Requirements

Requirements for the Interdisciplinary Humanities Emphasis

Completion of five units to include:

  1. Five units chosen from a single pathway, two of which must be at the 300-level or above.
  2. Students wishing to declare the IHE meet with the program director to discuss their educational goals and create a plan for completion of one of the pathways. This plan will be finalized in a signed contract to be filed with the IHE Director; further, the goals described in the contract will also be added to the student’s ePortfolio at this time. Once filed, the contract will be reviewed periodically, and may be modified as needed.
  3. By the end of their senior year, students pursuing the IHE submit to the program director a short essay that reflects on their progress in their chosen pathway and its relevance to their major(s), minor(s), or other programs of study through ePortfolio.

Notes

  1. Because these pathways are not intended as substitutes for a minor or major, students may not count more than two units from any department or program towards a single pathway.
  2. A maximum of two units from each major, minor, or program that a student plans to complete may count toward a pathway.
  3. With permission of the program director, students may substitute one of the five required units with a relevant second semester, second year (or higher) language course, e.g., German 202, French 202, etc.
  4. Courses in the IHE may not be taken as Credit/No Credit.
  5. A student must have a grade of C- or higher in all courses of the IHE.
  6. Four out of the five required units must be taken on campus.

The Artist as Humanist

This pathway encourages students to engage with the interplay among creativity, creative processes, and humanistic concerns such as the representation of cultural values, exploration of identity, and inquiry into questions of meaning within the fields of visual and literary arts, theatre, and music. It fosters questions about the relationships between artists, aesthetic objects, and audiences. Courses in this pathway explore the following questions:

How do aesthetic objects or performances alter perceptions and communicate ideas, and how do they participate in larger social and political discourses?

What are the roles of sensations, emotions, and poetics in invoking form, conveying meaning, and fostering critical thinking?

How does the creative process itself contribute to the production of knowledge?

  • AFAM 205 Survey of Race and Culture in Ethnic Literature
  • AFAM 375 The Harlem Renaissance
  • AFAM 401 Narratives of Race
  • ARTH 275 Studies in Western Art I: Ancient through Medieval Art
  • ARTH 276 Studies in Western Art II: Renaissance to Modern Art
  • ARTH 278 Survey of Asian Art
  • ARTH 302 The Art of Mexico and Mesoamerica
  • ARTH 325 The Cutting Edge: Art and Architecture Since 1900
  • ARTH 334 Early Italian Renaissance Art: From Giotto to Michelangelo
  • ARTH 365 Nineteenth Century Art and Architecture in Europe and the Americas
  • ARTH 367 Chinese Art
  • ARTH 368 Japanese Art
  • ARTH 371 East Asian Calligraphy
  • ARTS 201 Drawing into Painting: A Contemporary Approach to the Figure Students may count either ARTS 201 or ARTS 301, but not both, toward this pathway
  • ARTS 202 The Printed Image
  • ARTS 251 Painting
  • ARTS 281 Beginning Printmaking: Relief and Intaglio
  • ARTS 282 Beginning Printmaking: Lithography and Screen Print
  • ASIA 205 Introduction to Asian Literature
  • ASIA 305 Heroes and Rebels: Martial Arts Culture in China and Beyond
  • ASIA 320 Self and Society in Modern Japanese Literature
  • ASIA 330 Writing the Margins in Contemporary Japanese Literature
  • BUS 380 Entrepreneurial Mindset for the Arts
  • CONN 303 Art-Science: Inquiry into the Intersection of Art, Science, and Technology
  • CONN 370 Rome: Sketchbooks and Space Studies
  • ENGL 212 The Craft of Literature
  • ENGL 227 Introduction to Writing Fiction
  • ENGL 228 Introduction to Writing Poetry
  • ENGL 229 Introduction to Creative Nonfiction
  • ENGL 238 Afrofuturism
  • ENGL 240 Digital Writing: Text, Image, and Sound
  • ENGL 245 Shakespeare: From Script to Stage
  • ENGL 277 The Book as Human Artifact
  • ENGL 345 Paradise Lost
  • ENGL 375 Special Topics in Rhetoric, Literacy and Composition when topic is Authorship and A.I.
  • ENGL 378 Visual Rhetoric
  • ENGL 381 Major Authors
  • FREN 392 African Film
  • GERM 356 Becoming Modern: Art and Media in Weimar Germany
  • GLAM 231 Ancient Tragedy
  • GLAM 232 Ancient Comedy
  • HUM 290 Introduction to Cinema Studies
  • LAS 387 Art and Revolution in Latin America
  • MUS 123 Discovering Music
  • MUS 220 Popular Music since the Birth of Rock
  • MUS 221 Jazz History
  • MUS 223 Women in Music
  • MUS 225 Romanticism in Music
  • MUS 226 Twentieth-Century Music Through Film
  • MUS 233 Introduction to Historical Musicology
  • MUS 234 Introduction to Ethnomusicology
  • MUS 321 Music of South Asia
  • MUS 330 Opera: Based on a True Story
  • MUS 493 Special Topics in Historical Musicology when topic is African American Music in the Concert Hall OR Black Scholars
  • PHIL 353 Philosophy of Film and Performing Arts
  • PHIL 360 Aesthetics
  • SPAN 326 One Hundred Years of Multitudes: A History of Latin American Film
  • SPAN 416 One Hundred Years of Multitudes: A History of Latin American Film
  • THTR 200 The Theatrical Experience
  • THTR 215 Fundamentals of Acting
  • THTR 313 Directing
  • THTR 325 Dramatic Writing for the Screen and Stage

