course is centered on the common historical heritage between the island of Cuba and its diasporic populations. Dating back to the birth of the Cuban independence movement, exile, migration, and displacement have been nearly permanent conditions of Cuban history. This course argues that there is not only a history of Cuba in Cuba but also a history Cuba that has played out in Florida, New York, Spain, Mexico, and a variety of other locations as diasporic communities have worked to shape both the Cuban republic and their adopted communities. This course looks at the interplay between events on the island and events in diasporic communities as a way of showing the profound and constant linkages between them. Along the way, the course explores how race, sexuality, citizenship, gender, culture, and a variety of other factors have shaped this shared history.
This course provides an overview of the history of peoples of Latin American descent in the United States. The course begins with an analysis of Latinx people as a historical group. From there, the course largely moves chronologically and shows the various ways in which Latinx people have shaped their own communities and the nation. Special attention will be paid to civil rights history, community history, and the social and cultural history of Latinx people.
This course introduces students to the theoretical and practical aspects of public history, using the city of Tacoma as its subject. The course begins by examining the underpinnings and guiding practices that define public history. We examine (and sometimes visit) museums, community archives, historical societies and other groups to gain an understanding of the breadth of public history work. The second section of the course looks at the history of Tacoma with special attention paid to the ethnic and racial groups that have defined much of its modern history. In this section, we also consider the presences and silences of this history in present-day Tacoma. The last third of the course centers on the creation of an original, collaborative public history project relating to Tacoma history.
This course traces the emergence of modern Mexico since its 1910 revolution. It begins with attempts at economic modernization and political centralization in the late nineteenth century, considers the social upheaval of the Revolution and the consolidation of the post-revolutionary regime by 1940. A second section follows the rise and demise of the "Mexican Miracle" of growth and stability from 1940 to 1982 in the context of the Cold War. A final section considers Mexico's neo-liberal trade and investment reforms culminating in NAFTA, along with the contradictory structures of migration, drug flows, in-bond industry in northern Mexico and militarization of the US southern border.
In 1915 filmmaker D.W. Griffith predicted that "moving pictures" would soon replace book writing as the principal way to communicate knowledge about the past. Both historical writing and movies have at various times made parallel promises to objectively convey past realities. But just as historians have questioned the objectivity of the written word, one might also ask "how real is reel?" This course explores the relationship between film and historical interpretation and understanding. It considers how films produced in the U.S. and Latin America interpret Latin American history, and how they can be used to understand Latin America's past. Besides viewing and discussing around ten films throughout the semester, the class also reads a series of related historical texts, both as a point of interpretive comparison for the films, and as a point of reflection on the possibilities and limits of the academia-bound historian's primary medium.
Revolutions, according to H.L. Mencken, are the "sex of politics." They offer an opportunity to glimpse social and political life in their rawest and most revealing forms. The goal of most twentieth-century Latin American revolutions has been national development, defined economically, politically, and culturally. This course explores the revolutions of Mexico, Cuba, and Nicaragua in terms of their causes, the process of revolution, and the consequences of revolution for politics, society, and culture. It also considers the foreign policy of the United States toward revolutionaries and revolutionary governments. Sources include historical narrative, testimony, novels, and film.
The region referred to as the U.S.-Mexico borderlands has been the subject of wide-ranging popular and scholarly treatment, especially focusing on politics, cultural contact, economic exchange, and violence. Readings cover examples of how the geo-political boundary and socio-cultural space encompassed by the region have produced persistent debate about identity formation, the fluidity of the border, and the inability of governments to restrict the movement of peoples and goods. Through close reading of primary and secondary sources, students explore several questions throughout the semester: How are "borderlands" defined? What role do the historical shifts in political boundaries that have occurred along the U.S.-Mexico border play in defining the geographical limits of "borderlands"? What are the origins of cross-border violence, and how have official approaches to dealing with this violence changed over time? How does the historiography on borderlands contribute to an understanding of the causes of, and popular and official reactions to, the Drug Wars currently underway? This seminar provides students with a general understanding of the scholarship and theoretical foundation of U.S.-Mexican borderlands history.
Scholars have recently embraced a turn towards "transnationalism"--an approach to the study of the movement of goods, people, and information beyond state boundaries--as a framework or set of theoretical and methodological approaches for understanding Latin America as a distinct world region. This course considers a variety of topics including environmental issues, the Cold War, the drug trade, border politics, religion, economic development, the persistence of social inequality in the region, the persistence of regional identities and loyalties, forms of political activism and the "failures" of radical politics in the context of neoliberalism.
Nelson Mandela has become an international symbol of South Africa's twentieth-century tragedies and triumphs, and for good reason; his experience touches on many of the major themes in that country's recent history. This course uses Mandela's autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, as a starting point for exploring the history and historiography of South Africa. Major topics include rural life and the peasant experience, "tribalism" and the significance of tradition, urbanization and industrialization, the development of apartheid and anti-apartheid ideologies, and the implementation of democratic governance. Students consider the benefits and challenges of using autobiographies as historical sources, analyzing Mandela's account in the context of other South Africans' experiences .
How did colonialism shape ideas of gender for both Africans and Europeans? How did concerns about gender shape colonial policies and Africans' responses to those policies? How did the gendered nature of work shift after colonization? How could the performance of gender both uphold and subvert colonial power? Students will approach these questions through a variety of analytical lenses, and work collaboratively to explore different kinds of historical evidence around questions of gender.
Half of all Africans identify themselves as Christian, but their interpretations of Christianity vary dramatically. Some follow the ancient traditions of Ethiopia and Egypt, while others embrace new and radical forms of Pentecostalism. This course offers a narrative of Christianity in Africa from the 4th century AD to the present, with a particular emphasis on the ways both Africans and Europeans spread Christianity. The course seeks to use Christian belief and practice as a window into issues of power, gender, colonialism, nationalism and identity. A major focus is the motivations behind African conversions and the ways in which Africans adapted Christianity to their own changing circumstances.
This course seeks to introduce students to the debates surrounding the history of slavery in Africa. Did slavery in Africa predate the Atlantic Slave Trade? What impact did the Atlantic Slave Trade have on African communities? How did the Atlantic Slave Trade compare to other slave trades within and out of Africa? How were slavery and slave trading related to European colonial claims in Africa in the 19th century? These questions are addressed using both primary source material and scholarly arguments from historians, anthropologists and sociologists. While the course considers only in passing the contours of slavery in the Western Hemisphere, it aims to situate Africa and Africans within larger global narratives of violence, trade, and modernity.
This course is an advanced seminar in which students explore the historiography on a particular issue, topics, or field in the discipline. Students read recent works. Students discuss and evaluate cutting edge scholarship on the topic. In this reading intensive course, emphasis is placed on discussion and the growth of students as members of the community of historians.
This course is a practicum in the methods and techniques of historical research and writing. Students undertake independent research in primary source materials and complete an advanced research paper. Research topics may relate to any area of history covered by department faculty, and are defined through consultation with the instructor in a process which ideally begins before the start of the course.
Throughout the world, societies, markets, and governments are in upheaval. Some would even argue that we are on the brink of a new world order. So how do we understand the current historical moment? How are nation-states being remade in the face of the hyper-mobility of capital? Are global corporations the new arbiters of rule? What is the fate of global cooperation in an era of growing nationalism? How are emerging economies and global social movements challenging the terms of the globalization debate? How are power and wealth distributed between and within nations? International Political Economy engages students to understand how the relationship between states, markets and civil society on a global stage affect issues like poverty, inequality, unemployment, security, and climate change.
This course trains students in the modern International Political Economy analysis of the battle between the winners and losers of economic globalization. The first part of the course focuses on political economy approaches to international trade issues, including discussions of trade policy in rich and poor countries, the role of government in assisting displaced workers, the regulation of labor standards, and the politics of multinational corporations. The second part of the course provides students with a well-rounded understanding of the political, economic and social aspects of the international financial system and financial crises.
This course serves as an introduction to global development and provides an overview of several problems associated with development and globalization. There are two themes that run throughout the course. First, what are the tradeoffs inherent to the process of industrialization, globalization, and economic growth? Second, what are the political, social, and economic challenges faced by low-income countries? In pursuing these two themes, this course will cover several topics related to development and globalization: the historical trajectory and meaning of the development idea; the role played by colonialism in shaping the contours of the contemporary world; the policy dimensions of development and globalization; the tradeoffs associated with the modernization of agriculture; the causes and consequences of the debt crisis; patterns of health and illness in low-income countries; the environmental impact of industrialization and growing global consumerism; and the challenges faced by women in low-income countries. Crosslisted as IPE/GDS 211.
This course combines Economic and IPE approaches to understand and compare different governments' choices to influence markets and how those choices affect incentives and the behavior of economic agents (consumers, suppliers, laborers, employers, policymakers, etc.) in markets which are "misbehaving". In one way or the other, the markets considered in this class do not meet the economic goals of efficiency, equity, stability, or growth, requiring government action. This action, however, often creates distortions of its own. By considering nations' differing approaches to common problems, the successes and failures of government policy can be evaluated. The purpose of this course is to identify the need for market intervention, apply and evaluate policies which seek to achieve national goals, and identify optimal government action in the context of both economic, political, and cultural realities. Policy areas considered include healthcare, environmental protection, education, taxation, and equity.
This course examines theoretical explanations of international political economy relationships and events. Students become acquainted with important theoretical debates and research methods used to answer questions in IPE. Students identify and research questions suitable for the senior thesis.
This course studies the interaction between states, markets and civil society, in the fight against global poverty. More precisely it analyzes the roles of Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), Corporations and social entrepreneurs. The course addresses a number of issues: What do NGOs do and how do they finance their operations? Can multinational corporations play a role in the fight against global poverty, and if so, how? How can we make sense of so-called 'social enterprise'? What is the role of the state in regulating and encouraging private solutions to poverty? Are these private solutions further proof of economic liberal dominance or a move toward a new form of capitalism tailored to serve social needs?
In the contemporary world, tourism is often the foremost process that brings together people from different parts of the world, allowing those from vastly different societies to interact on a face-to-face basis under peaceful, if not always equal, circumstances. As such, tourism as a phenomenon and as a process raises questions about global interconnections and global movements of finance, cultural and material artifacts, ideas, and people across national and cultural boundaries. The two questions this course addresses throughout the semester are 1) what are the economic, political, social, cultural, and environmental impacts of tourism in low and middle income countries? and 2) what are the tradeoffs associated with tourism? In tackling these two questions the course examines a wide range of issues, including the political, economic, social, and cultural implications of tourism, the impact of global tourism on environmental and global conservation efforts, and tourism as a vehicle of social change and as a facilitator of cultural and material globalization. Crosslisted as IPE/SOAN 323.
Everyone eats, and therefore everyone has a relationship to global agriculture. But because less than one percent of the US population earns a living from farming, most Americans rarely think about where our food comes from. This course explores the origins of our current global food system, the political-economic relations that structure it, and emerging alternatives to industrial food. The course begins with an overview of the global food system, including the actors and ideas that have shaped its historical development. Second, students examine the dominant paradigm of industrial agriculture and the politics of its organization primarily in the US context. Finally, students discuss some of the most prescient debates over the future of our food system with a focus on the local context. Note: this course includes a required weekly three-hour experiential session in addition to regular class sessions. This experiential session provides students the opportunity for hands-on learning through field trips, volunteering, and community-based projects. Students use class materials to bring an analytical lens to these experiences, and the course culminates in a major research project and presentation that engages local community gardeners.
