LTA2022 The Speculative Genres: Horror, Sci-Fi and Fantasy Literature and Film
4 credit intermediate liberal artsIn this class, we examine the speculative genres, stories containing science fictional, gothic/horror, or fantastic qualities that are particularly invested in socio-political questions. Rather than resolutely celebrating a techno-scientific future, these stories engage audiences in difficult ethical and philosophical discussions: What does it mean to be human? What is the cost of progress? What does it take to imagine (and then create) a more equitable world? We discuss a range of texts, including essays by J. R. R. Tolkien and Ursula K. Le Guin; novels by Mary Shelley, Octavia Butler, Karen Tei Yamashita, Cormac McCarthy, and Margaret Atwood; short fiction by Keri Hulme, Carmen Maria Machado, W. E. B. Du Bois, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and Ted Chiang; films such as Get Out, The Hunger Games, Black Panther, and Blade Runner; and tv such as Station 11 and The Rings of Power

Prerequisites: (AHS1000 or FCI1000) and (WRT1001 or RHT1000)

HSS2010 The US in the World in the 20th Century
4 Intermediate Liberal Arts CreditsThis course explores the role of the United States throughout the world from 1900 to the present. We will investigate the people, institutions, and processes that influenced American diplomatic and military engagements, and analyze the impact and effectiveness of America's role. We will begin by exploring the emergence of America as an empire, and how American power and influence evolved and changed over the course of the century to the present day. We will explore America's role in shaping the Cold War, in particular in Latin American and the wars in Vietnam, as well as more recent engagements in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Africa.

Prerequisites: (FCI1000 or AHS1000) and (WRT1001or RHT1000)

PRF1120 Theater Production Workshop
2 Free Elective CreditsThis course will center on a major collaborative project undertaken jointly by all enrolled students (as well as some students involved in an extra-curricular capacity): the rehearsal and performance of a full-length play. In the professional theater world, every production is a considerable undertaking, requiring deep collaboration among a diverse ensemble, each bringing distinctive expertise to the project. Creating a theater production is not only a rigorous intellectual and aesthetic undertaking but also one that demands the development of leadership and collaboration skills. Whether you intend to pursue a career in the arts or not, the core skills developed through this experience will be highly relevant to any professional path.

Prerequisites: None

LTA2079 Theories of Love
4 Intermediate Liberal Arts CreditsWhat is love? Where does it come from, what does it ask of us, and how does it alter our minds, bodies, values, and relations? Are sex, friendship, and marriage necessary for love, or do they inhibit love's fullest expression? In this course, we will examine how influential writers have conceived and contested love's meanings across a range of cultural contexts. Focusing primarily on erotic love (erôs), we will consider how such meanings relate to notions of art, beauty, conjugality, legality, pleasure, sexuality, spirituality, and transgression, both in their original era and our own. Particular attention will be paid to differences of race, class, age, gender, and authority as incitements to, and/or impediments of, relations of love and eroticism.

Prerequisites: (FCI1000 or AHS1000) and (WRT1001or RHT1000)

GDR4610: Topics in Women's Studies
4 Advanced Liberal ArtsThis course provides a forum to examine and discuss contemporary women's and girls' roles and positions. The course will address the following topics: first and second waves of feminism, sexuality, psycho-social influences on gender construction, paid work and structures of inequality, women and social protest and family configurations. At the beginning of the course, we will read some historic documents as background to the women's movement in the United States. Although the main focus will be on women and girls in the United States, we will also discuss women's positions in other countries as well. Because femininity and images of women are balanced, and often countered, by masculinity and images of men, we will spend time discussing men in relation to women. Integral to this course is recognition of how race, class, ethnicity and sexuality converge to influence how women negotiate their political, social and cultural roles. Finally, we will attempt to become _enlightened witnesses_ to the social construction of femininity and masculinity, and use our understanding to notice stereotypical portrayals as well as new, liberating images of women and men.

Prerequisites: 2 Intermediate Liberal Arts Courses (CSP, LTA, HSS)

HUM4607: Trauma, Culture, Transformation

4 Advanced Liberal Arts credits

What is trauma and how does it impact individuals and societies? The word comes to us from the Greek "wound," and so it has come to mean a lasting injury made by a violent or startling event that penetrates a person's psychic boundary system. The difference between a wound and a traumatic wound is that the latter does not heal; rather, it results in post-traumatic stress, which in turn creates cycles of repetition of uncannily similar events until the event has been "worked through." While the term is largely attributed to Sigmund Freud's 19th and early 20th century work, in fact many of his sources came from classical Greek texts, meaning the concept and experience of trauma have been around for centuries.

