Faculty discussing literature with students
Spring 2019 FFC courses for Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences majors

» Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences Majors - Global Intersections First-Year Foundation Courses

All undergraduate majors entering Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences must fulfill their First-Year Foundation (FFC) course requirement by selecting from the course offerings organized into three major themes, Global Intersections, Justice and Equality, or Representation and Interpretation. In Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences we examine and represent the complex relationships we have to one another and to the world around us. To do this, we ask the essential questions at the heart of the intersection of the arts, humanities, and social sciences: Who are we? How do we know? How can we best live together?

Students will critically analyze and communicate complex issues and ideas as they explore global intersections, justice and equality, and how we represent and interpret the world.

Wilkinson College majors select their FFC course from one of three major themes listed below:

Global Intersections - Spring 2019 selections

The increasing complexity of global intersections that impact our lives makes engagement and social responsibility critical in the 21st Century. Courses in this category explore issues, such as migration, refugee movements, sustainability, social media, and trade, hat are critical to local and global communities.

+ - Literature and Film

Walter Tschacher, Ph.D. - Professor of Languages, Department of World Languages and Cultures, Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences
FFC 100-11 (T/TH, 8:30-9:45a.m.)

In this course students will critically examine films in relation to their source material (both English and in translation) and the social, historical, and cultural contexts of both. Possible texts/films include Death in Venice (Thomas Mann/Visconti) and Room with a View (E. M. Forster/J. Ivory). We will consider not only the adaptation of literary works but also the inverse process, called novelization (i.e., the film serves as the basis for literature; for instance, some James Bond and Star War films underwent novelization). The course will take up such questions as: How does the change in medium produce a new text/meaning? When comparing and contrasting literature and film, what are their relative strengths and weaknesses? How is literary and visual art affected by commerce, and vice-versa—how, for example, is "popular" art coded as more or less authentic than "high" art?

Justice and Equality - Spring 2019 selections

Individuals and communities around the world stand in different relations with the material, cultural, and political resources needed to advance their goals. These differences are often historically rooted and indicate social, political, or legal injustices. Courses in this category explore the barriers that limit justice and community responses to issues such as political oppression, racism, poverty, human rights, religious intolerance, and gender inequality.

+ - Free Speech and the University

Gordon Babst, Ph.D. - Associate Professor of Political Science, Department of Political Science, Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanites, and Social Sciences
FFC 100-07 (M/W, 2:30-3:45 p.m.)

This course prepares students to think critically through some vexing challenges facing the contemporary university involving free speech and inclusive public discourse. The course also presents court cases involving a variety of socially stigmatized or simply disliked forms of expression where decisions have turned on giving voice to marginalized persons, ideas, or artistic expression.

The proposed course is grounded in liberal-democratic theory, itself interdisciplinary (both Political Science and Philosophy), and uses copious examples from the Humanities to illustrate how the understanding of freedom of expression has evolved in the American context and its role in liberating free inquiry, but also in maintaining exclusion.