College of Arts & Sciences
Fall 2022
| Department | Course Title |
|---|---|
| ANTH 090-010 | White Picket Fences: Rethinking the American Dream |
| ART 090-010 | Sketching and Seeing: How drawing teaches you to see the world more clearly |
| ASIA 090-011 | Globalization in Asia Through Time and Space |
| BIOS 090-011 | Women in Science |
| BIOS 090-012 | Biodiversity in a Changing Planet |
| BIOS 090-014 | Biology of Human Disease and Therapy |
| COMM 090-011 (AAS 090-011) | Race and Media |
| EES 090-010 | From Ice Age to Greenhouse Earth |
| EES 090-011 | Lands of the Midnight Sun |
| EES 090-014 | The Control of Nature |
| ENGL 090-010 | Multicultural Colonial Bethlehem |
| HIST 090-010 | America Goes to the Middle East |
| HIST 090-011 | Wild Wild West |
| HIST 090-012 (AAS 090-012) | Black Radical Thought |
| IR 090-010 | Strongmen and International Relations |
| IR 090-011 | Sex, Power, and International Politics |
| IR 090-012 | East Asian International Relations |
| MATH 090-010 | Elementary Problem Solving |
| MLL 090-010 | Banned Books and Other Words (Almost) Too Dangerous to Mention |
| MUS 090-010 | History of Keyboard Instruments and the Music Written for Them |
| PHIL 090-010 | Fluxus: Beautiful Becomings |
| PHY 090-011 | From Black Holes to Strings: the Early Universe and the Nature of Space and Time |
| POLS 090-010 | U.S. Climate Change Challenges |
| POLS 090-011 | Data, Power, and Politics |
| POLS 090-012 | Dreams and Nightmares of American Politcal Thought |
| PSYC 090-010 | The Seven Sins of Memory |
| REL 090-014 | Buddhism, Psychology, and Medicine |
| REL 090-016 | Love |
| SOC 090-010 | Sociology of "The Office" |
| SOC 090-011 | Social Justice and the Sociology of Emotions |
| SOC 090-013 (LAS 090-013) | The Latin@x Experience |
| THTR 090-010 | Intro to Acting |
| THTR 090-011 | Geek Theatre |
| WGSS 090-013 (HIST 090-013) | Women, Gender, and Sexuality in 20th Century Media |
4 credits (SS)
Professor Samantha Fox
TR 9:20-10:35am
WHITE PICKET FENCES: RETHINKING THE AMERICAN DREAM
This class interrogates America’s self-conception as the land of opportunity, where anyone who works hard enough can have a house with a white picket fence. How and why did the detached single-family home even become such an icon of American success? What are the ramifications of a social life oriented around the nuclear family? Is upward mobility a myth? How do manicured lawns contribute to climate change? We will discuss these questions and more through the lens of anthropology, urban studies, and other interdisciplinary fields.
Professor Samantha Fox is an Assistant Professor of Anthropology and faculty member in Global Studies. She received her Ph.D. in Sociocultural Anthropology from Columbia University (2018), holds an M.A. in Visual and Media Anthropology from the Freie Universität Berlin, and was previously a postdoctoral fellow at the New School for Social Research. She is working on a book about urban renewal and sustainable shrinkage in the post-industrial former East Germany.
3 credits (HU)
Professor Amy Forsyth
TR 11:15am-12:30pm
SKETCHING AND SEEING: HOW DRAWING TEACHES
YOU TO SEE THE WORLD MORE CLEARLY
Sketching provides the opportunity to slow down and carefully observe all the things around us. Unlike the camera, which allows us to postpone looking until later, sketching requires thoughtful observation to record that particular series of moments. How does light fall on the object, where are the shadows and how rich are the colors? Who am I with, what are the sounds and scents? How can I record what I am experiencing in my very own way? How do I represent space, motion, sound? Starting with making our own sketchbooks, we will build a personal library of media and techniques to allow each student to observe and record their experiences, and finally, to imagine other realities through sketching. We will investigate the sketches of other artists for inspiration, and we will sketch in many different media. We will draw just about everything, including people and objects, and we will sketch outdoors and in other interesting locations. $100 additional lab fee.
Professor Amy Forsyth teaches in the Department of Art, Architecture, and Design. She studied Architecture at Penn State and Princeton Universities, and teaches Design classes at Lehigh. She designs and builds furniture in addition to keeping an ongoing sketchbook practice. Her work has been exhibited in galleries and museums throughout the US. She is also a musician, and plays the fiddle and sings in various bands in the area.
4 credits (SS)
Professor Kyoko Tanniguchi
MF 1:35-2:50pm
GLOBALIZATION IN ASIA THROUGH TIME AND SPACE
Have you ever wondered about Asia? It covers a vast geographic territory; it is divided into East, South, and Southeast Asia and each sub-region contains numerous different ethnic groups, cultures and nations. The time span for these cultures is similarly vast going back to pre-history and continuing through modern times. This is a team-taught course with four professors. This semester, we investigate four interrelated topics (Globalization, Life and Death, Racism and Xenophobia, Crisis/Pandemics/Disasters) through our four fields of study: music, material objects and histories, religion, and horror film. During the hands-on Experiential Learning sessions, students will learn about East and Southeast Asian musical cultures, examine the historical objects and personal experiences that tell stories, explore divination methods with the Yijing, one of the Confucian "Five Classics," and perform Japanese Bon-odori dance, a communal dance celebration that welcomes the spirits of the ancestors.
Kyoko Taniguchi is a Professor of Practice in Japanese and Asian Studies. She teaches Japanese language and contemporary/modern Japanese literature, film, and popular culture. She received her B.A. from the University of Virginia and her Ph.D. from Emory University. The courses she taught at Lehigh include “Japanese Storytellers: from Anime to Mythology” and “Ghosts, Monsters, and J-Horror.” (email: kyt213@lehigh.edu)
3 credits (NS)
Professor Johanna Kowalko
TR 9:20-10:35am
WOMEN IN SCIENCE
Coming soon!
Johanna Kowalko... coming soon!
3 credits (NS)
Professor Santiago Herrera
TR 1:35-2:50pm
BIODIVERSITY IN A CHANGING PLANET
Our planet is facing unprecedented changes caused by anthropogenic activities. These changes are threatening biodiversity at levels ranging from populations to ecosystems, as well as our own survival. In this class, we will discuss past, present, and future threats to biodiversity and their connections to human populations. Emphasis will be placed on the ocean environment, as this constitutes more than 95% of the habitable space on our planet and is its main life-support system.
Professor Santiago Herrera's research focuses on the ecological and evolutionary processes that produce the biodiversity patterns in the ocean. He uses an interdisciplinary approach that combines experimental molecular genetics and bioinformatics analyses to study deep-sea and cold-water ecosystems and the biological models such as corals, anemones, fish, and hydrothermal vent barnacles, and shrimp that inhabit oceanic ecosystems. Dr. Herrera received bachelor's degrees in biology and microbiology, and a Master's degree in biological sciences from the Universidad de los Andes in Bogota, Colombia. During his Master's training, he was a graduate fellow at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History. He earned a Ph.D. in biological oceanography from MIT and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Prior to coming to Lehigh, Dr. Herrera was a postdoctoral fellow funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) at the University of Toronto. He teaches courses in biodiversity, epigenetics, and oceanography.
3 credits (NS)
Professor Jeffrey Trimarchi
MW 10:45am-12:00pm
BIOLOGY OF HUMAN DISEASE AND THERAPY
This course examines the basic biology underlying a range of human diseases from a genetic, molecular and cellular perspective. Using this information, we also explore how doctors treat patients with these diseases and how researchers envision the diseases will be treated in the future. Finally, we discuss how the science surrounding diseases and the development of new therapies is communicated to the general public.
Dr. Jeffrey Trimarchi is a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences. Dr. Trimarchi received a B.A. in Biology at Amherst College and his Ph.D. in Biology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He was a Postdoctoral Fellow at Harvard Medical School and later went on to be an Assistant Professor at Iowa State University. Dr. Trimarchi also has worked in the Biotechnology industry as a Research Scientist.
AAS 090-011; CRN 45024
4 credits (SS)
Professor John Vilanova
TR 9:20-10:35am
RACE AND MEDIA
This course introduces the ways racial ideas and attitudes are embedded in various types of media, including news, information, social, and entertainments. Students will learn the stakes and politics of representation, unpack dominant stereotypes, and think through how difference in media informs the world around them.
John Vilanova is a writer, editor and academic whose work crosses boundaries between popular media and the academic world. He is currently Professor of Practice in Journalism & Communication and Africana Studies at Lehigh University and is a recent Ph. D graduate of the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania. He holds a master's degree in Communication, a graduate certificate in Africana Studies, and a bachelor's degree in English, all from the University of Pennsylvania, and a master's degree in American Studies from the University of Kansas.
His scholarship critiques and identifies structural and institutional inequities in the global culture industries. He focuses specifically on the music industry, arguing for critical understandings of its stakeholders, ideological formations, politics, representational issues, historical dynamics and more. Dr. Vilanova is also an accomplished journalist and editor, with recent bylines in The Atlantic, Rolling Stone, and the Los Angeles Times, among others, and editorial consulting work for Vogue, The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal.
3 credits (NS)
Professor Benjamin Felzer
TR 10:45am-12:00pm
FROM ICEAGE TO GREENHOUSE EARTH
This course will consider climate change over Earth’s history with emphasis on the last 2 million years, when Earth’s climate varied from glacial to interglacial conditions to today’s current greenhouse world. Factors that control natural and human-caused climate change will be explained. Current climate change will be put into context with the past. Readings will be based on Richard Alley’s book, The Two-Mile Time Machine, a story of the Greenland ice core project. We will learn about proxies used to reconstruct past temperatures and CO2 levels, dating techniques, and glacial dynamics. Then we delve into the deep climate past, studying topics such as a) why the earth was so warm when the sun was much less bright billions of years ago, b) the explanation for snowball earth, when earth was completely covered by snow and ice, c) the warm Cretaceous when dinosaurs thrived on the earth, and d) the more recent Cenozoic cooling that led to the glacial-interglacial cycles. Ultimately we discuss rapid climate change in the recent geologic past and how we might be replicating it again today.
Professor Benjamin Felzer is a climate and biogeochemical modeler who studies terrestrial ecosystems. He received his B.A. in physics and astronomy from Swarthmore College in 1987, his M.S. in geology from the University of Colorado – Boulder in 1991, his Ph.D. in geology from Brown University in 1995, and a postdoctoral fellowship at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder. Following his postdoctoral research, he worked as a Project Scientist for the U.S. National Assessment of the Potential Consequences of Climate Variability and Change, spent the next year as an assistant project manager for the hydrological component of NOAA’s Office of Global Programs (OGP), and in 2001 became a research associate at the Ecosystems Center of the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, MA. He spent the spring of 2008 as a Visiting Professor of Geology at Oberlin College, and started his current position as an Assistant Professor in Earth and Environmental Sciences at Lehigh in August, 2008, becoming an Associate Professor in 2015. His recent work has involved modeling the effects of human and natural disturbances, such as land use and land cover change, in the context of climate warming. He has also looked at how climate extremes affect ecosystem function and human societies.
3 credits (NS)
Professor Kristen Heroy
MW 12:10-1:25pm
LANDS OF THE MIDNIGHT SUN
The Arctic and Antarctic regions are some of the most hostile environments on Earth, yet they have been the focus of human dreams for centuries. In Lands of the Midnight Sun, we will explore the geography and physical processes of these extreme environments, as well as plant and animal adaptations, human exploration and modern communities, and environmental change. After we build a foundation of understanding the fascinating polar regions, we will discuss major modern issues and the interactions among them including: global change, pollution, resource extraction, political boundaries, and indigenous cultures. Student interests can dictate which ones we focus on. (Fulfills Natural Science Requirement). The course will be a combination of discussion, lecture, writing, and presentation (including making a short film).
Professor Kristen Heroy... bio coming soon!
3 credits (NS)
Professor Kenneth Kodama
MW 10:45am-12:00pm
CONTROL OF NATURE
In this seminar we will learn how human attempts to control nature can disturb the natural system. To do this we will learn first about the natural system, then the strategies used by humans to control it, and finally the unexpected side effects of that control. We will also look at attempts to control nature at a larger scale, how human activities inadvertently control nature globally. The Control of Nature by John McPhee will be our central reading, but we will branch out into other topics with additional readings.
Ken Kodama is a professor in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Department. He has taught at Lehigh since 1978 and teaches courses at the introductory level, the upper undergraduate level, and at the graduate level. He has an active research program studying paleomagnetism, the fossil magnetism of rocks which can be used to monitor the ancient magnetic field of the Earth. The paleomagnetism of rocks can also be used to determine the ancient positions of the continents. Ken Kodama’s research has focused on the effects of rock deformation on the accuracy of the paleomagnetism, the use of rock magnetics to detect ancient global climate cycles, and most recently the changes in the Earth’s ancient field intensity that may detect the time of inner solid core nucleation a half billion years ago.
4 credits (HU)
Professor Scott Gordon
MW 12:10-1:25pm
MULTICULTURAL COLONIAL BETHLEHEM
Believe it or not, Bethlehem was one of early America’s most extraordinary communities. Eighteenth-century Bethlehem was a racially-integrated and egalitarian town: Whites, Blacks, and Native Americans lived, worked, and worshiped alongside one another. It had a communal economy and the large stone dormitories in which everybody lived (no private homes!) still stand on the north side of the river. (We will visit this original settlement on a field trip.) This seminar will explore the early history of the town in which you will live for the next few years, with special attention to the complicated histories of Black and Indigenous people here. In addition to thinking about what this experiment in eighteenth-century Bethlehem can teach us about today's world, we will examine how the city remembers (or forgets) its own past.
Professor Scott Gordon is a member of the Department of English. He came to Lehigh in 1995 and has served as chair of the English Department (2011-2016) and of the History Department (2018-2019). He researches and writes about early American culture. His recent book, The Letters of Mary Penry, brings into print for the first time the vast correspondence of an early American woman with strong and surprising opinions about politics, religion, and gender.
4 credits (HU)
Professor Ugur Pece
MW 10:45am-12:00pm
AMERICA GOES TO THE MIDDLE EAST
Discusses the history of relations between the United States and the Middle East from the nineteenth century to the present through the stories of a diverse cast of characters such as missionaries, marines, writers, musicians, cooks, and many others. Topics include travel, food, migration, imperialism, war, and transnational appeal of American pop culture.
Uğur Peçe is a professor of History, with an expertise in the Ottoman Empire and modern Middle East. He is currently writing a book on the history of migration and popular protest in the late Ottoman Empire. Uğur received his PhD in History from Stanford University in 2016. He had taught at Bard College and Harvard University before joining Lehigh in 2018.
4 credits (HU)
Professor Michelle LeMaster
MW 12:10-1:25pm
WILD WILD WEST
Introduction to the American West as both region and process. Investigates the diverse populations living in the west, including Native Americans, Mexicans, American settlers, miners, and cowboys, and Chinese railroad workers. Explore the process of first Spanish/Mexican and Russian and then U.S. expansion into the region and the rise of the myth of the wild west. Themes include the evolution of land use, immigration, cultural life, social communities and changing technologies.
Professor Michelle LeMaster is an Associate Professor in the History Department. She has taught a variety of courses in early American, Southern, women's, and Native American history. She hails originally from the Wild Wild West, having grown up in Washington state, and is looking forward to introducing students to the history of the region.
AAS 090-012; CRN 45422
4 credits (SS)
Professor Everett Hardy
MW 3:00-4:15pm
BLACK RADICAL THOUGHT
It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity. One ever feels his two-ness, an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder. Dr. William Edward Burghardt DuBois 1903 The Souls of Black Folk.
In 1903 Dr. William E.B. Dubois named the experiences of the decedents of kidnapped Africans living in America, double-consciousness. At the age of 35, the sociologist, historian, Pan Africanist and author used but two words to explain the struggle of over four million US citizens. Dubois term implied questions for women and men of color. These questions, How to remedy this two-ness; How to escape the burdens it laden on women and men; How to reconcile and ultimately feel safe; and How, ultimately to find home helped shape the social, spiritual, political and recreational lives of women and men of color in the United States and the globe.
Throughout this course, we will explore how African descended people attempted to reconcile their displacement and longing for a home through their own words, music, films, and material culture.
My name is Everett F. Hardy II, pronouns He/Him/His. I am the Visiting Professor of History and Africana Studies, and a PhD candidate in Lehigh’s History Department. As an undergraduate at Villanova University, I wanted to study the Medieval World, specifically the Islamic and Christian kingdoms in Africa. Before going into my graduate coursework at Villanova I decided to instead focus on the history of the United States. I now specialize in African American History, Urban History, Gender, and Twentieth Century Movements. In my teaching and research, I am interested in uncovering the ways African people in the Americas have developed and maintained methodologies which allow them to thrive and not merely survive. In my leisure time I enjoy gaming and reading fantasy novels.
4 credits (SS)
Professor Henri Barkey
MW 1:35-2:50pm
STRONGMEN AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
This is a course on the emergence of "strongmen" (yes, they all are men) in international relations. From Vladimir Putin in Russia to Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Turkey, Victor Orban in Hungary, Narendra Modi in India, Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines and Donald Trump in the U.S., several leaders who came to power ostensibly through elections have chosen to manipulate their countries' institutions to not only make sure they can remain in power for very long periods of time but also slowly transform them into hybrid political systems. Referred to as "populists" in the current political science literature, these leaders make sure through repression, corruption and often through foreign military adventures to mobilize loyal followers. Their importance does not manifest itself solely in their own societies but as we are currently witnessing with Putin's invasion of Ukraine but also in international politics. This course will study a number of these leaders to better understand their emergence and demise.
Henri J Barkey is the Cohen professor of international relations at Lehigh University's Department of International Relations and an adjunct senior fellow for Middle East studies at the Council of Foreign Relations. Among other roles, he previously served as a member of the US state department’s policy planning staff, working primarily on issues related to the Middle East, the Eastern Mediterranean and intelligence.
4 credits (SS)
Professor Mary Anne Madeira
TR 3:00-4:15pm
SEX, POWER, AND INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
This course introduces gender as an important category of analysis in the study of international politics. Mainstream scholarship typically overlooks how global processes like war, globalization, and economic development affect people differently depending on their gender. Additionally, women have historically had limited access to foreign policymaking processes, which may affect policy outcomes. In this course, we will focus on these aspects of gender in international politics to gain a richer understanding of contemporary global issues. We will explore topics such as international security, the war on terror, sexual violence in war, human rights, global governance, human trafficking, environmental degradation, development, economic integration and global activism.
Professor Mary Anne Madeira is an assistant professor of International Relations. She studies the global political economy and is particularly interested in the role of women in economic globalization. She also studies trade politics, regional integration, and European politics. Professor Madeira holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of Washington.
4 credits (SS)
Professor Yinan He
MW 10:45am-12:00pm
EAST ASIAN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
Introduction to East Asian international relations, with emphasis on post-1945 period: historical background of Asian international system; Cold War conflicts; China's rise and regional responses; Japan's changing international role; the two Koreas; ASEAN and Asian regionalism; U.S. and Russian policies; current and future issues.
Yinan He, Associate professor of International Relations, Lehigh University. Her research focuses on politics of memory and reconciliation, East Asian international security, Chinese and Japanese foreign policy, and national identity mobilization and nationalism in East Asia. Author of The Search for Reconciliation: Sino-Japanese and German-Polish Relations since World War II (2009). She is currently preparing a book-length investigation of China’s identity politics and its impact on foreign relations since the modern times.