This course serves as an overview of the political, economic, social, and cultural processes shaping the region known as Southeast Asia. This course utilizes a range of disciplinary approaches in order to illustrate patterns of change in the Southeast Asian context. Throughout, the course integrates discussion of theoretical issues with examples from around Southeast Asia. By applying theoretical material to specific countries and real-world examples, the class explores the ways in which broad perspectives intersect with economic, political, and social issues to shape the nature and direction of change in Southeast Asia.
The base of the pyramid (BOP) refers to the billions of people living on very low incomes ($2-4 per day). Currently, various approaches exist as to how best to align business activity with the needs and potential of this segment of the global population. Those at the BOP can be seen as a large untapped market of demanding consumers, as creative entrepreneurs, as business partners, and as innovators. This course examines the various BOP perspectives to need satisfaction, poverty alleviation, and economic growth through business activity. The focus is on emerging business models that address individual and social needs in an innovative, profitable, sustainable, and socially-responsible manner. This course integrates concepts of development economics, international business, and strategy. Cross-listed as BUS/IPE 361.
In 2008 the United Nations announced that for the first time in human history, more than half of the world's population lived in cities. In 2016, POLITICO published the headline "Revenge of the Rural Voter" in an attempt to explain the dramatic right turn in US electoral politics. In the wake of that election, rural America is in the spotlight as (largely) urban scholars and pundits attempt to explain the dynamics of rural places to a (largely) urban audience. So, what might they be missing? While urbanization shows no signs of slowing, it more important than ever to study and understand rural places. Although fewer and fewer of us claim rural places as our home, these communities play a crucial role in natural resource management, energy development, agriculture, cultural and historic preservation, global social movements, and domestic politics. This course will examine the political, economic, and social significance of rural communities in an increasingly metropolitan world. Students will be introduced to the discipline of rural social science, and will gain a complex and nuanced understanding of the dynamics of rural communities from a global perspective.
This course examines the efforts of states in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) to adapt to the international political economy. It examines and assesses the constraints and opportunities states face and how they have tried to reshape their political and economic institutions. Attention is paid to relationships that exist between the state, business, labor, civil society, international capital, and foreign governments. Topics include the relationship of economic reform to democratization, regional integration, religious radicalism, and corruption and illicit transactions.
This course examines patterns of illicit activity in the global economy. A political economy approach is used to understand reasons why illicit behavior occurs, how it occurs, and who the relevant actors are. Attention is focused on production and distribution of commodities, especially those that originate in developing countries. Commodities are broadly defined to include drugs, money, guns, people, diamonds, oil, timber, and intellectual property. The course concludes with a discussion of efforts by states and multilateral institutions to combat illicit transnational activity.
Exploring the Chinese Economy analyzes the economic, political, and social facets of the Chinese economy and their relationships with globalization. First, we discuss China's transition to a market economy and its rise as a global economic power. This includes the role of state and market actors, labor, and the rural-urban divide. Second, students think critically about the role of education and technology in the Chinese economy, including universities, the internet, and social media. Third, we investigate China's place in the global economy, including international trade, foreign investment, the battles of global brands for the Chinese consumer market, and environmental issues. The field school portion of this course will take place between June and August. It will consist of a full time, 8-week internship in Beijing, and weekly cultural activities. Students will be immersed in the Chinese economy, experiencing it as interns, commuters, consumers, and foreigners exploring a new culture. Participation in the field school, including completion of an internship, field notes, and a final video project, is required to pass the course. The instructor will be present for the first three weeks of the field school to meet regularly with students and to ensure that students are settled into their internships.
Rigorous examination of topics of current interest in International Political Economy. This course is designed to allow students to participate in focused discussion and thoughtful analysis of a number of topics in IPE while they research and write their senior theses.
Political ecology is an active interdisciplinary framework with foundations in anthropology, geography, environmental studies and the biological sciences. Its central contention is that our understanding of environmental issues and environmental change must include an analysis of the social, political, economic, and cultural context in which they are produced. Through a set of advanced readings in the social sciences, students in this course become familiar with the genealogy of this interdisciplinary approach, the keystone texts that inform contemporary political/ecological work, and the new directions that comprise the cutting edge of political ecology. Recurring themes in the reading list will examine indigenous peoples' struggle over resources, the construction of nature through the capitalist lens, and an examination of sustainability in both discourse and practice. Students conduct original ethnographic research that builds upon these areas of interest.
Advanced coursework in anthropology, sociology, and/or international political economy is strongly recommended.
This scheduled weekly interdisciplinary seminar provides the context to reflect on concrete experiences at an off-campus internship site and to link these experiences to academic study relating to the political, psychological, social, economic and intellectual forces that shape our views on work and its meaning. The aim is to integrate study in the liberal arts with issues and themes surrounding the pursuit of a creative, productive, and satisfying professional life. Students receive 1.0 unit of academic credit for the academic work that augments their concurrent internship fieldwork. This course is not applicable to the Upper-Division Graduation Requirement. Only 1.0 unit may be assigned to an individual internship and no more than 2.0 units of internship credit, or internship credit in combination with co-operative education credit, may be applied to an undergraduate degree.
This course introduces students to the institutions and processes of U. S. politics. It covers all of the fundamental principles and important decisionmakers, giving to students the necessary breadth and understanding to take more advanced and more specialized courses. In addition, it prepares students to evaluate the guiding values of the polity, both in theory and in practice.
How do we understand the fall of Apartheid in South Africa, the rise of Islamic Fundamentalism in Iran, the troubles of Russia's post-Communist regime, and China's attempt to blend communism with capitalism? This course provides students with the tools to understand these and other questions about how politics works around the globe. The study of comparative politics focuses on the basic foundations of political life and how these institutions differ in form and power around the world. This introductory course deals with such central concepts as nation and state, citizenship and ethnicity, political ideology, religious fundamentalism, revolution, terrorism and political violence, the relationship between politics and markets, democracy and authoritarianism, electoral systems and different forms of representation, development and globalization. These concepts are investigated through a number of country case studies, which may include the United Kingdom, Japan, Russia, China, Iran, India and South Africa, among others.
What are the causes of war between states? What conditions help make peace more likely? Is the international distribution of economic assets just? Why is it so difficult to increase the amount of cooperation between states? What role can non-states actors play in international politics? These are just some of the questions considered in this course. By focusing on the interaction of contemporary and historical international actors--including states, intergovernmental organizations, and non-governmental organizations--this course examines the interplay of political, economic, social, and cultural factors that influence the international distribution of power and wealth and contribute to world conflict and cooperation. Specific areas of study include causes of interstate war, terrorism, economic globalization, and international law and organizations.
This course is designed to provide an introduction to the enduring masters of political thought (Plato, Locke, Hobbes, Machiavelli, Marx) who enhance our understanding of the political order and its values by asking questions with clarity and determination.
This course is an introduction to the construction of knowledge in the social sciences, and in political science particularly. In the first half of the course, students study the tools and methods used in political science. Students explore the connections between normative and empirical claims, uses of evidence, and theory building and testing. They ask how theoretical ideas are generated and how they inform the world around them (both explicitly and implicitly). In the second half of the course, they focus on the concept of power, central to any study of politics, to ask: how do actors use claims, theories, and data to reinforce or subvert dominant power structures? This class provides students the tools and perspective to become more thoughtful interlocutors and more critical consumers of information by helping them better understand the process(es) of knowledge construction. This is a required course for the major.
Race is central to understanding American politics.This course asks the questions: what does race mean; how has it changed over time; what is the relationship between race and ethnicity and power; and what is the role of race in American politics. This course examines these questions by looking at a variety of historical and contemporary moments, and a variety of political forces including electoral politics, social movements, government institutions, and everyday politics. By the end of this course, students should be able to talk critically about the evolution of the concept of race in America, identify how race shapes our political language and outcomes, and evaluate contemporary racial politics.
This class focuses on environmental policy making and policy in the United States, emphasizing developments since the emergence of the modern environmental movement in the late 1960s. It offers an overview of environmental policymaking institutions and the key policies of the national and state governments, and explores the challenges that have come with the emergence of new issues and interests in the environmental policy field. The class gives special attention to the strengths and weaknesses of current policies and the prospects for significant reform of the "green state."
Immigration politics and policy define the nation, its borders, its community, and its identity. Through an exploration of the political history of immigration, students gain insight into the reconstruction of American identity. The class looks at the rhetoric, the movements, the institutions, and the actors central to the politics of immigration to understand the current system and future political possibilities. Specific policy issues such as refugee and asylum policy, border enforcement, immigration detention, and birthright citizenship are considered.
This course explores many visions of the corruption of the American republic, exploring concerns grounded in the liberal and civic republican and constitutional traditions, commitments to and deviations from the core commitments of the American 'creed,' religious values, pluralism, the partisan and ideological 'spirit of faction,' and the abandonment of the hope that, to borrow from Richard Rorty (through James Baldwin), we can 'achieve' a country. The reading list includes books that engage broad themes in American politics and American political development, and this course exposes students to those themes while working through the multifaceted meanings of corruption, and the political consequences of these perceptions of corruption.
This course focuses on the US presidency. In the first part of the course students read two great books on the presidency and the American political system, Richard Neustadt's "Presidential Power" and Stephen Skowronek's "The Politics Presidents Make" as tools for understanding the evolution of the presidency as an institution and its relationship to the larger constitutional system. In the second half of the course students trace the growth of presidential power over the course of US history, focusing on executive management of the bureaucratic state and control of foreign affairs, and consider the implications of this development for the republic.
The course focuses on the historical development of the legislative and executive branches, focusing on the interactions between Congress and presidents in policy making process. Some offerings of the course focus heavily on the presidency, and others are more focused on Congress; recent offerings have used a single presidency as a long case study of problems in presidential leadership and the workings of the legislative and executive branches. Prospective students may wish to consult the instructor.
Detention is one of the most extreme forms of state control. This class explores the theoretical justifications for state detention, the effectiveness of this policy tool, the politics that lead to its use and acceptance, and the impacts of detention, both on the individual and various communities. Looking at the variation across three policy areas, criminal justice, the war on terror, and immigration, highlights what forces are at work on all three and what pulls the practices of detention in different directions, providing leverage on questions of justice, the balance of power, and the role of identity in public policy formation.
In a government based on "consent of the governed," elections are fundamental. They provide citizens with the opportunity to choose their leaders, and in the process pass judgment on the past performance of officials and broadly indicate the direction they want government to take in the future. This course approaches the study of parties, elections, and campaigns through the lens of presidential and congressional elections, focusing on the purpose, process, and problems of electing our nation's leaders. It looks at how the system works, how it came to be, what citizens want it to accomplish and what it in fact accomplishes, and what the possibilities and limits of reform may be. At the end of the course, students should be able to give an in-depth, well reasoned, and historically informed answer to the question, "Is this any way to run a democracy?"
Examination of the role of the Supreme Court in the American constitutional systems with particular emphasis on its role in establishing a national government and national economy, and in protecting the rights of individuals. Views Supreme Court from historical, political, and legal perspectives to understand its responses to changing interests and conditions.
There is widespread pessimism about the performance of American national government over the last 35 years. This course examines this gloomy conventional wisdom, exploring its analytical and ideological roots and its critique of American political institutions and public policy. The class then interrogates it, first by examining contrary arguments and evidence and then in a series of student-led case studies of government performance in specific policy areas. Students produce major term papers that assess the successes and failures of some public policy. The course aims at helping students to come to grips with the complexities of policymaking, the strengths and weaknesses of national governmental institutions, and the extent to which the pessimism that marks so much of contemporary political discourse is justified.
This course introduces students to the nature, functions, and processes of law. The course surveys criminal and civil trials in the U.S., England, and France, appellate deliberations in several countries, constitutional courts and public law, and specific extra-judicial legal institutions. The latter third of the course details lessons of the first two-thirds by case study of litigation in the United States.
The course surveys the state of civil liberties in the U.S. and the world. Primary emphasis is given to institutions in the United States and how they enforce, obstruct, or affect the protection of civil liberties. Specific topics include free expression, free belief, freedom of religion, and emerging rights and claims.
This course focuses on social welfare policy in the United States. The first section of the course explores ideological debates over the welfare state, theories of welfare state development, and the historical development of the U.S. welfare state in comparative perspective. The middle section of the course explores arguments about challenges to political order created by market dynamics, the question of American exceptionalism, and the intersections of race, gender, and welfare in American political development. Then, we focus on core welfare state policies aimed at addressing problems of unemployment, poverty, access to health care, and old age security. The final section addresses questions about the sustainability of the welfare state, in practical, fiscal as well as ideological terms.
This course introduces students to the theory and practice of research about public opinion. Students learn about the creation and manipulation of public opinion, its measurement and study, and the implications of findings for the practice of democratic republicanism in the U.S. and abroad. Instruction includes projects in survey research and content analysis, so that students master the techniques of public opinion research as well as the theories.
This course in American politics focuses on key questions about local governance. Students explore institutional structure, civic engagement, local economics, and demographics to understand how decisions are made, power is wielded, and community needs are met. Students interact with local practitioners. Students could engage in sustained field work throughout the term.
What is the relationship between government institutions and the U.S. economy? How have moments of crisis forged the economic and political reality of America today? This course begins with a critical examination of capitalism and the free market before turning to the issues of globalization and deindustrialization. Together, students will tackle questions regarding what can and should be done about the crisis of poverty and income inequality in the United States.
Why authoritarianism? This course looks at non-democratic forms of political rule, investigating the rise, persistence, and decline of authoritarianism around the world. The course will consider ideological, institutional, international and other factors, drawing from historical as well as contemporary cases. In addition to understanding authoritarianism, we will consider the emergence of illiberalism as a newer tendency in democratic politics, and its possible relationship to democratic decline and collapse. Students will be encouraged to focus on their own particular regions of interest in order to broaden our comparative focus and discussion.
Why are the world's most successful examples of economic and political modernization of the last 50 years all located in Asia? Is the explanation Confucian culture? Japanese imperialism? American aid? Or is it something about the domestic political institutions? And what are the trade-offs of these institutions? This course employs the tools of comparative political economy to analyze eight Asian cases in seeking answers to these questions.
This course offers an intellectual history of the evolution of the interdisciplinary research program concerned with issues of economic development, exploitation and political change. Working in the field of comparative political economy, students examine the classical theories of eighteenth and nineteenth century political economy and political sociology (Smith, Marx, Spencer, Durkheim, Weber), post-WWII neo-classical theories of modernization and development, and theoretical approaches at the global level in the wake of the collapse of the dominant modernization paradigm. Students apply these theories to contemporary puzzles of development, underdevelopment and political change and address broader issues of the growth of knowledge in the social sciences.
How do emerging democracies confront violent pasts while constructing the political institutions for a stable future? Does the need to heal society outweigh individuals' claims to justice for human rights abuses? In this course students examine the choices post-conflict societies have made and continue to confront throughout Latin America. The region has often been characterized by civil war, autocratic government, and grave human rights violations. At the same time, Latin America has emerged as an innovator of institutional forms that have allowed states to confront violence, seek justice, and transition to democracy--a broad array of institutions known collectively as "transitional justice" mechanisms. In the first half of the course students explore the process through which societies in Latin America have sought to come to terms with violent pasts with a focus on specific country case studies. We situate these individual cases in a broader exploration of transitional justice mechanisms, from criminal prosecutions of past leaders to truth commissions that trade amnesty for information. In the second half of the course students will apply these concepts to an in-depth simulation of peace negotiations. Students will represent the interests of a specific political stakeholder while negotiating the form and functioning of transitional justice institutions that might put the country on a path toward peace, justice, and reconciliation.
The roots and extent of America's involvement in world affairs; ideological, institutional, and strategic factors shaping U.S. foreign policy since WWII. America's responsibility and influence on global conditions. Approaches to analyzing American foreign policy.
This course examines the creation, function, and influence of international organizations in global governance. We explore why states join institutions that may limit their sovereignty and how these organizations can impact state behavior. Through theories, case studies, and simulations, students critically analyze power dynamics within global institutions like the UN and WTO, and in regional bodies like the EU and ASEAN. The course encourages reflection on how international organizations shape and are shaped by power structures, considering whose interests are served and how marginalized voices are represented in--or excluded from--the institutions that "run the world."
This course examines the configuration of word politics and how claims of individual and group rights challenge the current global framework. Students examine the role of the state as a meaningful purveyor of rights and material goods. They also analyze and critique alternative approaches to organizing human populations in an increasingly globalized world. It is easy to say that the world's poor deserve a better material existence. It is much more difficult to determine where the duty to provide resources lies, and how individuals, states, and organizations might achieve better outcomes. Students examine these issues from the perspective of states, international organizations, and non-governmental entities.
This course explores evolving threats to global peace and stability in the post-Cold War era. The class tests the efficacy of traditional theories about international conflict through the examination of a number of contemporary security problems. Attention focuses on issues that are persistent, politically explosive, and global in scope, such as nationalism, migration, and environmental problems. All have potential for generating violent conflict in the world today.
This course examines the causes of and means of preventing terrorism and other forms of political violence. Students will consider definitions of terrorism and what separates terrorism from other kinds of violence. Why do some political groups turn to violence while others try to affect change through the political system? We will explore the similarities and differences between different violent groups, such as al Qaeda, the Islamic State, and White extremists. Why and how do groups use violence to achieve their goals? How does the internet and social media facilitate recruiting? And how is political violence best addressed by the state? We will engage these and other questions as the class focuses on understanding and preventing terrorism and political violence.
This course examines the current relationship between the United States and Canada. After a brief overview of U.S. and Canadian political institutions, and initial efforts to distinguish American and Canadian political culture, this course then focuses on contemporary issues in the complex political, economic and social relationship between the two states.
The course examines the constitutional law of U.S. national security policy. It explores classic constitutional issues, such as separation of powers, war powers of the President and Congress, intelligence operations, and treaty-making, as well as contemporary policy issues, such as domestic wiretapping, and the internment and trial of suspected terrorists.
Empires have existed since the pre-modern era, and until the mid-twentieth century imperial states were the dominant form of government. Today, no state refers to itself as an empire--yet the term is still widely used. Some call modern American foreign policy "imperialist." Other react that American power is a stabilizing force. The purpose of this course is to examine critically the meaning of the term "empire." What do empires have in common? What are the political causes of empire, and what are its effects on the colonizer and the colonized? What are the common attributes of this form of governance across time and space? Is economic dominance without political conquest "imperial" in any meaningful sense of the word? If the United States has an empire, what exactly does this mean? Do American interactions with other peoples reflect earlier patterns of imperial dominance, or do users of the term "empire" (perhaps willfully) mischaracterize the phenomenon of benign American hegemony? Students attempt to answer these questions through critical examination of historical forms of empire and contemporary accounts of American political and economic policy. Students should complete PG 103 and have a basic familiarity with international relations theory and social science methodologies prior to taking the course.
This course examines ancient Athenian political philosophy and applies the questions raised in those texts to contemporary political challenges. In light of the ideas, words, and deeds of thinkers from ancient Greece, students ask themselves: 'how shall we live, and what shall we do in our time?' Thinkers studied typically include Homer, Thucydides, Aristotle, and Plato. The course also explores Greek satire and tragedy.
What is the relationship between sex and the state? When--and to what ends--does the state regulate sexuality and gender? In this course, students will explore feminist, trans, and queer critiques of the state and consider how those critiques align or misalign with white supremacist, abolitionist, and anti-capitalist critiques of the state. Together, we will learn about U.S. values, laws, economic relations, and technologies, and we will ask how, both historically and currently, the regulation of sex (both as sexuality and as biological sex) is used to preserve the power of the U.S. state.
This seminar explores recent trends in the field of political theory. Contemporary political theory focuses predominantly on new thinking related to justice, identity and democracy. Theories of distributive justice (developed by John Rawls) or communicative action (offered by Jürgen Habermas) often serve as a starting point the reconsideration of political community central to contemporary political theory. In the process of questioning the boundaries of modern political community, the inclusiveness of democracy, or the fairness of justice, political thinkers have moved beyond institutional definitions of politics and democracy. Rather, the subject (in all its forms: political, cultural, or social) and language have emerged as important points through which to understand "the political." As a result, this seminar addresses the politics of identity reflective of race, class, sexuality, gender, or location at work in the formation of democratic community and practice. Recent theories with this attention toward identity at their foundation have suggested new ways to think about democracy by emphasizing deliberation, new forms of citizenship, plurality, and a dissociation of democracy from the nation-state. Issues at the transitional level also closely related to these questions of democracy, including nationalism, immigration, colonialism, and post-colonial politics, are also addressed in the course.
What is justice? How should society be governed? What is the good life? Questions like these, while abstract and philosophical, underpin all international political disputes, and understanding them is a first step towards resolving the conflicts inherent in international relations. This course seeks to draw connections between the problems of international politics and the world of political philosophy. It traces the history of political thought, from ancient Greece and its protean ideas of both realism and idealized governance through the hard-nosed politics of Machiavelli and Hobbes and the modernized idealism of Kant and Grotius up to the present-day thinking of such international relations scholars as Morgenthau, Waltz, and Walzer. In doing so, the class explores the connections linking political thinking and events across time, taking lessons from different times and applying them to the problems of today. The course concludes by examining four case studies of real policy problems, including humanitarian intervention, the role of international law, and the invasion of Iraq, through the lens of political theory.
In the words of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, "Europe was created by history; America was created by philosophy." The history and character of the United States cannot be understood without careful examination of the ideas, theories, and philosophies that underpin the American nation. This course examines the various strands of American Political Thought, beginning with the early political thought of the Puritans. Much attention is paid to the theories that unite the United States, such as the adoption of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, as well as those ideas that have divided the nation, such as race and slavery during the Civil War. The course concludes by considering the enduring tensions in American liberalism and the modern civil rights era.
This course interrogates intersectionality as an approach to the study of politics. Students will study the history and theory of intersectionality and will engage current debates about the application, benefits, and limitations of the intersectional method. In the second part of the semester, students will undertake an archival, group-based research project as a way to test the intersectional method.
Students explore the concepts of citizenship and personhood in the American political imagination as filtered through a racial valence. Perhaps what is most striking about this valence is the way that it and Americans' conceptions of whiteness, citizenship, and personhood has evolved through America's history. Students will consider what role such images play in constructing a "shared" political community, and to what extent the exclusions they engender strengthen or undermine this community.
Can ideologies, when put into practice, live up to the utopian dreams of their visionaries? Or will they degenerate into dystopian nightmares? In this course in political theory, students study many of the ideologies that have shaped politics in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. They explore the core theoretical texts of nationalist, anarchist, socialist, liberal, and Islamist movements, including Marx, Mao, Mussolini, Qutb, and others. Finally, they reflect on the (perhaps utopian) ideals that shape these movements and on how those ideals have influenced politics and political arrangements.
This course explores contemporary issues in political theory related to questions of citizenship, membership, and power. Students reflect on the structures and practices that determine who wields power, who holds citizenship status, who counts as a member of a political community. Students also explore the relationship between economic and political arrangements.
