Fall 2017 Honors Program Instructor Course Descriptions

Instructor Course Descriptions

We provide course descriptions written by the instructor teaching the course whenever possible. For official descriptions, visit the University Catalog.

CLAS 1115-880: Masterpieces of Greek Literature in Translation
E. Christian Kopff
This course is an introduction to ancient Greek literature and therefore to all literature in the Western Tradition. Students read major literary genres, including epic, lyric poetry, tragedy, comedy, rhetoric and philosophical dialogue, composed by authors from Homer to Plato, who wrote about mythological heroes and historical individuals from Achilles to Socrates. Students discuss the way Greeks told stories, what those stories might have meant to them and why this literature is still meaningful and influential today. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: literature and the arts.

CLAS 1140-880+881: Bread and Circuses: Society and Culture in the Roman World
Isabel Köster
Surveys the outstanding achievements of Roman culture and society as reflected in literature; philosophy and art; private and official religion; and legal and political thought. No Greek or Latin required. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: historical context.

EBIO 1030-880: Biology – A Human Approach 1 
Robert Buchwald
Did you know that living in and on your body there are 10 times more bacterial cells than your body's own cells? Did you know that fish are evolving at an accelerated rate in the Hudson river due to heavy pollution? Ever wonder why inbreeding causes genetic problems? In this course we will take an integrative approach to the study of biology, covering topics that include the diversity of life, genetics, ecology, natural resource conservation and evolution. As we discuss these topics, we will also apply our newfound scientific knowledge as we discuss and debate related news stories like the status of the Yellowstone bison and the effects of a changing climate. Throughout the semester students will also conduct library research and give short presentations on intriguing organisms, the genetics of disease, conflict and controversies, and more. Guest speakers and field trips will round out our journey through introductory biology. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: natural science. Recommended for non-science majors.

ENGL 1220-880: From Gothic to Horror
Kelly Hurley
Explores literature in the Gothic mode and aesthetic and critical theories related to modern "horror" genres or their precursors. Introduces literary-critical concepts (such as notions of abjection, repression and anxiety) that developed alongside this branch of literature. Students read canonical works in British and American traditions while reflecting on notions of popular or marginalized literature. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: literature and the arts.

ENGL 1230-880: Environmental Literature 
Laura Winkiel
What is environmental literature? In what ways do literature and the environment intersect and what are their possible futures? Topics include: the politics of anthropocentrism; instrumentalist conceptions of nature and their alternatives; the Anthropocene as a new geological epoch; questions of resources, sustainability, and bioregionalism; issues of eco-cosmopolitanism, environmental justice and global impact; the concepts of “posthuman,” and “postnature.” In this course you will learn the critical terms and concepts necessary for analyzing environmental literature; and to locate those terms and concepts within the social, historical, biographical, and cultural contexts that gave rise to them. Texts may include work by Henry David Thoreau, John Muir, Fredric Douglass, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Aldo Leopold, Jamaica Kincaid, Annie Dillard, J. M. Coetzee, Rachel Carson, Elizabeth Kolbert, Rob Nixon, Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: literature and the arts.

ENGL 3060-880: Modern and Contemporary Literature
Douglas Burger
This course will provide a sampling of a remarkable variety of literary works, from groundbreaking fiction of James Joyce (Dubliners) and Virginia Woolf (To the Lighthouse) in the early 20^th century to the most recent fiction of Kent Haruf (Plainsong), a Colorado writer who died just two years ago. From the thorough and realistic tracing of the daily thought processes in the stream of consciousness of Joyce and Woolf to the playful and mindteasing fantasies of Italo Calvino, to the clever mingling of fictional and historical characters (Houdini, Henry Ford, Admiral Peary, etc.) in Doctorow’s Ragtime, to the enigmatic ghost (?) in Morrison’s Beloved, to the English boy raised by Australian aborigines in Remembering Babylon—the readings reflect the striking differences in style, genre, and literary approach of the novels and short stories that we will read. At the same time, they will incorporate the recurrent ideas and concerns of modern/contemporary literature: family relations, gender, class structures, racism and the marginalized “other.” The requirements for the course will include frequent informal response papers, two papers and two exams. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: literature and the arts.