Challenging Inequality, Leading Social Change: Issues of Gender

This pathway encourages students to evaluate the ways in which understandings of sex and gender have informed and intersected with institutions and hierarchies across time and space, through an exploration of a variety of disciplinary lenses and genres. Courses within this pathway explore the following general questions from different cultural, historic, or geographical perspectives:

How do cultures understand and/or conceptualize gender?

How do those understandings intersect with political, cultural, and social institutions? How do they shape the lived experiences of individuals and groups? How have dominant ideas and practices around gender been challenged, and what implications might those challenges have today?

How do different disciplines explore, conceptualize, and/or evaluate concepts of sex/gender?

  • AFAM 305 Black Fictions and Feminisms
  • AFAM 355 African American Women in American History
  • ENGL 346 Jane Eyre and Its Afterlives
  • ENGL 365 Gender and Sexualities
  • ENGL 379 Special Topics in Theory
  • FREN 340 Francophone Women Writers
  • FREN 381 African Women Writers
  • FREN 392 African Film
  • GLAM 323 Sex and Gender in Ancient Greece and Rome
  • GQS 201 Introduction to Gender, Queer, and Feminist Studies
  • GQS/REL 215 Religion and Queer Politics
  • GQS 310 Let’s Talk about Sex
  • GQS 340 Feminist and Queer Methodologies
  • HIST 305 Women and Gender in Pre-Modern Europe
  • HIST 349 Women of East Asia
  • HIST 392 Gender in Colonial Africa
  • LTS 300 Latina/o Literatures
  • LTS 375 Queer-Latinx: Art, Sex, and Belonging in America
  • MUS 221 Jazz History
  • MUS 223 Women in Music
  • MUS 234 Introduction to Ethnomusicology
  • PHIL 390 Gender and Philosophy
  • REL 298 Reproductive Ethics
  • REL 303 Sexuality and Religion
  • REL 307 Prisons, Gender and Education
  • REL 323 Gender and Sexuality in Muslim Societies
  • SOAN 102 Introduction to Anthropology

Challenging Inequality, Leading Social Change: Issues of Race and Ethnicity

This pathway allows students to explore how race and ethnicity have influenced the construction of individual and collective identities, and to better understand the marginalization of individuals and groups, as well as strategies of resistance to oppression. Courses within this pathway explore the following general questions from different cultural, historic, or geographical perspectives:

How have race and ethnicity shaped individual and collective identities?

What forms of resistance have been undertaken by communities marginalized on the basis of race and/or ethnicity?

What is the relationship between race and ethnicity, and how do the two vary across different regional and historical contexts?

