Writing Fellows Courses - Spring 2009
Writing Fellows courses help students improve their writing skills by working with a Brown undergraduate who has been trained in composition and pedagogy. In a “fellowed” course, students receive detailed commentary on at least two paper drafts during the semester. Professors receive the first drafts, with annotations by the Writing Fellows, and the final papers, so that they may review the process of their students’ work. Writing Fellows courses for the spring 2009 term are listed below. First-year seminars are listed first, followed by additional courses that are served by Writing Fellows.
First-Year Seminars
ANTH 0066I-S01 - Human Trafficking
In this seminar, students will retrace the development and impact of the 2000 UN Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Human Trafficking, especially of women and children. This set of norms was created as a supplement to the UN Convention against International Organized Crime. This seminar will deal with the protocol as both a legal as a living document that has both a history and ongoing political relevance.
Monday 3:00-5:20 p.m.
Instructor: Kay Warren, Professor of Anthropology
ANTH 0066J - So You Want to Change the World: Anthropological Perspectives on Global Poverty and Development
Examines from an anthropological perspective efforts to address global poverty that are typically labeled as "development." The enterprise of development is considered critically, both with regard to the intentions and purposes that underlie the actions of wealthy countries, donor organizations, and expatriate development workers and with regard to the outcomes for the people who are the intended beneficiaries. Privileging the prespectives of ordinary people in developing countries, but also looking carefully at the institutions involved in development, the course relies heavily on ethnographic case studies that will draw students into the complexity of one of the greatest contemporary global problems: social inequality. In a highly participatory seminar, students will read, discuss, and write about ethnographies that combine theoretically sharp and experience-near accounts of poverty and development in a range of world areas and across numerous specific development problems such as the environment, public health, gender inequality, agriculture, population and economic transformation. Reserved for First Year students.
Monday 3:00-5:20 p.m.
Instructor: Daniel Smith, Professor of Anthropology
ANTH 0066O-S01 - How to do Things With Gifts: Charity, Corruption and Friendship Across Cultures
In all human societies, people exchange goods and services, From Adam Smith onwards, economists have emphasized the central importance of the "free" market, where self-interested individuals strike bargains, and simultaneously expand humanity's "common stock." Yet costly practices-expensive weddings, charitable donations, corporate hospitality-still flourish, which appear designed to build human relationships rather than generate hard profits. And in today's global economy, personal gifts remain an essential part of doing business in places like China, Japan, Nigeria and Saudi Arabia. Where mainstream economistic analysis sees inefficiency or corruption, this course explores classic and contemporary alternative understandings of gift-giving's cultural significance.
Thursday 9:00-10:20 a.m.
Instructors: Keith Brown, Associate Professor of International Studies
ECON 0180C-S01 - Punishment and Inequality in America
This seminar uses social theory and social science evidence to help students understand how punishment works as a mechanism to produce inequality in American society. The institution of incarceration as a generator of social stigma is examined in this light. Zero-tolerance policing practices and racial profiling are discussed from this point of view as well. Questions about authority, legitimacy, deviancy, power, and social cognition will guide the discussion.
Monday 3:00-5:50 p.m.
Instructor: Glenn Loury, Professor of Economics
ENGL 0250F-S01 - Shakespeare's Present Tense
Shakespeare in Love suggests how Shakespeare was clued in to elite and popular cultures. Current adaptations like O and 10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU demonstrate how Shakespeare provides anachronistic clues to issues of the present. This course will trace such clues by examining the cultural origins and ongoing adaptations of Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, Othello, Twelfth Night, Henry V, and the sonnets.
Thursday 2:30-3:50 p.m.
Instructors: Stephen Foley, Associate Professor of English
GNSS 0090C-S01 - Reproductive Health: Science and Politics
Reproductive health issues such as contraception, abortion, sexually transmitted infections and gay and lesbian health are some of the most controversial and politically charged issues in the US today. After an introduction to the interpretation of medical literature we will explore scientific, political, religious and cultural aspects of these important public policy issues. Successful national and international programs will be discussed. Although all views are welcome, it is expected that students will be respectful of other's opinions and will incorporate the best available scientific data into their conclusions.
Monday 3:00-5:20 p.m.
Instructor: Sarah Fox, Assistant Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology
GRMN 0750C-S01 - Crime Fiction: The Global Hyper-Genre
Twenty-five percent of all new literary books worldwide are crime fiction. As a means of a society to reflect upon itself, crime fiction reflects how certain cultures deal with the dialectics of threatening and securing civic order, how they depict mentalities, traditions, topographies, or cultural chance. No prerequisite. In English.
Thursday 9:00-10:20 a.m.