GEOG 1972-880: Environment-Society Geography 
Abby Hickcox
The goals of this class are to increase your understanding of key contemporary environmental issues and to introduce you to the ways in which the field of geography has approached the interaction between society and nature. In pursuit of these goals, the class will survey global and regional environmental issues and problems, with an emphasis on their social, political-economic, and cultural dimensions. The study of these issues evokes one of the most profound questions of our times: What is, and what ought to be, the relationship between humans and the environment? We will address this question through an examination of selected environmental issues, varied social responses to environmental change, and the different ways in which human societies have transformed the earth. We will also ask:  How do we understand “nature”?  What drives human modification of the earth, and how are specific groups of people differently affected by those modifications? What kinds of assumptions have led to the creation of certain environmental problems (and for whom are they problems)? Topics covered include: population and consumption; environmental hazards; ecology; environmental ethics; biodiversity and environmental conservation; anthropogenic climate change; and water use. Through this class, you should find that geography offers an integrated way of understanding environment and culture that is increasingly useful for addressing some of the world’s most pressing problems and their potential solutions. Formerly GEOG 2412. Meets MAPS requirement for social science: geography.

GRMN 2301-880: Inside Nazi Germany
Patrick Greaney
Examines social culture and everyday life in Nazi Germany. Topics include the role of propaganda in the media and entertainment industries, anti-Semitism and suppression of ethnic, social and religious minorities, the role of education and youth organizations, as well as the role of women, the churches, and the effects of a controlled economy before and during World War II. Taught in English. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: historical context.

HIST 1113-880: British History to 1660 
David Paradis
Deals with Roman, medieval, and early modern periods. Covers the demographic, economic, and social patterns, political and religious developments, and cultural changes that contributed to the formation of the English nation. Formerly HIST 2103. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: historical context.

HIST 2166-880: The Vietnam Wars 
Steven Dike
In this class, we will study the history of a series of conflicts that occurred in Vietnam from about 1930 to 1975. These struggles involved Vietnamese nationalists, Vietnamese communists, French colonialists, Japanese occupiers, and Americans (along with others) in the final phase of these wars. This is a complicated history, but my goal is that all of you will leave this class with a deep knowledge of the issues, people, and conflicts that shaped Vietnam and the other nations that fought there in these decades. We will examine the American experience in the war, as well as the American home front. Students will write an independent research paper on a topic of their choice. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: United States context or contemporary societies.

HONR 1810-880: Honors Diversity Seminar
Alphonse Keasley
Students will develop an appreciation for, and experience with, diverse perspectives. In particular this includes: racial/ethnic, gender, sexual orientation, and class perspectives, for constructing knowledge as they proceed through their undergraduate studies. Three themes provide the framework for the course: education for the next century, the 21st century citizen, and the modern individual in a diverse society. Topics explored include privilege, stigmatization, targeted and non-targeted grouping, and oppression. Engaging in independent research and experiential, empathetic experiences is required. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: human diversity.

HONR 2250-880: Ethics of Ambition
Paul Strom
Through selected readings in the classical literature on ethics and through more contemporary readings and films, participants will have the opportunity to acquire the language and skills of critical ethical analysis, to analyze and evaluate the decisions made by others and by ourselves, and to consider the possibilities for transforming our personal ambitions and values. Our primary resources will be experiences and reflections recorded in biographies and autobiographical essays. We will consider how social location contributes to the formation of ambitions and ethics. We will consider the relationships of means and ends in the ethical styles of decision making. We will mark how ambitions may compete in a pluralistic society and, as far as possible, we will analyze and evaluate the ambitions and values of those considered “extreme risk takers.” Each seminar participant will independently analyze the ethics and ambitions of a person of their own choosing and present their insights to the class and to the instructor in a formal essay. Finally, our goal is to consider together how we might become moral agents who are able to act consistent with our most noble ambitions and according to our highest moral commitments. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: ideals and values.

HONR 2251-880: Introduction to the Bible 
E. Christian Kopff
The Bible, sixty-six works of history, law, prophecy, poetry and letters, is one of the great legacies of the ancient to the modern world. Students will read works that still influence issues that arise today and will likely arise tomorrow, while developing an historical perspective on the ideas, institutions and cultures which helped to shape the works and their authors. These cultures include the empires of Babylon, Egypt, Persia, Greece and Rome. Students will develop their own insights into Biblical texts and their ancient and contemporary significance by close reading, class discussion, a quiz and oral and written reports and papers. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: historical context.

HONR 3220-880: Advanced Honors Writing Workshop 
Rolf Norgaard
This course introduces honors students to inquiry and argumentation as they are rendered in longer prose forms. As such, the course provides excellent preparation for writing an honors thesis. With the collaboration and thoughtful feedback of your colleagues in class, you will have the opportunity to engage in independent scholarship in your area of expertise. Our informal theme for the semester will be “Composing Knowledge.” Through readings and individualized writing projects, this course encourages you to explore the role of language and rhetoric in “composing” what—and how—we “know.” Is knowledge a given, something to be consumed? Or is it constructed and composed, shaped by language and by communities of knowers that organize themselves through language? Working and writing together, we’ll explore the connection between language and inquiry. Specifically, we will examine assumptions about critical thinking, literacy, and communication that various disciplines hold, and how those assumptions relate to the expertise you acquire and share in your major. The theme is meant to provide a common backdrop to the individualized projects that lie at the heart of the course. We will begin by reviewing fundamental strategies of analysis and argument, and by reading and responding critically to a set of articles that explore the theme of “Composing Knowledge.” You will then focus on some aspect of the theme that interests you or on a specific issue that bears on your work in your major as you form a research question and tentative hypothesis. With the help of Norlin Library Instructional Services, you will then become acquainted with advanced information literacy skills that can help you prepare a formal prospectus or plan for enriching your inquiry through research. Drawing on that research and on feedback on preliminary drafts, you will have the opportunity to develop a sustained argument (roughly 20-25 pages) that showcases the fruits of your inquiry. The course will also address oral presentation skills essential to presenting your work effectively before an audience. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: written communication.

