WCore Power, Institutions, and Behavior Courses
COMM-101: Disinformation in the USA
Disinformation is the intentional spread of false, inaccurate, distracting, and/or distorted information for the purpose of gaining power. In this class, we'll explore the history of disinformation-from early propaganda to more recent manipulation of facts-to examine how we as consumers can better identify and fight media exploitation. Emphasis will be on evaluating, analyzing, and synthesizing primary and secondary sources to promote healthier media landscapes through information literacy. (WCore: RE, WCPIB)
EDUC-207: Hope/Resilience Childhood Trauma
This Social and Behavioral Sciences W-Core course will explore ways in which traumatic childhood events impact and shape individuals' brain development, health and well-being, relationships, educational trajectories, and involvement with the justice system. We will investigate traditional practices, policies, and structures found within a variety of organizations and critically analyze how they impact the success of youth and adults who have experienced childhood trauma. Furthermore, through community engagement, we will learn from and work with professionals in the field who implement trauma-responsive practices and examine case studies that illuminate trauma-informed practices in education, health care, social services, and in the foster care and justice systems. Based on these experiential and academic experiences, students will apply concepts of transformation, social responsibility, and sustainability to solving real-world problems. (WCore: WCSBS, WCPIB)
ENVI-103: Radical Hope
We live in a world in the midst of a climate crisis, a 6th great extinction, and ongoing environmental injustice. How might we find hope in our connection to things like pigeons, mushrooms, and frogs? The world around us is filled with environmental monsters and ghosts. What might we learn from those stories of horror and loss? The Anthropocene seems fraught with change, peril, and despair at every step; what tools for a more verdant and just future, what seeds for radical hope might we find among the ruins? this course aims to acknowledge the dramatic changes associated with the Anthropocene and the anxiety and despair that those changes might produce. In response, however, together we will look for tools to address this despair and reassess those changes to consider ways we might discover creative connections to the world around us, and how those connections might contain kernels of a more hopeful present and future. (WCore: WCSBS, WCPIB)
ENVI-202: People and Places
Have you seen hilarious public restroom graffiti, or initials and the symbol of a heart carved on the face of a boulder? Have you wondered about why people do what they do and say what they say in certain places but not other surroundings? How do people make sense of and cope with surroundings such as a prison, or a crowded and polluted neighborhood? Through readings, discussions, site visits, and other activities, we will delve deep into the intricacies of human-place relationships and examine the way in which social differences (race, gender, class, etc.) shape and influence that relationship. Topics may include nature in prisons, wilderness therapy, and community gardens, among others. (WCore: WCSBS, WCPIB)
HIST-124: Film and Memory
This course analyzes the intersection between film culture and the past by placing memory at the center of analysis. In other words, it explores how different genres of film, from war dramas to science fiction, shape the way communities remember the past and imagine the future. We will explore the representation of diverse societies and peoples in a variety of films. This course will consider how visions of the future reflect historical realities (new ideas about science, nuclear war, space exploration). We will examine how different actors-production companies, directors, studios, and the state-attempt to craft national narratives and contribute to community identity through different genres. (WCore: WCSBS, RE, WCPIB)
HIST-214: Vietnam and America
This course explores the tangled history of America's involvement in Vietnam, the war's impacts on the people of both nations, and the war's global legacy. We will emphasize the reasons, meanings, and outcomes of the war for a range of participants: Vietnamese soldiers and civilians, northern and southern; U.S. civilians, policy makers, and soldiers, pro- and anti- war; and participants, observers, and protesters around the world. This course fulfills the WCore Research Emphasis. You will learn and practice history-specific research, discussion, and writing skills in a variety of assignments, including weekly reflective journals and crafting short "vignettes" and a longer research paper based on primary and secondary sources that you find, evaluate, analyze, and communicate to your classmates. (WCore: WCSBS, RE, WCPIB)
JUST-109: Power and Social Change
Power and Social Change is an exploratory course: the place where the student will be exposed to concepts, problems, and challenges of the ethics of justice. This will be accomplished by laying a phenomenological foundation to the study of justice. The student becomes familiar with (in)justice problems, critically analyze and challenge materials and images detailing the complexity of social constructions. By using critical analysis, students evaluate the ways in which race, ethnicity, class, (dis)ability, and gender intersect in the social structure. (WCore: WCSBS, DE, WCPIB)
MATH-220: Social Justice by the Numbers
How can we measure and analyze justice, fairness, and equity in our society? How can we use such analysis to determine how to better ourselves and the society in which we live? Jordan Ellenberg describes math as "an atomic-powered prosthesis that you attach to your common sense"; in this course, you will develop your prosthesis and use it to analyze and improve the world around you. (WCore: WCSBS, QE, WCPIB)
NURS-101: Aging Matters: Social Gerontology
The goal of this course is to prepare students to describe the complexity and diversity of older adults, explore ways to work effectively with older adults and promote healthy aging. Students will examine aspects of aging within historical, cultural, physical, mental, emotional, social, spiritual, economic and interpersonal contexts. The impact of an increased aging population on society and how society cares for the aging population will be a central theme of the course. (WCore: WCSBS, WCPIB)
PHIL-129: Race, Power, and Privilege
In this course, we will look at how systems of racism and privilege contribute to how we define ourselves, how we are defined by society, and how we view the world. We will do this from a philosophical perspective. This discussion-based course will encourage students to complicate the ways they view their own identity, question the simplified accounts of power that they encounter from the media, and reflect upon the ways in which race structures society and affects the lives of individuals. (WCore: WCFAH, DE, WCPIB)
PHIL-131: Philosophy of Gender and Power
The term "feminist" has almost as many meanings as it has both advocates and detractors. For some, the term "feminism" means a radical shift in language, politics, and economics. For some, the term simply means equality. And still for others, the term means witchcraft, sexual deviancy, and the death of the American family. This semester, we will examine how contemporary theorists (many of whom call themselves "feminist") argue the world needs to change in order to make a more just environment for women. In the process, we will read about, write about, and discuss a wide range of issues including structures of power, sexuality and sexual violence, race, masculinity, and beauty norms. The goal for this class is not to decide on one solitary definition of "feminism" but instead to force ourselves to think more critically about how gender structures the world around us and how we can change our future. (WCore: WCFAH, DE, WCPIB)
PHIL-209: Poverty and Global Justice
Poverty is examined in this course as an ethical issue of the most pressing sort. Reviewing various ethical theories and conducting a survey of some of the most commonly used definitions of poverty, we focus on this question: What ethically, politically, or economically justifies-if anything-the current state of the world in which so many people remain mired in extreme conditions of deprivation (i.e., in poverty that kills)? We will consider various arguments for the necessity of change in regards to poverty. (WCore: WCFAH, WCPIB)
PLSC-203: Courts, Law, and Social Justice
In this course, students use the tools of social science and legal analysis to understand and analyze the role of law and the courts in American society and politics. Students come away from this course with an appreciation for the role of law in American society, an ability to use the basic tools and principles of legal analysis, and a perspective on US courts that is informed by social science theory. (WCore: WCSBS, WCPIB)
SOC-205: Social Problems
Focusing on various social problems such as poverty, unemployment, crime, substance abuse, racism, discrimination, gender inequality, sexual inequality, and global inequality, this course utilizes sociological analysis to examine how social problems are defined and dealt with in the United States and other parts of the world. (WCore: WCSBS, DE, WCPIB)