Instructors: Thomas Kniesche, Associate Professor of German Studies
PHYS 0120-S01 - Adventures in Nanoworld
Richard Feynman famously said, "There's plenty of room at the bottom," about the possibility of building molecular-size machines operating according to Quantum Mechanics. Scientists are now learning the art, and students in this course will use basic physics and simple mathematical models to understand the phenomena and materials in the nanoworld. Non-science concentrators and potential science concentrators alike will learn about important classes of nanosystems such as macromolecules, nanotubes, quantum dots, quantum wires, and films. We will learn how people make nanosystems and characterize them. We will consider existing and potential applications of nanotechnology, including molecular motors, nanoelectronics, spintronics (which received the latest Nobel prize in Physics), and quantum information.
Tuesday/Thursday, 1:00-2:20 p.m.
Instructor: Dmitri Feldman, Assistant Professor of Physics
RUSS 0320C-S01 - Demons and Angels in Russian Literature
The literary images of fallen angels, as well as various poetic demonologies in Russian literature extend from the medieval apocrypha, up to famous works of the twentieth-century literature, like, for example, Bulgakov's Master and Margarita. Although, the Russian literary angels are in many respects related to their Western counterparts, the apocalyptic character of Russian spiritual culture makes them in many respects unique. Examining these images, the course addresses the important questions concerning the human condition in general. Angels as one critic said, "represent something that was ours and that we have the potential to become again"; their essence is otherness. Consequently, their literary representations explore the possibilities of human existence as well as its central paradigms like, love, rebirth, mortality, or 'fallenness.' The course will analyze the images of angels and fallen angels (devils) in the works of the nineteenth and the twentieth-century Russian prose, visual art, and film - from romanticism to 'postmodernism' - in the context of the world literature and culture. Authors to be studied: Milton, Goethe, Byron, Lermontov, Flaubert, Dostoevskii, Sologub, Bulgakov, Andreev, Nabokov, Erofeev. We will also discuss films by Tarkovskii and Wenders. In English.
Wednesdays 3:00-5:20 p.m.
Instructor: Michal Oklot, Assistant Professor of Slavic Languages
Additional Courses
AMCV 1550-S01 - Methods in Public Humanities
This course offers a survey of the skills required for public humanities work. It incoporates presentations from local and national practitioners in a diverse range of public humanities topics: historic preservation, oral history, exhibition development, archival and curatorial skills, radio and television documentaries, public art, local history, and and more.
Monday/Wednesday/Friday 11:00-11:50 a.m.
Instructor: Steven D. Lubar, Professor of American Civilization
ARCH 0650-S01 - Islamic Civilizations
This introduction to early Islamic civilization will examine the interrelationship between the emerging Islamic religious tradition and the development of specifically Muslim social institutions, the role of ethnic and religious minorities, and the flowering of Islamic thought and material culture. Students will study archaeology, political and social histories, visual arts, and textual traditions to explore the evolution and institutionalization of Islam from Spain to Central Asia.
Monday/Wednesday/Friday 2:00-2:50 p.m.
Instructor: Ian Straughn, Post-Doctoral Fellow in Joukowsky Institute of Archaelogy
COLT 0810J-S01 - The Colonial and Postcolonial Marvelous
A celebration and critique of the marvelous in South American and related literatures (U.S., Caribbean). We follow the marvelous from European exoticizing of the New World during the colonial period to its postcolonial incarnations in 'magical realism' and beyond. We attend particularly to the politics and marketing of the marvelous, in writers including Borges, Chamoiseau, Columbus, García Márquez, Fuguet. Reading in English or Spanish.
Thursday 2:30-3:50 p.m.
Instructors: Stephanie Merrim, Professor of Comparative Literature and Hispanic Studies and Esther Whitfield, Assistant Professor of Comparative Literature
EDUC 1860-S01 - Social Context of Learning and Development
This course focuses on the social environment that contributes to the development of children's minds, language, self-understanding, relations with others, affect, and attitudes toward learning. The period from birth through young adulthood will be examined. Topics include children's social interactions, parental expectations and socialization practices, and the influences of family, peers, school, and media. Prerequisite: EDUC 0800, EDUC 1710, EDUC 1270, COGS 0630, or PSYCH 0810.
Tuesdays 4:00-6:00 p.m.
Instructor: Monique LeBourgeois, Assistant Professor of Education
ENGN 2910Y-S01 - Innovation and Entrepreneurship: Creating Value Out of Graduate Research (primarily for graduate students)
This course focuses on innovation and entrepreneurship of embryonic ideas, pioneering technologies, and scientific breakthroughs emanating from the university research enterprise. All assignments center on graduate research, culminating with a full business plan. The course helps students to focus on graduate work while harvesting the commercial potential of their research.
Tuesday/Thursday 1:00-2:20 p.m.