HONR 4000-880: Topics: Racism in American Culture 
Abby Hickcox
Why does racism persist in a “colorblind” America? What is the role of culture in perpetuating ideas about race? Is popular culture racist? How do we come to understand race as a reality? This course addresses the legacies of racism and colonialism in the United States and how racism is perpetuated and resisted through cultural forms. We will examine histories of privilege and oppression, including discourses on immigration, whiteness, structural racism, nationalism, biological racism, diversity, and multiculturalism. We will trace the ways in which racial meanings develop, dominate, and decline over time and identify the prominent racial discourses of contemporary American culture.

HUMN 4835-880: Literature and Social Violence 
Cathy Comstock
This seminar focuses on both literary and non-fictional texts about social violence, so that we can compare the understanding and effects made possible through different media, including film in some cases. We’ll study gang culture, homophobia and AIDS, the effects of racism and poverty on gutted-out neighborhoods and school systems, and the politics of hunger. We’ll also look at sources of great hope and positive action, such as Mountains Beyond Mountains, The Freedom Writers’ Diary, Angels in America and other ways in which both art and social action can make a transformative difference. All this is combined with the option to get extra credit by doing volunteer work in community agencies, since the personal experience with the effects of social violence helps us to understand the class materials—and our culture overall—more deeply. As a means of approaching works from across the disciplines and beyond, we will be learning how to do discourse analysis of the language of both the texts and our society. In this way the class will focus especially on our methods of making meaning and how those meanings act to maintain or transform our cultural structures. The class texts include Do or Die, Angels in America, The Bluest Eye, Freedom Writers’ Diary, Savage Inequalities, Gandhi the Man, and Tortilla Curtain. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: contemporary societies.

MATH 1300-880: Calculus 1
Ira Becker
Topics include limits, derivatives of algebraic and trigonometric functions, applications of the derivative, integration and application of the definite integral. The honors-aspect of this course will include deep discussions of the underlying fundamental assumptions of calculus (the continuum) and why various aspects of calculus work as they do. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: quantitative reasoning and mathematical skills.

MATH 2300-880: Calculus 2
TBD
Continuation of MATH 1300. Topics include transcendental functions, methods of integration, polar coordinates, conic sections, improper integrals, and infinite series.

MUEL 1832-880: Appreciation of Music
Daniel Jones
This course investigates music as a human cultural activity. As this is a non-majors course, no prior knowledge of music or particular cultures is expected. The essential premises behind our investigations are 1) humans create and use music, individually and collectively, to form and express identity and culture; 2) through studying a person’s/group’s music, we can gain insights into the values and concepts upon which they form their identity and culture, make choices in their lives, etc. Our course of investigation divides into three units. Unit I establishes primary concepts and perspectives for the entire course: music as a physical, personal, and cultural phenomenon; a “soundscape” as a living, evolving musical tradition; our multi-faceted approach to studying music as culture (sound, setting, significance). Unit II looks at some specific arenas of use for music (dance, ritual, identity creation, politics), maintaining and continuing to apply the primary perspectives. Unit III extends the topics from Units I-II by looking at how soundscapes are maintained and re-created across time and space and in response to changing circumstances (during migration, through history, in a globalized world). The main focus during our investigations is a set of recorded musical examples (prescribed by text), drawn from a variety of musical styles: non-western as well as western, folk and popular as well as classical. Additional sources—e.g., live music events, recorded pieces beyond text examples, including of your own choosing—will also be used to enlarge this focus and introduce flexibility into the materials. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: literature and the arts.

