Archive

Spring 2024 Honors College Signature Seminar


HNRS 4013H-003: The Science, Politics and Culture of Dinosaurs

Professor:  Celina Suarez

Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Social Science

**The deadline to apply to Honors College Seminars (via this application form) is 11:59 p.m., Sunday, October 29th.

Dinosaurs are one of the most successful animals to ever live on Earth. Dinosaurs, which encompass both non-avian and avian dinosaurs (birds), span from 230 million years to today and have come to dominate all ecosystems on Earth. They inspire the imagination and are often a child’s first introduction to science. How do we know what we know about dinosaurs? What are the scientific and cultural influences dinosaurs have on society? How can they help us understand Earth’s past climate and give us clues to our future climate? Dinosaurs are also a means for science communication: How do scientists, artists and science writers work together to reconstruct these fascinating creatures and their environment. This seminar series will delve into both the scientific aspects of dinosaurs as well as topics related to dinosaur research, such as land-use policy, paleo-art, science communication and the business of fossil sales.


HNRS 4013H-002: Ozarks Culture

Professor(s):  Virginia Siegel, Joshua Youngblood, Jared Phillips

Colloquium Type: Social Science

**The deadline to apply to Honors College Seminars (via this application form) is 11:59 p.m., Sunday, October 29th.

The Ozarks is a place often described by outsiders as full of hillbillies, moonshiners, regressive, insular, etc. But how have Ozarkers thought about themselves over the years? What are these assumptive descriptions really saying? And how is this region being redefined in the age of Walmart and Netflix? By examining the history, literature, and cultures of the Ozarks through diverse perspectives, students will explore how Ozarkers have been engaged in meaning-making in this place and the nation during the American Century, impacting everything from country music to global commerce.

In particular, this course will push students to think beyond the traditional narrative of hillbillies to see how the Ozarks have evolved in the past fifty years to include a far more cosmopolitan community than generally understood. Highlighting the stories of immigrants, queer communities, and the region's longstanding communities of color will help to show students that the Ozarks are far more than Silver Dollar City would have us think.


HNRS 4013H-004: Engineering Antiquity

Professor:  Kevin Hall

Colloquium Type: Natural Science

**The deadline to apply to Honors College Seminars (via this application form) is 11:59 p.m., Sunday, October 29th.

How did they do that?!? This is a very common reaction when touring what remains of the built environment of late antiquity and earlier. Monumental spaces and structures, clever mechanical and hydraulic works, and other artifacts capture our imagination, inspire awe, and marshal our respect for ancient engineers and craftsmen. However, in our awe and wonder, many times we miss a very important and central theme: the ancients were responding to demands in their societies that have not changed through the intervening centuries to present day. What can we learn from their solutions? What can we learn from the impacts – both positive and negative – their solutions had on their societies? In this course we will consider both how “they did that” and why “they did that” on the path of our ultimate quest: in terms of technological advancement, how do we balance “can we...”? against “should we...?”


Spring 2024 Honors Colloquia


ANTH 3923H: Pilgrimage

Professor:  Kirstin Erickson

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences or Humanities

This course examines pilgrimage in its broadest sense – from the practice’s religious aspects (pilgrimage as a rite of passage involving intentional movement across a landscape, the possibility of spiritual transformation, the interplay of the orthodox and the heterodox) to its metaphorical implications (pilgrimage as a modern search for identity, heritage, and homelands). We will examine the ways in which pilgrimage has been defined and studied by anthropologists, historians, scholars of religion, and social philosophers. Our journey begins with the examination of iconic practices (pilgrimages to Santiago de Compostela and Walsingham, Ndembu rituals, etc.) and a critical assessment of the analytical models these pilgrimages have inspired (the generalizability of "the Camino," movement toward an axis mundi or sacred center, liminality and the phenomenon of communitas). Our scope also encompasses secular pilgrimages (Nevada’s Burning Man Festival, the Vietnam Veterans’ Memorial, and the return of Armenians to their homeland). We will consider conflict in pilgrimage, the inseparability of tourism and pilgrimage (as in the massive Hindu gathering at Kumbh Mela, India), and how cultural expression and commercial activity have always been bound up with the pilgrim's journey. Pilgrimage case studies and histories provide an effective analytical lens, enabling us to interrogate larger theoretical questions, including: the relationship between narrative and experience, self-body-healing, land-based epistemologies, material religion, sacralization and agency, articulation theory, the relationship between nostalgia and seeking, and the ethics of conducting ethnographic fieldwork in sacred spaces. 


AIST 4003H: Nuclear Asia: From Hiroshima to Fukushima

Professor:  Kelly Hammond

Colloquium Type: Social Science

This course explores the history of nuclear security in Asia from the dropping of the two nuclear bombs on Japan to end World War II through to the nuclear meltdown of the Fukushima reactor in the wake of the 2011 Tsunami. Although the course is bookended by two nuclear disasters in Japan, the course explores many different aspects of nuclear security throughout Asia including the development, acquisition, and testing of nuclear weapons, the development of nuclear power facilities, and the extraction and exploitation of natural and human resources used to build nuclear bombs and nuclear facilities.  

By focusing on the development and acquisition of nuclear weapons, the testing of nuclear weapons, and the development of nuclear energy from Pakistan to the Marshall Islands, we will develop new insights into an era of internationalism, decolonization, and environmentalism that is often overshadowed by the superpower rivalry. By framing the course around nuclear security, we approach Asia from both a bird’s eye view and from the ground up, exploring high-level state-to-state relationships between non-superpower states, as well as thinking about the ways that issues surrounding nuclear security impact the daily lives of people living throughout Asia.  

The course is also designed to refocus the post-World War II era beyond the usual framing of the USSR vs. USA Cold War binary, and to explore the ways that decolonization, the non-aligned movement, and state-to-state interactions in the Global South inform geopolitics today.

Students can contact the professor directly to get into an honors section for INST credit.


CLST 4003H: Rome in America

Professor:  David Fredrick

Colloquium Type: Humanities

A Critical Exploration of the Roman Roots of the American Republic.

The American political system — with its federalism, bicameralism and separation of powers — consists of overlapping majoritarian and counter-majoritarian institutions designed to promote stability and continuity at the expense of popular government.

                                                                        Jamelle Bouie, NY Times Opinion Piece, 9/29/2023

In language, structure, and symbols, America’s federal government is deeply indebted to Rome. For America’s founders, the Roman republic had many admirable qualities, but buckled under the passions of a motley and illegitimate citizen body: the urban “mob.” Determined to avoid this fate, the framers outlined a more narrow concept of citizenship, excluding the enslaved and systemically discriminating against America‘s emerging cities. This course will examine the framers’ complex engagement with Rome, and evaluate originalist readings of the Constitution in the light of actual Roman history and the resilient ideal of a more democratic union.


ENGL 3923H: Lyric Poems of the Renaissance

Professor:  Dorothy Stephens

Colloquium Type: Humanities

Stressed out? This course is designed for low anxiety. We'll read lots of poems, but most will be brief, and we'll go over entire poems together in class.

Lyrics are short poems that focus on the speakers' emotions—about annoying lovers, attractive bed head, disorienting walks at night, friends who criticize your love life, bubonic plague, hovering cows, blissful kisses, crises of faith, being judged by one's weight or skin color, inviting friends for dinner, fireflies, tortoise canoes, you name it. We'll learn about lyric forms that were common during the English Renaissance: sonnets, lute songs, ballads, odes, elegies, and sestinas.


ENGL 3923H: Documenting the Crisis in Tibet

Professor(s):  Sidney Burris and Craig Pasquinzo

Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

In 1959, the Dalai Lama fled from Tibet to escape Chinese persecution and set up a home in exile in Dharamsala, India. Ultimately over 100,000 Tibetans followed him to live out their lives, forced from their homeland, in a new and radically different country.

Since 2008, The TEXT Program at the University of Arkansas has been collecting interviews with the exiled Tibetans currently living in India. Using this footage, as well as the photographs we’ve archived, and other secondary reading material, students in this class will have the opportunity to gain first-hand knowledge of an exiled people that are thriving in exile, against all odds, while learning about the rich history that supports them. The class meets once a week on Tuesday evenings from 6:00-8:30, and during the first half of the session, Professor Burris will lecture and host discussions on the most important aspects of Tibetan culture and history. In the second half of the class, working with documentarian, Craig Pasquinzo, students will be divided into teams and spend the semester making a five-minute documentary chronicling one of the aspects of Tibetan culture that most interests them.

The course requires no familiarity with Adobe or video-editing skills in general. All technical material is taught from the beginner’s level. Video teams will also have the opportunity to record an interview with at least one Tibetan Buddhist monk as part of their documentary film. This course allows our students to become involved with a video-based human rights program that has been endorsed by both the Dalai Lama himself as well as ESPN!

Important note: if JOUR students would like JOUR 405V credit for this course, they need only consult the Journalism department, and they will issue a course substitution.


HIST 3923H: Museum Matters: History, Practice, Culture and Controversy

Professor:  Bill McComas

Colloquium Type: Humanities

Museum Matters is an introduction to museology for those wishing to get behind the scenes (literally and figurately) to learn more about the history, practices, responsibilities, purposes, and controversies involved in the fascinating and diverse world of museums as vital cultural and educational institutions. This class will address the following questions:

Why is there a human urge to collect? What goals and rationales support the foundation and function of museums? Why should we care about what curators do? How do the diverse types of museums relate and contrast? What are the special challenges of education in museum environments? What sorts of work is done in museums? What is the distinction between collections, displays and exhibitions? What are the socio-cultural aspects of museums? Why have the Enola Gay and Elgin Marbles caused controversy?

The class will feature brief lectures and extensive discussions accompanied by media resources and targeted readings for each topic. Assessment will target course content, a museum evaluation project and an individual research project/presentation chosen from an extensive list of options.


HUMN 3923H: Tibetan Philosophy and Culture

Professor:  Thupten Dorjee

Colloquium Type: Humanities

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology. 


MEST 4003H: Political Leadership in the Middle East

Professor:  Najib Ghadbian

Colloquium Type: Social Science

With the global surge in populism, the subject of leadership has regained significant prominence. This seminar will concentrate on the theme of political leadership in the Middle East, with a specific focus on addressing the following questions: To what extent is the concept of leadership in the Middle East distinctive, and how do leaders in this region compare to their counterparts worldwide? Throughout this seminar, we will explore these inquiries by examining political leadership as an interactive process involving individual leaders, their followers, and the contextual factors, all within a historical framework. The seminar will be structured into three main segments: Firstly, we will explore various theoretical frameworks for the study of leadership. Secondly, we will categorize leadership into different types and investigate exemplars from each category. Lastly, we will dedicate the final portion of the seminar to an in-depth examination of political leadership in Syria.


PHYS 3923H: The History of Gravity

Professor:  Daniel Kennefick

Colloquium Type: Natural Science

The history of gravity begins with the Big Bang and continues through the formation of the solar system via gravitational collapse (the nebular hypothesis). Gravity will also govern the end of the solar system and the fate of the Universe itself. Humanity’s conception of gravity began with the understanding of weight and was given scientific form in the physics of Aristotle. This physics entered a crisis with the work of Copernicus and Galileo, a crisis which was resolved by Newton’s Universal theory of gravity. Gravity is not just a quirk of life here on Earth but a Universal force: Everything attracts everything else. It was Einstein who resolved the conflict of gravity and relativity with his theory of general relativity, which is one of the best tested theories in scientific history. Nevertheless, most physicists expect it to be replaced by a quantum theory of gravity, which will, they hope, lie at the heart of a final unified theory of gravity, or theory of everything. Advanced physics concepts will be presented in their proper historical context in this course, but without complex math (no tensor calculus). Instead, we follow Einstein in his clever use of thought experiments.


PLSC 3923H: Political Violence

Professor:  Jeffrey Ryan

Colloquium Type: Social Science

Please contact instructor (jeffr@uark.edu) for more information.


WLLC 3923H: Intro to Game Design II

Professor:  David Fredrick

Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course will build upon the game design concepts and hands-on Unity skills learned in Game Design 1. However, while GD1 focused on providing students with a shared vocabulary of coding approaches for building basic games (including visual scripting), GD2 will dig into key aspects and features of Unity essential for games, but generally associated with art rather than coding. These include shaders and materials, lighting, VFX, animation, and game audio. Working in groups, students will create 3 games based on the Popul Vuh, the creation story of the Maya (K’iche’), to accompany a critical exploration of the emergent voices of indigenous designers in video games. While completion of Game Design 1 is strongly recommended, students without this course may enroll in Game Design 2 with instructor approval.

 

Fall 2023 Honors College Signature Seminar


HNRC 4013H-011: Bad Medicine

Professor:  Trish Starks

Colloquium Type:  Humanties or Social Science

**The deadline to apply to Honors College Seminars (via this application form) is 11:59 p.m., Friday, March 31st.

Hippocrates (460-370 BC) divided the art of medicine into three factors — the disease, the patient and the physician. Patients, literally the ones who "suffer," gave themselves up to the physician’s knowledge, skill and craft. Yet in these early days, there was precious little that the physician could do besides follow the Hippocratic dictum to “first do no harm.” Even in that, they often failed. Bleedings, blisterings, cauterizations and poisonings came part and parcel with the knowledge and skill of the physicians. Healing was often accidental, if it occurred at all. Still, having the ability merely to name the dread disease from which a ruler or loved one suffered, physicians gained power.

Entering the modern era of nation states, liberal politics, enlightenment philosophies and capitalist economies, this power came not just from their guidance in the face of disease and death. Increasingly, European rulers saw the wealth of their nations as measured by having people to serve soberly, healthfully and quiescently in militaries and factories. Medical authorities became tools of the state in this quest for power, and helped bolster an entire bureaucratic structure that used medicine to control people who might threaten white patriarchal authority. Science was employed to define behaviors and peoples as unhealthy even when there was little medical evidence to justify these views. Then, through a web of state-backed and culturally-supported authorities, physicians pushed for these vectors of invented disease – be they hysterics and neurasthenics or imbeciles and morons – to be cured, quelled or eliminated.

Bad Medicine will demonstrate how those who disturbed order or menaced authority were medically defined as deficient, abnormal or aberrant and in need of a "cure." Students will explore how modern Western states used medicine to define and control their subjects, to incarcerate and harm those seen as deficient and to sterilize and kill those considered dangerous.

The class will show students how to be a patient is still to suffer.


HNRC 4013H-012: Good Medicine

Professor(s): Jamie Baum and Erin Howie Hickey

Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Social Science

**The deadline to apply to Honors College Seminars (via this application form) is 11:59 p.m., Friday, March 31st.

“If we could give every individual the right amount of nourishment and exercise, not too little and not too much, we would have found the safest way to health.” - Hippocrates

In Ancient Greek the word diet (δίαιτα – diaita) meant mode of life and it encompassed the various aspects of lifestyle: food and drink, physical exercises, baths and massage, sun-therapy, sleep and sexual practice, passions of the soul, habits and generally the whole way of leading one’s life. Today, diet (nutrition) and physical activity are two separate fields of study.

In this course, we will return to the Ancient Greek definition and explore the relationship between nutrition and physical activity and their role in whole health and well-being. To do this, we will focus on Hippocrates’ dedication to research and communication and the university’s land grant mission - research, education, and extension.

Throughout the course we will discuss the role of nutrition and physical activity in whole health and wellbeing, how to design research focused on changing nutrition and physical activity behaviors, and the importance of community engagement in achieving positive health outcomes. We will also address the challenges communities face and the barriers they need to overcome to implement dietary and physical activity changes in their daily lives.

The class will include guest speakers from across colleges on campus, community representatives, and interactions with leaders across the nation and globally.


HNRC 4013H (12321): Teeth: Evolution's Bite

Professor:  Peter Ungar

Colloquium Type:  Natural Science or Social Science

**The deadline to apply to Honors College Seminars (via this application form) is 11:59 p.m., Friday, March 31st.

Most of us only think about teeth when something’s wrong with them—when they come in crooked, break or begin to rot. But take a minute to consider teeth as the extraordinary feat of engineering they are.

They concentrate and transmit the forces needed to break food, again and again, up to millions of times over a lifetime. And they do it without themselves being broken in the process—with the very same raw materials used to make the plants and animals being eaten. Chewing is like a perpetual death match in the mouth, with plants and animals developing tough or hard tissues for protection, and teeth evolving ways to sharpen or strengthen themselves to overcome those defenses. The variety of tooth types, especially across the mammals, is extraordinary.

