Spring 2009 Honors Courses
HON 203 H, Democracy and Its Friendly Critics (Required for all Honors
Students; 3 Hours Credit)
HON 203HA
|
Democracy and Its Friendly Critics
|
MW 2:00-3:15 |
Dr. Peter Lawler |
HON 200HB
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Democracy and Its Friendly Critics
|
|
TH 12:30-1:45 |
Dr. Eric Sands |
Course meets these requirements:
- Required course for all honors students
- General Education core requirement in Behavioral & Social Sciences --
200 level for Government and International Studies.
Course description:
America 's leading statesmen such as
James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and
Franklin Roosevelt understood that popular government is extremely difficult to
sustain. They understood what we largely have forgotten: Democracy, like all
forms of government, comes with its own set of challenges and pathologies.
These lessons about democracy are best expressed by Alexis de Tocqueville, a
critic, albeit a friendly one, of American democracy who thoughtfully and
forcefully articulated the dangers facing the emerging democratic world. This
course will use Tocqueville's Democracy in America to illustrate the perpetual
issues and problems of democracy--many of which are still very real despite our
being blind to them---and we will also draw on works of literature, philosophy,
film, and theology to give concrete meaning to these problems as they are
manifested in American political and social life.
HON 203 H, Democracy and Its Friendly Critics (Required for all Honors
Students; 3 Hours Credit)
HON 203 HC
|
Democracy and Its Friendly Critics
|
MWF 12:00-12:50 |
Dr. David McKenzie |
Course meets these requirements:
- Required course for all honors students
- General Education core requirement in Humanities--100 level for Philosophy.
- May also count as the fifth humanities elective, if religion or philosophy
course requirement has been met by other means (e.g. AP credit).
Course description:
The motto “e pluribus unum” was
inscribed on the United States National Seal, created by the Continental
Congress during the Revolutionary War Period. The motto referred originally to
the one nation arising from the many nations whose settlers came to America and
from the thirteen states which constituted the original union. The idea that it
would be possible to create a nation that really is “one, from many” is a
seminal idea of American history. As the phrase comes to us, it stands more
broadly for the dialectic of the one and the many in American experience,
reflected in a wide array of issues. This course focuses on certain moments in
this rich dialectic in which the tensions inherent in the interplay of unity and
diversity have come to full expression. It explores early arguments related to
state and nation from the discipline of politics, cultural conflicts between
Native-Americans and European settlers from the disciplines of history and
literature, persistent issues of race relation from the disciplines of
philosophy and Black studies, treatment of immigrant populations from the
disciplines of literature and sociology, the long struggle for gender equality
from the disciplines of history and women’s studies, and arguments pertaining to
religious identity and separation of church and state from the disciplines of
religious studies and politics.
English 102, The Rhetoric of Analysis and Argumentation, Honors (3 Hours
Credit)
ENG 102 HB
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Inquiry and Writing
|
TH 2:00-3:15 |
Dr. M.E. Cooley
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| ENG 102 HS |
Inquiry and Writing |
MWF 10:00-10:50 |
Dr. Lara Whelan |
Course meets these requirements:
- An HON 250 course (3 of 9 elective required hours for all Honors students)
- General Education core requirement in Communication (3 hrs credit)
Course description:
The course focuses on developing
analytical and critical thinking and writing skills in argumentative and
persuasive prose for academic and professional audiences. Four essays and a
revision essay are required; all final drafts require several rough drafts.
Class is a combination of lecture and workshop activities. Current event issues
are used as the basis for readings and discussions which then become topics for
writing.
Honors 250HA, Science Fiction and Politics (3 Hours Credit)
HON 250 HA
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Science Fiction and Politics
|
T 4:00-6:30 |
Dr. John Hickman |
Course meets these requirements:
- an HON 250 course (3 of 9 elective required hours for all Honor students)
- an elective requirement for the Government major or minor
Course description:
Writers and filmmakers have long
found science fiction irresistible as a vehicle for arguing their politics.
This course explores the political in science fiction’s stories of dystopian
societies and encounters with the extraterrestrial, machine or post-human Other.
Implicit or explicit in these stories are questions about individual identity,
and thus the legal rights associated with that identity, and about human nature,
and thus political ideology. Typical of the assignments would writing an essay
on the possible scope of the legal rights that might be extended to the short
lived artificial humans in the 1982 film Blade Runner and David Brin’s
2002 novel Kiln People. This course also explores the effect of
popular anxieties in the 20th century that made specific works of science
fiction effective as vehicles for political arguments.