  • AFAM 101 Introduction to African American Studies
  • AFAM 305 Black Fictions and Feminisms
  • AFAM 310 African Diaspora Experience
  • AFAM 320 Race, Power, and Privilege
  • AFAM 346 African Americans and American Law
  • AFAM 360 The Art and Politics of the Civil Rights Era
  • AFAM/COMM 370 Communication and Diversity
  • AFAM 401 Narratives of Race
  • ASIA 330 Writing the Margins in Contemporary Japanese Literature
  • BIOE/REL 255 Pandemic Ethics, Laws, and Health Inequities
  • COMM 347 Public Discourse
  • COMM 373 Critical Cultural Theory
  • CONN 318 Crime and Punishment
  • CONN 334 Truth and Reconciliation in South Africa and Beyond
  • ENGL 235 American Literature and Culture: Long Nineteenth Century
  • ENGL 236 American Literature and Culture: Modern and Contemporary
  • ENGL 237 American Literature and Culture: Beyond Borders
  • ENGL 238 Afrofuturism
  • ENGL 242 Introduction to Native American Literature
  • ENGL 356 Bollywood Film
  • ENGL 361 South Asian Fiction
  • ENGL 362 Native American Literature
  • ENGL 363 African American Literature
  • ENGL 364 Asian American Literature
  • ENGL 366 Critical Whiteness Studies
  • ENGL 431 Advanced Seminar in American Literature when topic is Native American Literature
  • FREN 260 Cultures of the Francophone World
  • FREN 330 Introduction to Francophone Literature
  • GLAM 322 Race and Ethnicity in the Ancient World
  • HIST 252 Monuments and Memory in US History
  • HIST 254 African American Voices: A Survey of African American History
  • HIST 281 Modern Latin America
  • HIST 360 Frontiers of Native America
  • HIST 367 Immigration in the U.S.
  • HIST 368 The Course of American Empire: The United States in the West and Pacific, 1776-1919
  • HIST 376 Cuba and the Cuban Diaspora
  • HIST 378 History of Latinx People in the United States
  • HIST 383 Borderlands: La Frontera: The U.S.-Mexico Border
  • HIST 391 Nelson Mandela and 20th Century South Africa
  • HIST 394 Slavery and the Slave Trade in Africa
  • LAS 100 Introduction to Latin American Studies
  • LTS 200 Latina/o America: A Critical Introduction to Latina/o Studies
  • LTS 300 Latina/o Literatures
  • LTS 375 Queer-Latinx: Art, Sex, and Belonging in America
  • MUS 221 Jazz History
  • MUS 222 Music of the World’s Peoples
  • MUS 234 Introduction to Ethnomusicology
  • MUS 321 Music of South Asia
  • MUS 493 Special Topics in Historical Musicology when topic is African American Music in the Concert Hall OR Black Scholars
  • PG 339 The Politics of Empire
  • PG 384 Ethnic Politics: Governance across Diverse Societies
  • PHIL 312 Latin American and Latinx Philosophy
  • PHIL 389 Race and Philosophy
  • REL 222 Antisemitism and Islamophobia
  • REL 270 Religion, Activism and Social Justice
  • REL 302 Ethics and the Other
  • REL 307 Prisons, Gender and Education
  • SPAN 216 (Wo)men of Maize: Food Cultures of the Americas
  • SPAN 222 Introduction to Latin American Cultures
  • SPAN 311 Literature of the Americas
  • SPAN 316 Latin American Film
  • SPAN 318 Survey of Twentieth Century Latin-American/Latine Theatre
  • SPAN 321 Migration Narratives
  • SPAN 415 Bitter Flavors of the Americas: Sugar, Coffee & Bananas
  • THTR 250 World Theatre I: African Diaspora
  • THTR 252 World Theatre II: Asian Theatres
  • THTR 254 World Theatre III: Voices of the Americas

Empire, Colonialism, and Resistance

This pathway asks students to compare the processes of empire-building, the experiences of rulers and subject peoples, and challenges to imperial rule across global contexts and time periods. Students engage with a variety of disciplinary perspectives on central questions, including:

What has led peoples or nations to conquer and govern other peoples or nations? What political, institutional, or cultural structures have empires developed in the distant and recent past?

How is empire justified and explained to the conquerors and the conquered?

How have conquered peoples and/or colonized subjects responded to—accommodated, resisted, ignored, undermined—imperial or colonial powers and institutions?