It’s a testament to what evolution can accomplish given time, motive, and opportunity. Lots of animals have “teeth.” Sea urchins, spiders and slugs all have hardened tissues used for food acquisition and processing, but real teeth, like yours and mine, are special. They first appeared half a billion years ago, and Nature has spent the whole time since tinkering with ways to make them better. It’s a story written in stone—the fossil record.

TEETH:  EVOLUTION’S BITE is broken into three parts. The first part introduces key terms and concepts:  tooth form, structure, and development, food and feeding. The second part focuses on the evolution of teeth and, in a broader sense, the animals in whose mouths they evolve. We cover teeth before the mammals, the origins of chewing, and the mammalian fossil record. And the third part presents the teeth of mammals today in all their glory – an amazing example of Darwin’s “endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful.” The course closes with a consideration of our teeth. Smile and look in a mirror. Millions of us suffer fillings, crowns, wisdom tooth extractions, and braces each year. Most other mammals don’t have widespread dental disease and orthodontic disorders. Why are we so different? The answer is rooted in evolutionary history; and this course offers the student the perspective needed to understand this and, in doing so, to better appreciate our place in Nature.


Fall 2023 Honors Colloquia


HIST 3923H: Life in Nazi-Occupied Europe

Professor:  Richard Sonn

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Within a year of the invasion of Poland in September 1939, which began World War II, the Germans occupied most of the continent of Europe.  Much of Europe was thus occupied for four years or more.  What was life like under the Nazis? Were most people resisters, collaborators, or simply bystanders?   This course will use diaries and memoirs as well as some secondary sources to explore how the French, Italians, Poles, Jews and Germans themselves experienced daily life under the Nazis.  Students will write one shorter paper based on class readings and a longer final paper that involves primary sources. 


HUMN 3923H: The Universe in a Single Atom

Professor:  Thupten Dorjee

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Following decades of intensive workshops between leading academics and His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the Universe in a Single Atom is the culmination of the mutual understanding and communication between two traditions that have increasingly found common ground in their pursuit of truth through analysis and reason. The course will follow the main presentations on cosmology, metaphysics, epistemology, and consciousness that are explored in the book while providing a thorough background of the covered information in a format suited for undergraduate coursework. Students will not only learn about the major philosophical tenets of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many activities that enhance their abilities for critical thinking and reasoning in the same way that Tibetan scholars have for nearly a millennia. 


JOUR 3923H: Government and the Media

Professor:  Gina Shelton

Colloquium Type: Humanities or  Social Science

This class examines relations between the media and government, with analysis of the power, responsibility and performance of journalists and politicians. Topics include trust in media, use of freedom of information laws, money in politics, international press and influence, and coverage of courts, Congress and the White House. Students meet newsmakers from local, state and national politics and the reporters who cover them. They have the opportunity to record roundtable discussions in the campus television station, UATV, and podcasts in the campus radio station, KXUA, with exploration of breaking news and presentations of research from class projects.


JOUR 3923H: Issues in Advertising & Public Relations

Professor:  Lucy Brown

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

The primary goal of Issues in Advertising & Public Relations is to increase your awareness of the effects of the advertising and public relations industries and their messages on society. You’ll be encouraged to think about the implications of what you do when you create an advertisement or public relations message or campaign and how that message may affect a diverse audience. Students develop a social marketing plan (SMP) in teams to educate the public about a social problem or for a nonprofit or educational entity. This helps you to learn how advertising and public relations messages can be used to help society.


PLSC 3923H: Authoritarianism

Professor:  Jeff Ryan

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

**By permission only. Send requests for enrollment to jeffr@uark.edu. 

When Louis XIV uttered his infamous proto-hashtag “L'etat c'est moi,” it seems unlikely he was deliberately trying to capture in a pithy phrase part of the very lifeblood of autocracy as a political species, but he did. That vital essence is absolutism; a Manichaeistic belief that everything is black or white, right or wrong, good or evil, which courses through the veins of all the many variants of authoritarianism. It shows up in the way both aspiring and actual autocrats construct their worldviews; how they define the political realm; who they love and especially, who they hate. It defines how they govern if they are in power and if not, what they will do to capture power. 

In ‘Authoritarianism,’ we’ll explore basic human nature by interrogating the idea of an ‘authoritarian personality’ that primes some to become autocrats and others to blindly obey. We then turn to the state itself, covering the sort of ‘classic’ authoritarian regimes that tend to come to mind when people think of a dictatorship: the suffocating terror of totalitarianism; the primal atavism of a state constructed on ethnonationalism; the systematic savagery designed to atomize society of the bureaucratic-authoritarian state; and more. 

We will also probe the various roles that individuals or groups occupy during authoritarian episodes: the leaders, apparatchiks, followers, torturers, rebels, victims and bystanders. We even explore the co-optation of artistic expression to serve as state-reinforcing propaganda, from music to film to architecture. At the end of the day, the course is designed to provide a ‘full spectrum’ investigation of the multi-faceted phenomenon of political authoritarianism. In ‘Authoritarianism,’ there is no black and white…just different shadows of gray. 


PLSC 3923H: Politics & Conflict in Syria

Professor:  Najib Ghadbian

Colloquium Type: Social Science

Please contact the professor by his email, ghadbian@uark.edu, for more information.


PLSC 3923H: Hitler in Film

Professor:  Thomas Adam

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

While few Americans take classes in German history and study Nazism and Adolf Hitler, every American has an image of Hitler in mind. That was shaped not by historical scholarship but by Hollywood. Even though this image is historically incorrect, it still needs to be taken seriously. In our class, we will analyze the construction of the image of Hitler in post-1945 movies. For this purpose, we will dissect the image created in movies such as Downfall and tv-show episodes such as the Cradle of Darkness from the TV show Twilight Zone. This class is grounded in postmodern thought and cultural history. The focus is the creation of images of Hitler by German, English, and American moviemakers and not the historical person itself.


PSYC 3923H: In Treatment: The Science and Practice of Psychotherapy

Professor:  Tim Cavell

Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Social Science

This course is an introduction to the science and practice of psychotherapy. The course will operate as a seminar that combines outside readings with focused, in-class discussions about those readings. Students will read two books, Gottlieb’s (2019) Maybe You Should Talk to Someone, and Yalom’s (2011) The Gift of Therapy. The objectives of this course are threefold. The first goal is to provide students with a basic understanding of psychotherapy so they can be more informed consumers of mental health care. A second goal is to help guide students who are interested in a career in the mental health field. The third and final goal is to help students understand how psychotherapy can be used to foster more adaptive coping and prevent burnout. 


WLLC 3923H: Intro to Game Design l

Professor:  David Fredrick

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course provides an introduction to the theory and practice of creating video games. Over the course of the semester we will explore the fundamental role of rules, play, art, and narrative in games, examine and critique representative video games in depth, and contemplate the decisions designers must make using the principles of game design. We will also put these principles into practice by building a series of basic 3D games!   Students will acquire an understanding of the production pipeline used for contemporary video games, including level design, modeling and texturing 3D assets, lighting, scripting the most common forms of interactivity, and creating a user interface; students will then see how these elements come together in a game engine to create the experience we all know. 

Required Readings include Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals, Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman; The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses, Jesse Schell; Wonderbook: The Illustrated Guide to Creating Imaginative Fiction, Jeff Vandermeer; and Selected PDFs from Introduction to Game Design, Prototyping, and Development, Jeremy Gibson. 

 

Spring 2023 Honors College Signature Seminar


HNRC 4013H-001: Death and Art: A Human History

Professor:  Lynn Jacobs

Colloquium Type:  Humanities

**The deadline to apply to Honors College Seminars (via this application form) is 11:59, Monday, October 31st.  

Although today art is associated with museums and galleries, in premodern Europe art was closely tied to one’s fate after death.  At that time—when people had an average lifespan between 30 and 40 years and about half of all children died before the age of sixteen—death was a very visible part of life. Medieval Christians were terrified about what future awaited them they died. But art could help secure the proper spiritual future for their souls. Commissioning art constituted a “good work,” which could help achieve salvation after death. Prayers before indulgenced images offered reduced time in Purgatory, the place where souls who had committed minor sins were punished (for thousands of years or so) before being admitted to heaven. In addition, images, epitaphs, and tombs served as reminders to the living to pray for the deceased and thereby shorten their time in Purgatory.  This class will focus on the art of Northern Europe in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, a time when the fascination with death and the macabre was particularly evident in art. We will examine different sites and artistic genres that functioned in relation to death, such as chapels, monasteries, altarpieces, tombs, epitaphs, and books, before examining artists who focus on themes of death, such as Baldung, Holbein, Bosch, and Bruegel. Students will give presentations on selected themes, such as Death and the Maiden, the Dance of Death, skulls, skeletons, suicide, war, capital punishment, the Fall, and the Death of Christ.


HNRC 4013H-002: The Science, Politics, and Culture of Dinosaurs

Professor:  Celina Suarez

Colloquium Type:  Natural Science or Social Science

**The deadline to apply to Honors College Seminars (via this application form) is 11:59, Monday, October 31st.  

Dinosaurs are one of the most successful animals to ever live on Earth. Dinosaurs which encompass both non-avian and avian dinosaurs (birds) span from 230 million years to today and have come to dominate all ecosystems on Earth. They inspire the imagination and are often a child’s first introduction to science. How do we know what we know about dinosaurs? What are the scientific and cultural influences dinosaurs have on society? How can they help us understand Earth’s past climate and give us clues to our future climate? Dinosaurs are also a means for science communication, how do scientists, artists, and science writers work together to reconstruct these fascinating creatures and their environment. This seminar series will delve into both the scientific aspects of dinosaurs as well as topics related to dinosaur research such as land-use policy, paleo-art, science communications, and the business of fossil sales.

We will explore the practice of paleontology and dinosaur paleontology. Early in the history of paleontology in North America, for example, exploration of the American West was driven by the idea of Manifest Destiny. Not only did this mean the take over of many Native Lands, but also the theft of mineral resources and items sacred to these people, including dinosaur bones. Today, there is an effort to return materials stolen from these lands by early paleontologist to Native peoples such as the Pine Ridge Sioux. I hope to bring in several speakers (virtually) to discuss these topics. A likely candidate for this would be Kevin Madelena of the Jemez Pueblo Nation who works with the Bears Ears National Monument and the Utah Dine Bikeyah as a field researcher.    We will discuss the diversity in the field of paleontology. This includes addressing the white male-dominated science practiced by wealthy scientists to a science that is incredibly popular with several students from diverse backgrounds. We will discuss efforts made by the various societies (the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology and the Paleontological Society) and why it is important to increase diversity in the field. We will also address the idea of “helicopter science” in which scientists from western wealthy countries conduct work in 2nd and 3rd world countries without contributing to or partnering with local science knowledge. We will use sources such as speakers from the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology diversity and inclusion committee. We will review efforts made by these societies as well as have students’ suggestions for potential outreach ideas.


HNRC 4013H-004: First Amendment

Professor:  Mark Killenbeck

Colloquium Type:  Humanities

**The deadline to apply to Honors College Seminars (via this application form) is 11:59, Monday, October 31st.  

An intensive examination of the legal issues arising under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, with an emphasis on basic free speech doctrines and the dilemmas posed by interplay between the free exercise and establishment clauses. This is a Law School course with 5 seats reserved for Honors College students.


HNRC 4013H-003: Soccer

Professor:  Todd Cleveland

Colloquium Type:  Humanities or Social Science

**The deadline to apply to Honors College Seminars (via this application form) is 11:59, Monday, October 31st. 

Soccer is undeniably the world’s most popular sport. Yet, few observers of the game pause to interrogate its unrivaled global popularity. How did soccer generate so many practitioners and followers? From a seemingly innocuous endeavor enjoyed by members of the British working class in the nineteenth century, how did the game subsequently spread throughout the world and come to dominate the global sporting landscape?  Who were the agents of this diffusion? How was the game received, adopted, appropriated, altered or even resisted by various populations worldwide?

This course will prompt students to explore the various historical processes related to the diffusion of and engagement with the sport and to analyze how various geo-historical contexts shaped these processes, as well as the constituent individual experiences of these broader patterns. We will also examine the ways soccer has reflected the broader, ongoing process of globalization, with players, ideas, tactics and wealth circulating throughout the globe, shaping the ways that the game is currently played and consumed, while also considering the future of the game based on these contemporary trends. 


Spring 2023 Honors Colloquia


CLST 4003H: Shopping in Ancient Rome

Professor:  Rhodora Vennarucci

Colloquium Type: Humanities

Shopping today is viewed as a meaningful cultural practice that fosters various social behaviors, but very few scholars ask whether shopping was a meaningful action in pre-industrial societies. This is due in large part to the prevalent view that shopping behavior is a hallmark of modern retailing. An interdisciplinary approach to the evidence from ancient Rome, however, suggests that a sophisticated retail system developed in urban centers during the Republic so that by the Early Imperial period, many Roman towns were characterized by busy commercial streets and districts where people consumed time and space alongside ready-made goods and services. The shop became a place of leisure and a locus of sociability where status and identity were forged, negotiated, and performed. It also became a potentially subversive space where information was exchanged, and status and power could be challenged and temporarily overturned.

This honors colloquium is concerned primarily with the questions of where, how, and why ancient Romans shopped. But to explore these questions, we will need to map distribution networks, trace the evolution of the retail trade, scrutinize Roman attitudes toward various forms of retailing, analyze commercial art and architecture, and embody the Roman shopkeeper as well as the ancient consumer to investigate evidence for marketing strategies, shopping behaviors, and consumption practices. Other topics may include politics and religion in the shop, enslaved labor, shopping with the senses, and Virtual Reality (VR) applications.

The course will be a mix of lecture and discussion and is structured thematically, starting with a general history of retailing and how that has shaped approaches to ancient retailing. Our approach to ancient shopping will largely be through a social and cultural point of view, which should appeal to a wide range of majors across programs and colleges. Students will be required to complete a research paper on a topic related to the course and to present their research to the rest of the class.


COMM 3923H: Patient-Provider Communication

Professor:  Trish Amason

Colloquium Type: Social Science

The Health Communication seminar examines common issues and concerns about communication within the provision of health care services such as patient-provider communication, communication among health care professionals, negative consequences of poor communication in health care delivery, and the use of technology in health-related information dissemination. The objectives are to cover a fairly narrow "survey" of information and engage in-depth independent research from myriad topics regarding communication in health-care settings. Specifically, you will do in-class presentations individually and working in teams, engage in our in-class discussions of readings, and individually conduct research from a variety of related topics in the form of a paper and in-class presentation. This class should serve as a springboard for students who are interested in studying communication processes associated with healthcare delivery and/or who are interested in pursuing a career in health care delivery.


ENGL 3923H: Writing History & Making Films

Professor:  Sidney Burris and Craig Pasquinzo

Colloquium Type: Humanities

This innovative course and film-lab will introduce students to the two fundamental skills that structure the most important media outlets that we consult on a daily basis: historical research and basic video editing skills. No prior knowledge of film-editing is required. The course will require two projects that dynamically support and enrich one another: 1) a paper that explores your personal response to the assigned book by Ama Adhe (8-10 pp.) and that will supply the background for 2) a documentary film (5-10 minutes). The course will focus on the Tibetan refugee situation and will use the extensive film archives of The TEXT Program (Tibetans in Exile Today)—the University’s oral-history project that chronicles the lives of Tibetan refugees currently living in India, and is directed Professor Sidney Burris, one of the instructors of the class. For the documentary film, students will be given access to these archives and photographs that include not only interviews with Tibetans, but hours of footage from The TEXT Program’s travels throughout India—all of this material will be available to students in the class, as they organize their paper and design their film.


HIST 3923H: Nuclear Asia: From Hiroshima to Fukushima

Professor:  Kelly Hammond

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course explores the history of nuclear security in Asia from the dropping of the two nuclear bombs on Japan to end World War II through to the nuclear meltdown of the Fukushima reactor in the wake of the 2011 Tsunami. Although the course is bookended by two nuclear disasters in Japan, the course explores many different aspects of nuclear security throughout Asia including the development, acquisition, and testing of nuclear weapons, the development of nuclear power facilities, and the extraction and exploitation of natural and human resources used to build nuclear bombs and nuclear facilities.  