Honors 250/COM 416IA Media Law (3 Hours Credit)
HON250 HC
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Media Law
|
MWF 12:00-12:50 |
Dr. Brian Carroll |
Course meets these requirements:
- An HON 250 course (3 of 9 elective required hours for all Honors students)
- COM major elective
- COM major, journalism concentration course
- May count as one of the two free electives, outside of major/minor, required
for graduation.
Course description:
Constitutional and legislative
foundations of freedom of speech and press, with special emphasis on the law of
privacy, libel, censorship, access and broadcast regulation.
We examine the delicate balance that exists between freedom and control of
the media in the United States. The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution is,
of course, the major guarantee of freedom of expression. Since the courts,
especially the U.S. Supreme Court, are ultimately responsible for interpreting
the First Amendment and maintaining the balance between freedom and control, our
study focuses on judicial decisions and reasoning, examining how tensions in the
law are resolved. Other very significant sources of press freedoms and controls
exist, as well, including those produced and enforced by the marketplace,
government regulation and even popular opinion or sentiment. Therefore, we
consider other factors that influence the balance between freedom and control of
mass communication, including statutory law, executive and administrative
actions, and ethical concerns. The course also examines how the nature of a
medium affects or even dictates how it is controlled or not controlled.
The course is organized into three major sections: Freedom of Expression
& the First Amendment; Media Malpractice (privacy invasion and libel); and
Special Areas of Media Law (telecom, commercial speech, the Internet, copyright
and intellectual property, trial coverage). Because law is largely derived from
precedent, there is a significant historical thread that runs throughout the
course, providing a timeline on which landmark Supreme Court cases mark the eras
of jurisprudential change.
Honors 250/ REL 382A, Women in World Religions(3 Hours Credit)
HON250 HD
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Women in World Religions
|
TH 2:00-3:15 |
Dr. Jeffrey Lidke |
Course meets these requirements:
- An HON 250 course (3 of 9 elective required hours for all Honors students)
- General Education core requirement in Humanities -- 100 level for Religion
(3 hrs credit)
- May count as one of the two free electives, outside of major/minor, required
for graduation; OR, as the fifth humanities elective
Course description:
This seminar is a multileveled and
interdisciplinary inquiry into the role of women in the religious history of the
world. The course is divided into four units: Feminist scholarship, Women in
Indigenous Traditions, Women in Asian Traditions, and Women in Abrahamic
Traditions. In the subsequent units we apply this interdisciplinary approach to
specific case studies of women in respective religious traditions. Classes
combine instructor and guest lectures with discuss on readings, student
presentations, and analysis of multi-media materials including artwork, music,
and dance. While striving to understand respective traditions in and on their
own terms, we are also challenged to ‘think globally’ about the possibility of
establishing a universal ethic for the treatment of women in all communities at
all times.
Honors 250/HIS 333A, Twentieth-Century Europe (3 Hours Credit)
HON250 HE
|
Twentieth-Century Europe
|
TH 9:30-10:45 |
Dr. Matthew Stanard |
Course meets these requirements:
- An HON 250 course (3 of 9 elective required hours for all Honors students)
- Counts as the history course requirement or the fifth free elective course
in the Humanities general education core (3 of 15 hours required)
- May count toward the major with departmental approval
Course description:
This course examines the history of
Europe since 1914. The course does not aim for encyclopedic coverage of every
single event and development in Europe since 1914, rather it seeks to explore
major political, social, and cultural developments that shaped European history
in the 20th century. As such, the course is designed around six main themes:
the causes and outcome of World War I; fascism and Nazism; the Holocaust; the
end of European overseas empire; the Cold War; and the role of memory in
European history.
Honors Thesis
Register for HON 450H if you are starting your thesis.
Register for HON
451H if you completed HON 450H last semester.
You will need an
authorization form signed by your thesis director, department chair, and the
honors director.
Honorization of Courses
“HONORIZING ” a course or a course within a major.
As you know, an honors student may request to change a “regular” course
within a major into an honors course. Follow the procedure below.
BEFORE you begin attending the course, during registration, meet with the
instructor. Print and take the form with you (see Forms on the Honors Web page);
this form has guidelines for you and your instructor. Discuss with the faculty
member your interest in receiving “honors” credit for a particular course. He or
she will define the nature of the honors work to be completed.
Honorizing any course is NOT Permitted after the first week of classes.
Complete your part of the form and return the form to Dr. Cooley.