HRTS 3295-002: Special Topics: International Human Rights Law

March 28, 2014

Instructor: Molly Land

This course will survey the theory and practice of international human rights law. We will examine the historical foundations of international human rights law; the primary international and regional human rights instruments; and the domestic, regional, and international forums that human rights advocates use to increase respect for international human rights. The course will also address the roles, activities, and obligations of corporations and non-governmental organizations; mechanisms and strategies of human rights enforcement; and selected current issues in the field, such as the right to health, international criminal law, trade, national security, self-determination, and women’s human rights.

PHIL 1101: Problems of Philosophy

March 25, 2014

Two Honors sections of PHIL 1101 will be offered in Fall 2014.

PHIL 1101-001 (Donald Baxter)

The purposes of Philosophy 1101 H are:

  1. to introduce students to some of the great thinkers and great issues of western philosophy.
  2. to train students in critical thinking, complex reasoning, and clear, persuasive speaking and writing.
  3. to promote reason and civil discourse in debates with others.

The course emphasizes that the sort of discussion taught in philosophy classes is an essential way of inquiring into matters of value, and so is important for coming to wise decisions on the personal, political, moral, religious, social, etc. issues faced by everyone in their lives. Topics include God and Religion, Mind, Self, Freedom, Morality, and Ethical Problems. The textbook will be John Cottingham, ed. Western Philosophy: An Anthology, 2nd Edition. Students are strongly encouraged to participate in class discussion, which will takes issues beyond the elementary exposition of non-honors sections.

PHIL 1101-002 (Mitchell Green)

Philosophy is the replacement of intellectual habit with intellectual discipline.  One who knows how to philosophize is in possession not so much of a body of knowledge as a skill, namely, the skill to think critically and circumspectly about issues that science alone is unable to settle but that nevertheless daily confront anyone who purports to live an examined life.  In that spirit, this course is intended as a general and non-technical introduction to the main traditional problems of metaphysics, ethics, and the theory of knowledge as they are to be found in the writings of historical figures (such as Plato, Descartes, Pascal, Leibniz, Hume, and John Stuart Mill) and contemporary authors.  Among our questions will be:  Can we be rationally justified in believing in the existence of a divine being?  How can the will be free in a world governed by physical law?  Is the rightness or wrongness of an act a matter of the conventions of the society in which that act is performed or can morality transcend social norms?  Is there a difference in principle between knowledge as it is conveyed by science and beliefs or opinions that we might form in other ways, for instance on the basis of intuition?  Is the mind so related to the body that it could survive the latter’s death or are “mind” and “brain” two ways of referring to the same thing?  This course is intended for those making a first approach to the subject, either to gain an idea of its scope or in order to lay a foundation for further study.

Prerequisites:  None.
Requirements: Two papers, a midterm examination, a final examination, and active participation in discussion.

EVST 1000 – 004D: Introduction to Environmental Studies

Introduction to Environmental Studies views the fundamentals of environmental thought from many perspectives in the humanities (art, literature, history, philosophy, etc.) and social sciences (economics, politics, social justice, anthropology, etc.). From our conceptions of nature to how resources are valued to environmental justice, and much more, this class covers the foundational ideas that guide how individuals and societies deal with the environment. In the honors section, you will engage with the material in a practical way through a service learning project at a community garden in Willimantic. (Bus transportation is available.) You will learn about the importance of volunteerism in environmental action, the diverse community that supports the garden, and take on a project to improve the garden in some way. Past projects have ranged from hands-on (organic pest prevention, setting up better composting, planning drip irrigation) to administrative (publicity, helping at the farmer’s market, grant writing). These activities will be accompanied by associated materials and a reflection piece at the end of the semester. The honors section service learning projects proved to be enjoyable, educational, and some students continued as volunteers and interns with the garden.

GERM 1175-001: Human Rights and German Culture

Instructor: Sebastian Wogenstein

This course examines philosophical discourse on human rights from the Enlightenment to the present as well as literature and other art forms related to human rights. Literature and the arts have early evoked and discussed the idea of natural and universal rights while communicating experiences of the violation of human dignity. Such works provide the basis for a discussion of ethical dilemmas and provide insight into the complex history of the struggle for human rights. Using various media, we will analyze theoretical and legal documents, documentary sources, literature and films related to Germany’s colonial history, the women’s rights movement, the Holocaust, human rights in divided Germany and current debates on citizenship, multiculturalism and political asylum. While the course introduces students to the history of human rights from the Enlightenment to the present in Germany, it also aims at raising the students’ awareness of related issues in their own lives.

MUSI 1003-005D: Popular Music & Diversity in American Society

Instructor: Glenn Stanley

An introduction to popular music and diversity in America: jazz, blues, Top-40 pop, rock, hip-hop and other genres. Musicians and their music studied in the context of twentieth-century and contemporary American society, emphasizing issues of race, gender, class, and resistance. No prior musical training or knowledge required.