By focusing on the development and acquisition of nuclear weapons, the testing of nuclear weapons, and the development of nuclear energy from Pakistan to the Marshall Islands, we will develop new insights into an era of internationalism, decolonization, and environmentalism that is often overshadowed by the superpower rivalry. By framing the course around nuclear security, we approach Asia from both a bird’s eye view and from the ground up, exploring high-level state-to-state relationships between non-superpower states, as well think about the ways that issues surrounding nuclear security impacts the daily lives of people living throughout Asia. The course is also designed to refocus the post-World War II era beyond the usual framing of the USSR vs. USA Cold War binary, and to explore the ways that decolonization, the non-aligned movement, and state-to-state interactions in the postwar inform geopolitics today.


HUMN 3923H: TIBETAN PHILOSOPHY AND CULTURE

Professor: Thupten Dorjee

Colloquium Type: Humanities

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology. 


INST 4003H-003: The Rise of Monotheism

Professor:  Spencer Allen

Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course examines the emergence of Israelite monotheism from its polytheistic origins and among its neighbors - including the Sumerians, Egyptians, Babylonians, Greeks, and Phoenicians - and explores what possibilities prompted Israel to embrace a monotheistic theology. Israel's theological transformation will be contrasted with the independent rise of monotheisms possibly found in Classical, Christian, Islamic and other theological systems.


PHYS 3923H: The History and Discoveries of Astronomical Telescopes

Professor:  Julia Kennefick

Colloquium Type: Natural Science

The world has been building telescopes for use in astronomy for over 400 years, and we’ve come a long way.  We now have telescopes that span the electromagnetic spectrum and one that literally uses the whole Earth as a platform to peer into galaxies to the black holes in their cores.  In this course, we will cover the history of the telescope, highlighting as we go the amazing discoveries they have allowed us to uncover.


PLSC 3923H/HIST 3923H: Eugenics in Global Perspective

Professor:  Thomas Adam

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This seminar offers students an introduction into the phenomenon of Socialdarwinism and eugenics as global phenomena of the nineteenth and twentieth century. We will explore the origins and foundations of eugenic thought, its spread across North America and Europa, the creation and introduction of eugenic legislation in the United States and Germany and the sterilization and killing of those deemed “feebleminded.” In this context, we will also analyze movies such as The Black Stork and I Accuse that sought to propagandize eugenic measures. This class will, further, explore the impact of eugenics on the development of the concept of “reproductive rights” in the second half of the twentieth century. 

 

August Intersession 2022 Colloquia


HNRC 300VH 001: Ozark Bootcamp

Professors: Lynda Coon and John Treat

Colloquium Type: Humanities

A new, three-credit forum that will give participants an opportunity to build community while introducing them to the region via an interdisciplinary study. The course will include field trips to Bentonville, Eureka Springs, a Native American archeological site, the Fay Jones House, and a two-night stay in Mountain View, Arkansas, a major center of Ozark music and culture. Each day, U of A faculty from a variety of fields will speak to the class. The supervising faculty will be Honors College Dean Lynda Coon and Honors College Director of Interdisciplinary and Curricular Learning John Treat.

The course will meet daily August 8-19 from 9:00 a.m. - 12:45 p.m. with some longer days for fieldtrip travel. Additional costs will be associated with the course.


Fall 2022 Honors College Signature Seminar


HNRC 4013H-002: Extractions 

Professor: Toni Jensen 

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences 

**The deadline to apply to Honors College Seminars (via this application form) is 11:59, Thursday, March 31st.  

This Signature Seminar is designed to introduce students to the human costs of extractive industries. The course will consider our world’s demand for raw materials, energy, and human capital in the context of climate crisis. The practice and concepts of extraction will be studied broadly through political, environmental and socio-economic approaches. 
 
Questions central to our inquiry include: How do we balance our material needs and wants with the environmental and societal impacts of these extractions? What are the human costs of these extractions, and how can studying these costs help lead us toward solutions? How are race, class and gender factors in who benefits or is harmed by extractive practices? 
 
We’ll dive deeply into the lives of those affected by oil and gas extraction, mining, forestry, and commercial agriculture and food production. Those include the lives of workers and landowners, corporation executives and pipeline protestors, politicians and climate scientists alike. In Extractions, students will work toward layered knowledge both of these industries and of the people and places most affected by them. 


HNRC 4013H-003: Wrongful Convictions 

Professor: Tiffany Murphy 

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences 

**The deadline to apply to Honors College Seminars (via this application form) is 11:59, Thursday, March 31st. 

Wrongful Convictions will encompass a study of the substantive causes of wrongful convictions and the procedural mechanisms allowing for the litigation of actual innocence claims.  The focus of this class is the methodology used to investigate and develop claims of actual innocence. During the course of the semester, students will review actual cases of wrongful convictions and processes necessary for exoneration. 


HNRC 4013H-001: Climate Change: A Human History 

Professor: Benjamin Vining 

Colloquium Type: Natural Sciences or Social Sciences 

**The deadline to apply to Honors College Seminars (via this application form) is 11:59, Thursday, March 31st. 

As anthropogenic climate change increasingly challenges the modern world. Past interactions between societies and changing climates offer lessons in adaptability, resilience, and vulnerability.  This signature seminar takes an interdisciplinary approach to critically examining how societies over the past four millennia have experienced and responded to climate changes.  Using modern paleoclimatic and anthropological approaches, the course will examine the behavioral choices that civilizations have made when confronted with violent storms, severe droughts, flooding, or other changes in regional climates in order to better understand how human action can either help us ‘weather’ these challenges or exacerbate our vulnerabilities.  

Our examination will go beyond simple deterministic models that propose that climate shapes social adaptations and failures.  We will look at how past civilizations have relied on economic, social, or ideological structures that have helped them create capacity to deal with climate change.  The course will examine some of the great civilizations of the world that many are familiar with, but we will go much deeper into the diversity and pluralism of these societies to understand how human decision-making shifted vulnerabilities across different communities. The result will be a better understanding of how the decisions we make collectively might condition our future experiences with anthropogenic climate change. 


Fall 2022 Honors Colloquia


COMM 3923H-001: The Sixties: Power and Protest 

Professor: Lisa Corrigan 

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences 

As a decade and as a generational touchstone, the 1960s occupy a singular place in American life and memory. While the largest youth generation ever on Earth—the Baby Boomers—began to exert financial and social power in the United States, some of them also pushed back against the conformism, anxiety, and failure of their parents, “The Greatest Generation.” In this course, we’ll be examining primary and secondary accounts of the 1960s as a contested public memory and history, emphasizing conflict within American liberalism between cold warriors and antiwar activists, advocates of the bureaucratic welfare state versus those favoring small-scale community control, and idealized liberalism versus a rising tide of street and student radicalism. Course topics include: 1.) Cold War politics and culture; 2.) the Vietnam War; 3.) consumerism, the American economy, and the politics of “cool”; 4.) the “War on Poverty” and struggles over ideas of social welfare; 5.) the political and ideological struggles between liberalism and conservatism; 6.) the struggle for civil rights and Black freedom; 7.) feminist movements, gender, and the sexual revolution, and 8.) counterculture, radicalism, and youth movements. 


HIST 3923H-001/PLSC 3923H-002: Communism in Germany 

Professor: Thomas Adam 

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences 

This colloquium focuses on the history of East Germany (German Democratic Republic) from its founding in 1949 to its demise in 1989/90. Students will be introduced to the political, social, economic, and cultural history of Communist East Germany. Topics will include the structure of the political system (parties, government, etc.), opposition, the economic development, popular culture and film in East Germany, and the everyday life experience of East Germans. The class will provide insights into the causes of the 1989 peaceful transformation and the process of regime change in East Germany. 


HUMN 3923H: The Universe in a Single Atom 

Professor: Thupten Dorjee 

Colloquium Type: Humanities 

Following decades of intensive workshops between leading academics and His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the Universe in a Single Atom is the culmination of the mutual understanding and communication between two traditions that have increasingly found common ground in their pursuit of truth through analysis and reason. The course will follow the main presentations on cosmology, metaphysics, epistemology, and consciousness that are explored in the book while providing a thorough background of the covered information in a format suited for undergraduate coursework. Students will not only learn about the major philosophical tenets of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many activities that enhance their abilities for critical thinking and reasoning in the same way that Tibetan scholars have for nearly a millennia. 


JOUR 3923H-001: Government and the Media 

Professor: Gina Shelton 

Colloquium Type: Social Science 

This class examines relations between the media and government, with analysis of the power, responsibility and performance of journalists and politicians. Topics include trust in media and use of freedom of information laws, money in politics, international press and influence, and coverage of courts, Congress and the White House. Students meet newsmakers from local, state and national politics. They have the opportunity to record roundtable discussions in the campus television station, UATV, with analysis of breaking news and presentation of research from class projects. 


JOUR 3923H-004: Issues in Advertising & PR 

Professor: Lucy Brown 

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science 

The primary goal of Issues in Advertising & Public Relations is to increase your awareness of the effects of the advertising and public relations industries and their messages on society. You’ll be encouraged to think about the implications of what you do when you create an advertisement or public relations message or campaign. You’ll read classic readings as well as current examples of major social, economic, cultural and ethical issues regarding advertising and public relations. You’ll develop a social marketing plan in teams to educate the public about a particular social problem or for a nonprofit or educational entity. This helps you to learn how advertising and public relations messages can be used to help society. You’ll write an individual literature review paper on a different topic (which can be the basis for a literature review for your thesis). You’ll consult with me to select a “doable” topic about an ethical issue or topic relevant to the course. 


PLSC 3923H: Authoritarianism 

Professor: Jeff Ryan 

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences 

**By permission only. Send requests for enrollment to jeffr@uark.edu. 

When Louis XIV uttered his infamous proto-hashtag “L'etat c'est moi,” it seems unlikely he was deliberately trying to capture in a pithy phrase part of the very lifeblood of autocracy as a political species, but he did. That vital essence is absolutism; a Manichaeistic belief that everything is black or white, right or wrong, good or evil, which courses through the veins of all the many variants of authoritarianism. It shows up in the way both aspiring and actual autocrats construct their worldviews; how they define the political realm; who they love and especially, who they hate. It defines how they govern if they are in power and if not, what they will do to capture power. 

In ‘Authoritarianism,’ we’ll explore basic human nature by interrogating the idea of an ‘authoritarian personality’ that primes some to become autocrats and others to blindly obey. We then turn to the state itself, covering the sort of ‘classic’ authoritarian regimes that tend to come to mind when people think of a dictatorship: the suffocating terror of totalitarianism; the primal atavism of a state constructed on ethnonationalism; the systematic savagery designed to atomize society of the bureaucratic-authoritarian state; and more. 

We will also probe the various roles that individuals or groups occupy during authoritarian episodes: the leaders, apparatchiks, followers, torturers, rebels, victims and bystanders. We even explore the co-optation of artistic expression to serve as state-reinforcing propaganda, from music to film to architecture. At the end of the day, the course is designed to provide a ‘full spectrum’ investigation of the multi-faceted phenomenon of political authoritarianism. In ‘Authoritarianism,’ there is no black and white…just different shadows of gray. 


PYSC 3923H: Alcohol and Other Substances: Prevalence, Theory, and Research 

Professor: Byron Zamboanga 

Colloquium Type: Natural Sciences or Social Sciences 

The goal of this course is to provide students with a general understanding of young people’s risk for initiating or misusing the following substances: caffeine, cigarette, marijuana, and alcohol. In this class, students will gain knowledge about the prevalence of these substances, who’s at risk and why, and what motivates young people to use them. This course will focus primarily on (a) alcohol use, (b) the general young adult population, (c) mainstream cognitive psychology theories (e.g., expectancy and motivational theories), and (d) quantitative and meta-analytic studies on substance use published in peer-reviewed academic journals. 


WLLC 3923H: Intro to Game Design I 

Professor: David Fredrick 

Colloquium Type: Humanities 

This course provides an introduction to the theory and practice of creating video games. Over the course of the semester we will explore the fundamental role of rules, play, art, and narrative in games, examine and critique representative video games in depth, and contemplate the decisions designers must make using the principles of game design. We will also put these principles into practice by building a series of basic 3D games!   Students will acquire an understanding of the production pipeline used for contemporary video games, including level design, modeling and texturing 3D assets, lighting, scripting the most common forms of interactivity, and creating a user interface; students will then see how these elements come together in a game engine to create the experience we all know. 

Required Readings include Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals, Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman; The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses, Jesse Schell; Wonderbook: The Illustrated Guide to Creating Imaginative Fiction, Jeff Vandermeer; and Selected PDFs from Introduction to Game Design, Prototyping, and Development, Jeremy Gibson. 

 

January Intersession Honors Colloquium


PHIL 3923H-001/PHIL 4093-002/PHIL 5093-002: DESCARTES

Professor: Jeremy Hyman

Colloquium Type: Humanities and Natural Sciences

An intensive study of the formative work of early modern philosophy, Descartes’ Meditations on First Philosophy together with the Objections and Replies.  Some of the topics to be considered include: skepticism and science, self and self-knowledge, God and his attributes, substance and mode, human free will, matter and bodies, and the nature of the human being.  Some attention will also be given to a number of more global issues, among them the proof structure of the Meditations;  the nature of meditation and the identity of the meditator;  the place of the Meditations in Descartes’ ongoing corpus; Descartes’ relation to his various objectors, be they philosophers, theologians, mathematicians, or scientists;  and the way in which the Meditations sets the agenda for thinkers to follow in the early modern period—and today.  The course will be conducted as a combination of lecture and discussion and, towards the end of the course, students will have the opportunity to assume the persona of one of Descartes’ objectors. The course is open to undergraduates in humanities and science fields alike, and there are no prerequisites for the course except the desire to think critically, participate in discussion, and engage with the system of one of the greatest of modern philosophers. 


 Spring 2022 Honors College Signature Seminars


HNRC 4013H-026: EUCLID

Professors: Edmund Harriss and Joshua Youngblood

Colloquium Type: Humanities and Natural Sciences

Euclid’s Elements weaves its way through the history of mathematics and the world. Studying the book provides an amazing insight into many topics, especially the history of the book in general and of course mathematics. 

This Signature Seminar will guide students through the textual and intellectual history of Euclid. For more than 2,000 years, the mathematical concepts written up by the mathematician from Alexandria in Africa, have served as building blocks for students, theoreticians, designers, builders, and even poets and musicians. The collected books of Euclid were one of the most frequently taught texts in the world until the early 20th century and remain valuable sources of scholarly inquiry. In physics the 20th century began by finally showing how the universe quite literally bent the rules the Elements set down so long before. 

Combining an interdisciplinary approach to mathematics, relying on history, intersectionality, and active creation, with analyses of the “book” as artifact and object, this course will allow Honors students to explore cultural and intellectual development over millennia though one of the most frequently cited and complex textual odysseys in the world. The mathematics of Euclid was adopted into the foundation of western civilization even though it was the work of the eastern Mediterranean. Students will seek to decolonise the historical assumptions about early mathematics and how they were understood or not understood, or willfully misunderstood. 


HNRC 4013H-027: ECONOMIC THOUGHT AND COMPETITION LAW

Professor: Sharon Foster

Colloquium Type: Humanities

Economic thought is the study of what economists thought happened, what did happen or what was about to happen within a particular economy.  The study of economic thought from the ancient period and the Middle Ages provides a rich understanding of the origins of competition law, or as it is known in the United States, antitrust law.

The written evidence from the ancient period and the Middle Ages indicate economic thought in general, and in competition law specifically, focused on fair and unfair – virtue and vice.  In fact, the term “justice” referenced in many ancient texts primarily meant economic justice.  Economic justice, basic principles of fairness, permeates legal history in numerous areas of commercial law including contracts, usury, and debt relief.  But competition law is, perhaps, where we most clearly see economic justice concepts.  Admonitions against the concentration of wealth in the hands of the few by unethical means included cartels and monopolization, a particular concern during frequent times of famine and plague.  Yet, despite a bountiful historical record relating to competition law, there is very little historical analysis of competition law from the ancient period or the Middle Ages. 

In this Signature Seminar, students will analyze economic thought starting with the ancient city-states of Mesopotamia from around 2402 B.C.E. through the Middle Ages ending in 1400 C.E.  The primary focus will be on economic thought regarding cartels and monopolization as expressed through ancient codes, biblical sources, canon law, philosophical writings and literature. Through these sources from the ancient period and the Middle Ages, this Signature Seminar will elucidate the connection between early economic thought and modern economic theory as it applies to competition law.