Looking at the interaction between religion and politics in the United States, students explore various understandings of the relationship between church and state, the treatment of minority religious communities and the influence of religion on the formation of American identity, institutions and policies. Students investigate various theoretical approaches and U.S. political development to provide a foundation for evaluating how religion and politics influence each other in the current moment. Topics include political behavior, public opinion, organizationsl activity, and public policies in areas such as gay rights, environmental policy, and immigration.
Students engage in a series of seminars on the Washington state legislative process learning from experts in the field and engage in simulations of some of the core conflictual processes. Students learn about the difficulties of budgeting, the rules of the state legislative chamber and how they impact outcomes, the role of political parties and legislative leaders and industry lobbyists, as well as how to conduct legislative research, create sample legislative proposals, and write about state politics for the general public.
State governments are often overlooked, however, states wield tremendous power over the daily lives of citizens. A citizen's life can look very different depending on what state she lives in. The course takes a comparative approach to understand this critical level of U.S. politics. Why is marijuana legal in some states and not others? Why are the systems of public education so different? A comparative look allows students to ask why states respond differently to similar policy questions, considering the potential role of historical, cultural, economic and political contexts as well as variations in institutional arrangements. After delving into factors that alter the political opportunity structures in states, students turn to case studies. Looking at particular states and particular policy issues allows one to see how and why politics and political outcomes vary across states.
This course begins with a brief historical review of the rise of Islam as a political structure and its impact on the region, as well as the development of the Ottoman Empire and its relationship to Europe and European foreign policies. This discussion will be followed by a focus on colonialism and its effects, in particular the development of nationalism, populism, Islamism and Zionism. From there we will consider ways in which scholars have attempted to analyze and understand Middle East politics and institutions, drawing comparisons to state building, authoritarianism, and democratization elsewhere in the world. This will be combined with an investigation of regional and international politics as they relate to the region, from the collapse of the Ottoman Empire to the Cold War, and from the Arab Spring onward. This will include a consideration of military conflicts, terrorism, the role of oil and weapons of mass destruction. We will also turn our attention to a number of cases in both their domestic and international politics, which may include but not be limited to Egypt, Israel and Palestine, Saudi Arabia and Iran. Students will have the opportunity to investigate particular topics and cases through in depth research and writing and presentations.
This course examines courts as political actors. Why do political actors create courts? Why do legislators, executives, and bureaucracies obey them? Do courts take political, economic, and social factors into account when determining how to rule? We will examine these topics through a broad-based comparative inquiry, drawing on materials from around the world: North and South America, Africa, Europe, the Middle East and South Asia, and the Asia-Pacific region.
How do different societies weigh civil, political, social, economic, and cultural rights? Is there a "standard" approach to rights such as abortion access, non- discrimination, and free speech? Are the rights that many Americans consider "self-evident" seen as such in other societies, and what rights do other societies recognize that are curiously absent in the American legal context? This course invites you to step outside the American debate on rights to consider alternative approaches. Students will accomplish this by reading, analyzing, and discussing cases from around the globe, in particular cases from Latin America, Africa, and Asia. Topics include abortion access, LGBTQ+ rights, indigenous rights, and religious freedom.
This course is designed to familiarize students both with the institutions of the Japanese political economy and with a breadth of issues relevant to a deeper understanding of how political and economic processes actually work in Japan. It is comparative in nature and deals primarily with issues since 1945.
Although China can lay claim to both the world's longest continuous civilization and the first modern state, in just the past half century, China has experienced tumultuous political revolution, sweeping reform and most recently painful retrenchment. This begs the questions: Will the growing divisions between rich and poor, coastal and provincial, urban and peasant tear China apart? Can the center hold? Can the Chinese political economy, its environment, and indeed the world accommodate not only a billion capitalist workers and consumers, but also embrace the same number of potential citizens demanding a political voice in their future? Will China's "rise" be peaceful? These questions are empirical, not rhetorical, and their answers are as important as they are uncertain. Students employ the analytical tools of comparative political economy to frame appropriate questions and weigh those factors most relevant to this remarkable story of socio-political and economic development: political and economic, social and cultural, structural and historical, domestic and international.
This course is designed to guide students in developing a deeper understanding of key social science concepts and theories regarding identity, ethnicity and nationalism. Students learn how to employ the comparative social science method to better understand compelling political and social issues that are becoming increasingly relevant and contentious under the conflicting conditions and aspirations of globalization, localization and nativism in the early 21st century. These concepts and methods are employed to analyze the complex processes accompanying the emergence, development, evolution and fragmentation of national identity in the geographic region known as Greater China, but these tools and understandings apply not just to Greater China, but to other ethnic groups, nations and cultural imaginaries of the world.
A broad survey of politics in a region often characterized by poverty, political instability, authoritarianism, populism, corruption, and violence. The course explores some of the major approaches to Latin American politics by focusing on political institutions, political culture, non-state actors, and civil society. The course is organized around key themes that are illustrated using a number of cases, which may include among others, Cuba, Mexico, Venezuela, Chile, and Brazil.
The course examines the intersection of environmental issues with politics and policy-making on a global as well as a local scale. It explores international structures and efforts to deal with environmental problems, a wide range of particular environmental challenges such as climate change and conservation, and the different experiences of individual countries in trying to use and manage their natural resources. Throughout, the relationships between political and natural systems are explored, with a particular focus on the ways in which politics and policy can both produce effective strategies and new difficulties for handling environmental challenges.
What are the political and economic implications of natural resource endowments? Why is international cooperation on natural resource governance and, especially, climate change so difficult? This course addresses these and other pressing questions through a broad overview of the politics of natural resources. The course begins by examining how oil and other minerals influence political and economic development, and why mineral rich countries appear more likely to engage in war and conflict. It then focuses on other resources, namely water, forests, and clean air, and evaluates the role that governments and international cooperation play in ensuring access to them. The course culminates in a section on politics of climate change at the local and international level. This course is appropriate for students who want to explore politics and governance of natural resources in an analytical and systematic manner.
How do diverse societies approach questions of governance within and across borders? When does ethnic diversity lead to domestic conflict, and when can institutions bridge ethnic divides? Are states less likely to go to war with states they consider "ethnic brethren"? Students use theory and concrete examples to examine how political scientists measure and compare ethnicity and its effects around the world. While reference to the U.S. and Europe will be made, the emphasis will be on states in the Global South, including South Africa and India.
In her landmark work on feminism and international politics, Cynthia Enloe encourages scholars to ask, "Where are the women?" when trying to understand international relations. This course introduces students to feminist analysis of international relations by engaging both theoretical and practical questions about women's experiences in the world. From a foundation of ethics, the course builds to address the place of gendered analysis in international relations issue areas such as security, political economy, and migration.
Despite the centrality of human rights in multilateral institutions, many aspects of international human rights -- as defined by international law -- are controversial, and their implementation at global and domestic levels remains incomplete. This is a survey course on human rights that analyzes the gap between human rights in theory and human rights in practice. Students explore the following questions: What are global human rights? Can we identify patterns of human rights violations, particularly for marginalized groups? What role do international law and institutions play in promoting human rights? How do non-governmental organizations affect human rights globally?
This course considers the evolution of the idea of morally justifiable warfare, primarily in the Western context. Students trace just war theory from the ancient world to the present day, with attention to both religious and secular theoretical texts. The course encourages students to think about recent and contemporary international relations through the lens of just war theory.
Much of the study of international relations has been driven by questions about war. Regardless of individuals' views on any particular war, everyone agrees that war is costly. The most obvious costs are in military expenditure and human lives. However, there are many ways of calculating cost, particularly as it relates to war. This course considers how much weight to give these additional factors in answering the question, "What are the costs of war?" The course looks at human, environmental, economic, social, and political costs of war to deepen students' understanding of what war claims from belligerents and what costs are paid by combatants and noncombatants alike.
What is meaningful work? The vast majority of the human population will spend the bulk of their waking hours in the workplace; how do we begin to interrogate and evaluate the purpose and meaning of our own work while also attending to the historical struggle for labor's recognition? The primary objectives in this course will be to historicize and normatively evaluate the struggle of various historical labor movements and their impact on the making of the American political state. Students will develop a nuanced and robust body of knowledge that critically interrogates the battles to protect workers with a particular eye towards building intersectional solidarity among the working class. Only by understanding how these historical labor movements coalesce and help form our contemporary landscape of work can we begin to normatively evaluate and postulate greater forms of liberation.
Students in this capstone course study major theoretical approaches to contemporary questions in politics and government. The course brings students into conversation across a broad array of approaches and traditions, applying the unique perspective of each to major questions about democracy and power around the world today. Students are expected to participate regularly in seminar discussions and may be responsible for leading class sessions and completing a major project. Students who wish to complete a senior thesis should consult the requirements to enroll in PG 490.
This is an optional thesis course in Politics and Government. Students who wish to complete a thesis do so in the spring semester of their senior year (having completed the field-specific capstone course in the fall semester of the senior year). In the course, students complete much of the thesis work independently under the supervision of the thesis instructor. Students are permitted to enroll in PG 490 by satisfying these criteria: successfully completing PG 410, 420, 430, 440, or 441; developing a prospectus for the thesis project in consultation with a field advisor during the fall semester of the senior year; participating in a consultative meeting with both the field advisor and the thesis instructor before the end of the fall semester of the senior year.
Students complete 120 hours of field experience at a site prearranged in consultation with the department and internship coordinator. In addition, the student works with a faculty mentor within the department to develop an individualized learning plan which must be pre-approved by the department and completed alongside the field experience. The learning plan is tailored to integrate the field experience with relevant scholarship, linking the major to practical job experience. One unit of PG 498 may count toward the major.
Humans are complex organisms, and psychology provides a rich, interdisciplinary understanding of the study of mental life, experience, and behavior. Through this course, students develop an appreciation for these complexities by focusing on individual and social behavior, as well as the physiological and neurological processes underlying them. Central to this course is an understanding of the diverse methods, experimental designs, foundational theories, and research used to inform the various subdisciplines in psychology. Topics frequently covered in this survey course include: research methods, sensation and perception, learning and memory, developmental, personality, abnormal, and social psychology.
Although many people believe that psychology is based on common sense, personal experience, or intuition about human behavior and mental processes, the discipline is actually founded on the results of scientifically conducted experiments and studies. Thus, learning the methods for how data are collected, analyzed, interpreted, and communicated form the foundation for an undergraduate degree in Psychology. In this course, students practice using critical thinking and integration of primary research articles to produce logically organized writing in the manner that psychologists use in the discipline, explore the basic principles of empirical research in order to understand the ethical considerations and the characteristics of different types of research designs, and gain facility in beginning-level statistics. Overall, this course aims to strengthen students' identity as scientists and welcome students to the Psychology major.
This course covers experimental design and research methodology, elementary and advanced techniques of data analysis, and basic issues in the philosophy of science. Laboratory and individual research is required.
This course focuses on the milestones of human development from conception through late childhood. It considers physical, cognitive, language, social, and emotional changes that occur during the first decade of life with special attention to various contexts of development. It addresses major theories as well as current research and methodology that explain how and why developmental change occurs. Implications for child-rearing, education, and social policymaking are also examined.
This course focuses on the development of individuals from adolescence through death. The domains of cognitive, physical, and psychosocial development are examined, with a particular emphasis on the multiple factors and contexts that influence development in each of these areas. Current theories and research are explored on a variety of topics relevant to adolescence and adulthood, including adolescent rebellion, identity development, midlife crisis, and caring for elderly parents.