How do the processes of empire-building, consolidation, and decline impact the political, social, and economic lives of ordinary people and elites?

How have post-colonial thinkers responded to the legacies of colonialism and empire? What are the legacies of empires in developing regional, transregional, and global interconnectedness in the past and present?

  • AFAM 205 Survey of Race and Culture in Ethnic Literature
  • ARTH 302 The Art of Mexico and Mesoamerica
  • ARTH 361 Art and Architecture of Ancient Rome
  • ARTH 367 Chinese Art
  • ASIA 340 First Encounters: Japan and Europe in the 16th Century
  • ASIA 344 Asia in Motion
  • CONN 322 Jihad, Islamism, and Colonial Legacies
  • CONN 333 Nations and Nationalism in Modern Europe
  • ENGL 242 Introduction to Native American Literature
  • ENGL 247 Introduction to Popular Genres
  • ENGL 361 South Asian Fiction
  • ENGL 362 Native American Literature
  • ENGL 382 Movements when topic is Irish Literary Revival
  • ENGL 431 Advanced Seminar in American Literature when topic is Frontier Mythologies, Critical Whiteness Studies, OR Native American Literature
  • FREN 260 Cultures of the Francophone World
  • FREN 330 Introduction to Francophone Literature
  • FREN 340 Francophone Women Writers
  • FREN 381 African Women Writers
  • FREN 392 African Film
  • GDS/IPE 211 Introduction to Global Development
  • GERM 355 Culture in the Third Reich
  • GERM 360 German Cultural History and Politics, 1871-Present
  • GERM 395 Holocaust in Contemporary Cinema
  • GERM 450 Contemporary Voices in German Literature and Film since 1989
  • GLAM 111 Ancient Rome
  • GLAM 330 Theories of Myth
  • HIST 103 History of Modern Europe, 1815 to the Present
  • HIST 224 Russia Since 1861
  • HIST 252 Monuments and Memory in US History
  • HIST 280 Colonial Latin America
  • HIST 281 Modern Latin America
  • HIST 291 Modern Africa
  • HIST 293 Early Africa to 1807
  • HIST 316 The British Empire
  • HIST 323 Politics and Societies in Post-Soviet Eurasia
  • HIST 325 Totalitarian Dictatorships in Twentieth Century Europe
  • HIST 344 Resistance, Rebellion, and Revolution in China: 1800 to the Present
  • HIST 360 Frontiers of Native America
  • HIST 361 United States and the War in Vietnam
  • HIST 368 The Course of American Empire: The United States in the West and Pacific, 1776-1919
  • HIST 370 Nationalism and the Fall of Empire in Central Europe
  • HIST 382 Comparative Revolution in Twentieth Century Latin America
  • HIST 393 Missions and Christianity in Africa
  • HUM 368 A Precious Barbarism: Enlightenment, Ideology, and Colonialism
  • LTS 200 Latina/o America: A Critical Introduction to Latina/o Studies
  • LTS 376 The Art of Mestizaje
  • MUS 321 Music of South Asia
  • PG 104 Introduction to Political Theory
  • PG 339 The Politics of Empire
  • PG 340 Democracy and the Ancient Greeks
  • PG 346 Race in the American Political Imagination
  • PG 347 Comparative Political Ideologies
  • PHIL 312 Latin American and Latinx Philosophy
  • REL 212 Global Islam
  • REL 444 God in the Anthropocene
  • SOAN 316 Cultural Politics of Global Development
  • SPAN 216 (Wo)men of Maize: Food Cultures of the Americas
  • SPAN 222 Introduction to Latin American Cultures
  • SPAN 326 One Hundred Years of Multitudes: A History of Latin American Film
  • SPAN 415 Bitter Flavors of the Americas: Sugar, Coffee & Bananas
  • SPAN 416 One Hundred Years of Multitudes: A History of Latin American Film
  • STHS 325 Natural History Museums and Society
  • STHS 344 Ecological Knowledge in Historical Perspective

The Global Middle Ages

This pathway encourages students to take a comparative approach to studying different regions and cultures in the period from roughly 500 to 1500 C.E., an era in which virtually every part of the globe experienced significant political, intellectual, religious, social, and technological developments which continue to shape our world. Though encompassing a variety of regions and disciplinary approaches, courses in this pathway share a concern with larger questions about human experience and self-expression in these centuries, such as:

How can we give voice to a range of medieval perspectives?