Spring 2022 Honors Colloquia


CLST 4003H-001: CLASSICAL BACKGROUND TO ENGLISH LITERATURE

Professor: Joy Reeber

Colloquium Type: Humanities

An exploration of the many ways English poetry and prose has imitated, borrowed, and challenged literary themes and genres from classical antiquity, from Milton's epic to the satire of Swift, and from the Romantics' fascination with Greece to Auden's more prosaic take on Rome. The classical legacy has been put to many uses in the English-speaking world, and we will also spend a certain amount of time studying its reception more generally to help contextualize the literature we read. (Recommended for all majors, especially students of English, Classical Studies, History, Religious Studies, Creative Writing, Philosophy, Medieval and Renaissance Studies minors. Required for CLST majors & minors.)


COMM 3923H-001: PATIENT-PROVIDER COMMUNICATION

Professor: Trish Amason

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences

Colloquium in Patient-Provider Communication examines the processes and complexities of health communication with an applied health professional focus. The goals of this course are to provide an understanding of the theories related to effectively communicating health information as well as learning the skills needed to initiate and maintain interpersonal and inter-professional relationships with patients, families, and other providers.

This course will evaluate and explore the multidimensional processes used to create, maintain, and transform complex scientific realities into everyday health care information for providers, patients, families, and so forth. In this course, you will be expected to (a) read the assigned texts and research articles; (b) work in small groups to develop class presentations; (c) actively participate in class and group discussions; (d) complete written assignments in APA style; and (e) stay informed about course information (policies, assignments, revisions, and grades) via Blackboard and your uark email.


ENGL 3923H-003: WRITING HISTORY AND MAKING FILMS

Professor: Sidney Burris and Craig Pasquinzo

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences

This innovative course and film-lab will introduce students to the two fundamental skills that structure the most important media outlets that we consult on a daily basis:  historical research and basic video editing skills.  No prior knowledge of film-editing is required.  The course will require two projects that dynamically support and enrich one another:  1) a paper that explores your personal response to the assigned book by Ama Adhe (8-10 pp.) and that will supply the background for 2) a documentary film (5-10 minutes).  The course will focus on the Tibetan refugee situation and will use the extensive film archives of The TEXT Program (Tibetans in Exile Today)—the University’s oral-history project that chronicles the lives of Tibetan refugees currently living in India, and is directed Professor Sidney Burris, one of the instructors of the class. For the documentary film, students will be given access to these archives and photographs that include not only interviews with Tibetans, but hours of footage from The TEXT Program’s travels throughout India—all of this material will be available to students in the class, as they organize their paper and design their film.

Make sure to check out our course website (http://readwrite.typepad.com/historyfilm/) as well as the website for The TEXT Program (http://textprogram.uark.edu).


HIST 3923H-002/HIST 7133-001: ARTISTS AND BOHEMIANS

Professor: Richard Sonn

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

This honors colloquium and graduate seminar has a dual focus on modern art in the era of modernism, (1870 to 1970), and also on how artists defined a new way of life for themselves in the 19th and 20th centuries.  A bohemian lifestyle emerged among the Romantic generation of French writers and artists in the 1830s, was canonized by Henri Murger in Scenes of Bohemian Life, and later metamorphosed into the even more famous opera La Bohème by Rossini.  Ever since, we assume that unconventional lifestyles are adopted not only by artists and by writers of the avant-garde, but by rock stars and anyone else who wants to live “artistically.”  The course therefore includes the sociology of artists and intellectuals, in order to explore why, in their lives as in their art, artists felt they must renounce bourgeois norms.   We will begin in Paris, then move on to New York, Vienna and London.   This unconventional lifestyle implied the wholesale rejection of Victorian values, including those of sexual propriety.  The values of these small coteries of artists—living creatively without fixed schedules, drug-taking, sexual freedom—lasted from the 1830s to the 1950s, then exploded into a mass movement in the 1960s.


HUMN 3923H-002: TIBETAN PHILOSOPHY AND CULTURE

Professor: Thupten Dorjee

Colloquium Type: Humanities

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology. General Class Information: Aside from the lecture / discussion format, class-time will be spent viewing movies and gaining a first-hand knowledge of the production of Tibetan culture. Cooking, chanting, making sand mandalas and prayer flags, as well as learning the fundamental progressions of Buddhist logic—all of these will contribute to a general understanding of Tibetan culture. It is a culture, of course, that has been heavily influenced by the Buddhist philosophy of non-violence and compassion for all sentient beings, and accordingly we will investigate the ways in which a community operates in an environment of cooperation and genuine concern for its fellow citizens. All Tibetan culture—according to Tibetan cosmology—is concerned with the five major sciences: 1) arts and crafts; 2) medicine; 3) grammar; 4) logic; 5) philosophy. We will explore various aspects of these sciences in our class. Note: Before class begins, it is recommended that you view two films. First of all, Kundun, and second, Seven Years in Tibet. These are widely available at the rental stores in town, or Professor Burris will be happy to loan you his personal copies of these films.


PHYS 3923H-001: "ABOUT TIME": TIME KEEPING IN ASTRONOMY AND PHYSICS

Professor: Julia Kennefick

Colloquium Type: Natural Sciences

Beginning with the ancient Babylonians, we will study how different cultures added to humankind’s knowledge of the motions of celestial bodies and used these observations to develop concepts of time, both celestial and secular.  The focus will be on understanding the motions of the Earth within our solar system and how these motions inform and change the calendars that humans have developed.  Other topics will include the development and current state of the art of clocks, anomalies in the Earth’s motion, the role of time in physics, time in general and special relativity, and pulsar timing as a way to study cosmological phenomena. 

May Intersession 2021 Colloquia


ENGL 3923H-001/ENGL 3903-001: Crafting a Creative Life: Best Practices for Beginning Writers

Professor: Geffrey Davis

Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course introduces and demystifies the professional literary world for beginning writers. Participants will conduct preliminary research on inspiring publication opportunities and post-graduation prospects that fit both their aesthetic tastes and personal ambitions. We will also address how to find (or create) an active literary community after graduation, including applying to residencies, workshops, and competitive programs in creative writing. Bring any and all questions related to the life of a writer!


August Intersession 2021 Honors College Signature Seminar


HNRC 4013H-023: CHRISTIANITY AND THE RWANDAN GENOCIDE

Professor: Jay Carney

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences or Humanities

"After a century of evangelism, we have to begin again because the best catechists, those who filled our churches on Sundays, were the first to go out with machetes in their hands." Bishop Thaddée Nsengiyumva, 1994

This course examines the 1994 Rwanda Genocide in which the Rwandan government and military orchestrated the killings of 800,000 predominantly Tutsi citizens over the course of 100 days. Students will analyze Rwanda's history in the context of the Great Lakes region of central Africa, including the underlying ethnic, political, and religious factors that established the groundwork for genocide. In particular, the class critically evaluates the roles played by the majority Catholic Church and other Christian communities before and during the genocide. At the same time, we will also examine the impact of the U.S., the U.N., and other international actors, the subsequent wars in neighboring Democratic Republic of the Congo, and how the Rwandan case compares to other modern genocides. Finally, the course will examine the nature of reconciliation, religious warrants for and against violence, and Christian identity in the shadow of the Rwanda genocide.

Methodologically, the course unfolds at the intersection of religious studies and history, and students will study both historical and theological texts. Reflecting the interdisciplinary nature of genocide studies, students will also analyze the political, anthropological and sociological dimensions of genocide and post-conflict reconciliation. The course will also enable students to engage the complex nature of postcolonial African identity, including dimensions of gender, race, ethnicity, and citizenship.

**The deadline to apply to the Christianity and the Rwandan Genocide Signature Seminar (via this application form) is 11:59 pm Wednesday, March 31st.


HNRC 4013H-024: SO YOU WANT TO PUT ON A MATH CIRCUS

Professor: Chaim Goodman-Strauss

Colloquium Type: Natural Sciences

This fall, the Honors College will celebrate 150 years of the University Arkansas by hosting a Math Circus — and we need creative, capable hands on deck! Crowds of people will show up and:

                Weave Bamboo Dodecahedral Stars!

                Grow Enormous Amounts of Rainbow Foam Hyperbolic Surface!

                Stencil Up Some Math Chalk Art

                Enjoy Lots of Hands-On Take-Home Mathartfun Freebies

We’ll have lots of trained volunteers to help out, but in this course, you will help lead, design and put on a Math Circus!  You will:

  • Learn the mathematics, and get to make a lot of mathey things
  • Working in interdisciplinary teams, 
    • Produce freebies like trading cards and stickers,
    • CNC new sidewalk stencils,
    • Improve technical aspects of the sculptures
  • Learn how to organize casual passers-by into a sculpture building machine!
  • Make some art and have some fun!

This course may be taken either as a three-credit signature seminar from 9:00-12:45 or as a one-credit forum from 10:00-11:15.  Only the three-credit course will be counted towards honors colloquium credit.


Fall 2021 Honors College Signature Seminars


HNRC 4013H-020: SUSTAINABLE CITIES

Professor: Noah Billig

Colloquium Type: Natural Sciences or Social Sciences

More than 50% of the world’s population now lives in cities. Cities will continue to be the predominant living condition as people seek urban opportunities. Cities also have the potential to mitigate climate change, pollution, biodiversity loss, and other key sustainability challenges of the 21st century.

This course will investigate the many layers of the city—from the meaning of cities to cities as nested, but non-linear systems—including infrastructure, natural systems, and cities as narrative and people’s stories. Students will look at key challenges to sustainable cities in the 21st century.

Students will then investigate many facets of the sustainable city, including landscape function and aesthetics; built urban fabric; government policies; transportation and transit; infrastructure liabilities and repurposing; conservation of resources such as water and energy; regional and urban ecology and habitat; and social structures and environmental justice.

They will also learn about adaptive solutions attempting to address these issues, including urban sprawl repair, tactical urbanism, the rise of small-scale developers, the emergence of grassroots community development organizations, and the adaptive reuse and densification of suburban residential neighborhoods.

Students will understand patterns, processes, and policies associated with these various adaptive urban solutions, both in the developing world and North America. Students will then apply their new knowledge to creative and strategic proposals for sustainable cities.

**The deadline to apply to the Sustainable Cities Signature Seminar (via this application form) is 11:59 pm Wednesday, March 31st.


HNRC 4013H-021: BLACK UTOPIAS

Professor: Caree Banton

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

Functioning as a gateway for humans to break with the past and imagine their world anew, the COVID-19 pandemic has produced utopian dreams of a virus-free world. But long before the pandemic, oppressed people in efforts to articulate agendas for self-determination had embraced utopian ideas.

The biblical story of the exile and exodus of the Jewish people and the subsequent creation of Israel, which many have referred to as a Zionist utopia, has long served as the chief ideological touchstone. Yet, since the modern era, the Black social and political imaginary has been largely structured and informed by utopian visions.

Black nationalist thinkers in the U.S., the Caribbean, and Africa at different points envisioned in great detail the ideals of a perfect Black society that would shield them from the perils of white supremacist and racist oppression. Through fugitivity, colonization, and emigration to Haiti, Canada, Liberia, Ghana, France and numerous other spaces, Black utopia came to represent the convergence of Black escapism with ethnic nationalist and political possibilities. Despite the differences in places, movements, leaders, and philosophies, Black people have had to confront the reality of utopia as elusive.

Still, in the 20th century, painters, musicians and fiction writers would continue to intervene upon the utopian traditions of Black culture, including anti-utopia, heterotopia and dystopia. Through artistic and philosophical renderings of Black life in outer space, Black utopia has more prominently become a site for Afro-futurist ideas.

In this course, we will engage the various ways in which Black people have sought to envision and create a bettr world. To examine how Black people have articulated utopian visions, we will read historical works alongside novels and short stories, view paintings, listen to music from the likes of Outkast, Fela Kuti and Lee “Scratch” Perry as well as view films that portray Black utopian societies and movements.

**The deadline to apply to the Black Utopias Signature Seminar (via this application form) is 11:59 pm Wednesday, March 31st.


HNRC 4013H-022: CONSPIRACY THEORY

Professor: Ryan Neville-Shepard

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences

Conspiracy culture is not new in the United States. From the Revolutionary War to the era of McCarthyism, Americans were spinning populist counter-narratives about evil doers working through secret societies to undermine the interests of “common” people.

By the turn of the 21st century, however, a feeling emerged that conspiracy culture was becoming increasingly mainstream especially with the popularity of JFK assassination theories, the 9/11 Truthers, the Birther movement, and most recently the widespread misinformation surrounding the coronavirus pandemic.

Although such rhetoric was once limited to the fringes of society, it now permeates everyday life, impacting health decisions, political participation, public policy, and so much more.

Conspiracy Theory is a Signature Seminar that will begin with a basic understanding of conspiracy discourse. Students will be challenged to define conspiracy theories and understand the formal characteristics of conspiracy narratives. Moreover, the course will trace the conditions in which conspiracy theories – in the United States and across the world – tend to flourish.

Particular attention will be given to the way mass media has shaped conspiracy culture, from contemporary film and television genres, to forms of social media that have made it far easier for people to create and share their own content online. Not only will students gain an understanding of how such misinformation circulates in public and shapes beliefs and actions, but we will imagine the best ways that society might respond.

**The deadline to apply to the Conspiracy Theory Signature Seminar (via this application form) is 11:59 pm Wednesday, March 31st.


Fall 2021 Colloquia


CLST 4003H-001: SOCIAL NETWORKS IN ANCIENT ROME

Professor: Emma Brobeck

Colloquium Type: Humanities

Who were the Romans, and what sorts of lives did they lead? This course will explore the daily social lives of people living in Ancient Rome and neighboring areas. We will look at ancient social networks through a variety of lenses, including gender, ethnicity, citizenship, and occupation. We will also look at the structure of relationships in ancient Rome, particularly the institutions of friendship and patronage. Classwork will incorporate a range of materials from the ancient world, from ancient literary texts and monuments to the objects of daily life with the goal of better understanding the practices and ideologies surrounding identity in Rome. All materials will be in translation; reading knowledge of Latin is not required.


ECON 4003H-001: ECONOMICS OF LIFE

Professor: Amy Farmer

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences

Economics is everywhere.  It informs and affects business, politics, international trade and relations, but it also affects individuals and families.  Have you thought about the role of economics in decisions to have children, get an education, get married and divide house and market work?  Does economics inform how we date, raise children or choose to spend our leisure time?  People, organizations and governments respond to incentives, and those incentives create equilibrium outcomes that may or may not be efficient.  The role of economics is to examine these policies and determine if altering the incentives might improve the world around us.  Economics is much more than supply and demand, monopolies and investments; it is a way of thinking that can inform every decision you make. 

The goal of this class is to help you see the role of economics everywhere, including in decisions you make in your personal life as well as how it influences the world in which you live.  We will investigate the topics listed above along with larger social topics like health care, discrimination and the environment.  You will hopefully learn a way of critically thinking about and evaluating the world that will inform your personal, professional and political choices and how you evaluate those decisions throughout your life.


ENGL 3923H-001: COOL BOOKS ABOUT STUFF THAT REALLY HAPPENED (CREATIVE NONFICTION)

Professor: Sidney Burris

Colloquium Type: Humanities

For one semester, we’re going to read some of the coolest—the most important critical term I know—books in English.  And all of these books are about stuff that actually happened: art-fights, culture wars, movies, graduation, music, love, and death. I have chosen books that are, to me at least, fun—the second most important critical term I know—to read.

The class is discussion-based, and the discussions arise from our own close readings of the books. The final assignment will be your own creative non-fiction essay, but this will be preceded by several shorter writing assignments of less than one page. These are designed to help you understand the true nature of the English paragraph.

The reading list changes from semester to semester, but past semesters have included these books:   Reality Hunger, David Shields; This is Water, David Foster Wallace; The Cost of Living, Deborah Levy; The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion; Between the World and Me, Ta-Nehisi Coates; The Wisdom of Insecurity, Alan W. Watts; The River of Consciousness, Oliver Sacks; If You Want to Write: A Book about Art, Independence, and Spirit, by Brenda Ueland; The Origin of Others, Toni Morrison; Recollections of My Nonexistence, Rebecca Solnit.


HUMN 3923H-004: THE UNIVERSE IN A SINGLE ATOM

Professor: Thupten Dorjee

Colloquium Type: Humanities

Following decades of intensive workshops between leading academics and His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the Universe in a Single Atom is the culmination of the mutual understanding and communication between two traditions that have increasingly found common ground in their pursuit of truth through analysis and reason. The course will follow the main presentations on cosmology, metaphysics, epistemology, and consciousness that are explored in the book while providing a thorough background of the covered information in a format suited for undergraduate coursework. Students will not only learn about the major philosophical tenets of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many activities that enhance their abilities for critical thinking and reasoning in the same way that Tibetan scholars have for nearly a millennia.