Instructor: Danny Warshay, Lecturer, Department of Engineering
GEOL 0240-S01 - Earth: Evolution of a Habitable Planet
This course introduces students to the Earth's surface environment, evolution-climate, chemistry, and physical makeup. The Earth's carbon cycle is used to understand solar, tectonic, and biological cycles' interactions. We will examine the origin of the sedimentary record, the dating of the geological record, chemistry and life on early Earth, and the nature of feedbacks that maintain the "habitable" range on Earth. Two field trips; five laboratories arranged. Prerequisite: GEOL 0220 or 0230; or instructor permission.
Tuesday/Thursday 1:00-2:20 p.m.
Instructor: Timothy D. Herbert, Professor of Geological Sciences
HIST 1220-S01 - European Intellectual and Cultural History: Exploring the Modern, 1880-1914
A sequel to HI 121 focusing on radical intellectual and cultural currents that challenged and destabilized the assumptions of Victorian high culture during the fin de siecle. Through a careful reading of primary texts by Hobhouse, Nietzsche, Weber, and Freud. The course explores issues such as the rise of mass consumer culture, neoliberal and neofascist politics, philosophic irrationalism, psychoanalysis, and the woman question.
Monday/Wednesday/Friday 1:00-1:50 p.m.
Instructor: Mary Gluck, Professor of History
ITAL 1420-S01 - Sex and the Cities: Venice, Florence, and Rome, 1450-1800
This course examines the politics of sexuality and the sexuality of politics in Italy between the Renaissance and the Enlightenment. Italy's urban settings saw the development of some of the most sophisticated political systems in Europe, and issues of gender identity and sexual practices figured prominently in the political symbolism, political criticism, and legal and social orders of these regimes. Lectures and course discussions also explore everyday practices and their implications for defining and defying the social and political norms of gender and sexuality in early modern Italy. Suggested prerequisites are HIST 0010 or any Italian Studies course at level 1000 or above. No prerequisites are required. Lectures in English. Discussion groups in English and Italian.
Tuesday/Thursday 10:30-11:50 a.m.
Instructor: Caroline Castiglione, Associate Professor of Italian Studies
PHIL 0360-S01 - Early Modern Philosophy
This course introduces students to central themes in Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, and Kant. Major topics we will cover include reason, experience, and knowledge; substance and the nature of the world as it really is; induction, causation, and the origin of our ideas; and skepticism, realism, and idealism. Connections are made with the scientific revolution of the 17th century.
Monday/Wednesday/Friday 11:00-11:50 a.m.
Instructor: Katherine Dunlop, Assistant Professor of Philosophy
PHIL 0040-S01 - Reason and Religion
This is an introductory course in the philosophy of religion. We will be considering central questions in the philosophy of religion, e.g. the existence of God, from a contemporary analytic perspective. As this is a course in analytic philosophy, we will be addressing these issues in a way that stresses clarity and rigor.
Thursday 9:00-10:20 a.m.
Instructor: Maxwell Pines
PHP 1680D-S01 - Ethical Perspectives in Environmental Health
Introduction to ethical principles and concepts shaping emerging field of environmental ethics. Examines interfaces between policy, science, economic and social drivers attendant to ethical decision-making related to environmental issues. Environmental actions/decisions are used as case studies to identify, review and analyze ethical principles and approaches. Impact of national and international decisions are examined for their local impact.
Thursday 3:0 -5:20 p.m.
Instructor: Valerie Wilson, Associate Dean of the Graduate School
SOC 0020 - Perspectives on Social Interaction: An Introduction to Social Psychology
An introduction to the discipline of sociology examining the individual in social situations. Explores the social development of the person, the development of interpersonal relationships, and the problems of integrating the individual and social system. For each area, the personal and situational factors that bear upon the issue are investigated. The objective is to deepen understanding of the behavior of people in a social context.
Tuesday/Thursday 1:00-2:20 p.m.
Instructor, Gregory Elliott, Associate Professor of Sociology
SOC 1330-S01 - Remaking the City
Cities are being reshaped by immigration, economic restructuring, and other forces. This course reviews these changes from several perspectives, including the patterns and causes of change, the role of politics and public policy, and how different groups of people (by class, race, and national origin) manage under the new conditions. Readings will emphasize historical and cross-national comparisons.
Monday/Wednesday 8:30-9:50 a.m.
Instructor: John Logan, Professor of Sociology
SOC 1950-S01 - Senior Seminar (for sociology concentrators)
This advanced research seminar is for sociology concentrators in the second semester of work on an honors thesis. Participants examine methods for analyzing, writing, and presenting thesis material and apply peer review techniques in assessing each other's work. The course culminates in students’ presentation of their theses to the department. Students doing independent study research may also participate with the instructor's permission. This course is required for "honors" in sociology.
Wednesdays 3:00-5:20 p.m.
Instructor: Dennis Hogan, Professor of Sociology