Instructor: Chris Simon
There’s not just one future, there are Alternative Futures.
Focusing on current events… Interactions of humans and the environment, shifting baselines, tradeoffs, problem-solving, climate change, population growth, biodiversity, restoration, alternative energy, throwaway society, risk assessment, brave
new world, alternative futures.
Suitable for all majors and all class levels.
Instructor: Clifford Roth
When you attend class, talk with your roommate, watch television, or surf the Internet, you face decisions about what to believe. Should you accept a newspaper editor’s claim that the pharmaceutical industry has too much power to set drug prices? Should you agree with a website’s conclusion that stem cell research has the potential to cure Muscular Dystrophy? Should you be persuaded by your roommate’s claim that a particular herbal tea can prevent you from getting the common cold? The answers to these questions depend on the quality of the arguments provided in each case.
In this course, you will learn how to identify, evaluate, and construct arguments. Your readings, written assignments, and oral presentations will focus on contemporary issues in the healthcare field. We will examine arguments as they appear in a range of topics, including such questions as: Should euthanasia be legal? Is the Affordable Care Act (ObamaCare) a success or could Congress make improvements? Is the administration of vaccines a public health issue or one of personal choice?
(CA 1)
Instructor: Clare Costley King’oo
Prerequisite: English 1010 or 1011 or 2011 or 3800
This course, designed with Honors students in mind, delves into the major writers and literary traditions of England from the beginning of the sixteenth century to the middle of the seventeenth century (or, roughly, from Sir Thomas More and Sir Thomas Wyatt to John Donne and John Milton). Our principal aim will be to familiarize ourselves with the most popular genres of the time, including autobiography, martyrology, lyric verse, epic poetry, prose fiction, and drama. We will also investigate how the literature of the period interacted with contemporary social, cultural, and economic upheavals—such as the arrival of the printing press, the development of Humanist thought, the growth of capitalist enterprise, the exploration and conquest of the new world, the expansion of the enclosure movement, and the often-violent religious conflicts of the Reformation. Our discoveries will be the focus of our own rigorous writing practices, as we work on improving our argumentative and stylistic skills through a range of reports and essays (with revisions). Lively participation in class discussions will be expected and warmly encouraged. Students who have already completed an early English literature course (British Literature I, Medieval English Literature, or Shakespeare, for example) will be particularly well prepared for this class.
Instructor: Sarah Winter
Prerequisite: ENGL 1010 or 1011 or 2011 or 3800
This course will provide an introduction to the history and performance of drama. We will study major plays and changing theatrical conventions from classical Greek drama to the present. Requirements: a 5-7 page paper and an 8-10 page paper; a small group presentation; and a final exam.
Instructor: Sean Forbes
Prerequisite: ENGL 1010 or 1011 or 2011 or 3800
The Speaker: The Eye of the Poem and the Short Story
According to Frances Mayes, “the poet ‘finds’ the right speaker and the right listener, usually by trying out several approaches.” In this introduction to creative writing class we will examine the different approaches that a writer can take when trying to establish a speaker in a poem or short story. We will look at exemplary works of poetry and fiction from writers like Robert Hayden, Elizabeth Bishop, Richard Blanco, and Justin Torres. Students will produce a final portfolio of their original work. Class participation is an essential component to this largely workshop-based course along with weekly writing prompts such as writing in iambic pentameter and challenging prose sketches.
Instructor: Mark Boyer
While this is not an Honors course, Prof. Boyer welcomes Honors students of all levels and majors and encourages Honors conversions. If you do not have junior standing, contact Dr. Boyer for a permission number.
This course in human geography focuses on two primary sets of linkages:
Additionally, the course will explore the interaction between those two sets of linkages, their geographical context, policy implications and their ever-evolving status in today’s contemporary world. Fundamental to the course are considerations of scale as we move from the global to the regional to the local and seek to understand how each spatial realm impacts the others. Moreover, emphasizing systemic thinking throughout the course, the latter part of the course employs a future modeling simulation that will allow students to build scenarios about world and regional futures.
This is also a course that requires active participation by students in all aspects of the course. You will need to participate in class discussions, read assigned materials, work in groups to solve problems and use computers in a variety of ways in the course. Thus, students should be prepared for an active learning environment that is flexible and adaptable to a variety of approaches and learning styles. Students are encouraged to ask questions, to raise interesting topics and to explore the world of global environmental politics in new and creative ways. Only by doing this will the next generation of citizens and policy-makers be able to meet the environmental challenges facing the world system now and in the future.
Course Methods: