Subject: Amer Culture & Difference (AMCD)

CRN: 20741

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: John Roach Center 227

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just AND [Core] Integ/Humanities
     

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     FYE CommGood/Learning Comm
     Writing to learn

  David Lawrence

In AMCD 200, students learn about the historical and theoretical foundations of Cultural Studies as an academic discipline and use cultural theory to analyze a variety of cultural products and representations. In this course, students look specifically at dominant and subversive constructions of gender, race, ethnicity, national and sexual identities, and how these constructions are deployed through cultural practices and productions such as sports, film and television, folklore and popular culture, youth subcultures, music, and so on. For example, the course may contain units on "nation" and the creation of American mythologies; the process of hero-making in American history; stereotypes and the representation of race and ethnicity in television and film; representations of gender and sexuality in advertising; as well as a section on American music from jazz, blues, folk and roots music, to rock and roll, punk, and hip-hop.

4 Credits

Subject: Art History (UG) (ARTH)

CRN: 20761

Blended Online & In-Person | Lecture

St Paul: O'Shaughnessy Education Center 311

Online

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Fine Arts
          OR
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just AND [Core] Integ/Humanities
     

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     CommGood/Community-Engaged
     Writing to learn

  Heather Shirey

Street art—including graffiti, murals, and other installations in public space—provides expressive avenues for marginalized voices, shapes urban space, and promotes competing visions of community development. In contrast to art that is created for museums or the commercial art market, street art is uniquely positioned to engage with social issues from a critical perspective. This class will involve an analysis of street art projects from the United States, situated in comparison with projects from around the world. Topics to explored include the history of street art over time (from its origins in graffiti to contemporary mural festivals); the impetus for street art in communities in the USA and globally; models for creating, preserving, and presenting street art; the institutionalization of street art; street art as it relates to diversity and inclusion; and, ultimately, the potential for street art to play a role in social change.

4 Credits

Subject: Art History (UG) (ARTH)

CRN: 20763

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: O'Shaughnessy Education Center 305

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Fine Arts
          OR
     [Core] Integ/Humanities

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     Art History Museum Studies
     Honors Course
     Writing to learn

  Amy Nygaard

In this course, museum successes and failures will be examined in relation to the broad topics of exhibition design, collecting, politics, tourism, museum organizational structures, architecture, and education. The course combines thematic and theoretical classroom discussions with practical and experiential museum components. This course will provide an opportunity for discussions with museum professionals. Partnerships with regional museums will provide hands-on project opportunities during the semester.

4 Credits

Subject: Biology (BIOL)

CRN: 20824

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: John Roach Center 401

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     CommGood/Changemaking
     School of Ed Transfer Course
     WGSS Major Approved
     WGSS Minor Approved

  Jerry Husak, Patricia Maddox

While discussions of gender and its social construction have become common in our culture, there is less discussion of whether there are actually binary “biological sexes” that impact those conversations. In addition, while we have made many inclusive efforts in understanding the LGBTQIA+ community, our larger society correlates sexual orientation to biology leaving us to ask: are queer folks born that way and does it stay fixed throughout our lives? This course explores the convergence of sociology and biology in how we define gender, sex, sexual orientation, and sexual behavior as continua instead of binaries as once previously believed. Topics are examined in developmental order from conception to adulthood and include current issues relevant to the LGBTQIA+ community and society at-large. The course also considers these topics in non-human animals to ask ‘what is normal?’ in nature. This will be a BIOL - SOCI crosslisted course.

4 Credits

Subject: Communication Studies (COMM)

CRN: 22192

Blended Online & In-Person | Lecture

St Paul: O'Shaughnessy Education Center 306

Online

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     Faith and Praxis Minor or Cert

  Kristen Einertson

This course focuses on the creation and use of rhetoric in public persuasion settings, including social movements and political campaigns. The diversity of rhetorical acts examined may include campaign ads, speeches, films, advertisements, music, memorials, architecture and other nonverbal strategies. Topics of study may include: The rhetoric of domination and resistance, national identity formation, and the rhetoric of public memory.

4 Credits

Subject: Communication Studies (COMM)

CRN: 20993

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: O'Shaughnessy Education Center 305

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     Narrative Medicine Minor Appr
     Writing in the Discipline
     WGSS Major Approved
     WGSS Minor Approved

  Debra Petersen

This course focuses on theories and research of the historical and contemporary correlation between gender, race, class, and communicative practices, including rhetorical practice and mass communication content. It includes the influence of gender and racial stereotypes on public speech and debate, political campaigns and communication, organizational leadership, news coverage and advertising. Topics include: gendered perceptions of credibility; who is allowed to communicate and who is silenced due to class and racial privilege; and the impact of gender, race and class stereotypes about human nature, expertise, and abilities on individuals and groups that want to participate in public culture and communication. Students analyze and evaluate their own communicative styles in light of course readings and activities.

4 Credits

Subject: Communication Studies (COMM)

CRN: 20994

Online: Asynchronous | Lecture

Online

Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     Family Studies Major Approved
     Family Studies Minor Approved
     Writing Intensive

  Pamela Nettleton

This course provides an overview of documentary television and film as part of American culture. Class sessions will focus on how to analyze and interpret claims particular documentaries make, while providing a foundation for understanding aesthetic, rhetorical, and political economic conventions that help shape the meaning of each documentary. To this end, this course will center on current theoretical dilemmas and debates in documentary filmmaking, including questions of how to define documentary, what constitutes the ethical treatment of documentary subjects and subject matter, and how documentaries construct and position audiences. We will explore the concepts of reality, truth and authority, through a variety of readings and viewings.

4 Credits

Subject: English (UG) (ENGL)

CRN: 21119

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: John Roach Center 227

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just AND [Core] Integ/Humanities
     

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     Writing to learn

  Dan Jones

How did the modern warfare of World War I change those who fought and those who stayed at home? Why did so many of the best American artists flee to Paris? How did the traditionalism and stability of the 1950s lead to the radicalism and rebellion of the 60s? How has technology, from the typewriter to the internet, reshaped literature? Such questions will be explored in a chronological framework though extensive readings in American literature from the beginning of the twentieth century to the present. Threaded throughout the literature are themes such as progress and innovation, war, the “lost generation,” the New Woman, race, and conformity and individuality. This course fulfills the Historical Perspectives requirement in the English major. Prerequisite: ENGL 106, 121, or 190. 

4 Credits

Subject: English (UG) (ENGL)

CRN: 21874

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: John Roach Center 227

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just AND [Core] Integ/Humanities
     

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     Sports Management Minor
     Sports Studies Minor
     Writing to learn

  Liz Wilkinson

This course is focused on the multiplicities of narrative that are sport, with a special emphasis on American authors and U.S. sports journalism. Sports by definition are stories that literally play out in front of us: stories that involve conflict – conflict within the self, conflict in relationships, conflict against the elements, and, if we believe it possible, conflict with the supernatural. Through sports literature, students will thoughtfully investigate human interactions: the best we have to offer and sometimes the worst. Sports literature, whether that be fiction, non-fiction, drama, or poetry, asks us to consider what is just and what is unjust -- and how we discern which is which. Analytical and creative non-fiction writing assignments put students in thoughtful conversation with the ways that race, ethnicity, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, class, disability, or other underrepresented or marginalized positions affect our engagement with sports and our world. Prerequisites: ENGL 121 or 190, or transfer equivalent.

4 Credits

Subject: English (UG) (ENGL)

CRN: 21131

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: John Roach Center 301

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just AND [Core] Integ/Humanities
     

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     Pre-1900 American Lit.
     Sustainability (SUST)
     Writing to learn

  Laura Zebuhr

This course is about how 19th c. American literary traditions use Gothic tropes and modes to represent an idea of nature and the natural world. While we often think of “nature writing” as having a positive emotional orientation to human/nature relationships (in which safe exposure to wildness heals and refreshes our spirit, natural resources support human endeavors, and we do our best to use these resources wisely) such pastoralism masks darker truths. For example, the wallpaper in The Yellow Wallpaper looks like convulsing mushrooms and wallowing seaweeds. Frederick Douglass repeatedly uses images of being trapped in the earth to describe his despair while enslaved. In Poe’s famous story, Usher thinks it is stones and mold that cause his madness, and cursed mansions tend to collapse into lakes and oceans in Southern Gothic stories. With these and other examples in mind, we will turn our attention to a counter-tradition of nature writing in which negative emotional states prevail: fear, dread, even hate. In our readings of these and other “ecogothic” texts we will attend to a range of 19th c. contexts including: new ideas about the earth in geology and geography, claims about human nature in sexology, psychology, and scientific racism; mining and other extractive industries; and political movements like abolitionism, feminism, and animal rights. This course satisfies an Integration in the Humanities and the Diversity, Inclusion, and Social Justice core requirements, as well as a WAC Writing to Learn requirement. It also counts for the Sustainability minor. Prerequisite: ENGL 106, 121, or 190.

