*NOTE: Registration for seminars is done on a priority basis. We consider the following criteria: 1) Class standing (seniors given priority); 2) student is on track to receive Honors Degree (i.e., number of Honors credits taken, language fulfillment status (completion of 1 or both semesters of language by the end of their sophomore year), and cumulative GPA (3.5+); and 3) major – seminar’s subject fits with, or is advantageous to the student’s major area of study.
Fall 2013 Honors Seminars
The Art and Science of Medicine
UH 402RH-001 or 403RS-001 (4 credits)
Prerequisites: UH 201 & UH 202, or UH 301
Time: Monday/Wednesday, 3:10 – 5:00 pm
Place: Wilson Hall, Room 2105
Instructor: Professor Don Demetriades
Course Description:
Designed for students from all academic disciplines, this seminar will focus on just how broadly and profoundly contemporary medicine touches all of our lives. It will examine the underlying principles of medicine through the lens of literature, science, art and related fields. The why of suffering and disease, the how of healing, and the role both patient and physician play in individual health will be explored. Medical professionals will be invited to visit the seminar.
Ethics and Etiquette in the Digital Age
UH 494IS-01 or UH 494CS-01 (4 credits)
Prerequisites: UH 201 & UH 202, or UH 301
Time: Tuesdays/Thursdays, 10:00 – 11:50 am
Place: Quad F, Room 105
Instructors: Dr. Richard Wolff (Professor and Gilhousen Telecommunications Chair, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Engineering)
Course Description:
How has information technology impacted policy, ethics, etiquette, and our way of life? This seminar will explore the revolutionary and disruptive advances occasioned by information technology. From smart phones to Wi-Fi; Face Book to computer games; artificial intelligence and robots to Second Life, information technologies and telecommunications have affected our lives in profound ways. Are books obsolete? Do search engines make it unnecessary to remember things? Have cyber warfare, hacking and identity theft become permanent threats to our existence? Social networks, instant messaging, online video and music downloads are but a few of the markers of change in daily life. Academic inquiry and creative activities have also been affected dramatically and questions abound. What does the future hold and what are the social and economic implications? Students will engage in a range of activities including online learning systems, blogging, social networking, electronic research methodologies and new media creation techniques. Numerous guest experts will visit the seminar, providing expertise tailored to student interest. Each student will carry out a research project in an area of their choice and will be required to provide appropriate documentation in addition to a class presentation.
Sociobiology: Evolution and Human Behavior
UH 494IS-02 (4 credits)
Prerequisites: UH 201 & UH 202, or UH 301
Time: Monday/Wednesday, 2:10 – 4:00 pm
Place: Quad F, Room 105
Instructors: Dr. Steven Swinford, Honors Associate Director and Professor, Department of Sociology and Dr. Kevin O’Neill, Professor, Land Resources and Environmental Sciences
Course Description:
From Charles Darwin onward, biologists have made claims that evolutionary biology can broaden our understanding of humans, including human culture. Edward O. Wilson famously predicted in the mid-1970s that the social sciences would eventually be subsumed into biology. Not surprisingly, many social scientists have reacted with scorn, and occasional virulent outrage. But others have embraced biology and have worked towards an integration of the biological sciences and social sciences. In this seminar we will explore the intersection of the biological and social sciences to broaden our understanding of the development of human behavior and culture.
Mythological Displacements in Literature, Dreams, and Life
UH 494-01 (4 credits)
Prerequisites: UH 201 & UH 202, or UH 301
Time: Tuesday/Thursday, 3:10 – 5:00 pm
Place: Quad F, Room 105
Instructors: Dr. Michael Sexson, Department of English and Regents Professor
Course Description:
“All literature,” wrote the Canadian cultural critic, Northrop Frye, “is displaced myth.” By this he meant that mythology supplies the originary rituals, frames and models which can be discerned in even the most recent and most realistic literary texts. Sigmund Freud understood the manifest content of dreams to have gone through the processes of “condensation” and “displacement,” thus making necessary an interpretive strategy aimed at detecting what lies beneath psychic disguises. Through exploring displacement in literature and dreams, this class will then take up the provocative notion that all contemporary reality may be treated as the “tip of the ice berg,” beneath which lies structures and patterns best seen through the lenses of mythology. In a phrase, we may not know how accurately we speak when we talk of life-situations as being “fairy tales.”
The two central texts for the class, Mircea Eliade’s Myths, Dreams, and Mysteries, and Northrop Frye’s The Secular Scripture will be supplemented by myth and fairy tale-related materials from the instructor’s personal library and from the now substantial materials on the internet.
Our Nuclear Age
UH 494-002 (4 Credits)
Prerequisites: UH 201 & UH 202, or UH 301
Time: Monday/Wednesday, 6:10 pm - 8:00 pm
Place: Quad F, Room 105
Instructor: Professor Amanda Rutherford (Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering)
Course Description:
Whether we like it or not, we live in a nuclear age. We will seek to better understand nuclear energy from scientific, political, and cultural points of view. We will study nuclear science and landmark events in historical context. How close has our nation been to nuclear war? What happened at Three Mile Island? How are fusion reactors fundamentally different from fission reactors and how close are we to the reality of fusion power? How has the existence of nuclear energy permeated our culture? We will discuss these questions and many others throughout the course of this interdisciplinary examination of our nuclear age.
Music and the Brain
UH 494IA-01 (4 credits)
Prerequisites: UH 201 & UH 202, or UH 301
Time: Tuesday/Thursday, 1:10 – 3:00 pm
Place: 117 Howard Hall
Instructors: Dr. John Miller, Professor, Dept. of Cell Biology and Neuroscience; Dr. Greg Young, Professor, School of Music; Shane Colvin, Adjunct Instructor, Honors Program and Mitchell Scholar
Course Description:
This course will examine aspects of the comprehension, emotional reaction, analysis, performance, and clinical application of music to brain function: we will explore how the brain understands, produces and reacts to music. The field is intrinsically and essentially multidisciplinary: it attempts to unify theory from neurology and neurophysiology (how the brain is structured and how it functions) with music and communication theory. There has been a great deal of recent interest and research in aspects of emotional communication through music that extends well beyond verbal language. The goal of this course is to explore this realm of human communication. Three excellent books will be used as core texts: 1) Music, the Brain and Ecstasy by Robert Jourdain; 2) Musicophilia by Oliver Sacks; and 3) Music, Language and the Brain by A.D. Patel.
Where Science and Policy Diverge: A global tour of climate change science and political deadlock
UH 494CS-02 (4 credits)
Prerequisites: UH 201 & UH 202, or UH 301
Time: Friday, 12:00 – 3:20 pm
Place: Quad F, Room 1
Instructors: Dr. Scott Powell, Dr. Paul Stoy, and Dr. Tony Hartshorn, Department of Land Resources and Environmental Sciences; Douglas Fischer, Journalist and Founding Editor of The Daily Climate
Course Description:
On no other topic do science and American public policy intersect with greater explosiveness than climate change. This seminar will enable an in-depth investigation of the scientific and political debates over climate science and the broader role that science can play in informing public dialogue of important environmental issues facing society. This course will introduce students to the challenge of “business-as-usual” greenhouse gas emissions and potential solutions; students will assess the scope and effectiveness of political responses, from the local level up to the international arena. The course culminates with “virtual” attendance of the United Nation's climate conference in Warsaw, Poland, a gathering that draws roughly 20,000 participants and delegates, has been held annually since 1992, and represents the global society's most concerted response to climate change. This course will bring an international perspective to the local, regional, and global challenge of addressing climate change.
Spring 2014 Honors Seminars
The Art and Science of Medicine
UH 402RH-001 or 403RS-001 (4 credits)
Prerequisites: UH 201 & UH 202, or UH 301
Time: Monday/Wednesday, 2:10 – 4:00 pm
Place: Quad F, Room 105
Instructor: Professor Don Demetriades
Course Description:
Designed for students from all academic disciplines, this seminar will focus on just how broadly and profoundly contemporary medicine touches all of our lives. It will examine the underlying principles of medicine through the lens of literature, science, art and related fields. The why of suffering and disease, the how of healing, and the role both patient and physician play in individual health will be explored. Medical professionals will be invited to visit the seminar.
Human Nature
UH 494IH-001 (4 Credits)
Prerequisites: UH 201 & UH 202, or UH 301
Time: Wednesday, 3:10 - 6:20 pm
Place: Wilson Hall, Room 1139
Instructor(s): Professors Robert Rydell, John Miller and Distinguished Guests
Course Description:
What exactly is human nature and why do answers to that question matter so much? This seminar examines the problem of human nature from multiple perspectives in the sciences, the humanities, the social sciences and the arts with a view towards encouraging students to “dive deeper” (the phrase is from Moby Dick) into issues that have been fundamental to thinking of ourselves—and our future—as human beings. To what extent do we have free will? How important is “nurture” to understanding our “nature” and vice versa? How do ideas about human nature inform thinking about government and society? Why do ideas about human nature change? Does human nature itself change?
The seminar will meet once a week for three hours and will be organized around three thematic clusters: 1) Human Nature: Our Bodies, Our Minds, Our Selves; 2) Being Human: Nature and Culture; 3) Human Nature and the Body Politic. Each cluster will be divided into four seminar meetings between students and visiting faculty with the final week of each cluster being devoted to synthesis. For each of the seminar meetings with visiting faculty, students will prepare a 1-2 pp. set of questions along with comments about why their questions are significant. At the end of each cluster, the seminar will meet to summarize and synthesize the arguments that have been presented. For a final project, students will work in groups of five and will prepare a creative project for presentation that elucidates the themes of the course.
Origins
UH 494IH-002 or UH 494IN-001 (4 Credits)
Prerequisites: UH 201 & UH 202, or UH 301
Time: TBA
Place: TBA
Instructor(s): Professors Michael Miles, Philosophy, Dr. Neil Cornish, Physics, and Jack Horner, Paleontology
Course Description:
Open to students from all academic disciplines, this interdisciplinary seminar seeks to explore the picture that is currently emerging as a consequence of Cosmology and Evolutionary investigation. Participants will explore the quest for a unified theory that involves the fusion of Superstring theory and Particle Physics, proceeding from Quantum through the “Big Bang.” Scholars will also examine the scientific methodology that leads to the fundamental conclusions of Darwinian Evolution as well as the philosophical and spiritual implications associated with our changing perception of the universe and our place within it.
Honors Read
UH 494-001 (4 Credits)
Prerequisites: UH 201 & UH 202, or UH 301
Time: Tuesday/Thursday, 7:10 - 9:00 pm
Place: Quad F, Room 1
Instructor(s): Professor Kent Davis
Course Description:
This seminar will offer students the opportunity to contribute to the selection of texts for "Hike and Read," as well as "Texts and Critics: Imagination and Knowledge", respectively. Seminar participants will each identify and champion a text for possible inclusion in the Honors curriculum for the upcoming academic year. Through vigorous research and debate, students will collaboratively create guidelines for selecting the texts. Seminar goals: the synthesis of new and unexpected texts, real-world exploration of the intersection between pedagogy and pragmatism, and engaging a community of enthusiastic, diverse, upper-division students who are excited about challenging and inspiring their fellow Honors students.
Language and the Brain: Neuro-linguistics
UH 494RH-001 or UH 494RS-001 (4 Credits)
Prerequisites: UH 201 & UH 202, or UH 301
Time: Mondays/Wednesdays, 1:10 - 3:00 pm
Place: Wilson Hall, Room 2105
Instructor(s): Dr. Jerome Coffey (English) and Dr. John Miller (Cell Biology and Neuroscience)
Course Description:
Neuro-linguistics is the study of relations of language and communication to aspects of brain function, i.e., how the brain understands and produces language and communication. This involves attempting to combine theory from neurology and neurophysiology (how the brain is structured and how it functions) with linguistic theory (how language is structured and how it functions). With the aid of local neurologists students will participate in clinical experiences with brain-damaged and aphasiac patients. Students will be expected to write several short papers and reports on their laboratory, clinical, and research experiences. At the end of the term students will write a major research report and will share this work with their fellow students in a seminar setting.