To what extent were medieval societies inclusive and/or exclusionary?

How did various medieval cosmologies impact political institutions, social hierarchies, and aesthetic sensibilities?

  • AFAM 401 Narratives of Race
  • ARTH 275 Studies in Western Art I: Ancient through Medieval Art
  • ARTH 278 Survey of Asian Art
  • ARTH 334 Early Italian Renaissance Art: From Giotto to Michelangelo
  • ARTH 359 Islamic Art
  • ARTH 362 Art, Religion, and Power in Late Antiquity and Byzantium
  • ARTH 363 Faith and Power in the Art of the Medieval West: Seventh-Fourteenth Century
  • ASIA 310 Death and Desire in Pre-modern Japanese Literature
  • ENGL 231 Medieval and Renaissance Literature
  • ENGL 371 History of the English Language
  • ENGL 381 Major Authors when topic is Chaucer
  • ENGL 383 Eras when topic is Dante, Chaucer, and the City
  • ENGL 433 Advanced Seminar in Rhetoric and Literacies when topic is History of the English Language
  • GLAM 110 Before East and West
  • HIST 112 Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages
  • HIST 113 Europe and the Mediterranean World, 1050-1650: A History in 100 Objects
  • HIST 230 England from the Romans to the Tudors
  • HIST 245 Chinese Civilization
  • HIST 293 Early Africa to 1807
  • HIST 304 The Global Renaissance, c.1300-1600
  • HIST 305 Women and Gender in Pre-Modern Europe
  • HIST 307 The Crusades
  • HIST 314 War and Society in Premodern Europe
  • HON 206 The Arts of the Classical World and the Middle Ages Only for students enrolled in the Honors Program.
  • HUM 302 Mystics, Knights, and Pilgrims: The Medieval Quest
  • HUM 303 The Monstrous Middle Ages
  • HUM 330 Tao and Landscape Art
  • HUM 367 Word and Image
  • REL 204 Religions of the Book
  • REL 233 Japanese Religious Traditions
  • REL 310 Christianity and Law in the West
  • REL 350 Mysticism & Spirituality in Christianity
  • REL 363 Saints, Symbols, and Sacraments: History of Christian Traditions
  • STHS 201 Alchemy, Astronomy, and Medicine before 1700
  • THTR 371 Theatre History I: From the Origins of Theatre to the 17th Century

Science and Values

This pathway encourages students to evaluate and understand the sciences through a humanistic lens, and to consider questions such as:

How can the sciences be understood in their broader historical, social, and ethical contexts?

What is the relationship between science and values (in the past and the present)?

How were scientific methods and approaches developed and why?

How have claims about what is ’natural’ been used to defend or undermine value statements?

  • AFAM 401 Narratives of Race
  • BIOE/REL 255 Pandemic Ethics, Laws, and Health Inequities
  • BIOE/PHIL 292 Basics of Bioethics
  • BIOE/REL 292 Basics of Bioethics
  • CONN 393 The Cognitive Foundations of Morality and Religion
  • ENGL 348 Illness and Narrative: Discourses of Disease
  • ENGL 375 Special Topics in Rhetoric, Literacy and Composition when topic is Authorship and A.I.
  • ENVP 326 People, Politics, and Parks
  • ENVP 335 Thinking About Biodiversity
  • ENVP 355 Sacred Ecology (0.25 units.)
  • HIST 364 American Environmental History
  • HON 212 Origins of the Modern World View Only for students enrolled in the Honors Program.
  • HUM 202 The Psychedelic Renaissance
  • PHIL 105 Neuroethics and Human Enhancement
  • PHIL 230 Philosophy of Mind
  • PHIL 232 Philosophy of Science
  • PHIL 285 Environmental Ethics
  • PHIL 286 Ethics, Data, and Artificial Intelligence
  • PHIL 320 British Empiricism
  • PHIL 321 17th- and 18th-Century Philosophy
  • PHIL 330 Epistemology
  • PHIL 336 Philosophy of Language
  • PHIL 389 Race and Philosophy
  • PHIL 390 Gender and Philosophy
  • REL 298 Reproductive Ethics
  • REL 301 Consciousness and the Bourgeoisie
  • STHS 100 Apes, Angels, and Darwin
  • STHS 200 History of Modern Science and Technology
  • STHS 201 Alchemy, Astronomy, and Medicine before 1700
  • STHS 330 Evolution and Society Since Darwin
  • STHS 333 Evolution and Ethics
  • STHS 340 Finding Order in Nature
  • STHS 344 Ecological Knowledge in Historical Perspective
  • STHS 366 Medicine in the United States: Historical Perspectives
  • STHS 370 Science and Religion in the United States: From Evolution to Climate Change
  • STHS 375 Science, Technology, and Politics