HUMN 3923H-005: INTRODUCTION TO GAME DESIGN I

Professor: David Fredrick

Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course provides an introduction to the theory and practice of creating video games. Over the course of the semester we will explore the fundamental role of rules, play, art, and narrative in games, examine and critique representative video games in depth, and contemplate the decisions designers must make using the principles of game design. We will also put these principles into practice by building a series of basic 3D games!   Students will acquire an understanding of the production pipeline used for contemporary video games, including level design, modeling and texturing 3D assets, lighting, scripting the most common forms of interactivity, and creating a user interface; students will then see how these elements come together in a game engine to create the experience we all know.

Required Readings include Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals, Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman; The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses, Jesse Schell; Wonderbook: The Illustrated Guide to Creating Imaginative Fiction, Jeff Vandermeer; and Selected PDFs from Introduction to Game Design, Prototyping, and Development, Jeremy Gibson.


HUMN 3923H-006: NEVER ALONE: BIPOC VIDEO GAMES

Professor: David Fredrick

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

Video games are the world's dominant form of entertainment, as their revenue exceeds the total value of film and music combined. This is more than toxic shooters and exploitative commerce: largely through the work of indie developers, video games have emerged as a nuanced and powerful form of art (e.g. Breath of the Wild, Firewatch, Life Is Strange, The Outer Wilds, What Remains of Edith Finch). In this context, BIPOC and LGBTQ+ players and developers have an increasingly important voice in video games, and thus in global communication. Imbued with some of the world's oldest storytelling traditions, Black, Brown, and Indigenous creators are seeking to express and transmit their cultures through video games, changing the stories video games tell and articulating alternative forms of identity along the intersectional lines of ethnicity, gender, race, and sexuality. This has become an intervention in the very practices of coding and Artificial Intelligence, as these developers seek to realign the human/computer interface to reflect the interconnected nature of life, language, and the material world. This course will follow the journey of BIPOC games and their developers: their work as 21st-century voices for traditional and Indigenous values and storytelling practices, their resistance to the trivialization of Indigenous cultures in mainstream media, and their call for economic, ecological, and social justice. No prior video game or coding experience is necessary.


JOUR 3923H-004/ADPR 4483-001: MULTICULTURALISM IN ADVERTISING AND PR 

Professor: Lucy Brown 

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences

The primary goal of this colloquium is to increase your awareness of the effects of the advertising and public relations industries and their messages on society. You will be encouraged to think about the implications of what you do when you create an advertisement or public relations message or campaign, and how that message may affect a diverse audience. The course focuses on racial and ethnic groups and covers advertising and public relation issues relevant to women and LGBTQ+ markets. You will study classic readings as well as current examples of major social, economic, cultural, political and or ethical issues regarding advertising and public relations. You will develop a social marketing plan in teams to educate the public about a particular social problem for a nonprofit or educational entity. This helps you learn how advertising and public relations messages can be used to help society. You will write an individual literature review paper on a different topic, which can be the basis for a literature review for your thesis.


 

LALS 4003H-001/LALS 4003-001/WLIT 603V-001: THE AMAZON BEYOND THE ANTHROPOCENE

Professor: Luis Fernando Restrepo

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

In this course, we will examine historical and literary representations of the Amazon from the Conquistadors’ search for El Dorado, the violent rubber boom, and oil drilling to the rampant present-day agro business. The destructive capitalist search for cheap nature and cheap labor has severely deforested one of the most diverse tropical rainforests of the world and nearly destroyed its indigenous peoples.

We will also look at Native perspectives beyond the antropocentric view of the world where all living creatures are part of one sustainable web of life.


PSYC 3923H-001: ALCOHOL AND OTHER SUBSTANCES: PREVALENCE, THEORY, AND RESEARCH

Professor: Byron L. Zamboanga

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences or Natural Sciences

The goal of this course is to provide students with a general understanding of young people’s risk for initiating or misusing the following licit substances: caffeine, cigarette, marijuana, and alcohol. In this class, students will gain knowledge about the prevalence of these substances, who’s at risk and why, and what motivates young people to use them. Students will also be introduced to general treatment and motivational-based intervention approaches in combating substance use risk and related harms. This course will focus primarily on (a) the general young adult population, (b) mainstream cognitive psychology theories (e.g., expectancy and motivational theories) and to some extent, multicultural topics in psychology (e.g., acculturation), and (c) quantitative and meta-analytic studies on substance use published in peer-reviewed scientific journals.

 

January Intersession 2021 Honors College Signature Seminar


HNRC 4013H-004: WITCHCRAFT

Professor: Timothy R. Landry

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

Magic is real. It enchants our worlds with meaning; it helps us to cope with lives that have become increasingly difficult; it empowers the marginalized to insist on revolution; and helps to explain the yet unexplained. Even if we don’t realize it, magic is all around us and we all benefit from its presence. In fact, the United States has long had a thriving community of individuals interested in those supernatural, mystical and magical worlds, known collectively as the "Occult."

In this seminar, we will examine the significance of a wide range of occult practices, including Ceremonial Magick, the New Age movement, Neo-Paganism, Wicca and Satanism. Students will begin to unravel the occult's hidden role in the formation of American society, especially as it relates to issues of class, race, gender and nationality. Drawing heavily on feminist theory and material studies, we will position magic as a meaningful cultural practice that is critical to understanding how people mobilize complex symbolic systems while working with non-human beings to manage increasing concerns over social inequity, global economic insecurity and distrust. Thinking about what it means to live in an enchanted world, students will seek to answer the question: What does it mean to be religious in America?

**The deadline to apply to the Witchcraft seminar (via this application form) is 11:59 p.m. Friday, October 30, 2020.


Spring 2021 Honors College Signature Seminars


HNRC 4013H-001: FOOD MATTERS

Professors: Margaret Sova McCabe, Jennie Popp, and Curt Rom

Colloquium Type: Natural Sciences or Social Sciences

Since the 1970s U.S. dairy milk drinkers have declined sharply while consumption of beverage products made from soy, oat and almond have grown in popularity as a replacement. Questions abound regarding nutrition equivalency and environmental impacts across products. Citing health and environmental reasons, consumers are turning to new meat alternatives such as Beyond Meat® and the Impossible™ Burger. Generally more expensive than ground beef, these products are not widely available and may be considered a food fad. 

POM Wonderful™ sales reached $91 billion in one year based on manufacturer’s-backed research claims that the product improved heart health and treated prostate cancer. The Supreme Court case ordered the company to remove these claims due to lack of scientific methods followed in the research. So, how wonderful is it? Is milk, milk? Is meat, meat? Are food names important? Is manufacturer-based research really research? Is industrial food better or is local? Is organic better for you and safer? Can food be considered medicine? This course is designed to consider the legal, economic, social and environmental aspects of products in the food system with the purpose of generating information and guidance for regulating agencies, the food industries and consumers on managing the modern food system. It’s a conversation about why and how food matters. 

**The deadline to apply to the Food Matters seminar (via this application form) is 11:59 p.m. Friday, October 30, 2020.


HNRC 4013H-002: GLOBAL SOCIAL CHANGE

Professors: J. Laurence Hare, Rogelio Garcia Contreras, and Jared Phillips

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences

 As the saying goes, “Think globally, act locally.” Indeed, many of today’s pressing global issues manifest themselves in the day-to-day challenges of communities, and it is within these communities that some of the most innovative and effective solutions emerge. Yet the ways in which challenges are understood and addressed vary across communities, cultures and nations. What can we learn from these different perspectives and experiences? In what ways can locales and regions in different parts of the world work together to achieve meaningful social change and solve common global challenges?

In this international honors signature seminar, UA students will meet online, in real time, with students from Barcelona's Universitat Abat Oliba who are enrolled in a course with similar goals. Together they will pursue a different kind of applied learning and community engagement. First, students will explore the ways in which global challenges manifest themselves in regional and local settings. They will gain experience with different pathways to social change, including social innovation and entrepreneurship, and discover how intercultural dialogue can facilitate solutions. Then, U of A honors students will work side-by-side with students, faculty, and community partners in Arkansas, Italy and Spain on a shared project to understand the impact of pandemic recovery on the international social change ecosystem and to apply their learning to proposing new ways forward in the wake of COVID-19.

This seminar connects students to the Arkansas Global Changemakers Initiative, which offers opportunities for student internships, research, service learning, and study abroad. It provides a terrific way to build intercultural skills, learn social innovation practices, and engage in meaningful partnerships between the University of Arkansas and communities at home and abroad.

**The deadline to apply to the Global Social Change seminar (via this application form) is 11:59 p.m. Friday, October 30, 2020.


HNRC 4013H-003: CONSERVATISM

Professor: Jay P. Greene

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

Conservative political thought has a long and influential history, but it receives relatively little serious attention on college campuses. This neglect is a disservice to students inclined toward liberal and progressive views because they too often critique a caricature of conservatism, which undermines the strength and clarity of their own political thinking. But this neglect is also a disservice to students inclined toward conservative views, who, lacking an understanding of the traditions and diversity of conservative thought, often develop a shallow version of conservatism that is little more than being contrary to liberals. This course attempts to remedy these problems by reviewing the history and defining characteristics of conservatism, as well as how that political philosophy can be applied to current issues and political controversies. Our goal is not to adjudicate whether conservative views are right or wrong. Instead, we will attempt to understand how conservatives think.

Our readings will describe how conservatism arose in opposition to the universal claims of a series of political movements, culminating in the French Revolution. We will also review the role conservative thinking played in the American founding and then jump ahead to the various strains of conservative thought that emerged in the U.S. following the Second World War. We will apply those strains of conservative thought to contemporary issues, such as the scope of government authority, taxation, trade, sexual and moral regulation, welfare, healthcare, education, the environment and foreign policy.

**The deadline to apply to the Conservatism seminar (via this application form) is 11:59 p.m. Friday, October 30, 2020.


Spring 2021 Colloquia


ANTH 3923H-001: VIOLENCE

Professor: Ram Natarajan

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

 This course takes an anthropological look at violence and social suffering, focusing first on how societies define injury and then on the costs of violence for those who suffer injuries and those who commit them.  Topics to be covered include warfare, colonial violence, animal violence, climate change, trauma, torture, fear, and pain.   Our overall concern will be how violence encompasses more than bodily harm and is a long-term process that becomes part of everyday life. 


CLST 4003H-001: NON-BINARY ROME

Professor: David Frederick

Colloquium Type: Humanities

The influence of ancient Rome on American culture is both ubiquitious and often unconscious: our banks, universities, and courthouses "naturally" look Roman, as columns and pediments convey wealth, stability, and...a noble government built to last. At the same time, Romans often appear in media as cautionary versions of ourselves: the dire consequences of conquest leading to excess, dictatorship, and decadence. Recent scholarship has challenged this cultural ancestry, but both positions (Romans like us, Romans not like us) begin with the assumption that when it comes to sex and gender, the Romans were firmly binary. Either the Romans (those yeomen farmers) were the heteronormative ancestors of George Washington, or...the Romans (including Cato) did not define identity through object choice, rather what counted was the role of active penetration in separating the citizen adult men (penetrators) from everone else (penetrated).

This class suspends the assumption of a binary Rome and explores the consequences for how we interpret Roman lives if this assumption were not true--or far less true than we think. We will use a wide range of evidence (literature, architecture, drama, visual art) to pursue the possibility of a non-binary Rome, and we will also read selections from critical race theory, intersectionality, and queer theory to inform our approach to this evidence.


COMM 3923H-001: PATIENT-PROVIDER COMMUNICATION

Professor: Trish Amason

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences

The Health Communication seminar examines common issues and concerns about communication within the provision of health care services such as patient-provider communication, communication among health care professionals, negative consequences of poor communication in health care delivery, and the use of technology in health-related information dissemination. The objectives are to cover a fairly narrow "survey" of information and engage in-depth independent research from myriad topics regarding communication in health-care settings. Specifically, you will do in-class presentations individually and working in teams, engage in-class discussions of readings, and individually conduct research from a variety of related topics in the form of a paper and in-class presentation. This class should serve as a springboard for students who are interested in studying communication processes associated with healthcare delivery and/or who are interested in pursuing a career in health care delivery.


HUMN 3923H-001: INTRODUCTION TO GAME DESIGN II

Professor: David Fredrick

Colloquium Type: Humanities

This is the second semester in our introductory sequence in game design. In this semester, we aim to deepen your understanding of the design concepts introduced in GD 1, while bringing some new design issues and approaches into the mix. In terms of practical content-creation skills, we will go deeper into C# coding in Unity, as well as common workflows for modeling assets in Blender and then bringing these into Unity. As part of the humanities focus of our approach in Tesseract, we will also introduce you to the unique challenges involved in representing historical content, in a critical way, through gameplay. We will also shift from individual to group-based work. Virtually every game made these days is built by a team, sometimes 2-6, sometimes 200-500. The ability to do collaborative work, efficiently and positively, between team members involves fundamental social and practical skills, and is an absolute necessity in game development.  


HUMN 3923H-002: TIBETAN BUDDHIST PHILOSOPHY AND CULTURE

Professor: Thupten Dorjee

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

This will be a remote course where we will connect through online resources. Aside from the lecture / discussion format, class-time will be spent viewing films and gaining a first-hand knowledge of the production of Tibetan culture. It is a culture, of course, that has been heavily influenced by the Buddhist philosophy of non-violence and compassion for all sentient beings, and accordingly we will investigate the ways in which a community operates in an environment of cooperation and genuine concern for its fellow citizens. Tibetan culture is concerned with the five major sciences: 1) arts and crafts; 2) medicine; 3) grammar; 4) logic; 5) philosophy. We will explore various aspects of these sciences in our class.


HUMN 3923H-003/HUMN 425V-004: WRITING HISTORY & MAKING FILMS

Professor: Sidney Burris

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

This innovative course and film-lab will introduce students to the two fundamental skills that structure the most important media outlets that we consult on a daily basis:  historical research and basic video editing skills.  No prior knowledge of film-editing is required.

The course will require two projects that dynamically support and enrich one another:  1) a traditional research paper (8-10 pp.) that will supply the background for 2) a documentary film (5-10 minutes). 

The course will focus on the Tibetan refugee situation and will use the extensive film archives of The TEXT Program (Tibetans in Exile Today), the University’s oral-history project that chronicles the lives of Tibetan refugees currently living in India, and is directed by Professor Sidney Burris, one of the instructors of the class. The other instructor, Craig Pasquinzo, is an accomplished documentary filmmaker who has had an extensive career in working with film production of all types.

For the documentary film, students will be given access to The TEXT Program’s archives and photographs that include not only interviews with Tibetans, but hours of footage from the Program’s travels throughout India—all of this material will be available to students in the class, as they plan their research paper and design their film.


PHYS 3923H-001: SEEING LIGHT

Professor: Reeta Vyas

Colloquium Type: Natural Sciences

This Honors Colloquium will explore fundamental properties of light waves and their application to optical phenomena including color and vision, role of light in art and nature, lasers, telescopes, microscope, cameras, fiber optics, holography, and modern science. The course will also feature demonstrations and hands-on activities.  Some background in elementary algebra, geometry, and trigonometry is desirable. 


PLSC 3923H-001: POLITICAL VIOLENCE

Professor: Jeffrey Ryan

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

Please contact instructor (jeffr@uark.edu) for more information.


PSYC 3923H-001: ALCOHOL AND OTHER SUBSTANCES: PREVALENCE, THEORY, AND RESEARCH

Professor: Byron L. Zamboanga

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences

The goal of this course is to provide students with a general understanding of young people’s risk for initiating or misusing the following licit substances: caffeine, cigarette, marijuana, and alcohol. In this class, students will gain knowledge about the prevalence of these substances, who’s at risk and why, and what motivates young people to use them. Students will also be introduced to general treatment and motivational-based intervention approaches in combating substance use risk and related harms. This course will focus primarily on (a) the general young adult population, (b) mainstream cognitive psychology theories (e.g., expectancy and motivational theories) and to some extent, multicultural topics in psychology (e.g., acculturation), and (c) quantitative and meta-analytic studies on substance use published in peer-reviewed scientific journals.

May Intersession 2020 Colloquium


ENGL 3923H-002/ENGL 3903-002: Crafting a Creative Life: Best Practices for Beginning Writers

Professor: Geffrey Davis

Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course introduces and demystifies the professional literary world for beginning writers. Participants will conduct preliminary research on inspiring publication opportunities and post-graduation prospects that fit both their aesthetic tastes and personal ambitions. We will also address how to find (or create) an active literary community after graduation, including applying to residencies, workshops, and competitive programs in creative writing. Bring any and all questions related to the life of a writer!