This course considers human development from the beginning to the end of life. Students focus on the major biological, cognitive, and social changes that occur at each stage of development. Students examine the central questions, theoretical perspectives, research methods, and scientific findings that guide current understanding of human development. The course also emphasizes the ways in which individual development cannot be clearly understood without examining the social and cultural context in which individuals are embedded. This course is designed for interested non-majors as well as those who need a developmental psychology course to fulfill a graduate or professional school pre-requisite.
Social Psychology is a field that uses empirical methods, primarily experiments, to study the social nature of our behaviors, attitudes, perceptions, and emotions. This course is a survey of theory and research literature pertaining to the prediction of human behavior in social settings. Topics covered include research methodology, social perception, attitudes and attitude change, prejudice, aggression, attraction, helping, conformity, group behavior, and the application of findings to current social problems.
This course considers the contributions of the nervous system to the understanding of the behavior of humans and other animals. To this end, the course surveys the basic structure and function of the nervous system, the principle methods for its study, and how knowledge of it informs an understanding of such phenomena as sensation and perception, movement, sleep, emotion, learning and memory, language, and abnormal behavior.
This course introduces the role of counseling and psychology in educational settings with a focus on K-12 schools. Students examine the specific roles and responsibilities of school counselors, school psychologists, and mental health counselors working in the school setting. Class discussions focus on the academic, career, and social emotional needs of school aged students and how these professionals promote culturally sustaining practices and support a safe, healthy learning environment. Experiential components of the course include introductory counseling, consultation, collaboration and advocacy skills.
Beginning with a brief study of the anatomy and physiology of the sexual and reproductive systems, the course progresses to the consideration of cultural heritages, including cross-cultural and sub-cultural variations. Consideration is given to the evolution of attitudes and behaviors across the life span, including the psychological foundations of the dysfunctions.
This course focuses on the application of psychological theory and methods to work behavior in industry and social service organizations. Research on job satisfaction, work motivation, personnel selection and training, decision making, and group processes within organizations are considered.
Evolutionary forces have shaped human behavior and the mechanisms of the human mind. In this course students learn the power and limits of evolutionary explanation about human behavior and cognition. After studying the basic processes of biological evolution, including natural and sexual selection, students apply these principles to selected issues in psychology. Examples of topics that may be included in this class are mate selection, sex difference, parenting and kinship, cooperation and conflict, dominance relationships, and social status.
This course considers the ways in which human culture and human behavior varies across cultural contexts. Students review psychological research on culture, examine the theoretical and methodological foundations of cross-cultural research in psychology, and discuss the mounting evidence suggesting that many psychological processes are culture-specific and context dependent.
Our emotional experiences and reactions are integral to who we are as a species and as unique individuals. Understanding emotions and the purpose they serve allows us not only to better manage them but to also respond to our environment in a manner that helps us maintain our goals. Understanding emotions can also allow us cultivate empathy, which can serve to foster our social and professional relationships. In this course, we will review the historical, philosophical, and biological underpinnings of emotion, explore social scientific theories and advances in the study of emotions, and apply our knowledge to real world scenarios to gain practice in understanding the role of emotions in the interactions we've felt successful in and in times we've felt our emotions have held us back.
This course considers the phenomena and methods of sensation, perception, and action in biological organisms. It focuses primarily on vision and audition, but with an emphasis on the general principles of how various forms of physical energy in the world are transduced and transformed to yield useful representations and purposeful behavior. Students wishing to facilitate a deeper understanding of the material may want to take PSYC 251, MATH 121, or PHYS 111/112 (or 121/122) prior to taking this course. Laboratory work is required.
This course is concerned with the lawful relationships between the behavior of organisms and the natural world. The course explores the scientific principles that govern these relationships with particular emphasis upon environmental control of voluntary behavior. Note: The laboratory component of this course requires daily work with live animals. Students must be able to commit one hour, MTWF, at the same time each day.
This course is an introduction to psychological testing and measurement. Students address the topics of test development, validation, and administration; survey commonly-used psychological measures; and discuss ethical, legal, social, and emotional impacts of decisions based on measures. In computer-based laboratories, students analyze test data with frequently-used statistical tests and procedures.
This course focuses on the biological causes and effects of psychological phenomena such as memory, emotion, attention, motor control, and perception. Students address these topics with an array of physiological methodologies such as measures of brain activity (e.g., EEG), muscle activity (e.g., EMG), heart rate, stress response (e.g., skin conductance), and eye tracking. Students learn the application of these methods including their strengths and weaknesses, as well as how to link psychological theories to physiological functions.
This course covers experimental design and research methodology, elementary and advanced techniques of data analysis, and basic issues in the philosophy of science. Laboratory and individual research is required.
The major focus of this course is aberrant human behavior and the scientific basis for understanding its causes. Students learn the major approaches utilized today in diagnosis and treatment of these disorders including biological, psychoanalytic, cognitive, behavioral, humanistic, and community-systems models.
This course focuses on the development of psychology from its origins in philosophy to its establishment as a distinct experimental science. The class evaluates the contributions of philosophers and psychologists in terms of the political, cultural, social, and intellectual tenor of the times. Students gain historical sophistication and develop the ability to critically examine both historical and current issues in psychology.
This course is designed to provide students with an understanding of several theoretical models of the determinants of human behavior. Taking an historical perspective, students learn about psychoanalysis, behaviorism, humanism, and other models of personality. A comparative approach is stressed with an emphasis on structural criticism of each theory and its philosophical underpinnings.
This course is concerned with how humans learn, think, reason, and solve problems. It addresses the ways in which humans input, encode, transform, store, retrieve, and output information. The course presents major concepts, methods, research findings, and controversies concerning human cognition and examines application of cognition to topics such as eyewitness testimony, autobiographical memory, childhood amnesia, and expertise.
What does it mean to be healthy, and how do we promote health and maintain it? What factors disrupt or undermine our health? What is well-being, and how might it be distinct from health? What contexts or environments cultivate health and well-being, versus illness and suffering? Interweaving foundational and current research in health psychology, with findings from positive psychology that promote human thriving, this course aims to: explore factors that underlie our health habits and lifestyles; understand the role of stress, emotions, outlook and behavior in illness development; examine the intrapersonal, social/cultural, relational, institutional and societal contexts which promote health and wellbeing; and interrogate popular and scientific sources in order to tease apart platitudes from methods for meaningful change. Students master concepts from the empirical literature, synthesize information from medicine, public health, social psychology, personality, organizational scholarship, neuropsychology, health psychology and positive psychology, and engage in experiential learning that requires application of empirically-based findings to targets of self-change and change in local communities or organizations.
Mental health disorders among children and adolescents are pervasive. Youth violence is a serious social problem. This course examines the etiology, diagnosis, and treatment of mental health problems of children and adolescents based on the empirical literature.
This course explores how children learn language with seeming ease by examining classic and contemporary theories of language acquisition. The focus is on all areas of language (phonology, semantics, syntax, morphology, and pragmatics) and their typical developmental sequence. Special topics, such as language development disorders, critical/sensitive period hypothesis, bilingualism, bidialectalism, pidgins and creoles, and animal communication systems are covered. When possible, language data from languages other than English are presented.
Neuropsychology is the study of how the systems of the brain work together to support thought and behavior. Neuropsychologists often infer the function of a particular brain region by assessing the type of dysfunction expressed after damage to that brain area following a stroke or head trauma. In this course, students learn basic neuroanatomy, clinical assessments, and the functional delineations of the brain's cortex. Topics may include split brain patients, language disorders, perceptual agnosias, Parkinson's Disease, attentional neglect, phantom-limb syndrome, and memory loss.
This course explores how people make sense of themselves and others in the dynamic context of social interaction. Students read and discuss classic and current empirical research in the areas of interpersonal perception and social cognition.
This class addresses the various ways in which people's perceptions, memories, and reasoning about the world may diverge dramatically from reality. The course will delineate a variety of such illusions and try to understand their underlying cognitive and neuropsychological causes. Class goals will be to understand their applications (for instance, to eyewitness accuracy) and to use them to help understand normal perception and cognition.
This course explores how people make sense of themselves and others in the dynamic context of social interaction. Students read and discuss classic and current empirical research in the areas of self-perception, interpersonal perception, and intergroup perception. Readings and discussion focus on theoretical knowledge supported by basic research on human cognition, motivation, and behavior and the relevance of that knowledge for issues of practical and personal importance such as academic achievement, interpersonal relationships, stereotyping, stigma, racism, sexism, aggression, homelessness, and criminal justice.
This seminar focuses on several facets of romantic relationships, from the initial stages of attraction and partner selection, to relationship building, maintenance, and dissolution. Other key topics include marriage and divorce, communication, and the qualities of relationships that predict relationship satisfaction and stability. Several theoretical perspectives on intimate relationships are presented in the course, and we also examine the advantages and limitations of different approaches and research methodologies. Particular emphasis is placed on empirical research on the course topics, although we also discuss the role of clinical observations (e.g., based on individual and/or couple psychotherapy) in understanding intimate relationships.
Cognition is the many ways organisms take in information from their sensory systems, process it, and act upon it. There are many forms of cognition, and those forms look different from species to species based on the organism's evolutionary history. Through readings, discussions, and independent data collection, this seminar explores the history of the field of animal cognition, its scientific and philosophical controversies, common methods, as well as topics like consciousness, communication, tool use, and intelligence in nonhuman animals. In order to bring course material to life, students conduct observational and experimental studies of animal behavior in both lab and field settings, culminating in an independently proposed and conducted empirical study.
Applied Multi-Method Assessment is an experiential learning seminar introducing students to methods of assessment used by psychologists and other professionals to understand the impact of programs and interventions on individuals and communities. The course focuses on qualitative research methods including interviews and focus groups that engage diverse constituencies, use a social justice lens, and are informed by quantitative approaches. Students learn about theory-based assessment, community-based participatory action research (CBPAR), culturally informed research, and qualitative data analysis. In assignments, workshops, and field work, teams of students conduct assessment research that applies course material.
The Psychology Senior Capstone Seminar provides an opportunity for psychology majors to read and critically analyze primary source materials and review articles drawn from varied subfields in psychology. Through weekly presentations, writing exercises, and ongoing discussion, students address key issues in the discipline concerning, for example, the ethical application of findings, the major paradigmatic shifts in the field, and the pros/cons of various methodological approaches. Students also write their Senior Capstone Paper as part of the course requirements, with seminar members sharing their progress regularly through writing workshops and informal presentations of their topic and proposal. The senior paper includes a comprehensive literature review of a specific research question, as well as a proposal for future research and/or application of findings.
This seminar reviews the major models of personality, psychotherapy, and clinical assessment. A strong emphasis in the course is placed on the comparison of cognitive-behavioral theories to psychoanalytic, humanistic, and systems approaches. Students have opportunities to develop and practice basic counseling skills as part of the humanistic segment of this course.
Students work with a faculty instructor in the Psychology Department in conjunction with a site experience related to clinical, counseling, and other applied careers in the discipline. The course includes 8-10 hours per week of on-site work and 3 hours of class time where practicum experiences and course-relevant readings are discussed. Students also complete written assignments focused on their fieldwork experience. Open to juniors and seniors with at least a 2.5 GPA. This course is specifically aimed for advanced psychology students and counts as an upper division psychology elective. Students who desire a year-long experience may continue in a subsequent semester through the University's Internship Program and may make those arrangements through the Career and Employment Services Office.
Interested students must complete an application to be submitted early in the Fall term of their senior year.
BA majors can receive either upper-level elective credit for PSYC 497 or use PSYC 497 to fulfill the departmental experiential requirement, but not both.