In the honors section students will have the opportunity to lead a discussion of one of the reading assignments from the primary-source materials text and present and discuss “My Favorite Pop-Song.” Honors students will also have an enhanced writing assignment on a topic of their choosing.

CAMS 1103-002: Classical Mythology (online course!)

March 24, 2014

Instructor: Roger Travis

Origin, nature, and function of myth in the literature and art of Greece and Rome and the re-interpretation of classical myth in modern art forms. Taught in English. The honors section of CAMS 1103 will feature the opportunity to engage in a unique activity only for honors students, which will greatly enhance your learning in classical mythology. You will have the chance to discuss the honors project, which is a collaborative interpretive paper on the cultural treatment of one of the most important Greek myths, the story of the House of Atreus, in a small online discussion group with Professor Travis and the rest of the honors section, with whom you are collaborating on the paper. (You will be graded on your contribution, and not on the group’s final product, so you will be evaluated only on your own work.)

ENGL 1701 (Creative Writing) and 2401 (Poetry)

March 21, 2014

ENGL 1701-002: Creative Writing I

Prerequisite: ENGL 1010, 1011, or 2011
Instructor: Sean Forbes

This workshop will introduce methods of writing poetry and prose. The first half of the course will focus on poetry, and the second half will focus on fiction. Students will have the chance to produce and revise work, to hone critical reading skills, to learn the tools with which they can critique the work of others, and to become careful editors of their own work. Students will be expected to read and write on a daily basis. Active participation is mandatory.

ENGL 2401-007: Poetry

Prerequisite: ENGL 1010, 1011, or 2011
Instructor: Jonathan Hufstader

How to read, hear, see, understand, enjoy, interpret, think about, talk about, and write about poems. Come prepared to do all these things actively in class. Two papers, midterm, final.

Fall 2014 Sociology Graduate Courses

The sociology department invites Honors students to consider taking one or more of their graduate courses. With your advisor’s approval, graduate courses may be included in your Honors Final Plan of Study for graduation. They also count toward your Honors participation requirements.

SOCI 5201 THE LOGIC OF SOCIAL RESEARCH
Bandana Purkayastha

How do social scientists decide which methods enable them to find the best answers to their research questions? How do different epistemologies lead to diverse methodological frameworks and different methods of social enquiry? This course will provide you with the tools to understand and weigh a variety of methodologies and methods of social inquiry. You will develop the ability to critically assess research methods. I will expect you to design your own research proposal and ensure it is consistent with the ethical standards of research required by our university.

SOCI 5231 QUALITATIVE RESEARCH I
Claudio Benzecry

How do sociologists observe social life? How do they gather evidence through conversation and observation? What is the difference between scientific evidence and anecdotal evidence or opinion? What constitutes rigorous empirical qualitative research? This course aims to answer these, and other questions. To do so the course will familiarize students with both classic and contemporary ethnographies; it will acquaint studies with the methodological tenets of ethnography, life stories, in-­‐depth interviewing and visual sociology; it will consider theoretical and epistemological issues in ethnographic research and will put some of the data production techniques into practice. Looking at sources, focusing especially on the fit between evidence and analysis, the course will intertwine questions about the theoretical and practical dimensions of practicing qualitative sociology. Theoretically, we will consider questions such as the following: What is “qualitative” research? What are the roles of induction and deduction? Can qualitative research verify hypotheses, or only generate them? Practically, we will consider questions such as the following: What is a good key informant? How does one write good fieldnotes? What is snowball sampling? What is the difference between good and bad ethnographic evidence? How many interviews are enough? In considering multiple means of observation, students will develop an analytic vocabulary with which to critique social inquiry. Written assignments are exercises in data collection and analysis, and some of each week’s class time will address the very practical concerns that researchers must consider when conducting any study. The skills gained in this course should be applicable to an extended research project, either individually or in collaboration with others.

SOCI 5251 CORE THEORISTS
Matthew Hughey

For better or worse, contemporary sociology rests largely on a foundation of concepts, observations, and procedures developed by a variety of European and North American thinkers in the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth centuries. In the eighteenth century, sociology was not yet institutionalized as a distinct point of view or profession. Rather, social reflection and observation were styles of thought within philosophy and letters more broadly. By the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, however, a number of thinkers began to identify social science—if not yet sociology in particular—as a distinctive enterprise with unique procedures, concepts, and theoretical points of view. Any understanding of sociological projects in the contemporary period thus rests on a comprehension of the origins and outlines of the field as they formed in these contexts. By the same token, the ideas, attitudes, and terms propagated by thinkers from the Enlightenment, the Romantic Age, and the Industrial Era, and the sociological theories built on them, provide enduring resources for, as well as origins of, the self-­‐concept of the modern world. These are the terms of our self-­‐understanding and referents of our sociological discourses. A central question is whether, and in what ways, they still contribute to our understanding of the world in which we live and the ways we practice sociology.