3 credits
Professor Steven Weintraub
TR 10:45am-12:00pm
ELEMENTARY PROBLEM SOLVING
In this course we will solve a variety of challenging logical and mathematical problems. They will not require extensive mathematical background, but all will require hard thinking and cleverness to be able to solve them. Here's a sample problem: Call a positive integer lucky if its decimal expansion contains at least one 7. How large must n be so that at least half of the integers between 1 and 10n are lucky? Here's another: How many primes are there in the sequence 1, 101, 10101,1010101, 101010101, ...?
Steven H. Weintraub is a Professor of Mathematics at Lehigh. He has interests in a wide variety of fields of mathematics. People who know him well say he has problems, lots of problems.
4 credits (HU)
Professor Mary Nicholas
MW 1:35-2:50pm
BANNED BOOKS AND OTHER WORDS
(ALMOST) TOO DANGEROUS TO MENTION
Attempts to ban books in the United States surged to their highest level in 20 years in 2021. Elsewhere around the world, censorship kept numerous books, poems, films, paintings, performances, even individual phrases and words out of general circulation. Moves to control what the public knows have a long history in most cultures, though the reasons individual works are banned vary from place to place, including censorship to extend political control, maintain public “decorum,” protect community values, or enforce traditional divisions in society. We’ll explore twentieth- and twenty-first-century works of literature, film, art, and music that have been banned around the globe to understand what motivates the censors and the ingenious dissenters who find and share such “dangerous” material. Assignments will include written responses, active discussion, and group work.
Mary Nicholas is a professor in the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures. An award-winning instructor, she has published extensively on post-revolutionary Russian prose, poetry, and the visual arts of late Soviet and post-Soviet Russia. She became interested in banned words after encountering the vibrant underground art movement in the Soviet Union in the 1980s. Still young at heart, she has been studying words almost too dangerous to mention for over four decades.
3 credits (HU)
Professor Eugene Albulescu
MW 10:45am-12:00pm
HISTORY OF KEYBOARD INSTRUMENTS
AND THE MUSIC WRITTEN FOR THEM
This course traces the history of compositional styles and how they relate to technological advances in the development of keyboard instruments. It emphasizes the unique historical background and development of music in cultural settings against the backdrop of sound producing advances, mechanisms, and manufacturing processes. Although we will look at a range of instruments, the main focus will be the lead up to the piano itself and then subsequent developments that stemmed from this instrument.
Lehigh University Philharmonic Music Director Eugene Albulescu is an award-winning performer and conductor who has steered the Lehigh University Philharmonic since 2007. He holds the Ronald J. Ulrich Endowed Chair in Orchestral Studies. Among his conducting accomplishments are a stint as director of the French Chamber Orchestra while on tour during 2008-2010, several performances and recordings with top orchestras including the Romanian National Philharmonic, New York Chamber Orchestra, as well as the New Zealand Symphony, which released his recent recording of Jenny McLeod’s “Rock Concerto” on the Naxos label.
4 credits (HU)
Professor Gordon Bearn
TR 3:00-4:15pm
FLUXUS: BEAUTIFUL BECOMINGS
This course will (1) initiate a theoretical exploration of the performance activities of the artists associated with Fluxus and (perhaps also) of the activists associated with the Situationist International. But even more we will (2) try to let the exciting breath of these movements into our lives by performing works in the spirit of fluxus. We will be performing in the streets and in our class. Why? To break through the dehydrated frame of representation to delicious becomings. And to ignite enjoying.
Gordon Bearn has taught Philosophy at Lehigh since the late 20th Century. His philosophical heroes were, in order: Whitehead, Wittgenstein, Derrida, Deleuze, and Foucault. Although philosophy has a reputation for attempting to track truth along narrow trails of logic, he thinks that philosophy should draw us out of our selves along languid lines of liquid corporeality, merging with sounds, merging with things. His favorite line, Gertrude Stein's "Yes that is the way I mean to please." His favorite way of spelling beautiful is becoming.
3 credits (NS)
Professor Timm Wrase
TR 3:00 - 4:15pm
FROM BLACK HOLES TO STRINGS:
THE EARLY UNIVERSE AND THE NATURE OF SPACE-TIME
In the early 20th century Einstein's theory of relativity drastically changed our understanding of gravity and the fabric of space-time. Despite its great successes, the theory of general relativity is incomplete. It does not take into account quantum mechanics and fails to describe fundamental properties of black holes and the very beginning of the universe.
In this seminar we will explore the key developments in modern physics and the challenges of unifying all the fundamental forces. We will introduce the main ingredients of string theory, the most promising framework for a quantum description of gravity, and discuss its consequences for space-time at the smallest scales. As we will see, string theory has given us crucial insights into the structure of black holes and the early evolution of the universe. The format of the course will be discussion of weekly reading assignments, and a final paper.