In the past, knowledge about trauma came predominantly from psychoanalysis; to a lesser extent, literary theory has explored how cultural texts reflect phenomena related to trauma such as repetition, disruptions of time and temporality, and fragmented points of view. Post-Traumatic Stress was a chronic, cyclical dis-ease with devastating consequences. In the past decade, however, neuroscientists have exponentially advanced our understanding of trauma and its relation to our bodies, not just our minds, and theorists have shown how trauma is also a cultural phenomenon, transmitted from one generation to the next. Most importantly, this new research also shows proven pathways to transformation and healing-pathways that also correspond to collective movements for healing our world.

Starting with Freud's foundational work and the classical texts that inspired him, we will study how cultural texts have represented both traumatic stress and methods for its healing. From there, we move quickly to study new developments in the understanding of trauma and post-traumatic stress, including methods of healing and transcending traumatic repetition that have gained traction in broader change-making contexts. We will conclude our study by exploring the concept of Transformational Literacy operating at the MIT Presencing Institute, and how the notion of collective trauma invites collective healing responses as together we bring "the emergent future" into being.

Prerequisites: Any Combination of 2 Intermediate liberal arts (HSS, LTA, CSP)

POL4604 Understanding Political Risk
(Formerly Managing Political Risk in an Uncertain World)
4 Advanced Liberal Arts CreditsThis course will provide a framework of concepts and perspectives for managing political risk in an increasingly global economic environment. Issues covered include, at the international level, geopolitics, trade policies, alliances and conflicts, and, at the national level, civil conflict, regime change, and underlying sources of instability such as inequality and terrorism, as well as diverse fiscal, monetary, and regulatory policies affecting property rights, industry structures, labor markets, environmental strategies, and other critical areas for business leaders. The nature of these issues and how they are addressed vary over time and across countries. This diversity of responses is shaped by history, culture, geography, and politics. This course will cover general themes, theories and approaches, while providing current analyses and insights on select issues, regions, and/or countries. Students will also have the opportunity in individual and team assignments to focus on specific issues, regions, and/or countries of their choosing, with the responsibility to share their findings with the class through discussion and presentations.

Prerequisites: Any combination of 2 ILA (HSS, LTA, CSP, LVA, CVA)

LIT 4673: Unruly Ghosts: Modern Irish Literature & Culture

4 advanced liberal arts credits

Ireland is haunted by its history as a colony and by the traumatic experiences of famine, emigration, and language loss. Yet at her 1990 inauguration President Mary Robinson spoke not of postcolonial ghosts but of "a new Ireland, open, tolerant, inclusive [....] a new pluralist Ireland…," reflective of optimistic post-independence conditions. The mid-1990s to the late 2000s were a period of rapid economic growth-the 'Celtic Tiger,' the 'Boom,' the 'Economic Miracle'-transforming Ireland into one of the wealthiest countries in Europe and spurring seismic social and cultural change. That accelerated, unchecked economic growth has now expressed itself in early 21st century discontents and reckonings. In cultural specters, so to speak. The critical questions raised by Irish Studies are not confined to Irishness and Irish identity; they are ethical, global questions. Our class will study how modern Irish fiction, drama, and film tackle some of the most pressing issues of our time. Our topics will include late capitalist volatility; economic precarity; institutional abuses; immigration, displacement and belonging; language dispossession; and climate crisis.

Prerequisites: Any combination of 2 ILA (HSS, LTA, CSP, LVA, CVA)

HSS2030 US Politics
(Formerly American Politics)
4 Intermediate Liberal Arts CreditsThe course begins with a focus on significant ideas, major political and economic institutions, and key social conflicts and events that have shaped the character of American politics. We will position American politics in its historical context, recognizing and contending with the legacies of enslavement, white supremacy, and imperial violence in its development. As such, the fundamental role of race, colonialism, gender, sexuality, and class will be addressed throughout so that we can understand key and persistent features of American politics. The latter half of the course will examine contemporary ideologies, struggles over civil liberties and rights, the forces generating economic inequality, and the origins of mass incarceration and systemic racism. We will also spend the beginning of classes discussing the news, so the class will be flexible enough to respond to and address political events as they occur. The course will involve a combination of lecturing, discussion, and small-group activities, so class participation is important.

Prerequisites: (FCI1000 or AHS1000) and (WRT1001or RHT1000)