MUEL 2752-880: Music in American Culture
Daniel Jones
This course is a survey of various folk and popular musics of the United States. This is a non-majors class; no prior knowledge of music or cultural studies is expected. In this course, music is regarded to be an aspect of culture, and we will thus combine multiple evaluative approaches (e.g., historical, sociological, as well as purely musical) in order to gain insight into pieces of music and the process of music making as elements of culture. Our main goal in the first 1/3 of the course is to get a real sense of what folk culture is and how it operates in people’s (including our own) lives. We will also survey some main strands of folk culture that form the basis of “American” culture.  In the remaining 2/3 of the course, we will first discuss the nature of popular culture and then undertake a chronologically-based survey of various United States popular music styles from roughly 1840 to the present. Class activities and assignments are designed to give students opportunities to go beyond fact gathering/reiteration, to explore and experience for themselves how American folk and popular musics operate as part of everyday cultural life. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: US context.

PHIL 1000-880: Introduction to Philosophy
Graham Oddie
This course has a two-fold purpose. The first and most obvious is to introduce you to five major problems in philosophy, and to some of the most important theories that have been put forward to solve them. These problems concern: God, Value, Freedom, Mind, and Knowledge. The second purpose is to introduce you to the rigorous study of reasoning. Philosophy is all about the reasons philosophers have (or had) for their beliefs. While it is important to know what the great philosophers thought, it is at least as important to know why they thought it, and to be able to follow their reasoning. Not all reasoning is good reasoning. Indeed, one of the things we will learn in this course is just how difficult it is to come up with good reasons. But to see this we will need to find out what it takes for an argument to be a good one. By the end of the course you should know what a good argument consists in, know how to criticize an argument, and know how to construct good arguments yourselves. Knowing what a good argument consists in is the first step to being able to articulate good arguments yourself. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: ideals and values.

PHIL 1400-880: Philosophy and the Sciences 
Helen Demarest
Considers philosophical topics and concepts related to the natural sciences, such as the following: science and pseudo-science; scientific method; the nature of explanation, theory, confirmation, and falsification; the effect of science on basic concepts like mind, freedom, time, and causality; ethics of experimentation; and the relation of science to society. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: natural science.

PSCI 1101-880: Introduction to American Politics
Vanessa Baird
Emphasizes interrelations among levels and branches of government, formal and informal institutions, processes, and behavior. Approved for GT-SS1. Meets MAPS requirement for social science: general or U.S. history. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: contemporary societies or United States context.

PSCI 2106-880: Introduction to Public Policy Analysis
Kenneth Bickers
Teaches a systematic general framework for the analysis of environmental policy issues. Analyzes the interaction of environmental sciences, ethics, and policy across a range of environmental policy problems. Stresses critical thinking and practical applications.

SOCY 1016-880+881: Sex, Gender, and Society
Zachary Owens
This course is an introduction to the sociological analysis of sex, gender, and sexuality in society. This course is designed to encourage you to critically examine the social world around you, and to understand how the individual is very much connected to the social structures we have created. We have many common sense ideas about sex, gender, and sexuality in contemporary society. It’s not uncommon for you to hear that women are just that way, or that boys will be boys, implying an implicit naturalness to gendered differences that exist in so many aspects of our lives. This course will challenge many of these “common sense” ideas. Throughout the course, you will use your “sociological imagination” to see gender as a major organizing principle of social life. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: human diversity.

SOCY 2031-880: Social Problems
Zachary Owens
This course is an introduction to the sociological analysis of contemporary social problems. Our primary focus will be the social construction of social problems in American society, though throughout the semester we will also discuss social problems on a global scale. While we cannot possibly cover everything that may be considered a social problem, we will survey issues related to major social institutions and structures that are perceived to be problems in today’s world. Throughout the course, you will use your “sociological imagination” to better understand the social forces which shape our lives and pattern the way in which we interact with other members of society. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: ideals and values.

WRTG 3020-880: Inkslingers and Wordsmiths – Upper Division Writing
Olivia Miller
This course centers on the exciting graphic nonfiction genre. The hybrid genre combines visual and narrative art forms that have held the modern and contemporary hero myths, paranoias and fantasies of our time. Very recently, the genre has been used to explore marginalized groups and alternative aesthetics including race, gender identity, and class. In this class, we will study the genre critically in order to move forward and craft our own treatments, scripts, panels and pages. We’ll begin by considering the landscape by exploring a variety of graphic nonfiction texts. Then we will apply the visual and narrative techniques we learn to create graphic scripts and the accompanying storyboards using Comic Life software. Students will work page-by-page and panel-by-panel to create an autobiographical comic, memoir, and social critique. The course’s theoretical focus will be on visual narrative theory, writing and analysis, as well as research. While artistic ability can’t hurt in this class it is not a requirement, as stick figures and sketches work just as well and the Comic Life software will make the process simpler. However, a passion and curiosity for the genre is critical. The class will approach the genre in different formats including daily in-class writing exercises and discussions, an analysis essay, and a series of comic assignments include memoir, social critique and autobiography. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: written communication. Requisites: Restricted to students with 57-180 credits (Junior or Senior) College of Arts and Sciences students only.