SOCI 5425 TOPICS IN STRATIFICATION AND INEQUALITY
Jeremy Pais

This course focuses on the social stratification processes that affect people’s life chances over life course—from childhood to old age. Understanding life course processes of stratification will require students to develop deeper analytical understandings of the social stratification system, to theorize ways in which this system shapes different life trajectories, and to recognize the system itself is a product of series of life-­‐course status distinctions. We will focus on a range of topics from the early formation of values, attitudes, and aspirations during the formative years; educational opportunities and human capital acquisition; the effects of local-­‐labor market conditions on young adults as they transition to adulthood; intragenerational mobility; poverty exposure and the process of “aging off the street”; intergenerational transmissions of status attainment; wealth accumulation; and health and quality of life issues among the elderly and disabled. This course will also provide supplemental material for students taking a social stratification comprehensive exam.

SOCI 5605 GENDER AND SEXUALITIES
Mary Bernstein

This course explores the social organization, construction, and politics of sexualities with a particular focus on lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (lgbtq) experiences and the intersection of sexualities, gender, race, age, and class. We look at how institutions, identities, and discourses interact with, are regulated by, and produce sexual meanings. We examine the ways in which sexuality and desire are constituted through the state and the political economy as well as the ways in which sexuality serves as an axis of domination. Other topics include sexuality and immigration, sex work, transnational sexuality, sexuality and masculinity, and adolescent sexuality.

SOCI 5612 FEMINIST THEORY AND SOCIAL SCIENCE
Nancy Naples

This course introduces you to the intellectual background and contemporary context for diverse feminist theoretical debates in the social sciences. We will explore these debates with reference to transnational and intersectional feminist perspectives on politics, science, socialization, sexuality, economics, postmodernism, postcolonialism, and globalization. Group discussion is the primary format for the course. I will offer background information and provide direction for the discussion, but we will work together to create an atmosphere that maximizes participation.

SOCI 5801 POLITICAL SOCIOLOGY
Ruth Braunstein

This course introduces graduate students to the sociological study of politics. More specifically, it will investigate the ways in which political institutions, processes and norms shape (and are shaped by) a variety of social and economic inequalities. We will explore this general theme by reviewing important theoretical debates about power, political struggles and the state; as well as classical and contemporary scholarship on welfare state development and the politics of social policymaking. We will pay particular attention to questions about the unique character of the American welfare state, the gendered dimensions of social policy, and the historical and enduring ways in which race, immigration and cultural distinctions between deserving and undeserving groups shape (and constrain) social policymaking. Throughout, we will consider the theoretical and methodological issues that drive major debates within this subfield. Although this course is open to students of all interests and backgrounds, it is particularly designed to provide a conceptual and theoretical foundation for graduate students who are thinking of taking a comprehensive examination in the field of political sociology and/or conducting original research that relates to this field.

SOCI 5895 INVESTIGATION OF SPECIAL TOPICS: CONTESTING DEVELOPMENT
Manisha Desai

In this seminar we will examine the history of International Development as theory and praxis, from modernization to its current formulation as a rights based discourse in the era of neoliberal globalization. Along the way we will study how race, gender, indigeniety, sexuality, and disability became embedded in its re-­‐imaginings and the current, critical struggles around and against development, post-­‐development, rights and justice.

SOCI 6203 QUANTITATIVE RESEARCH II
Simon Cheng

SOCI 6203 is the second course in sociology’s graduate sequence in applied statistics. The first course, SOCI 5203, deals with models in which the dependent variable is continuous. These include the linear regression model, seemingly unrelated regressions, and systems of simultaneous equations. SOCI 6203 deals with regression models in which the dependent variable is limited or categorical. Such models include probit, logit, ordered logit, and Poisson regression, among others. The course assumes a good working knowledge of the linear regression model for continuous variables, as well as elementary knowledge of matrix algebra.

Honors BIOL 1107 & 1108

A new Honors version of BIOL 1107 will be offered once a year, starting in Fall 2014. All Honors lab sections are attached to a single Honors lecture. Students who complete the course with a B- or better will earn 4 Honors credits on their transcripts. Students will no longer take the BIOL 1109 Honors seminar concurrently with BIOL 1107.

Honors credit for BIOL 1108 will still be earned by taking the BIOL 1109 Honors seminar concurrently with any BIOL 1108 section. Students’ transcripts will show 4 non-Honors credits for BIOL 1108 and 1 Honors credit for BIOL 1109. Starting in Fall 2014, students who earn a B- or better in BIOL 1108 and BIOL 1109 will be treated as if they had earned 4 Honors credits toward Honors participation requirements and/or Sophomore Honors. BIOL 1108+1109 may also be used as the 3 additional Honors credits at any level required for graduation as an Honors Scholar, but it will not fulfill the “depth” requirement (3 credits in an Honors graded class).