4 Credits

Subject: English (UG) (ENGL)

CRN: 21132

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: John Roach Center 301

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Integ/Humanities

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     Sustainability (SUST)
     Writing to learn

  Kanishka Chowdhury

This course explores the ways in which literature and film represent the natural world, engage with ecological concerns like the environmental implications of AI, and invite us to reimagine our relationship with our planet. From Indigenous worldviews to climate change to speculative futures, we’ll examine how narrative forms—novels, poetry, memoirs, and cinema—help us make sense of our planet. Our texts will include voices from the Global South to shed light on how environmental issues intersect with colonial histories. Along the way, we’ll also engage with key concepts such as the Anthropocene, ecofeminism, and postcolonial ecologies. Students will develop critical tools to analyze narratives, reflect on what it means to live ethically and imaginatively in a time of environmental uncertainty, and consider how storytelling can inspire awareness, resistance, and change. And, of course, there will always be room for wonder—for recognizing the amazing gift that is our planet. We will begin with a book that captures this wonder: Samantha Harvey’s ORBITAL. Other texts for the semester may include Octavia Butler’s PARABLE OF THE SOWER, Amitav Ghosh’s THE HUNGRY TIDE, Robin Wall Kimmerer's BRAIDING SWEETGRASS, and Mai Der Vang's PRIMORDIAL. This course satisfies an Integration in the Humanities requirement and a WAC Writing to Learn requirement. Application is being made to have this course count as meeting a Sustainability requirement (approval not guaranteed). Prerequisite: ENGL 106, 121, or 190.

4 Credits

Subject: Environmental Studies (ENVR)

CRN: 22506

In Person | Topics Lecture 2

St Paul: John Roach Center 301

Requirements Met:
     Sustainability (SUST)
     Writing to learn

  Kanishka Chowdhury

This course explores the ways in which literature and film represent the natural world, engage with ecological concerns like the environmental implications of AI, and invite us to reimagine our relationship with our planet. From Indigenous worldviews to climate change to speculative futures, we’ll examine how narrative forms—novels, poetry, memoirs, and cinema—help us make sense of our planet. Our texts will include voices from the Global South to shed light on how environmental issues intersect with colonial histories. Along the way, we’ll also engage with key concepts such as the Anthropocene, ecofeminism, and postcolonial ecologies. Students will develop critical tools to analyze narratives, reflect on what it means to live ethically and imaginatively in a time of environmental uncertainty, and consider how storytelling can inspire awareness, resistance, and change. And, of course, there will always be room for wonder—for recognizing the amazing gift that is our planet. We will begin with a book that captures this wonder: Samantha Harvey’s ORBITAL. Other texts for the semester may include Octavia Butler’s PARABLE OF THE SOWER, Amitav Ghosh’s THE HUNGRY TIDE, Robin Wall Kimmerer's BRAIDING SWEETGRASS, and Mai Der Vang's PRIMORDIAL. This course satisfies an Integration in the Humanities requirement and a WAC Writing to Learn requirement. Application is being made to have this course count as meeting a Sustainability requirement (approval not guaranteed). Prerequisite: ENGL 106, 121, or 190.

4 Credits

Subject: Environmental Studies (ENVR)

CRN: 22505

In Person | Topics Lecture 1

St Paul: John Roach Center 301

Requirements Met:
     Sustainability (SUST)
     Writing to learn

  Laura Zebuhr

This course is about how 19th c. American literary traditions use Gothic tropes and modes to represent an idea of nature and the natural world. While we often think of “nature writing” as having a positive emotional orientation to human/nature relationships (in which safe exposure to wildness heals and refreshes our spirit, natural resources support human endeavors, and we do our best to use these resources wisely) such pastoralism masks darker truths. For example, the wallpaper in The Yellow Wallpaper looks like convulsing mushrooms and wallowing seaweeds. Frederick Douglass repeatedly uses images of being trapped in the earth to describe his despair while enslaved. In Poe’s famous story, Usher thinks it is stones and mold that cause his madness, and cursed mansions tend to collapse into lakes and oceans in Southern Gothic stories. With these and other examples in mind, we will turn our attention to a counter-tradition of nature writing in which negative emotional states prevail: fear, dread, even hate. In our readings of these and other “ecogothic” texts we will attend to a range of 19th c. contexts including: new ideas about the earth in geology and geography, claims about human nature in sexology, psychology, and scientific racism; mining and other extractive industries; and political movements like abolitionism, feminism, and animal rights. This course satisfies an Integration in the Humanities and the Diversity, Inclusion, and Social Justice core requirements, as well as a WAC Writing to Learn requirement. It also counts for the Sustainability minor. Prerequisite: ENGL 106, 121, or 190.

4 Credits

Subject: Justice & Peace Studies (JPST)

CRN: 21330

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: Murray-Herrick Campus Center 308

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just AND [Core] Integ/Humanities
     

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     FYE CommGood/Learning Comm
     Faith and Praxis Minor or Cert
     Writing Intensive

  Mike Klein

Active nonviolence as a means for societal defense and social transformation analyzed through case studies of actual nonviolent movements, examining their political philosophy and how this philosophy is reflected in their methods and strategies. Examples of possible case studies include: Mahatma Gandhi's movement for a free India, Danish resistance to Nazi occupation, the struggle for interracial justice in the United State, an integrated Canada-to-Cuba peace-and-freedom walk, the campaign to close the U.S. Army School of the Americas (WHINSEC), fair trade movements, and the Honeywell Project. The course emphasizes the theory and active practice of nonviolence as well as oral histories of successful nonviolent movements. Usually offered every semester.

4 Credits

Subject: Justice & Peace Studies (JPST)

CRN: 21331

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: Murray-Herrick Campus Center 305H

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just AND [Core] Integ/Humanities
     

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     FYE CommGood/Learning Comm
     Faith and Praxis Minor or Cert
     Writing Intensive

  Mike Klein

Active nonviolence as a means for societal defense and social transformation analyzed through case studies of actual nonviolent movements, examining their political philosophy and how this philosophy is reflected in their methods and strategies. Examples of possible case studies include: Mahatma Gandhi's movement for a free India, Danish resistance to Nazi occupation, the struggle for interracial justice in the United State, an integrated Canada-to-Cuba peace-and-freedom walk, the campaign to close the U.S. Army School of the Americas (WHINSEC), fair trade movements, and the Honeywell Project. The course emphasizes the theory and active practice of nonviolence as well as oral histories of successful nonviolent movements. Usually offered every semester.

4 Credits

Subject: Justice & Peace Studies (JPST)

CRN: 21332

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: Murray-Herrick Campus Center 308

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just AND [Core] Integ/Humanities
     

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     FYE CommGood/Learning Comm
     Faith and Praxis Minor or Cert
     Writing Intensive

  Amy Finnegan

Active nonviolence as a means for societal defense and social transformation analyzed through case studies of actual nonviolent movements, examining their political philosophy and how this philosophy is reflected in their methods and strategies. Examples of possible case studies include: Mahatma Gandhi's movement for a free India, Danish resistance to Nazi occupation, the struggle for interracial justice in the United State, an integrated Canada-to-Cuba peace-and-freedom walk, the campaign to close the U.S. Army School of the Americas (WHINSEC), fair trade movements, and the Honeywell Project. The course emphasizes the theory and active practice of nonviolence as well as oral histories of successful nonviolent movements. Usually offered every semester.

4 Credits

Subject: Justice & Peace Studies (JPST)

CRN: 21333

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: Murray-Herrick Campus Center 308

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just AND [Core] Integ/Humanities
     

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     FYE CommGood/Learning Comm
     Faith and Praxis Minor or Cert
     Writing Intensive

  Ry Siggelkow

Active nonviolence as a means for societal defense and social transformation analyzed through case studies of actual nonviolent movements, examining their political philosophy and how this philosophy is reflected in their methods and strategies. Examples of possible case studies include: Mahatma Gandhi's movement for a free India, Danish resistance to Nazi occupation, the struggle for interracial justice in the United State, an integrated Canada-to-Cuba peace-and-freedom walk, the campaign to close the U.S. Army School of the Americas (WHINSEC), fair trade movements, and the Honeywell Project. The course emphasizes the theory and active practice of nonviolence as well as oral histories of successful nonviolent movements. Usually offered every semester.