Professor Timm Wrase earned his PhD from the University of Texas at Austin. Before joining the Lehigh Physics Department, Wrase held postdoc positions in Germany, at Cornell University and at Stanford University. He also was an assistant professor at the Technical University of Vienna, Austria. He works on various aspects of string theory, quantum gravity and early universe cosmology. His research currently focuses on the consistency conditions that are being imposed on a universe by the very existence of a theory of quantum gravity like string theory.
4 credits (SS)
Professor Albert Wurth
W 1:35-4:15pm
U.S. CLIMATE CHANGE CHALLENGES
Students in the course will examine the established science and potential impacts of climate change and investigate the range of possible responses that U.S. citizens can adopt through their political, social, institutional, and economic efforts. Special attention will be paid to the possibility of "win-win" initiatives, the impacts of the many decision-making entities in the United States (including institutions of higher education), and the economic and political obstacles to a viable transition to a stable climate future.
Al Wurth is Associate Professor of Political Science at Lehigh University. He joined the department in 1985. He earned a doctorate in political science at the University of North Carolina, a master’s degree in behavioral science from Southern Illinois University, and a bachelor’s degree in political science from Northwestern University. Professor Wurth’s research has appeared in numerous outlets including The Social Science Journal, Society and Natural Resources, Political Studies, Social Science Information, Knowledge and Policy, Technology in Society, and the Bulletin of Science, Technology, and Society. He has also engaged in a variety of community service projects, including being a board member for Clean Water Action; Sierra Club (Lehigh Valley Group); and the Coalition for Alternative Transportation. He has also served on a number of Lehigh University committees.
4 credits (SS)
Professor Janet Laible
TR 3:00-4:15pm
DATA, POWER, AND POLITICS
Big data and artificial intelligence play increasingly central roles in the activities of governments and the private sector, with important implications for our political, economic, and social lives. In this class, we explore how the emergence of data-driven decision-making is reshaping the landscape of democratic politics, raising important questions about equity, inclusion, accountability and privacy. We pay particular attention to how new methods of data analysis are shaping the exercise of political power, while also inspiring innovative forms of public engagement and citizenship. The course will introduce you to Political Science approaches that can support you in identifying, analyzing, and engaging critically with a range of social questions raised by the emerging “datafied” world, such as: what values and assumptions are encoded in data sets, and how do these shape the kinds of questions we ask with data, as well as the answers that we get? Who collects, controls, and owns data, and why does it matter? If algorithms are not “neutral,” then whose interests do they serve? What does it mean to hold government accountable when algorithms increasingly influence policy choices in areas such as policing and security, health care, and urban development?
Janet Laible is Associate Professor of Political Science at Lehigh University, with research interests in the territorial politics of the United Kingdom, nationalism, and the European Union, and with additional interests in science and space policy. Professor Laible is the author of Separatism and Sovereignty in the New Europe (Palgrave Macmillan) and the co-editor of Europe After Brexit with Scott Greer (Manchester University Press, forthcoming) and European Responses to Globalization with Henri J. Barkey (Elsevier/JAI). She has also published on social policy and Belgian politics. Professor Laible received a Ph.D. from Yale University and a bachelor’s degree in Political Science from the University of California, Berkeley. She is the Executive Director of the British Politics Group, a related group of the American Political Science Association.
4 credits (SS)
Professor Richard Matthews
MW 1:35-2:50pm
DREAMS AND NIGHTMARES OF AMERICAN POLITICAL THOUGHT
This course will be taught in the Socratic Method which means students will be called on at random to answer questions and follow-up questions. We will begin by critically examining the founding dreams of what the USA might become by reading the ideas of Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and Alexander Hamilton. Next, we will briefly look at what the USA was becoming just a few generations after the founding by reading Alexis de Tocqueville. Lastly we will think about what the USA has become, and might yet become, through several works of contemporary fiction. We finish the course asking the fundamental American question: Can contemporary Americans enjoy the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness? Or, is it time for another revolution within the U.S. political system.
Professor Richard Matthews, NEH Distinguished Professor of Political Science, has written extensively on the American founding and political ideologies. He is the author of two critically acclaimed books: The Radical Politics of Thomas Jefferson; and, If Men Were Angels: James Madison and the Heartless Empire of Reason. Matthews teaches with the Socratic question(s) and answer(s) method and has received multiple teaching awards.
4 credits (SS)
Professor Almut Hupbach
TR 9:20-10:35am
THE SEVEN SINS OF MEMORY
This seminar is based on Daniel Schacter’s book The Seven Sins of Memory. How the Mind Forgets and Remembers. We will explore several ways in which our memories let us down, e.g., when we temporarily cannot remember things we obviously know (e.g., someone’s name), when we incorporate misleading information into our memories, or when we persistently retrieve unwanted memories. We will see that the mechanisms behind these flaws are often the same mechanisms that help us learn and remember well. This seminar involves reading Schacter’s book and related articles, in-class projects, and listening to memory experts.
