Global Diversity (GDIV)

This course introduces students to modernity as a global phenomenon. Sometimes, European influence was dominant in the global circulation of modernity. However, just as often, modernity reflected diverse local/ethnic preferences and practices. The course is multi-disciplinary, drawing from history, literary studies, anthropology, art and design history, and political science.

Global religions, cultures, and philosophies, both past and present, have interpreted the relationship between human society and the natural environment in a variety of ways. In this course we will study attitudes towards the environment, its protection, and sustainability though the lenses of several major religions and philosophies, and will compare how these worldviews offer differing perspectives on the role of "Nature" in everyday life. This course can be counted towards the Environmental Humanities concentration.

The twentieth and twentyfirst centuries have produced an unprecedented level of global migration. As individuals and groups have moved around the world, different cultures have come into close, and often uncomfortable, contact. Through the concepts of migration, diaspora, and exile this course examines the literature, film, and music that express the challenges of these encounters.

This course examines the roles of literature, cinema, and other cultural forms in expressing Latin American and Hispanic cultures. Through direct examination of cultural artifacts, students gain insight into diverse cultures and experience different perspectives. As well as investigating specific cultures and cultural production, students will explore the interaction of distinct groups and societies to discover the dynamics and effects of cross-cultural interactions. Prerequisites :WRIT-101, DBTU-114

This course examines cinematic works from around the world in order to gain insight into the social and cultural values of diverse societies. After acquiring some of the basics of film theory and considering how to watch and analyze a film, we will analyze films from a variety of world regions. Students will identify how cultural differences are reflected in cinematic works while also considering the impact of cross-cultural influences in the world of filmmaking. The focus on the cultural dimensions of cinema in this Global Diversity course is designed to help students fulfill the Empathy outcome in the Hallmarks Program. Prerequisites: DBTU-114 and WRIT-201/202

This course will examine the social and cultural foundations of health and wellbeing, the experience and distribution of illness, and interventions related to healing and public health. Even as illness and health are universal concepts found globally, the localized social and cultural bases behind these can vary greatly. In this course, we will read real-life accounts of those seeking health and healing in a variety of global contexts, as well as the methods that researchers use to collect such data and the theories that help them to understand their findings. As such, materials in this course have clear relevance for students who wish to learn more about the complexity of what constitutes sickness, well-being, pathology, and diagnosis in cultures throughout the world. This course can be counted towards the Health Humanities concentration.

This course provides an introduction to the historical development, scriptures, practices, and contemporary cultural influence of various world religions. It will cover some selection of Hinduism, Daoism, Confucianism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and other religious traditions. Students will explore the role of religion in shaping different cultures. This Global Diversity course is designed to help students fulfill the Empathy outcome in the Hallmarks Program.

‘Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.’ Societies through time and in different cultural contexts have placed value on beauty, making it a currency and a source of power and privilege. Beauty is classed, sexed and racialized, which demonstrates both its power and fragility. The meanings and perceptions of beauty are bound to geographies, temporalities, and particular histories. What is considered beautiful in the West is not necessarily beautiful in the East, and yet Western colonialism and imperialism have impacted ideals of beauty across the world. This course engages with theories and practices of beauty and aesthetics across different cultures and places while paying particular attention to factors such as capitalism, colonialism, race, class, gender, sexuality, religion, media and their interactions with notions of beauty. Through scholarly texts, film, and artwork, the class will grapple with some of these questions: What is beauty? How is beauty gendered and sexed? Why does beauty matter? What are some of the phenomena that affect people’s understanding of beauty and aesthetics? This course can be counted towards the Design Humanities certification.

This course focuses on the various ways in which popular culture, expressed through film, television, social media, and print media and other realms are used as rhetorical devices, employed to shape how peoples around the world view one another. Through the reading and analysis of a variety of images from the U.S. and abroad, students will gain a better understanding of how popular media serve to build and express national identity; further, they will also gain substantive knowledge about some of the political, social, economic, religious, and other factors which underpin relations between peoples around the globe.