This structured academic experience provides the context to reflect on work happening at an off-campus internship site and to link these experiences to academic study relating to the political, psychological, social, economic and intellectual forces that shape our views on work and its meaning. The aim is to integrate study in the liberal arts with issues and themes surrounding the pursuit of a creative, productive, and satisfying professional life. Students receive .5-1.0 unit of academic credit for the academic work that augments their concurrent internship fieldwork. This course is not applicable to the Upper-Division Graduation Requirement. No more than 1.0 unit may be assigned to an individual internship and no more than 2.0 units of internship credit, or internship credit in combination with co-operative education credit, may be applied to an undergraduate degree.
This course is designed to introduce students to the field of sociology. Sociology is a broad discipline which, at its core, constitutes the scientific study of society. Students in this course are exposed to basic concepts, theories, and methods used in modern sociology. Upon successful completion of Introduction to Sociology, students have a basic understanding of the sociological perspective and the ways in which the discipline frames human behavior at all levels, from a brief encounter of two strangers to global social systems. The course also provides students with specific sociological tools that they can use to better understand their world; the theories, concepts, and ideas covered in this class will help students to recognize the connection between self and society, biography and history, as well as the individual and social structures.
This course introduces students to the discipline of anthropology, with an intent focus on the sub-discipline of cultural anthropology. Students gain an understanding of the methods, theories, and debates that characterize cultural anthropology through a critical exploration of the concept of culture, the central frame through which anthropologists grapple with gender, ethnicity, politics, economics, religion, tradition, technology, identity, globalization, and much more. The fundamentally cross-cultural, cross-temporal, holistic orientation of anthropology makes it unique among the disciplines, and its practitioners try to broaden any discussion of human beliefs and practices to include examples that are as diverse and varied as possible, while insisting on a singular, underlying, and universal "humanity." The course draws on ethnography, a term that applies to both the immersive field research that anthropologists engage in, as well as the written analyses of cultures that anthropologists produce to better understand how culture and representations of culture structure relationships of power and inequality in the contemporary world.
This course challenges students to learn to 'see' families sociologically and to think critically and comparatively about the family as an ideological construct and as a complex social institution. Rather than assuming a universal model of the family, course readings examine families in the United States and elsewhere in the world as diverse entities shaped by economic and political factors, gender ideologies, racial and class inequalities, sexual norms, and cultural changes. Family ideals frequently clash with contemporary family realities; social science is a powerful tool for illuminating the implications and meanings of family continuity and change.
This course aims to enable students to acquire a critical understanding of the theories and practices of heritage by scrutinizing the ideas of "heritage" and its formation in recent decades. We will critically engage the definition of heritage with reference to policies and treaties set up by international organizations like UNESCO and state governments. Addressing heritage both as an academic discipline and as a professional field, the course examines how the ideas of heritage -- oftentimes Eurocentric -- are interpreted, contested, and put into practice in various Asian countries. We will consider what are identified as natural and cultural heritage, as well as the tangible and intangible aspects of heritage, while critiquing the divide between natural/cultural and tangible/intangible. Key themes relating to heritage will be introduced through case studies on scenic sites, historical landmarks, agricultural landscapes, oral traditions, food and cuisine, and digital heritage. The course will engage in current debates about the ownership and authenticity of heritage, by taking into account the negotiations of cultural memories and identities, economic resources, and political struggles at the local, national, and global level. We will work towards developing a comparative framework for understanding natural and cultural heritage not only in Asia but also around the world.
This course offers an in-depth exploration of multiple theories of deviance and social control. Each section of the class is organized around a particular theoretical orientation; each theory will elucidate both how deviance happens and the mechanism of social control that align with that particular theory. Every theory covered in this course is situated within a social, historical, and political context. Social and scientific theories are socially constructed, and thus, the context in which they emerge and exist is fundamental to their basic understanding. Students also learn how to use this diverse set of theories to make sense of how knowledge, power, and inequalities are all fundamentally tied to the ways in which a society comes to define and control deviance. As the semester progresses, students synthesize and integrate these theories to allow for a deeper, holistic understanding of deviance and social control.
Gender surrounds us, but ideas about gender in popular culture often oversimplify its workings. This course provides an overview of a sociological perspective on gender, with close attention to the relational construction of gender difference through analyzing both femininities and masculinities, as well as how gender intersects with other differences such as race, class, ethnicity, and sexuality. The first half of the course examines gender inequality from several classic and contemporary theoretical perspectives. The second half foregrounds empirical research on gender and how gender works and changes over time in institutions that affect our daily lives such as schools, families, and workplaces. Readings focus on the United States as well as other countries within our increasingly globalized world.
More than half of all humans on earth now dwell in cities, and urban life is almost certainly an integral aspect of our collective future. This course introduces students to the sociological and anthropological study of the city through an examination of the theories, concepts, and frameworks social scientists have deployed in seeking to understand cities. This examination includes a focus on urbanization, or the underlying processes by which cities emerge, and on urbanism, or the character of life in an urban built environment. The geographical focus of the class ranges from global cities in other parts of the world to the American cities with which students are familiar. This course includes a field-based experiential component that requires students to explore the themes they encounter over the semester in the urban context of Tacoma.
The goal of this course is to provide an introduction to the forms of difference and inequality reflected, constructed, and reproduced through notions of race and ethnicity. It asks: what are the forms of knowledge, practices, institutions, and values that have informed the nature and meaning of race and ethnic relations in both the U.S. context and globally? Using a historical, theoretical, and comparative approach, the course examines both the origins of contemporary race and ethnic categories and the way those categories have been reconfigured and deployed over time and space as part of diverse political, social, and economic projects. Drawing on specific cases, students explore how notions of race and ethnicity intersect with other forms of difference such as class, gender, and national identity. Through engagement with sociological and anthropological analyses of race and ethnic difference, the course thus provides students with a conceptual and theoretical toolbox with which to critically examine contemporary race and ethnic relations and engage in informed debate about their implications.
This course is designed to engage students in a critical examination of select issues associated with social stratification in Singapore and Malaysia. Specifically, it examines the themes of identity and culture within the context of the broader dynamics of systematic inequality in these two neighboring countries have very intertwined histories and cultures, but yet are distinct from one another. Through various readings, discussions, lectures, and on-site engagement, the course delves into specific issues such as race, class, gender, and religious fault lines that enable students to (1) become more engaged with the lived experiences of Singaporeans and Malaysians; and (2) develop a more sociologically informed and nuanced understanding of how the aforementioned key components of stratification in these societies shape the lives of its people and institutions.
This course explores lived culture in Southeast Asia with a focus on the themes of power and inequality, gender and sexuality, race and ethnicity, humans and the environment, as well as religion and syncretism. Described as the crossroads of influences from East and South Asia to Europe and beyond, Southeast Asia is one of the most diverse and fascinating regions of the world. The course includes case studies from throughout the region, with a focus on Indonesia. Students begin by working through the prehistory and initial migration to the area, but focus on contemporary themes related to the peoples, cultures, political economies, and representational practices surrounding the region. In addition to providing a cultural overview of the region, this course critically examines sociocultural change that has occurred in Southeast Asia in recent decades. Spurred by new media and communications technologies, environmental challenges, globalized supply chains, volatile inter/national politics, shifting social norms, and new approaches to religious practice, Southeast Asia is experiencing a rapid transformation. Taking an anthropological approach to understanding these themes and foci, students will read and discuss ethnographic work as well as scholarship from a range of disciplines that explores both the background and contemporary manifestations of these cultural shifts.
This course examines the situations, problems, and continually developing strategies of indigenous peoples living in various countries and regions scattered throughout the world. While the central concern of this investigation focuses on so-called "tribal" peoples and their increasingly threatened, yet still instructive lifeways, the course also deliberately considers selected points of contrast and comparison involving "modern" societies as well. Toward this end, the course uses the approach of political anthropology, which has traditionally been associated with the study of small-scale societies (wherein the realms of "politics" and "economics" are inseparably interlinked with other sociocultural institutions such as "religion" and "kinship"). The ultimate aim of the course is threefold: first, to acknowledge the tragedy of past and presently-continuing destruction of indigenous peoples' physical, social, and cultural lives; second, to learn about and from the resilience and resistance such people have shown over millennia; and third, to inspire hope that it is still not too late for "modern" and "tribal" people humbly and profitably to learn from each other.
This course is an introduction to the sub-discipline of linguistics within the broader discipline of anthropology. The course covers methods used and theories formulated in the study of language in anthropology. These include the structure of language; language through history; a comparison between human and non-human modes of communication; the innate human capacity for language; the relationship between language, thought, and culture; and the study of language, power, and identity. A cross-cultural perspective is emphasized in this class.
This course examines major social movements in terms of their forms, aims, and implications, as well as the research and theories deployed to make sense of them. In particular it explores these movements' recruitment and organizational tactics, resource mobilization, strategy, and effects on public policy. It also analyzes their relation to political institutions, socioeconomic structures, and cultural formations, including mass media and official agencies. The course will focus on select movements which may include civil rights, feminist, environmental, labor, right-wing, and postcolonial/Global South politics.
This course examines the sociological dimensions of science and technology. In particular, it focuses on: understanding the social construction of scientific and technological knowledge; exploring the main sociological theories of science and technology; understanding how social inequalities are connected to the processes of scientific discovery and technological innovation; thinking critically about concepts like truth, facts, and nature; and seeing how sociological analysis can inform our understanding of the connection between science and technology and social policies and cultural values.
This course is designed to explore diverse and changing forms of transnational migration across a global landscape, with a focus on the dynamic relationships that define migrants' relationships to both home and host communities. The course draws upon anthropological and sociological contributions to migration studies, transnationalism and diaspora studies in order to examine the articulation of culture and identity amidst the complexities of the contemporary world. The course also utilizes case studies that allow students to analyze diasporic experiences both in the United States and abroad. This course allows for a sustained discussion on the changing relationships between people, place, and culture, and the role of anthropological methods in investigating them.
Archaeology seeks to uncover artifacts and the material culture of human life in order to understand past civilizations and the long-term development of human societies across space and time. This course offers an introduction to the field of archaeology, providing an overview of its goals, theory, methods, and ethics. Students discuss specific archaeological sites in their historical, social, anthropological, economic, religious, and architectural contexts. Attention is given to issues relevant to classical archaeology today, including the looting of ancient sites, issues of cultural property, and ethics in archaeology. Students have the opportunity to learn and practice basic archaeological techniques, as well as to reflect on the significance of these techniques for understanding other peoples. The course will shift in its regional and historical foci, including an introduction to classical archaeology of the ancient Mediterranean world. Students thus gain an appreciation of the complexities of present-day archaeological research and both the benefits and limitations of the role of archaeology in creating our images of the past.
Past societies are often divided into "prehistoric" and "historic" based on the existence of ties with Western culture. Following this dichotomy, archaeology has long contributed to a Colonialist perspective of selective literacy. In attempt to deconstruct said tendency, this course explores the multiplicity of circumstances in which archaeologists study a past for which historical records exist. The course encompasses ancient societies with hieroglyphic systems of writing, the Near East as the center of biblical archaeology, as well as recent historical periods of the Western nations themselves. For each study region or period, students examine the nature and biases characterizing available written records and explore the ways in which archaeological approaches have created complementary datasets that allow for a more holistic understanding of past societies. This set of comparisons on a global level lays the groundwork for the conceptualization of material culture as an author of its own history even when documents are readily available. As the course modules approach the present -- covering Slavery, the Industrialization, as well as poverty and migration in the 21st century -- discussions increasingly contribute to a comprehensive reflection upon some of the societal problems of today. In this context, the course concludes with an acknowledgment of both the difficulties and potential of heritage stewardship and education.