Almut Hupbach is an Associate Professor in the Psychology Department. Her research focuses on the dynamic nature and malleability of memory. She received her PhD from the University of Trier in Germany and did her postdoctoral research at the University of Arizona before coming to Lehigh in 2009. When she is not thinking about memory, she makes clay sculptures and runs trails with her dog Luke.
4 credits (HU)
Professor Annabella Pitkin
TR 12:10-1:25pm
BUDDHISM, PSYCHOLOGY, AND MEDICINE
How have neuroscientists, Buddhists, and medical practitioners described what meditation does to the brain, mind and emotions? How have Buddhists described what enlightenment does to the mind and body? What are the historical relationships between Buddhism, medical practice, and psychology, in the US and in Asia? Students in this course explore these questions, by examining Buddhist philosophy, psychology, memoir, and art, together with recent research on how meditation and other practices affect brain function, emotional response, and other mental and physical processes. This course is interdisciplinary and is recommended for students with interest in Asian Studies, Health, Medicine, and Society (HMS) and Religion Studies. It may be used for credit in the Religion, HMS or Asian Studies programs.
Annabella Pitkin is Assistant Professor of Buddhism and East Asian Religions in Lehigh’s Religion Studies Department, and Director of Lehigh’s Asian Studies Program. She researches and writes about Tibetan Buddhism, modernity, miracle stories, and Buddhist biographies. She teaches courses on Buddhism and East Asian religions, environmental ethics, sexuality and gender, and new technologies. She is the author of Renunciation and Longing: The Life of a 20th Century Himalayan Buddhist Saint.
4 credits (HU)
Professor Lloyd Steffen
TR 3:00-4:15pm
LOVE
Love is sometimes thought to be the most important value in life, all that is needed for happiness. Love is identified with beauty, healing, completeness and is for many the highest of human aspirations, even defining, for some, God. But love is also associated with false hopes, illusions and self-deception, as well as with such unromantic material processes as neurological excitations, instincts and adrenaline rushes. This first-year seminar will investigate the many sides of love, examining the ways philosophers, religious thinkers and all manner of students of the human condition have thought about love and the various forms of love, including affection, friendship, erotic love and democratized, impersonal divine love (agape). Seminar participants will ask why love stories fail in so many cases to have happy endings, and why the greatest love stories seem to end in death. They will ask, "What is this thing called love?" Is it a biological drive, an emotion, a passion? Is it a cognitive-perception process whereby objects (persons) are singled out for special attention, so that love is not so much a feeling as a way of reasoning? Of special interest in the seminar will be issues pertaining to the ethics of love, such as the relation of love to happiness, and whether love is something passive one falls into or whether it is, rather, a way of valuing and choosing. No field work will be assigned.
Lloyd Steffen is Professor of Religion Studies and University Chaplain. He also directs the Center for Dialogue, Ethics and Spirituality (the Dialogue Center) and the Lehigh Prison Project. His academic writing and research have been mainly in ethics, and he has addressed such topics as abortion, the death penalty, the ethics of war, religion and violence, and end-of-life issues. Before Covid, he was named a Fulbright specialist and taught seminars at two Brazilian universities on the topic of just punishment.
4 credits (SS)
Professor Danielle Lindemann
TR 10:45am-12:00pm
SOCIOLOGY OF 'THE OFFICE'
This class is an introduction to sociology, by way of the television show “The Office.” Michael, Dwight, Pam, and the rest of the gang at Dunder Mifflin may seem like simply silly characters, but they shed light on a variety of areas of sociology, including norms and deviance, small group interactions, gender, the economy, families, and of course the modern workplace. By watching episodes of the show, paired with key sociological texts, we will arrive at a better understanding of the major social forces that govern our own lives.
Danielle Lindemann is an Associate Professor of Sociology and core faculty member in the Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program. She studies gender, sexuality, the family, and culture. Specifically, she looks at non-normative (“deviant”) behaviors and how they can shed light on core features of social life. She’s recently published a book about the sociology of reality TV.
4 credits (SS)
Professor LaToya Council
MW 10:45am-12:00pm
SOCIAL JUSTICE AND THE SOCIOLOGY OF EMOTIONS
This course introduces students to questions or emotion (or imtimacy) at the intersection of race, gender, and place; and how everyday experiences are connected to systems broader than us as individuals. For example, how we 'feel' our race walking down the street is connected to experiences we often have with social institutions like police. As students gain a deeper understanding of sociology as emotions (intimacy), they will also learn how to put sociology into action known as social justice. This course challenges students to develop a sociological imagination which can help them understand current events within society, and the ways in which individuals engage social justice to respond to and resist social inequality.
LaToya Council... bio coming soon!
LAS 090-013; CRN 45208
4 credits (SS)
Professor Hugo Ceron Anaya
TR 1:35-2:50pm
THE LATIN@X EXPERIENCE
This freshmen seminar analyzes the Latin@x experience in the United States. The course draws from sociology, anthropology, gender studies, history, and critical race theory to examine several topics and themes that are key to understanding contemporary Latin@x communities. The class will study issues pertinent to ethnicity and identity formation, citizenship, immigration, imperialism, settler/colonialism, borderlands, mass incarceration, policing, language, cultural manifestations, and media representations.