These changes do not affect students who completed BIOL 1107 + 1109 and/or BIOL 1108 + 1109 prior to Fall 2014. These students will still be treated as if they had earned 5 Honors credits for each.

Meet the HIPS Coordinators!

March 14, 2014

2015 Coordinators

quian callender
Quian Callender, Honors student, class of 2016, Health Care Management major, Public Policy minor

My favorite part of being a Husky includes the ability always meet new people from all walks of life and across all interests.  In addition to UConn’s size, tight communities and close, lasting relationships with peers form.  There’s a huge sense of pride that’s apparent everyday especially during UConn traditions such as Homecoming Week and athletic games.  As a UConn student, you will have the opportunity to pursue any of your interests through the Honors Program, clubs, organizations, volunteering opportunities, internships, and research.

 

 

 

Sarah Levine, Honors Student, Class of 2016 Communication and Journalism Major Spanish Minor
Sarah Levine, Honors Student, Class of 2016, Communication and Journalism Major, Spanish Minor

My favorite thing about UConn is its size and diversity. In such a large school, I interact with all kinds of people every day.  There are always other people who are also interested in things that you are interested in- just look at all of the clubs, sports, and activities we have on campus.  Through these things, students can join tighter communities that make a 17,000-student university feel like home.  Personally, the thing that helped me transition into college the most was being a part of the Honors community.  Faculty and advisors are always around to answer questions or just talk, and I loved living with other honors students with whom I shared similar interests and classes.  From the minute I stepped onto campus, everyone has been welcoming and brimming with campus spirit.  Everyone is proud to be a Husky- especially at all of our many sporting events! Go Huskies!

 

 

Abby Raynor, Honors Student, Class of 2017 Molecular and Cell Biology Major, Pre-Med Track Spanish Minor
Abby Raynor, Honors Student, Class of 2017, Molecular and Cell Biology Major, Pre-Med Track, Spanish Minor

I am a freshman here in the University of Connecticut Honors Program. I intend to major in Molecular and Cellular Biology and minor in Spanish, and I am a part of UConn’s pre-med program. On campus, I am involved in numerous clubs and organizations like Pre-Med Society, Global Brigades and the UConn Club Swim Team. I am also an active member of the Honors community by volunteering at many recruitment events as a HIPS Student coordinator, and I’m currently training to be a student facilitator in the freshman seminar course each first-year Honors student is require to take. In my free time I love to attend all UConn sporting events, especially basketball, and show off my Husky pride!

 

Holly Chase
Holly Chase, Honors Student, Class of 2017, Health Care Management Major, Neuroscience Minor

My favorite part about being a Husky is the limitless opportunities that are available to each student. Your college experience is reflective to the work you put into it, and I believe engaging in campus events, clubs, and organizations is the best way to begin! In addition to volunteering for HIPS, I play Club Field Hockey, am a member of the Honors in Business Association, and consider myself an avid basketball fan! Through these outlets, I have made fantastic friends and gained peer connections that have positively shaped my direction as a student. Get involved and have fun! Bleed Blue!

 

Vince Pistritto
Vincent Pistritto, Honors Student, Class of 2018, Chemistry and Music Majors

Being a Husky means many things-either you’re pulling a sled in the Iditarod, you’re wearing a winter coat all year round, or you go to UConn. Coming from a small town in western Connecticut, everybody knows that when you’re a Husky, it only means one thing-you go to UConn. It is that sort of recognition and pride that sets UConn apart. You can meet so many different people and engage in truly thought provoking study while at the University. As a member of the Honors Program, you have a smaller family nestled within the larger student body. This gives you a small campus feel at a larger university. In addition, there is a wide variety of extra-curricular activities to get involved with which will enrich your college experience. I hope you all will come to UConn and get to experience first-hand what a special place Storrs, Connecticut truly is. Go Huskies!!!!

 

Kyle

Kyle Terracciano, Honors Student, Class of 2018, Chemical Engineering Major, Mathematics Minor

I am a freshman in the University of Connecticut Honors Program.  I am currently majoring in Chemical Engineering with a minor in Mathematics.  On campus, I am a member of the American Institute for Chemical Engineers and I volunteer for the Northeast Regional Science Bowl, one of the largest events of its kind in the country  Over the summers, I coachcompetitive swimming in my hometown of Middlesex, NJ.  I stay involved with the Honors Program by helping organize events for prospective honors students as a HIPS Student coordinator.  I am also currently in training to be a UNIV 1784 facilitator for next year.  What I love about UConn is all of the amazing academic opportunities provided for students and the abundance of school spirit.  Go UConn!