August Intersession 2020 Honors College Signature Seminar


HNRC 4013H: BRAIN AND MUSIC

Professor: Elizabeth Margulis

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences or Natural Sciences

This course intermingles science and the humanities to try to understand the pervasive and puzzling human behavior of music-making. Students will tackle challenging questions at the forefront of this highly intriguing subject, such as:

  • How is it possible to design experiments that illuminate as complex a cultural phenomenon as music?
  • What can neuroscience teach us about music, and what can music teach us about the brain?
  • How can this research inspire new machines, tools, and interventions that affect health and society?

Students in this course will learn to think flexibly, navigating back and forth between science and the humanities as they engage with the most cutting-edge approaches and discoveries in the neuroscience of music.  

*The deadline to apply for the Brain and Music Signature seminar is Wednesday, July 1. Application link.


Fall 2020 Honors College Signature Seminars


HNRC 4013H-001: ANIMAL MINDS

Professor: Edward Minar

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences or Natural Sciences

Philosophers and others have often thought that there is a great divide between human beings and other animals, marked by mental or psychological characteristics that distinguish “us humans” from even our closest animal relatives. Such features might include rationality, language, tool use, culture and self-awareness or sense of self. This picture of a gulf between humans and other animals is reinforced by perceived difficulties in obtaining knowledge of animal minds – they cannot tell us what they think or feel. The idea of a radical difference between humans and non-humans has been believed by some to rationalize the use of animals for human purposes. For example, if animals are thought not to be self-aware, their capacity to suffer, or at least the significance of their suffering, might be called into question. 

Such (until recently, widespread) skepticism about animal minds contradicts the experience of animal trainers and others who work with animals on a daily basis. Moreover, their “folk knowledge” of the animals with whom we live, often criticized as sentimental or anthropomorphic, is supported by recent advances in the scientific study of animal behavior. Researchers increasingly find – as Darwin and evolutionary theory would suggest – that the basics of rational thought, communication, culture and self-consciousness are present in non-human species. In other words, the differences between “us” and “them” have been exaggerated. The breakdown of a stark divide might have consequences for how we human beings treat our fellow creatures.

*The deadline to apply for HNRC Signature Seminars is Friday, April 3. Application link.


HNRC 4013H-002: BAD MEDICINE

Professor: Tricia Starks

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

Hippocrates (460-370 BC) divided the art of medicine into three factors — the disease, the patient and the physician. Patients, literally the ones who "suffer," gave themselves up to the physician’s knowledge, skill and craft. Yet in these early days, there was precious little that the physician could do besides follow the Hippocratic dictum to “first do no harm.” Even in that, they often failed. Still, having the ability merely to name the dread disease from which a ruler or loved one suffered, physicians gained power.

Entering the modern era of nation states, European rulers increasingly saw the wealth of their nations as measured by having people to serve soberly, healthfully and quiescently in militaries and factories. Medical authorities became tools of the state in this quest for power; science was employed to define behaviors and peoples as unhealthy even when there was little medical evidence to justify these views. Bad Medicine will demonstrate how those who disturbed order or menaced authority were medically defined as deficient, abnormal or aberrant and in need of a "cure." Students will explore how modern Western states used medicine to define and control their subjects, to incarcerate and harm those seen as deficient and to sterilize and kill those considered dangerous.

*The deadline to apply for HNRC Signature Seminars is Friday, April 3. Application link.


HNRC 4013H-003: LITTLE THINGS THAT CHANGED THE WORLD

Professor: Chaim Goodman-Strauss

Colloquium Type: Natural Sciences or Social Sciences

Consider a simple piece of string — hardly a technological marvel or a centerpiece of modern civilization! But string is old, and just try to make some. People of the paleolithic "String Revolution,'' beginning at least 44,000 years ago, worked out rope, thread, needle, cloth, clothes, nets, snares, lines, bags, straps, and handles, not to mention fancy hats, embroidery and beadwork, all refined over tens of thousands more years.

Or take the sugar cube — once a treasure in the global luxury goods trade, soon a driver of empire, genocide and an especially brutal form of slavery, later a standardized staple for a rising middle class, a symbol of 1960s psychedelic culture, and today a heavily subsidized agribusiness commodity.

The paperclip, the haircut, a leash, a fork, a needle, a flute, a button, the second, dice, beer, sauerkraut, ammonia, gears, chiles, wire, plastic bags ... any of these and many more banal little things will be our windows into our highly interconnected human experience.

It is amazing and humbling that within arms reach, at any time, we can touch the intellectual product of millions of minds across tens of millennia, building the technological world we live in today. Let's take a closer look.

*The deadline to apply for HNRC Signature Seminars is Friday, April 3. Application link.


HNRC 4013H-004: INTIMACIES

Professor: Lisa Corrigan

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences

When FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover began authorizing wiretaps on civil rights leaders like Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1962, he had hoped to find ties to international communists. Instead of any communist ties, his entirely white FBI found themselves recording and commenting on black civil rights leaders’ intimate lives to manufacture political leverage against them.

This seminar charts moments like this one between Hoover and King to understand how intimacy shaped politics at mid-century. We see intimacy as a primarily political project where feelings create closeness and distance in deeply politicized ways that shape public understandings of iconic public figures. Those who relate through this sense of political intimacy have shared spaces, touches, interests, politics, fetishes, conflicts, promises, memories and affections.

This course examines the production and circulation of social and political intimacies from multiple perspectives. It offers a partial historiography of intimacy using several touch points in the mid-twentieth century as case studies to understand how intimacy has been framed, celebrated, repressed, weaponized and liberated. 


Fall 2020 Colloquia


ARHS 3923H-001/ARHS 4973-001: PORTRAITS AND PERSONHOOD

Professor: Abra Levenson

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

Who am I? Who are you? What does it mean to be human? Are there certain essential truths that define a person, or is identity a constant negotiation between mind and body, inside and outside, nature and culture, self and other? How do we constitute the self, and how do we make ourselves legible to others? Such questions sit at the heart of portraiture, one of the most ubiquitous and universal modes of visual representation. This class considers the theory and practice of portrait making from its origins in the Renaissance to the selfie culture of the present. Using a diverse set of case studies as our guide, ranging from Albrecht Dürer to Kehinde Wiley, Paul Cézanne and Lorna Simpson to Andy Warhol, Leonardo, Cindy Sherman, and Gertrude Stein, we will explore how portraiture has produced and informed conceptions of identity and representation, individuality and collectivity, at crucial junctures in the history of art. Key topics include: the emergence of the modern concept of the individual and the mythos of the artist-genius; the performance and construction of race, class, and gender; discourses around mimesis, realism, abstraction, and symbolism; and intersections between the body and the body politic. 

Close reading of texts (both primary and secondary, historical and theoretical) will be balanced with careful analysis of artworks and objects, and we will make several trips together to visit Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art and other area collections.

 For more information, contact Professor Abra Levenson at levenson@uark.edu.


ENGL 3923H-001: CREATIVE NONFICTION, OR COOL BOOKS ABOUT STUFF THAT REALLY HAPPENED

Professor: Sidney Burris

Colloquium Type: Humanities

For one semester, we’re going to read some of the coolest—the most important critical term I know—books in English.  And all of these books are about stuff that actually happened:  personal triumphs and tragedies, art-fights, culture wars, biology, graduation, music, love, and death. The class is discussion-based and will focus on the artful purpose and construction of the English paragraph, one of the most overlooked elements of our prose tradition. The course requirements include a few brief, in-class writing assignments, two paragraphs written at home, and a final essay.


ENGL 3923H-002/ENGL 3873-001: MEDICAL HUMANITIES COLLOQUIUM

Professor: Casey Lee Kayser

Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course combines literary and critical texts that attend to the social rather than technical aspects of medicine, focusing on such topics as the human condition, personal dignity, social responsibility, cultural diversity, and the history of medicine. Through readings, class discussion, writing activities, and first-hand observation, students will practice critical analysis and reflection to instill in them a commitment to compassionate, community responsive, and culturally competent medical care. This course requires a service-learning component that involves close interaction with a physician at a local clinic and service hours at a local agency in addition to the classroom time commitment. Spots in the course are reserved for premedical students. Please contact Dr. Kayser at ckayser@uark.edu to inquire about the availability of spots for the Fall.


HIST 3923H-001: LIFE IN NAZI-OCCUPIED EUROPE

Professor: Richard Sonn

Colloquium Type: Humanities

Within a year of the invasion of Poland in September 1939, which began World War II, the Germans occupied most of the continent of Europe.  Much of Europe was thus occupied for four years or more.  What was life like under the Nazis? Were most people resisters, collaborators, or simply bystanders?   This course will use diaries and memoirs as well as some secondary sources to explore how the French, Italians, Poles, Jews and Germans themselves experienced daily life under the Nazis.  Students will write one shorter paper based on class readings and a longer final paper that involves primary sources. 


HUMN 3923H-001/HUMN 425V-003: OUTER WILDER: PLAYING WITH IDENTITY IN INDIE VIDEO GAMES

Professor: David Fredrick

Colloquium Type: Humanities

This honors colloquium explores the construction of body, agency, and identity in a (very) select set of independent video games.  How do you, as a player, come to feel “embodied” in these games, and given a sense that you can do things...and are responsible for these actions?  How does this player-body come to have gender and a sexual identity through game narrative and mechanics--and is this sex/gender position open to question?  How is a sense of a stable body-world relationship challenged?  It turns out that these issues are closely connected to memory and the perception of causality.  Finally, is there an ethical point to this?  Contrary to the (dated) stereotype of video games as driven by violence and committed to a male, white, western player-self, these indie games construct a fluid, multiple, and (often) contradictory player-self/body.  The class will address how this intersects with contemporary issues of environment, inclusion, equality, and human rights, arguing for the increasingly important political voice of indie video games.

Games will include Dear Esther, Disco Elysium, Gone Home, Life is Strange, The Outer Wilds, Tacoma, and What Remains of Edith Finch. Required readings include Rules of Play, Salen and Zimmerman (pdf selections); Gaming Representation: Race, Gender, and Sexuality in Video Games (eds. Malkowski and Russworm); Feminist Frequency (selections), Anita Sarkeesian; Eugenie Shinkle, Essays (pdf selections); and Game reviews and articles from Polygon, Rock-Paper-Shotgun, Kotaku, Gamasutra, etc.


HUMN 3923H-002/HUMN 425V-002: INTRODUCTION TO GAME DESIGN I

Professor: David Fredrick

Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course provides an introduction to the theory and practice of creating video games. Over the course of the semester we will explore the fundamental role of rules, play, art, and narrative in games, examine and critique representative video games in depth, and contemplate the decisions designers must make using the principles of game design. We will also put these principles into practice by building a series of basic 3D games!   Students will acquire an understanding of the production pipeline used for contemporary video games, including level design, modeling and texturing 3D assets, lighting, scripting the most common forms of interactivity, and creating a user interface; students will then see how these elements come together in a game engine to create the experience we all know.

Required Readings include Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals, Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman; The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses, Jesse Schell; Wonderbook: The Illustrated Guide to Creating Imaginative Fiction, Jeff Vandermeer; and Selected PDFs from Introduction to Game Design, Prototyping, and Development, Jeremy Gibson.


HUMN 3923H-003: TIBETAN BUDDHIST PHILOSOPHY AND CULTURE

Professor: Thupten Dorjee

Colloquium Type: Humanities

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture.


JOUR 3923H-001: GOVERNMENT AND THE MEDIA

Professor: Gina H. Shelton

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences

With the backdrop of the 2020 presidential election, this class will examine relations between the media, politics and government, with analysis of the power, responsibility and performance of the media. Topics include evolving media technologies and trends like fake news, use of freedom of information laws, money in politics, international press and influence, and coverage of courts, Congress and the White House.


JOUR 3923H-003/JOUR 405V-006: LITERATURE OF JOURNALISM

Professor: Bret Schulte

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

A survey of superior works of book and magazine-length narrative non-fiction, from the mid-19th century to today. Includes such authors as Hersey, Didion, Orlean, and Conover.


JOUR 3923H-004/JOUR 4483-001: ISSUES IN ADVERTISING AND PR

Professor: Jan Wicks

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences

 The primary goal of Issues in Advertising & Public Relations is to increase your awareness of the effects of the advertising and public relations industries and their messages on society. You’ll be encouraged to think about the implications of what you do when you create an advertisement or public relations message or campaign. You’ll read classic readings as well as current examples of major social, economic, cultural and/or ethical issues regarding advertising and public relations. You’ll develop a social marketing plan in teams to educate the public about a particular social problem for a nonprofit or educational entity. This helps you learn how advertising and public relations messages can be used to help society. You’ll write an individual literature review paper on a different topic (which can be the basis for a literature review for your thesis).


PSYC 3923H-001: PETS AND PEOPLE

Professor: Denise Beike

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences or Natural Sciences

Are pets just like our best friends, or our children? Do they think of us in return as their BFFs, or their parents? Do working animals enjoy their jobs? And are relationships with companion animals good for either of us, pets or people? Modern psychological and neuroscience research techniques allow us to answer these questions with hard data. This course will be a scientific approach to the psychology of relationships with companion and helper animals, spiked with first-hand experiences. Planned topics include the psychological and physical benefits of pet ownership for owners and for pets, how our relationships with pets are similar to and different from our relationships with humans, communication between people and pets, the training and effectiveness of therapy and service animals, the controversy surrounding emotional support animals, and the ethics of having a pet.

We will discuss primary readings from the psychological and neuroscience literature, which mostly focuses on dogs. There will also be videos, visitors/guest lecturers, and possibly a field trip to a local pet-relevant organization.  And, we will all work together as a single research team to design and execute our own novel scientific study about the relationship between people and pets! Your grade will be based on small weekly assignments, one in-class exam, one informal research write-up, and class participation.

**Students with animal allergies or phobias should be aware that live animals (under the control of their owners/trainers) will occasionally be present in class by invitation of Dr. Beike, and field trips and research may involve being near animals. Students who are uncomfortable in the presence of animals should discuss their concerns with Dr. Beike in advance of the semester.***  

Spring 2020 Honors College Signature Seminars


 HNRC 4013 001 / PLSC 399VH: CHURCH AND STATE

Professor: Mark Killenbeck

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences

In 1952 Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas (in)famously declared that “we are a religious people whose institutions presuppose a Supreme Being.” That statement was accurate at the time. It correctly expressed the worldview of a largely homogeneous American polity that assumed the existence of a single Christian deity and couched its conceptions of religious liberty in the light of that vision. But the assumptions that animated the nation in 1952, and shaped the Supreme Court’s approach to church-state relations for the next several decades, have become tenuous at best in an increasingly diverse nation whose composition more accurately reflects a multiplicity of views and beliefs. The goal of this Signature Seminar will be to shed light on what a contemporary understanding of the “separation of Church and State” should be in a nation that respects all creeds and is sincerely interested in protecting the “free exercise of religion.” The primary focus will be on the Religion Clause decisions of the Supreme Court, supplemented by readings tracing the history and development of the operative principles and rules since the Founding Era.  Settled expectations will be challenged, and an irreverent approach to matters of religious reverence will be the rule, rather than the exception.

*The deadline to apply for HNRC Signature Seminars is Friday, November 1. Application link


HNRC 4013 002 / ARHS 4983H: GOTHIC

Professors: Lynda Coon and Kim Sexton

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences or Humanities

On April 15, 2019, the spire of Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris collapsed after a devastating fire broke out underneath its lead roof. Gone too is the thirteenth-century timber-roof framing, a monument to the technical sophistication of medieval builders. Just days afterward, controversies over the building’s future went global: Should it be restored exactly as it was before the fire? Is it ethical to spend a billion Euros to bring a medieval building back from a brush with oblivion? How did a thirteenth-century monument to Catholic power become a symbol of a modern, ethnically diverse nation?

Is it all because Notre-Dame is GOTHIC?

This Signature Seminar takes an interdisciplinary approach to the study of Gothic art and architecture as a cultural phenomenon. Starting with Abbot Suger’s renovation of the royal abbey church of St.-Denis in Paris (1140) and culminating in the architectural extravagance of America’s collegiate Gothic campuses, seminar participants will tackle medieval building and medievalism from a variety of topics, including architecture as it relates to theology, technology, gender, nationalism and revolution.

The seminar offers an optional field trip to Chicago, where participants will experience the Neo-Gothic culture of an American city that had its own do-over after the Great Fire of 1871. Sites include the University of Chicago campus, Rockefeller Chapel, Chicago Tribune Tower and the skyscraper First Methodist Church.