4 Credits

Subject: Justice & Peace Studies (JPST)

CRN: 21336

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: Murray-Herrick Campus Center 305I

Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     Faith and Praxis Minor or Cert
     CommGood/Community-Engaged
     Writing in the Discipline

  Obasesam Okoi

In this class students will investigate how and why particular policies are developed, proposed, adopted, and implemented; will explore how social values shape and impact public policies; and will learn how to frame issues in ways that allow for more effective advocacy. The class will examine the relative power of diverse corporate and non-profit sectors in influencing policy debates and outcomes, including the role of think tanks. Students will analyze the limitations and strengths of diverse approaches to advocacy ranging from third-party appeals and solidarity efforts to elite decision makers, as well as the prospects for a politics of agency rooted in citizen-centered politics in which people mobilize to meet the needs of their communities. The course will integrate basic theory, interaction with public policy analysts and advocates, personal experience in persuasive advocacy, and case studies focused on issues such as climate change, economic inequality, land-food-hunger, and approaches to health care. Assignments will introduce students to various tools for persuasive advocacy and allow them to develop skill sets for using them.

4 Credits

Subject: Music Classes (UG) (MUSC)

CRN: 21407

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: Brady Educational Center 110

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Fine Arts

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     Writing Intensive

  Bruce Gleason

This course traces the development of American popular music from its roots through multiple genres such as minstrelsy, jazz, big band, swing, crooning, jump blues, gospel, rhythm and blues, country, western, folk/protest, and rock 'n' roll, concluding with the British Invasion. Popular music development is critically examined through four interrelated driving forces: identity (ethnicity, gender, culture, generation), centers vs. peripheries (the established vs. the innovative ), technology (impact on musical performance and listening), and business/law (commercial competition and development). Multimedia presentations include extensive audio and video support. Designed for the Popular Music minor.

4 Credits

Subject: Music Classes (UG) (MUSC)

CRN: 21412

Online: Asynchronous | Lecture

Online

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Fine Arts

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     Writing Intensive
     WGSS Major Approved

  Christopher Kachian

The origins and history of jazz in the United States. Various phases in the development of jazz style are discussed. Blues, ragtime, Dixieland, swing, bop, cool jazz, fusion, as well as other recent developments in jazz performances are investigated. An essential part of the course is the analysis and evaluation of recorded performances by outstanding jazz musicians. Designed for non-majors as well as an elective for music majors interested in jazz. Offered fall semester.

4 Credits

Subject: Sociology (SOCI)

CRN: 21763

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: John Roach Center 401

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     WGSS Major Approved
     WGSS Minor Approved

  Patricia Maddox, Jerry Husak

While discussions of gender and its social construction have become common in our culture, there is less discussion of whether there are actually binary “biological sexes” that impact those conversations. In addition, while we have made many inclusive efforts in understanding the LGBTQIA+ community, our larger society correlates sexual orientation to biology leaving us to ask: are queer folks born that way and does it stay fixed throughout our lives? This course explores the convergence of sociology and biology in how we define gender, sex, sexual orientation, and sexual behavior as continua instead of binaries as once previously believed. Topics are examined in developmental order from conception to adulthood and include current issues relevant to the LGBTQIA+ community and society at-large. The course also considers these topics in non-human animals to ask ‘what is normal?’ in nature. This will be a BIOL - SOCI crosslisted course.

4 Credits

Subject: Sociology (SOCI)

CRN: 21764

Blended Online & In-Person | Lecture

St Paul: O'Shaughnessy Education Center 309

Online

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     FYE CommGood/Learning Comm
     WGSS Major Approved
     WGSS Minor Approved

  Jessica Hodge

Although hate crimes have long existed in the United States, the term "hate crime" is a relatively new addition to the social, political, and legal domains. This course examines the institutionalization of hate crime law within our legal system and explores the complexities surrounding the development and enforcement of hate crime laws. This course also examines the causes, manifestations, and consequences of hate crimes, and the effectivess of formal and informal social controls in combating these crimes.

4 Credits

Subject: Sociology (SOCI)

CRN: 21765

In Person | Lecture

St Paul: O'Shaughnessy Education Center 307

Core Requirements Met:
     [Core] Diversity/Soc Just

Other Requirements Met:
     Amer Culture & Diff Minor Appr
     Family Studies Major Approved
     Family Studies Minor Approved
     School of Ed Transfer Course
     WGSS Major Approved
     WGSS Minor Approved

  Patricia Maddox

The transition between childhood and adulthood is examined using a general sociological framework and including life course, socioeconomic, and systems theories. Particular attention is given to the social construction of adolescence; institutional contexts (family, education, employment) of adolescent relationships with parents, peers, and others; gender and sexual socialization in society; cultures of achievement and risk; social diversity. This course meets a requirement in Family Studies and in Women's Studies. Prerequisite: SOCI 100 or permission of the instructor

4 Credits