This course offers an in-depth survey of sociology's foundational theoretical perspectives. Students analyze, compare, and apply the ideas of a range of classic and contemporary social theorists, and in doing so develop a keen appreciation for how the lens we use to think about and perceive various social phenomena profoundly shapes our questions and conclusions about the world. The course focuses on the kinds of questions that have been asked by influential nineteenth- and twentieth-century thinkers, as well as the theories they have constructed to answer them. The first half of the course focuses on the 'classical' theorists, including Marx, Durkheim, and Weber. The second half is devoted to several contemporary perspectives that build on and extend the classical theories, including theories of gender and race, symbolic interactionism, and postmodernism.
Anthropological theory sees the world through a disciplinary lens that focuses on culture -- shared understandings -- while looking broadly and holistically at the human condition across a broad range of times and places. This course invites students to "think anthropologically" as they become familiar with the various lines of thought that have characterized anthropology since its earliest days to the present. In addition, students learn to grapple theoretically with contemporary problems and articulate their thoughts on them in terms of relevant anthropological theorists. The course involves heavy reading demands and is conducted seminar style with students expected to lead and contribute to class discussions on a daily basis.
This course covers experimental and quasi-experimental design, the design of social surveys, and techniques of data analysis appropriate for each type of design. Individual student research projects are required.
Ethnography is the study of human cultures. Ethnographic methods are the constellation of research tools that anthropologists (and nowadays, many others) use in exploring, understanding, and writing about human cultures. This course introduces students to the methodological craft of ethnographic inquiry, and includes an examination of the historical development of this methodological toolkit, the theoretical implications of this approach to research, the ethical considerations paramount to ethnographic research, and the practical concerns involved in "doing" ethnography. Students will have the opportunity to practice and deploy these research methods in fieldwork settings in the greater Tacoma area. The course is structured around the design and implementation of an independent research project that utilizes these methods for anthropological inquiry.
This course examines social and economic inequality in the United States and globally. The goal of the course is to understand the extent of inequality as well as the power structures that systematically distribute resources in a particular way. The course introduces concepts and theoretical approaches that are fundamental to the social sciences. The policy implications that emerge from these comparisons are also discussed.
This course uses a sociological framework to examine gender and sexuality in contemporary Japan. Students are introduced to theoretical frameworks that underpin the study of gender and sexuality and apply those frameworks to the case of Japanese society. Using a culturally relativistic lens, students critically examine the following aspects of Japanese society: the social construction and representation of feminine and masculine gender and sexuality, both normative and otherwise; recent changes in the sexual landscape and the fluidity of both gender and sexual identities across time and space; changing patterns in intimate relationships and the social forces driving these trends; the commodification of gender performances; and feminist perspectives and debates.
Anthropological linguistics asks questions central to both disciplines: What is human language? Why is a person's or an ethnic group's particular language or language variety often such an important part of their identity? When a particular language becomes "lost" or "threatened," what happens to the semantic worlds (not just the words, but the linked insights and wisdom) that used to be encoded in those now no longer heard or spoken phrases and styles of discourse?
In nations with purportedly "one unifying language," mastery of, for example, "Mandarin" Chinese, Russian, Hindi, or certain dialects of English and Spanish are often seen, especially by "gatekeepers" in those societies, as necessary for upward social mobility. How does this impact the life-chances of the native speakers of those other languages or languages varieties (indigenous languages, dialects, creoles, pidgins) spoken there which are less valorized? Conversely, when speakers of "small," "endangered" languages (e.g. Yiddish, Gullah, Basque, Lushootseed, Welsh) organize to revitalize their linguistic heritage, how might "success" here best be judged? How does anthropological linguistics try to explore such questions? How might such concerns about language policies impact the domains of education, the juridical system, and popular imagination? This course will address these and other such issues vital to efforts to keep heritage languages vibrantly alive while also sustaining linguistic pluralism, linguistic rights, and linguistic justice.
Climate change has recently become shorthand for Global Warming, the clearcutting of rainforests, and the burning of fossil fuels. Yet while anthropogenic climate change on the global scale is indeed a modern phenomenon, climate change itself is nothing new, and human societies have been negotiating their natural world for millennia; adapting to changing conditions by inventing new technologies, adopting new social structures, and even modifying the landscapes around them.
This course uses examples from around the world, including Africa, the Mediterranean, Australia, the Americas, Asia, and the British Isles to examine how past societies perceived and interacted with their environments. Aspects of collecting, analyzing and interpreting various climate proxies, and the theoretical foundations for interpreting their relevance to archaeological questions, will constitute major components of this course.
Students focus on visual anthropology in its primary and original form: as a research practice. Specifically, they investigate and practically explore the use of visual media as a tool for anthropological research and presentation. They discuss visual anthropology both as a supplement to textually-focused ethnography, and as an end in itself, in the creation of a visual product that explicates cultural realities. This course focuses on visual forms of communication by analyzing and questioning how facts travel in the world through old and new media such as film, video, photography, including their digital forms. Students are introduced to the history of ethnographic film and contemporary changes that have widened the possibilities of visual anthropology beyond its early confines as a tool for illustration. Critical theory, methods, and ethical concerns are all part of the current refashioning of visual anthropology and are critical components of the class. Students will also be introduced to the emerging sub-discipline of media anthropology, which focuses on the intersections of culture and media consumption, production, and materiality. The class explores the history of media and cultural studies, and how they have informed contemporary media anthropological approaches. The class combines the discussion of theoretical and ethical issues, film and video screenings, and practical assignments in visual ethnography, using a variety of available media.
This course aims to engage students in an informed and critical study of contemporary China. Focusing on the historical continuity of Chinese society as well as its breaking away from tradition in the post-1949 era, the course encourages students to reflect on China's social transformations over the past seven decades from an anthropological perspective. Key topics include: 1) historical and sociocultural institutions (Chinese kinship, gender and marriage, popular religion and rituals, language and arts); 2) socialist transformations and aftermath (rural and urban transformations, socialist revolution, and the post-Mao reforms); and 3) China's global engagements (environment and development, media and young citizenship, and contested sociopolitical spaces). This course highlights the necessity of an interdisciplinary approach to the understanding of Chinese culture and society, as it draws from materials in other disciplines and beyond academia (such as journalism and documentary film) to supplement ethnographic readings on contemporary China.
Measuring students, norming test results, ranking students and schools, and "racing to the top" are endeavors that produce, according to a competitive paradigm, not only triumphant winners, but also deficient losers. Are there better, more inclusive and more socially just ways to envision and carry out the mission of education? How else might stigmatized students--those who are often perceived only as marginalized, "broken," and in need of "fixing"--be seen and positively incorporated in school systems? This course explores these and related questions, using an anthropological approach to identify the possible riches as well as perceived liabilities "brought to school" by those students who often struggle disproportionately in most educational systems. They include students whose biopsychological functioning is different enough for them to be labeled as "disabled"; students who are poor or have access to very limited economic resources; aboriginal students still negatively affected by their parents and grandparents having been forced to live far from family and home in residential boarding schools; and students whose home language is either a language other than English or a devalued variety of English. Class readings include both ethnographic accounts of such students' lived experiences as well as investigations of various proposed policies of school reform.
This course provides an anthropological overview of Southeast Asia, one of the most diverse and fascinating regions of the world, with a focus and required field component in Indonesia. Because of the Indonesia trip, the course requires an application and students are responsible for some expenses, including airfare. As a survey of Southeast Asian cultural groups and histories from an ethnographic perspective, the course begins on campus, but finishes in Yogyakarta, Central Java'a city often described as the cultural heart of Indonesia, and the country's center of higher education. In the first section of the class students investigate the prehistory, archaeology, and initial migration to the region. Students then examine the origins of agriculture and the development of complex state societies, and the influence of world religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, and particularly Islam) in the cultural development of SE Asia. Students then look at case studies of `indigenous' peoples in the region. Students also explore the economic and cultural impact of European colonialism and the response of SE Asian people to the European presence, as well as the post-colonial period of nation building. The final section of the course is more geographically focused, and looks at the cultural component of many important issues in modern day Indonesia, including environmental decline and deforestation, the impact of globalization and industrialization, the problems of ethnic and religious minorities, and human rights concerns. Students develop individual research projects that incorporate both library research and ethnographic fieldwork while in Indonesia. The Indonesia portion of the course lasts approximately 18 days, beginning shortly after the semester ends, and features an immersive stay at a local university including language instruction, guest lectures by Indonesian scholars, trips to cultural and historic sites, ethnographic projects, a multi-night stay in a rural village, and potential trips to Bali or other neighboring islands. Puget Sound students stay in the dorms alongside Indonesian students, some of whom sit in on class sessions and help introduce the visitors to their culture and lifestyle through group activities. Two faculty members accompany the group, and course meetings continue abroad, while taking advantage of the Indonesian setting with ethnographic assignments and individualized research projects developed prior to departure. The course is limited to 10-12 students and requires an application and instructor permission. There are fees related to the trip, including the plane ticket. Contact the course instructor for more information.
NOTE: This course will require an 18-day field component in Indonesia, and will require students to pay their own airfare, as well as other potential program fees. Applications will be accepted from all students who have met the prerequisite of SOAN 200 (Cultural Anthropology), and a panel of two faculty members (the instructor and one other member from SOAN or the Asian Studies Program) will evaluate applications on the basis of: (1) academic performance, (2) well-articulated ability/willingness to deal with adverse situations and cultural difference, (3) recommendations by Puget Sound faculty members, (4) interest and enthusiasm for study in and about Southeast Asia, and (5) a clean disciplinary record at the university.
The field of criminology covers two main areas: (1) analysis of law-breaking and (2) investigation of the ways in which laws are made and enforced by the criminal justice system. The first seeks to answer the question, Why do people break (or follow) the law? The second asks, How is (criminal) law made and enforced? These issues are examined historically and cross-nationally but there is particular attention given to contemporary conditions in the United States, a country with a high rate of offending and probably the highest rate of incarceration in the world. In addition to investigating the variation in offending and victimization, the course examines the extent to which the U.S. criminal justice system is biased against certain classes and groups.
This course explores the rise of identity politics within Latin America since the 1990s. It asks how ethnic, racial, feminist, sexual, and transnational identity politics have shaped the nature and goals of a diverse array of social movements in the region. It draws on ethnographic analyses to analyze how specific instances of identity politics emerged from particular historical and national contexts to challenge traditional hierarchies of power in new ways. The course also utilizes fictional, testimonial, and film sources for further investigation of the experiences of participants within these movements and their implications for transformations in Latin American society.
This course examines how culture, identity, and ethics are implicated in economic development efforts around the globe and here at home. Through a critical examination of major development theories and their assumptions about the nature of the global system and the meaning of difference within it, the course explores whose ideas about development matter, how they manifest in terms of particular policies and politics, and what stakes they pose for different social groups. In particular, the course explores how race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, health, environment, and education, among other things, have structured development differences. In doing so, the course interrogates the role that colonialism, science, capitalism, and activism have played in shaping development norms and challenges to them. The course engages interdisciplinary and cross-cultural approaches to development through a combination of theoretical and ethnographic texts, as well as experiential learning. This course counts as one of the core courses for the Global Development Studies Designation.
The world is becoming increasingly interconnected, with the movement of people, capital, and cultures across borders transforming lives all over the globe. Yet globalization also shapes, and is shaped by, gender, class, race/ethnicity, age, sexuality, and other axes of difference and inequality. This course examines how gender relations are embedded in practices of globalizing capitalism. Not only does globalization shape the lives of men and women in distinct ways, but the social and economic changes accompanying globalization affect power relations involved in masculine domination. The course examines key developments at the nexus of globalization and gender: the feminization of poverty, feminization of migration, and feminization of workforces which are consistent features of transnational production processes. Besides analyzing the gendered consequences of globalization, including how globalization shapes the lived experiences of women worldwide, it also foregrounds how gendered subjects constitute processes of globalization. Special attention is given to how gender shapes our ideas of what counts as "work," both paid and unpaid, globally, as well as how gender permeates institutions, especially workplaces, but also the government and international organizations.