The final unit of the semester will return to the subject of the Notre Dame fire and its multivalent meaning. What does restoring Notre Dame actually mean? And how does the training provided in “Gothic” complexify contemporary understandings of globally renowned buildings and social movements? Get your seat now in Gothic and find out!

*The deadline to apply for HNRC Signature Seminars is Friday, November 1. Application link


HNRC 4013 003 / ANTH 3923H: VIOLENCE

Professor: Ram Natarajan

Colloquium Type: Social Sciences

This seminar takes an anthropological look at violence and social suffering, focusing first on how societies institute and define injury and then on the consequences and afterlives of violence for those who inflict harm, those who suffer abuses and those whose existences are implicated with violence despite being neither victim nor perpetrator. Our main objectives are to study violence in a global context and to scrutinize how and why certain forms of violence get ignored and others get condemned and repaired: in other words, why and how societies accept or sanction certain forms of violence, but castigate, denounce or make invisible others. Topics to be covered include torture, trauma, colonial violence, animal violence, climate change, terror and non-violence. Our overall concern will be how violence encompasses more than bodily harm and becomes a long-term process that is part of everyday life.

*The deadline to apply for HNRC Signature Seminars is Friday, November 1. Application link


Spring 2020 Honors Colloquia Courses


ARHS 3923H 001 / ARHS 4973 001: FRENCH POSSESSIONS: ART AND COLONIZATION FROM THE 18th-20th CENTURIES

Professor: Allan Patrick Doyle

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course examines French art and visual culture ranging from encounter images to the Universal Exposition of 1931 through the lens of colonialism. Its geographic span encompasses North Africa, the Middle East, Polynesia, the Caribbean, and the Americas. Drawing on primary and secondary sources, we will consider how key works of French art were generated within a continuously evolving visual rhetoric charged by issues of racial, cultural, and gender difference. Our objects of study will vary from popular consumables, to luxury goods and high art; from ephemera to enduring National institutions and monuments. We will look for ways to complicate the colonizer-colonized binary by locating sites of contestation and circuits of exchange between France and its colonies. Close reading of texts will be combined with rigorous, historically sensitive analysis of artworks throughout the semester.


ARHS 3923H 002 / PLSC 3923H 002 / HIST 3923H 003: MUSEUM MATTERS

Professor: Bill McComas

Colloquium Type: Social Science

Museums have been sources of fascination and wonder for centuries and are among the most visited cultural institutions.  However, few of even the most ardent museum-goers have likely given much to thought to their history, purpose, and what happens behind the scenes.  Museum Matters is an introduction to museology or the study of museums.  We will consider the history of museum, goals and rationales of museums, examine distinct museum types, discuss the notions of collections, displays and exhibitions and consider the occasional controversies in the museum context.  In addition, we will address employment opportunities, architecture, educational challenges, legal issues and other socio-culture aspects of the wide world of museums.  This museum experience is highly inter-disciplinary with students bringing perspectives from several departments, but class size is limited.

We will meet late afternoons on Tu/Th and often hear from local curators in class on one day and visiting the site on another.  Note that occasionally on Thursdays we may leave campus earlier than our scheduled meeting time extend class somewhat to accommodate field trips to regional museums.  In addition to these visits we will spend some time in the UA museum storage facility and take a funded overnight trip leaving Friday and returning late on Saturday (TBD) to see museum types we do not yet have in NW Arkansas.  You will leave this class with many new insights, a new museum vocabulary, and probably never see museums in the same way again.


CLST 4003H 001: ANCIENT GREEK COMEDY

Professor: Daniel Levine

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

We also might call this class ARISTOPHANES.COM, because we will be reading “Old Attic Comedy,” which is only fully extant in the plays of Aristophanes of Athens. His eleven plays have a lot to tell us about his society, and our own. We will read the existing comedies of Aristophanes and Douglas MacDowell’s Aristophanes and Athens, which will provide important literary, historical and social context. In class we will re-enact selected scenes from each play, reading the roles aloud, to get a feel for what the audience might have experienced in Athens' Theater of Dionysus during the last years of the 5th century BCE. We will look at Comedy in TEXT and CONTEXT. That is, our discussions will first concentrate on the evidence in the works themselves. These original texts will cause us to ask certain questions about intent, staging, and social/political/literary references. We will ask questions of the text as we read, and address these issues together, and then look at what Douglas MacDowell has to say about these issues in his Aristophanes and Athens. All readings are in English.

Admission to this honors colloquium is by permission only. Contact Dr. Levine: dlevine@uark.edu.


COMM 3923H 001: PATIENT-PROVIDER COMMUNICATION

Professor: Trish Amason

Colloquium Type: Social Science

Colloquium in Patient-Provider Communication examines the processes and complexities of health communication with an applied health professional focus. The goals of this course are to provide an understanding of the theories related to effectively communicating health information as well as learning the skills needed to initiate and maintain interpersonal and inter-professional relationships with patients, families, and other providers.

This course will evaluate and explore the multidimensional processes used to create, maintain, and transform complex scientific realities into everyday health care information for providers, patients, families, and so forth. In this course, you will be expected to (a) read the assigned texts and research articles; (b) work in small groups to develop class presentations; (c) actively participate in class and group discussions; (d) complete written assignments in APA style; and (e) stay informed about course information (policies, assignments, revisions, and grades) via Blackboard and your uark email.


ENGL 3923H 003: SHAKESPEARE’S HISTORY PLAYS

Professor: Joseph Candido

Colloquium Type: Humanities

In this course we shall read and discuss at least eight of Shakespeare’s English history plays in the order in which they were written, starting with the so-called “first tetralogy” (1, 2, and 3 Henry VI and Richard III).  We will then move on to his great sequence of history plays, and the works on which his reputation as an historical dramatist largely rests (Richard II, 1 and 2 Henry IV, and Henry V).  These eight plays, taken together and considered in chronological order, constitute one long, continuous historical sequence.  Our concentration will be not only on Shakespeare’s development as an historical dramatist, but also on the distinctive literary features of the plays—their extraordinary poetic qualities as well as their great achievements in characterization.  We will also pay attention to the plays as literary works written for the Elizabethan public stage.  No previous knowledge of Shakespeare is required.  The course is open to all majors.  Class assignments will consist of short oral reports, short papers, and one longish (15-20 page) critical paper on a subject of the student’s choice.


HIST 3923H 001: HISTORY OF ADDICTION

Professor: Trish Starks

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

“Addiction” is a term dependent on historical context. Alternatively termed “dependency,” “habit,” or “weakness” and seen as everything from biological disease to moral failing, the language of addiction, the signs of “dependency,” the substances of “habit,” and the treatments for “weakness” have been contingent on the medical, political, social, and cultural contexts. In this course, students will examine the history of different “addictive” substances – from chocolate, cocaine, and tobacco to alcohol, gambling, and opioids – and investigate the ways in which diagnoses of addiction, treatment of addicts, and state responses to addictive substances have changed over time.

This course will count towards requirements in honors, history, and medical humanities.


HIST 3923H 004: MODERN U.S. WEST

Professor: Steven Rosales

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

The U.S. West has steadily remained a celebrated and mythologized spatial environment, typified by Manifest Destiny and continental expansion. This course, however,  will critically analyze that celebratory narrative by viewing the modern U.S. West from the vantage point of those deemed "conquered, " including LatinX and Asian/American communities, immigrants, Native Americans, the environment, and other marginalized groups, in settings both rural and urban. Also, American notions of  masculinity have been deeply interwoven with our ideas about the West. And yet, a wide variety of sexual and gendered behaviors have occured, often leading to the formation of urban safe havens such as the Castro district in San Francisco. Moreover, the study of the above subaltern groups will intersect with a simultaneous exploration of labor history (i.e., miners, migrant farmworkers, Arkies/Okies) in tandem with the growth of neo-liberalism and the political conservative apparatus that enabled free enterprise in the U.S. West while solidifying a hardened and politicized U.S.-Mexican border. I have selected a diverse range of historical scholarship, methodology, and theoretical approaches that reflect the diverse ways in which scholars have addressed the modern U.S. West from the Gold Rush to the present day.


HUMN 3923H 001: GAME DESIGN II

Professor: David Fredrick

Colloquium Type: Humanities

Building on the concepts and projects of Game Design 1, this course will provide theoretical and practical understanding of deeper issues in game design, including the procedural rhetoric of video games, critical modeling of systems through game play, game balancing, and storytelling through level design and game art.  In terms of practical content-creation skills, we will go deeper into C# coding the Unity3d game engine, as well as common workflows for modeling assets in Blender and then bringing these into Unity. As part of the humanities focus of our approach in Tesseract, we will also introduce you to the unique challenges involved in representing historical content through the artwork, story, and mechanics of video games.  This involves a game project based specifically on a global mythological text (Mahabharata, Odyssey, Táin Bó Cúailnge, Popol Vuh), with a critical eye on issues of diversity and inclusion in AAA and indie video games.  This course places an emphasis on group-based work. Virtually every game made these days is built by a team, sometimes 2-6, sometimes 200-500. The ability to do collaborative work, efficiently and positively, between team members involves fundamental social ("soft") and practical skills.  It is an absolute necessity in game development, and this course will introduce students to agile/scrum methodology, including Slack and Trello for project management.  While Game Design I is not required for this class, to be admitted students without this course must demonstrate familiarity with the Unity3d game engine, the basics of game programming, and 3D modeling software.


HUMN 3923H 002: THE UNIVERSE IN A SINGLE ATOM

Professor: Thupten Dorjee

Colloquia Type: Humanities or Social Science

Following decades of intensive workshops between leading academics and His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the Universe in a Single Atom is the culmination of the mutual understanding and communication between two traditions that have increasingly found common ground in their pursuit of truth through analysis and reason. The course will follow the main presentations on cosmology, metaphysics, epistemology, and consciousness that are explored in the book while providing a thorough background of the covered information in a format suited for undergraduate coursework. Students will not only learn about the major philosophical tenets of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many activities that enhance their abilities for critical thinking and reasoning in the same way that Tibetan scholars have for nearly a millennium.


HUMN 3923H 003 / HUMN 425V 004 / JOUR 405V 004: WRITING HISTORY AND MAKING FILMS

Professors: Sidney Burris and Craig Pasquinzo

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This innovative course and film-lab will introduce students to the two fundamental skills that structure the most important media outlets that we consult on a daily basis:  historical research and basic video editing skills.  No prior knowledge of film-editing is required.  The course will require two projects that dynamically support and enrich one another:  1) a paper that explores your personal response to the assigned book by Ama Adhe (8-10 pp.) and that will supply the background for 2) a documentary film (5-10 minutes).  The course will focus on the Tibetan refugee situation and will use the extensive film archives of The TEXT Program (Tibetans in Exile Today)—the University’s oral-history project that chronicles the lives of Tibetan refugees currently living in India, and is directed Professor Sidney Burris, one of the instructors of the class. For the documentary film, students will be given access to these archives and photographs that include not only interviews with Tibetans, but hours of footage from The TEXT Program’s travels throughout India—all of this material will be available to students in the class, as they organize their paper and design their film.


HUMN 3923H 004: IMMERSIVE RETAIL

Professor: David Fredrick

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Whether it is called experiential, contextual, living, seamless, or immersive, the “new” retail is moving away from traditional, large-inventory, brick & mortar stores toward new forms of shopper engagement driven by personalization and immersive experiences.  To create these experiences, Immersive Retail will leverage a new kind of integrated storytelling that traverses the physical, the augmented, and the virtual, with a corresponding emphasis on digital platforms and devices.  As the second semester of Immersive Retail, this course will build on the AR and WebGL (3D web content) prototypes developed in the first semester, with the goal of bringing these applications to a playable, near-release worthy condition by the end of the semester, working with a local entrepreneur who makes artisan chocolate.  In addition, working with Tesseract staff and an interdisciplinary faculty team, students will develop and construct a popup retail structure to host the AR content, as well as a prototype VR application.  Drawing on contemporary retail theory, we will explore how AR, WebGL, and VR digital content can work together with a physical space to create designed experiences that are coherent and compelling.  The primary software used will include Adobe XD and the Unity3d game engine, but students DO NOT NEED to have taken the first semester of Immersive Retail to take this semester.  Rather, a serious interest in communication and storytelling in these new forms of digital media is essential, and a willingness to work hard as part of an interdisciplinary team.


MUSC 3923H 001: MUSIC AND WAR

Professor: Micaela Baranello

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

For centuries, and across different cultures, music has both served war and illustrated its victories and terror. Music has also provided powerful commentary of war, articulating human pain and protest in equal measure. In this class we consider these functions in key works of art and popular music of the 19th and 20th centuries -- a period of nationalism, revolution and two world wars -- as well as our own contemporary experience with the war in Iraq. We discuss music of war; about war; and in the shadow of war.


PHIL 3923H 001: ECHO CHAMBERS

Professor: Eric Funkhouser

Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

Echo chambers are distorted epistemic environments in which favored beliefs are reinforced through selective exposure to evidence, repetition, and other influences. For example, your news aggregator refers you to stories that are very similar to ones you spent time reading in the past, and it fails to recommend stories similar to those that you have avoided in the past. Or, your Facebook friends disproportionately post content favorable to your political views, and they tend to “like” your political posts. This colloquium is about the distorting effects that modern media consumption – especially digital media – has on our political, scientific, and everyday beliefs. We will especially examine, on the user end, the influences of cognitive and motivational biases, self-deception, and tribal identities. On the side of content production, we will consider the dangers of machine learning, deep fakes, propaganda, and other forms of misinformation. We will study effects such as belief polarization, extremism, conspiracy theories, information cascades, and fake news. As this is a philosophy course, our focus will be on issues in epistemology (theory of knowledge) and philosophy of mind. Though, the course is also highly interdisciplinary, with several readings from the empirical sciences.


PHYS 3923H 001: ECLIPSES AND THE HISTORY OF ASTRONOMY

Professor: Daniel Kennefick

Colloquium Type: Natural Science

This class will discuss the role of eclipses of the Sun and Moon in the development of Astronomy over the ages. We will discuss ancient ideas on eclipses and the possibility that their existence helped give birth to the science of Astronomy. In the classical period the development of astronomy proceeded to the point where eclipses could be predicted in advance, which is part of a story which includes the invention of calendars. In the middle ages we have quite a few records of eclipses and a comparative study of different societies and their reactions to eclipses will be made. In the modern period eclipses figure repeatedly as exemplars of human power over the material and social worlds through scientific knowledge. Columbus is said to have overawed the natives of the Caribbean through successfully predicting an eclipse. 19th century Astrophysics developed considerably through expeditions to study the Sun during eclipses. Finally, the 1919 eclipse expedition to test Einstein's theory of General Relativity, which we will study in detail, brought eclipses to the forefront of world popular attention. The modern science of eclipses will be presented, but without any technical or mathematical prerequisites. The 2017 eclipse will be witnessed by enormous numbers of people, stimulating public interest in astronomy and science. In 2024 a total solar eclipse will pass through the state of Arkansas, providing a unique opportunity for Arkansans to witness one of the solar system's rarest events, since only Earth has a Moon which can provide such a remarkable show, just perfectly eclipsing the Sun's disk.


PLSC 3923H 003 / MEST 4003H 001: PROTEST, POLITICS AND THE STRUGGLE FOR SYRIA

Professor: Najib Ghadbian

Colloquium Type: Social Science

The Syrian protest movement of 2011 has unexpectedly become one of the most complex and deadly conflicts in the Middle East today. The conflict in Syria created the largest humanitarian disaster since World War II. Conservatives estimates suggest that over six hundred thousand people have been killed and more than half of country’s population displaced, with over five million refugees. This conflict fueled sectarian hostility, Islamic extremism, and rivalry among regional and international powers and destabilized the region. This course seeks to examine the conflict in Syria in all its dimensions with a focus on the regional and international competition and the rise and fall of ISIS.