Visual Culture

This pathway allows students to engage critically with numerous manifestations of visual culture, including artifacts, images (from paintings to film), and built environments from various historical periods and diverse cultures. The pathway urges students to examine the role of visual practices in history, culture, and the forming of human subjectivity. Courses in this pathway explore questions such as:

How do objects, images, and built environments reflect or shape social, religious, and political values?

How may objects, images, and built environments foster the development of personal or group identities?

  • ARTH 275 Studies in Western Art I: Ancient through Medieval Art
  • ARTH 276 Studies in Western Art II: Renaissance to Modern Art
  • ARTH 278 Survey of Asian Art
  • ARTH 302 The Art of Mexico and Mesoamerica
  • ARTH 380 Museums and Curating in the 21st Century: History, Theory, and Practice
  • ASIA 225 Visualized Fiction: Cinematic Adaptations of Traditional Chinese Literature
  • ASIA 305 Heroes and Rebels: Martial Arts Culture in China and Beyond
  • COMM 170 Introduction to Media Studies
  • COMM 372 Contemporary Media Culture: Deconstructing Disney
  • CONN 303 Art-Science: Inquiry into the Intersection of Art, Science, and Technology
  • CONN 313 Biomimicry and Bioart
  • CONN 330 Finding Germany: Memory, History, and Identity in Berlin
  • CONN 375 The Art and Science of Color
  • CONN 480 Informed Seeing
  • ENGL 277 The Book as Human Artifact
  • ENGL/HUM 340 Film Genres
  • ENGL 356 Bollywood Film
  • ENGL 378 Visual Rhetoric
  • FREN 270 Conversational French and Film
  • FREN 392 African Film
  • GERM 300 German Cinema of the Weimar Republic and under National Socialism, 1919-1945
  • GERM 350/350 From Rubble to New Reality: German Cinema after World War Two
  • GERM 355 Culture in the Third Reich
  • GERM 356 Becoming Modern: Art and Media in Weimar Germany
  • GERM 395 Holocaust in Contemporary Cinema
  • GERM 470 Writing with Light: Literature and Photography
  • GLAM 231 Ancient Tragedy
  • HIST 113 Europe and the Mediterranean World, 1050-1650: A History in 100 Objects
  • HIST 381 Film and History: Latin America
  • HON 206 The Arts of the Classical World and the Middle Ages Only for students enrolled in the Honors Program.
  • HUM 290 Introduction to Cinema Studies
  • HUM 330 Tao and Landscape Art
  • HUM 367 Word and Image
  • LAS 387 Art and Revolution in Latin America
  • PHIL 353 Philosophy of Film and Performing Arts
  • PHIL 360 Aesthetics
  • SOAN 308 Visual and Media Anthropology
  • SPAN 315 Spanish Film
  • SPAN 316 Latin American Film
  • SPAN 317 Modern Spanish Theater
  • SPAN 318 Survey of Twentieth Century Latin-American/Latine Theatre
  • SPAN 322 Visual Culture and Modernity in Latin America
  • SPAN 326 One Hundred Years of Multitudes: A History of Latin American Film
  • SPAN 416 One Hundred Years of Multitudes: A History of Latin American Film
  • THTR 200 The Theatrical Experience
  • THTR 371 Theatre History I: From the Origins of Theatre to the 17th Century
  • THTR 373 Theatre History II: 18th Century to the Present