This course grounds an understanding of many of our social and cultural conflicts within two dominant systems: First, a political-economy that has operated largely in the interests of the elite and thereby produced a level of economic inequality not seen in the United States in at least a century; second, an American empire that, despite continuing displays of force and the stationing of troops across the globe, is showing clear signs of overreach and decline. Beyond manifestations of coercive power, the course explores the system of propaganda and disinformation that seeks to maintain legitimacy and consent. What does it mean for the individual to live in times of such strain? How do these conditions interact with a cultural system that increasingly puts Americans into hostile camps divided by politics, race, gender, education, generation, location, and other factors? In short, a major concern of the course is with what Martin Luther King, Jr. referred to as the "Three Evils": racism, materialism (especially poverty and exploitation), and militarism. But just as MLK Jr. did not call for despair, we recognize that resistance is not futile, and the course explores a vision for a hopeful future based on social movements and social change.
In the contemporary world, tourism is often the foremost process that brings together people from different parts of the world, allowing those from vastly different societies to interact on a face-to-face basis under peaceful, if not always equal, circumstances. As such, tourism as a phenomenon and as a process raises questions about global interconnections and global movements of finance, cultural and material artifacts, ideas, and people across national and cultural boundaries. The two questions this course addresses throughout the semester are 1) what are the economic, political, social, cultural, and environmental impacts of tourism in low and middle income countries? and 2) what are the tradeoffs associated with tourism? In tackling these two questions the course examines a wide range of issues, including the political, economic, social, and cultural implications of tourism, the impact of global tourism on environmental and global conservation efforts, and tourism as a vehicle of social change and as a facilitator of cultural and material globalization. Crosslisted as IPE/SOAN 323.
The course has a two-fold purpose: first, to analyze the political, economic, and cultural forces creating interdependence in the world, and second, to adopt a comparative perspective and to investigate in some depth the social systems in a variety of countries.
Changes in transportation, information, and communication technology, as well as artificial intelligence and automation are rapidly transforming occupational and commercial arrangements. These forces of transnational economic integration undermine conventional organizational and commercial forms, and in so doing alter the ways people execute work and management in many fields. This course examines these phenomena by focusing on work and management in different phases of product and service supply chains locally and globally, in addition to examining differences in experience of these processes on the basis of race, class, gender, nativity, and other intersecting social dimensions.
This course examines the sociological dimensions of health, illness and the profession of medicine. Specifically, this course will address five primary themes: 1) The social construction of health and disease and medical knowledge; 2) health and illness behavior: the study of behaviors related to staying healthy and to interpreting and responding to symptoms of illness; 3) Social Epidemiology: the study of patterns of distribution of disease and mortality in the United States; 4) the roles that patients, physicians, and other players enact in the context of healthcare settings; and 5) the socialization and organization of health care professionals.
This course serves as an introduction to issues surrounding global health. Students explore multiple mechanisms that lead to health inequalities around the world, along with policies and interventions that aim to deal with issues of morbidity and mortality at a national and/or global scale. Topics covered in this course include, but are not limited to: the impact of globalization on the health of specific populations, socioeconomic contexts of disease, issues of infectious disease and nutrition, the interplay between culture and health, ethical and human rights concerns, and the role of NGOs and nonprofits in global health.
Disability studies offers perhaps the most trenchant critique of "the hegemony of the normal"--that is, the reification and privileging of certain numerical indices (for example, IQ score; body mass index; weight and height; complete blood count; range of motion; brainwave frequencies; and other such measurements which are then regarded as "better" or "worse" than comparable numbers). While certainly accepting the importance of such measurements in designing treatments and strategies to improve the quality of life for people living in pain, disability studies seeks to balance this "experience-distant" emphasis on "the quantified life" with "experience-near" insights. Thus disability studies seeks out, reflects on, and tries to incorporate and prioritize the meta-biological realities of the lived experiences of people with disabilities (defined here as lifelong or chronic biological and/or psychological impairments), especially in policy-making endeavors inspired by ideals of social justice. Hence this course focuses on issues of power, disparity, and diversity of experience and identities, particularly as these affect and are affected by the minds and bodies of individuals who "have" (or are socially close to people who "have") conditions that mark them as "not normal". Unlike studies done from the perspective of the healing professions, where non-normalcy is regarded as a condition to be helped or remedied, this course, following the perspective of disability studies, is less concerned with identifying and "fixing" deviation from some statistically defined ideal range, and more directly focused on socially grounded, ever-dynamic identity construction and its relation to emancipatory social change, especially when these processes involve confrontations between individuals with disabilities and the various social institutions (e.g. education, health care, legal and economic systems) they (or their caregivers) must deal with throughout their lives.
Utilizing key aspects of the ethnographic approach and methodology, and complemented with a constellation of interdisciplinary scholarly material tethered to anthropology, this course turns the ethnographic lens on the recent American past. Through a sequential trajectory comprising student-led explorations of American cultural ephemera, students assemble an analytic and empirically-grounded understanding of the evolving American zeitgeist in the decades preceding the postmodern and neoliberal turn. In the second half of the course, students consider a series of lectures and readings that illuminate America's paradigmatic immersion in the postmodern turn, and coincidentally, the extrapolation of the social, political, and economic relations endemic to neoliberalism and the neoliberal era. In the final segment of the course, students peruse a rotating set of theoretically adept materials that seek to explain the American present, and subsequently evaluate these various frameworks based on the understandings of the recent American past they've now assembled.
Islam has significant influence on a broad array of nations, ethnic groups, and local expressions of culture, and plays a role in shaping societies' politics, economics, and law. Taking a practice-focused, anthropological perspective on the study of religion, this course examines the many ways in which culture and society have been co-influenced by Islam in different parts of the world, including here in the Pacific Northwest. The objective of this course is to move beyond stereotypes and essentialization to better understand the diverse, lived experience of Muslims around the world, and the ways that collaborative, ethnographic social science can help in understanding Islam as a way of life. The course aims to help students develop a critical awareness of the ways Muslims' understandings of their faith can be mediated by social, economic, and political phenomena. Students further explore representational politics and power relations surrounding Islam, and how Western powers have historically represented the Islamic world and Muslims, both at home and abroad.
This course offers a critical analysis of what it means to be a man using a sociological lens. Feminist scholars made gender visible, problematizing both femininities and masculinities in order to challenge and transform unequal gender relations. Yet until recent decades, men were rather invisible as men, as gendered beings, in academic research. Building on the insights of gender studies, the course emphasizes the socially constructed, power-laden, and historically and culturally variable character of masculinities in its multiple forms. Readings highlight the individual, interactional, and institutional processes through which men become men and "do masculinity" in relation to both women and other men. Using an intersectional approach, the course also explores how masculinities are shaped by other axes of difference and inequality, including class, race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, and age. Masculinities are analyzed across multiple contexts over the life course, including intimate relationships, schools, families, workplaces, and organizations. Diverse forms of masculinities in the United States as well as masculinities in Mexico, Russia, and Western Europe will be considered.
Political ecology is an active interdisciplinary framework with foundations in anthropology, geography, environmental studies and the biological sciences. Its central contention is that our understanding of environmental issues and environmental change must include an analysis of the social, political, economic, and cultural context in which they are produced. Through a set of advanced readings in the social sciences, students in this course become familiar with the genealogy of this interdisciplinary approach, the keystone texts that inform contemporary political/ecological work, and the new directions that comprise the cutting edge of political ecology. Recurring themes in the reading list will examine indigenous peoples' struggle over resources, the construction of nature through the capitalist lens, and an examination of sustainability in both discourse and practice. Students conduct original ethnographic research that builds upon these areas of interest.
Advanced coursework in anthropology, sociology, and/or international political economy is strongly recommended.
Sociology has long sought scientific status. In the process, it has tended to squeeze out the human and personal from its vocabulary and methods. This course is designed to tackle the crucial questions of sociology by approaching them through an examination of works of literature (for novelists are often excellent microsociologists) and through personal social histories to try and arrive at the abstract and theoretical aspects of sociology from the personal and concrete. The unifying theme of the course is emancipation. This course is conducted in seminar format requiring extensive class participation.
This seminar involves an in-depth examination of selected topics in anthropology and/or sociology. A different topic is selected by faculty each time it is offered. Relevant theory and current research is examined. Students are responsible for research papers and presentations under close supervision of the faculty.
In this capstone course students bring together their previous conceptual, theoretical, and empirical knowledge and skills in sociology and anthropology in order to propose and ultimately investigate a social-scientific research question. Much of the work is done independently while under the supervision of the thesis instructor. In addition to the written report, students also give a public presentation of their thesis.
This course is an optional continuation of SOAN 490, Senior Thesis, for students interested in gathering additional and primary empirical data. Working from their proposed research question from SOAN 490, students must propose a research design, gather and analyze data, and use the results to answer their research question.
Benjamin Disraeli described the question placed before society by Charles Darwin's work as follows: "Is man an ape or an angel?" This course examines the development of evolutionary thinking during the nineteenth century and the resulting debates over the "Descent of Man." It explores the relationship between Darwin's theory of evolution and the social, political and religious history of Britain and the British Empire in the nineteenth century. The course serves as an introduction to analyzing the interactions between science and society, with particular attention to how Darwin's theory intersected with debates over God, Science, Empire, Ethics, Race, Gender, Economics, and Politics.
Students in this course analyze the history of the physical and biological sciences since 1800, paying special attention to the reciprocal relationship between scientific knowledge and social context. Beginning with the social and intellectual upheaval of the French and Haitian Revolutions, this course highlights how an historical approach can inform our understanding of the triumphs and tragedies of scientific and technological development. Subjects of the course may include creationism, natural theology, evolution, the origin and demise of the electromagnetic worldview, atomic theory, big science, and genetics.
This course focuses on the history of science, technology, and society from Antiquity to 1700 C.E. It emphasizes both the theoretical understanding of nature and the practical mastery of the technologies of settled existence. Topics include: astronomy in ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia and Greece; ancient Greek and early Chinese medicine; Islamic science in the Middle Ages; Renaissance anatomy, physiology, and natural history; and the Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century. Issues addressed include: the role of cultural institutions in the production and diffusion of scientific ideas; the transmission of science across linguistic and cultural boundaries; and the interaction of science with art, religion, philosophy and political life. There are no prerequisites, but the course assumes a working knowledge of biology, chemistry, and geometry at the high school level.
This course surveys the history of medicine in the United States, guided by the following questions: How and why did a particular way of understanding the body, health, and medicine become established as "scientific medicine" in the U.S.? What role have alternative understandings of health and disease played in challenging the status and assumptions of biomedical approaches? How has "progress in medicine" been defined, by whom, and for whom? What political, social, and cultural histories are needed to understand both historical and present-day health inequities in healthcare? How do we develop a narrative of the past that acknowledges both the historical triumphs and tragedies of the U.S. healthcare and medical system and why should we try? How can studying this history improve medical practice, institutions, and education, including provider-patient relationships?
In this capstone experience for the STHS major, students conduct detailed research on an STHS topic (drawing upon historical, sociological, and/or philosophical approaches) and produce a final project appropriate to their academic and co-curricular interests, e.g., writing a substantive paper, creating a web exhibit, or designing a syllabus.