Hugo Ceron-Anaya is an Associate Professor of Sociology and core faculty member in the Latin American and Latino Studies Program. His work analyzes how class structures, racialized dynamics, and gender relations influence the organization of the material and symbolic borders of the upper-middle and upper classes in Latin America. He recently published about wealthy golf clubs in México, which won the “2020 Outstanding Book Award” offered by the North American Society for the Sociology of Sports.
4 credits (HU)
Professor Lyam Gabel
MW 1:35-2:50pm
INTRODUCTION TO ACTING
We might assume that our favorite actors perform in ways that we like because of innate ability, but acting is a craft and a discipline that is acquired through thoughtful exploration and diligent play. Throughout the course, we will explore the craft of acting, both individually and collaboratively, as interpreters and as creators of text. We will cover psychological and physical approaches to the form.
Acting has evolved over centuries to include a number of styles--the actors in very old melodramas look nothing like actors in modern TV shows. The more that we come to understand ourselves, what we like, how we interact with people and what we would like to do in the world the more effectively we can perform. Alongside our study of the craft of acting we will explore how context shapes our taste, the value of storytelling as culture building, and the responsibility that we have as creators of culture.
No prior stage experience is necessary or expected, although those with prior experience can benefit greatly from a fundamental analysis of the acting process. This is a performance course, an acting class. Potential theatre students may substitute this course for the required beginning-level acting class.
Professor Lyam B. Gabel (they/he) is a trans* and queer artist, archivist, and organizer. Their current work is a multi-media performance called the dance floor, the hospital room, and the kitchen table. Prior to arrival at Lehigh Lyam taught and studied theater at Carnegie Mellon University, and taught as a guest artist at Boston University, Hollins University, and Keene State College. He also worked as an artist for eight years in New Orleans where they founded LAST CALL, a collective that documents and interprets neglected queer history, creating connections between those who lived this history and those who have much at stake if it is forgotten. They regularly collaborate on work by playwrights and solo performers and have developed work at Ars Nova, The Drama League, Judson Church, Pipeline, Ashland New Plays Festival, The Theater Offensive, Kelly Strayhorn Theater, and The New Orleans CAC among others. He holds a BFA from Virginia Commonwealth University and an MFA from Carnegie Mellon University. www.lyambgabel.com.
4 credits (HU)
Professor William Lowry
TR 10:45am-12:00pm
GEEK THEATRE
This seminar introduces the basics of theatrical production and performance of contemporary "geek theatre." "Geek theatre" uses narrative devices like post-apocalyptic scavengers, robot overlords, and hungering vampires to recontextualize human aspirations and struggles. In this class, students will examine the structure and content of several scripts that incorporate tropes from sci-fi, fantasy, and dystopian genres. Potential storylines include a brilliant inventor creating robots stronger and smarter than herself, challenging humanity's position of power in the world; a team of superheroes pursuing a villain revenge-killing couples in love, while a doctor races to build an artificial heart strong enough to survive heartbreak; and a group of survivors creating art in the American wastelands after the apocalypse, as their storytelling develops into a force larger than themselves. Through research, interpretation, analysis, and hands-on projects of creative expression, students will assess the potential of speculative drama to connect to the concrete here and now.
Will Lowry is a scenographer and an Assistant Professor of Theatre. He has created over one hundred designs for theatres along the East Coast and beyond, including productions at Playhouse on Park (CT), the Palace Theatre (SC), Mill Mountain Theatre (VA), Curtain Call Theatre (NY), Birmingham Children’s Theatre (AL), the California Theatre Center (CA), and as far as the Sydney Opera House in Australia. He worked for five years as studio assistant for Tony Award-winning costume designer William Ivey Long, contributing to various Broadway productions including Leap of Faith, 9 to 5, and Catch Me If You Can. He also worked as assistant to the costume designer for Emilio Sosa on Motown: The Musical and Isabel Toledo on After Midnight. He recently completed a two-year post-doctoral fellowship at Furman University, and he is a Creative Partner with Flux Theatre Ensemble, which produced the New York City premieres of three of the plays in the Geek Theatre anthology. He holds an MFA in Design from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and a BA in Theatre Arts and Computer Science from Furman University.
HIST 090-013; CRN 45353
4 credits (HU)
Professor Monica Najar
TR 12:10-1:25pm
WOMEN, GENDER, AND SEXUALITY IN 20TH CENTURY MEDIA
Visual and print media have reflected important changes in gender norms and sexuality in American culture, and they themselves have also been engines of change. This seminar explores the history of gender and sexuality in the 20th century in and through such popular media (including film, television, magazines, and advertising). By using the sources of popular culture, we will seek to understand changing gender ideals, expectations of marriage, sexual identities, and the role of media in American culture and politics.
Monica Najar is an Associate Professor in the Department of History and the Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program. Her research is on gender and religion in early America. She teaches courses in the history of sexuality, the history of women and gender, and U.S. history.