PLSC 3923H 001: POLITICAL AUTHORITARIANISM

Professor: Jeff Ryan

Colloquium Type: Social Science

This colloquium engages the phenomenon of authoritarian politics from a diverse array of perspectives across three broad vistas: structures, people and dynamics. It begins with a survey of the institutional varieties of autocratic rule, both historical and contemporary. What are the philosophies and structures that underpin states described variously as personalist, theocratic, bureaucratic-authoritarian, fascist and communist? What about so-called ‘hybrid’ regimes? Is totalitarianism a subset of authoritarianism or an entirely different ‘species’? Next we’ll focus on the human factor, namely the various types of people one encounters in societies marked by authoritarian rule. What can we say about the lifestyles, viewpoints and behaviors of not just those in charge, but of regime loyalists, resisters, apparatchiks and victims? We turn then to the dynamics of authoritarian systems across time. What accounts for regime persistence or results in failure/withdrawal? What are the various trajectories regimes take when authoritarian rule ends? And how do societies react to such situations? Decisions about what to do in the aftermath of dictatorial interludes occur in profoundly sensitive moral and political environments. How do post-authoritarian societies try to balance demands for justice with a perceived need for stability? Who decides? Lastly, we’ll try to tie together the insights we’ve gleaned about autocracies past and present in such a way that we can offer some predictions about the future of authoritarian politics in the global community.

Please note that this is a colloquium, not a lecture-based course, with most of the final course grade comprised of class participation. Interested students will be asked to complete a short form which can be obtained from Dr. Jeff Ryan (jeffr@uark.edu).

Summer 2019 Honors Colloquia Courses


ENGL 3923H 001: BEST PRACTICES FOR BEGINNING WRITERS

Professor: Geffrey Davis

Colloquium Type: Humanities

 This course aims to demystify the professional literary world, from the perspective of the beginning writer. Students will conduct preliminary research on exciting publication opportunities and post-graduation prospects that fit both their aesthetic tastes and personal ambitions as writers. We will also address how to find (or create) an active literary community after graduation


WLLC 3923H / WLIT 603V 001: LITERATURE AND HUMAN RIGHTS

Professor: Luis Restrepo

Colloquium Type: Humanities

The course reflects on the intersections of literature and human rights, examining human rights as a modern discourse of global reach and its philosophical and political foundations.  Literature and the arts offer valuable insights regarding human nature, humanity and human dignity.  A fundamental question is whose lives matter?  The course will consider the ethical and pedagogical implications of human rights discourses and practices in the classroom.  In addition to a selection of literary texts such as Waiting for the Barbarians by J. M Coetzee and Senselessness by H Castellanos Moya, we will examine related works of art, photography and film.


August Intersession 2019 Honors College Signature Seminar


HNRC 4013H 004: GHOST HUNTING

Professor: Misty Bastian

Colloquium Type:  Social Sciences or Humanities

This Honors College Signature Seminar will explore the history and practice of ghost hunting in the United States, looking specifically at what the efflorescence of paranormal research in America can tell us about intersecting topics like gender, race, class and social memory during the 21st century. Along the way, we will do some participant-observation with local ghost hunters and on ghost tourism in Northwest Arkansas. There are no guarantees that we will meet a real ghost in those hands-on explorations, of course, but we will keep open minds, just in case. We will address the following topics during our 11-day intersession seminar: Ghost Hunting 101: An Introduction to the Practice; Long, Black Veil: American Ghost Folklore and Storytelling; Spiritualism and the Roots of Contemporary Ghost Hunting in the U.S.; Ghosts of Gettysburg: Ghost Tourism and “Paranormal Playgrounds;” and Spectral Intersectionality: Working Class Whiteness and the Gender of Investigation.

*The deadline to apply for this HNRC Intersession Signature Seminar is June 1.  Application link 


Fall 2019 Honors College Signature Seminars


HNRC 4013H 001: SHEDUNNIT 

Professors: Padma Viswanathan and Justin Barnum

Colloquia Type: Humanities or Social Science

Who do you picture when you hear the phrase “woman criminal?” Bonnie with Clyde and a smoking gun or Alice Paul jailed campaigning for women’s suffrage? A battered wife taking revenge or Alex from Orange is the New Black? Drawing on sociological and literary perspectives, this course will explore how women criminals are made and how they are perceived, what motivates them and how they see themselves. Using the sociological imagination (Mills 1959) as a means of entering unfamiliar spaces and writing creative works on women and crime, we will look for answers to why and how women are labeled “criminal,” and for what crimes.

*The deadline to apply for HNRC Signature Seminars is Friday, March 29.  Application link 


HNRC 4013H 002: ENGINEERING ANTIQUITY 

Professor: Kevin Hall

Colloquium Type: Natural Sciences or Social Sciences

 The National Academy of Engineering's list of “grand challenges” facing the world today includes items such as urban infrastructure, access to clean water and the development of tools for scientific discovery.  While cast as modern problems, these issues -- and others -- plagued ancient societies as well. Basic societal needs – adequate food supplies and safe drinking water, reliable spaces to live and work, efficient transportation and communication networks, and protection from enemies -- have remained relevant and constant throughout the ages.  This course will examine how ancient societies met these challenges through technological advancement, and draw comparisons between these ancient modes of problem solving and those we use today.  But just as technological solutions from antiquity might inform our present efforts, consequences arising from those solutions must also inform us today. With this in mind, seminar participants will consider shifting our focus from “can we build it?” to “should we build it? “Engineering Antiquity” is a history of technology course with history of mathematics and science built in.

*The deadline to apply for HNRC Signature Seminars is Friday, March 29. Application link


HNRC 4013H 003: FASCISTS  

Professor: Kelly Hammond

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

This Signature Seminar is designed to introduce students to the ideological underpinnings and historical contexts surrounding the rise and spread of fascism in the 1930s and 1940s. We will also interrogate the ways that academics and politicians have written and talked about fascism from the 1950s through to the present. The comparative study of fascism has undergone significant changes in the last decades, both opening up new research opportunities and posing novel challenges. One of these main research avenues has been fascist internationalism, which focuses on the interactions, entanglements and cooperation among fascism movements and regimes, at various formal or informal political levels. In this class, fascist internationalism will be our starting point, and a frame for conversations about broad themes such as gender, art and architecture, animals, science, militarism, children, colonialism, socialism, religion and, of course, politics. This course examines the history of the rise of “fascism” in the 1930s-1940s with an eye toward today’s political scene. 

*The deadline to apply for HNRC Signature Seminars is Friday, March 29. Application link


Fall 2019 Honors Colloquia Courses


 ARHS 3923H 001: IMAGES OF WOMEN IN REMBRANDT’S HOLLAND

Professor: Lynn Jacobs
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This colloquium will examine the wide variety of depictions of women in Dutch art of the seventeenth century, the golden age of Dutch painting.  We will consider how women are represented as housewives, maids, prostitutes, potential wives, mothers, and saleswomen, and what meanings were associated with the scenes of women dancing, drinking, writing letters, making music, seeing doctors, and cleaning their homes -- all extremely popular themes in Dutch art of this time.  Some of the artists whose works will be studied include Rembrandt, Hals, Vermeer, Pieter de Hooch, Jan Steen, and Ter Borch; special attention will be given to women artists in seventeenth-century Holland, particularly Judith Leyster.  Students will have the opportunity to study a specific thematic strand within the imagery of women and to give a presentation of their findings.

This year's colloquium may include a fully-funded class trip to view the newly installed Dutch seventeenth-century galleries at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. (contingent on receiving approval from the Walton Family Foundation).


CHEM 3923H: Molecular Gastronomy

Intstructors: Joshua Sakon and Ya-Jane Wang

Natural Science Colloquium

Our colloquium seeks to explore the physical and chemical transformations of ingredients that occur while cooking. Cooking enables starch gelatinization in our staple foods, such as rice, bread and potato, for easy digestion of starch for energy release. Cooking denatures protein and inactivates protein inhibitors for efficient protein utilization. Cooking concentrates flavors through oil extraction. Moreover, because cooking incorporates unique ingredients and techniques to highlight the culture and history of each region and country, one can also learn a lot about the culture and history from the ingredients. And by watching how a chef cooks, chemistry questions emerge. For example, spices of Thai red curry dish include traditional Thai spices similar to ingredients found in green curry such as lemon grass, galangal, shrimp paste, and coriander seeds, but also include non-traditional spice such as cumin seeds imported from region spanning from east Mediterranean to India. Carotenoids in red pepper provided the color. Peppers reached Thailand as the result of the Columbian Exchange. Spice seeds are dry roasted in a frying pan or wok. Dry roasting triggers Maillard reaction in the food, changing their flavor and enhancing the scent and taste.


ENGL 3923H 001: COOL BOOKS ABOUT STUFF THAT REALLY HAPPENED (CREATIVE NONFICTION)

Professor: Sidney Burris

Colloquium Type: Humanities

For one semester, we’re going to read some of the coolest—the most important critical term I know—books in English.  And all of these books are about stuff that actually happened:  floods, fires, hurricanes, art-fights, culture wars, movies, graduation, music, love, and death.


HIST 3923H/7133 001: THE SIXTIES AS SOCIAL AND CULTURAL REVOLUTION

Professor: Richard Sonn

Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

The decade of the 1960s, best known for radical politics, witnessed a wide variety of challenges to the social and cultural status quo. Black power, feminism, the student and antiwar movements, and the counterculture all questioned fundamental tenets of Western society. We will see how the feminist slogan “the personal is political” was applicable to a wide variety of causes. At the same time, the civil rights movement and the New Left in Europe and America reinterpreted politics as participatory rather than simply electoral. Protest movements mobilized around the war in Vietnam. We will view the war through the eyes of American G.I.’s and a North Vietnamese woman doctor.


HUMN 3923H 001: IMMERSIVE RETAIL

Professor: David Fredrick

Colloquium Type: Humanities

A new course taught by Tesseract Center faculty and staff, School of Art design faculty, and gency professionals to explore building the immersive future of retail for real clients.  Exploration will involve a PopUP physical space, AR/VR content and eCommerce web development. 


HUMN 3923H 002: GAME DESIGN

Professor:  David Frederick

Colloquium Type:  Humanities 

Over the past decade, video games have emerged as the most lucrative form of popular media, and arguably one of the most culturally powerful.  This course provides a critical examination of the theory and practice of building video games, using the Unity game engine. Over the course of the semester we will explore the cultural role of play and games, critique several video games in depth, and discuss game design principles. We will also put these principles into practice by building a series of basic games (2D and 3D).  Along with a critical appreciation of the principles of design that shape interactive storytelling in contemporary video games, students will gain a hands-on grasp of the pipeline through which these games are made, including modeling and texturing 3D assets (in Cinema 4D and Photoshop), scripting the most common forms of interactivity, and creating a user interface. The course does not presume prior knowledge of game software or scripting, and is intended for students across the disciplines that contribute to games: Art, Architecture, Computer Science, English, History, Music, Theatre... Majors in these disciplines also stand to gain from learning about game design and the use of game engines for visualization.


HUMN 3923H 005: THE UNIVERSE IN A SINGLE ATOM

Professor: Geshe Thupten Dorjee

Colloquia Type: Humanities or Social Science

Following decades of intensive workshops between leading academics and His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the Universe in a Single Atom is the culmination of the mutual understanding and communication between two traditions that have increasingly found common ground in their pursuit of truth through analysis and reason. The course will follow the main presentations on cosmology, metaphysics, epistemology, and consciousness that are explored in the book while providing a thorough background of the covered information in a format suited for undergraduate coursework. Students will not only learn about the major philosophical tenets of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many activities that enhance their abilities for critical thinking and reasoning in the same way that Tibetan scholars have for nearly a millennium.


JOUR 3923H 001: GOVERNMENT AND THE MEDIA

Professor:  Gina H. Shelton

Colloquium Type: Social Science

This class examines relations between the media, politics and government, with analysis of the power, responsibility and performance of the media. Topics include evolving media technologies and trends like fake news, use of freedom of information laws, money in politics, international press and influence, and coverage of courts, Congress and the White House.


JOUR 3923H 003: LITERATURE OF JOURNALISM

Professor: Bret Schulte

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This seminar explores the growth of journalism as a field of literary pursuit, using the techniques that have long defined fiction. The semester consists of a survey of book and magazine-length narrative nonfiction from the mid-20th century to today. Authors include pioneering literary journalists, such as Hersey, Capote, Didion, as well as their successors, such as Frazier, Conover, and Orlean.


 MUSC 3923H 001: MUSIC AND THE MOVING IMAGE COURSE

Professor: Matthew Mihalka

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

In this course, we examine the synchronization of music with various forms of mass media, including film, television, video games, and music videos.  We explore how music is employed in such mediums both currently and historically, identifying the origins and common practices of melding music and visual images.  The basic process of creating a film score is illuminated, along with the necessary terminology to analyze the use of music in film and other visual media.  We will conduct several case studies of prominent film scores and examine the use of music during various types of television programs, such as news broadcasts, televised sports, commercials, and TV shows.  We will also analyze how music contributes to the immersive quality of video games and the varied approaches employed in creating music videos.


PLSC 3923H 001:  POLITICAL VIOLENCE

Professor: Jeffrey Ryan 

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science 

Please contact instructor (jeffr@uark.edu) for more information.

January 2019 Intersession 

(Note: The following courses are part of the Honors Passport Sicily study abroad program. As stipulated in the catalog of studies: no more than a total of 3 hours of required colloquia may be earned either abroad or in an intersession.) 


ARHS: 3923H 600: The Art and Architecture of Sicily

Professor: Daniel Levine, Rhodora Vennarucci

Colloquia Type: Humanities or Social Science

Please contact instructors dlevine@uark.edu or rgvennarucci@gmail.com for more information. 


HUMN 3923H 601: A Mediterranean Mosaic

Professor: Daniel Levine, Jared Phillips

Colloquia Type: Humanities or Social Science

Please contact instructors dlevine@uark.edu or jmp006@uark.edu  for more information.


 Spring 2019 Regular Session


ANTH 3923H 002, BIOL 3923H 001, HIST 3923H 003: THE DARWIN COURSE

Professor: William F. McComas 

Colloquia Type: Humanities or Natural Science

The Darwin Course is led by Parks Family Professor of Science Education William F. McComas (mccomas@uark.edu) who will be joined by a team of professors from a variety of specialties across campus who together bring a rich mix of perspectives designed to examine evolution from its history to Charles Darwin’s voyage on the H.M.S. Beagle to the Scopes Trial to continuing aftershocks in science classrooms today. Darwin and the ideas he supported have profound relevance across the fields of biology, history, literature, sociology and beyond, yet many misunderstand or even reject evolution. This course has been designed to demonstrate that the most complete view of any discovery, event or person can only be achieved through an interdisciplinary perspective and evolution is a superb example of a topic that demands an integrated consideration.

Darwin Course Faculty scheduled: William F. McComas (science education); Vince Chaddick (law); William Etges (biology); Daniel Kennefick (physics); David Jolliffe (English); Jack Lyons and Barry Ward (philosophy); Angie Maxwell (political science); Richard Sonn (history), J. Michael Plavcan, Claire Terhune and Lucas Delezene (anthropology).


CLST 4003H 001: Sex & Gender in Classical Antiquity

Professor: Joy Reeber

Colloquium type: Humanities or  Social Sciences

The goal of this course is to introduce you to the constructions and representations of sex, gender, and sexuality in ancient Greece and Rome. How did ancient Greeks and Romans think about sex and gender, and how does this differ from what “we” contemporary Americans think about sex and gender? How and why do individual speakers in antiquity talk about sex, and how does this vary by context and audience?  Can we see any disparity between how sex gets talked about and represented and its lived reality? Who wins and who loses when they, or we, talk about sex and gender? Authors and thinkers from ancient Greece and Rome differed widely from each other and from a modern audience in how they dealt with these issues. Considering some of the ways in which they answered these questions can tell us a lot about the meaning of sex and gender, two essential aspects of being a person then and now. To that end, we will read a wide range of literature from Ancient Greece and Rome, as well as secondary scholarship that either exemplifies major trends in the interpretation of the ancient evidence or that uses this evidence to confirm or challenge contemporary ideas about gender and sexuality. 


COMM 3923H 001: Patient-Provider Communication

Professor: Patricia Amason

Colloquia Type: Social Science

The Patient-Provider Communication honors seminar examines in-depth concerns about communication within the provision of health care services. We will identify communication skills necessary for effective health care provision and examine the difficulties impacting effective communication between health care providers and recipients. This includes issues of quality patient-provider communication such as differing cultural perspectives, interviewing skills, active listening, social support, ethics, boundary management, and conveying bad news. We will read both primary and secondary sources including research articles and summary book chapters. In addition to the selected readings we will read two books, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks and The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down. Students will write reaction papers, do an in-class presentation, lead class discussions of the reading assignments, engage in role-plays, and write a research paper.


ENGL 3923H 001: Medical Humanities Colloquium

Professor: Casey Kayser

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

This course combines literary and critical texts that attend to the social rather than technical aspects of medicine, focusing on such topics as the human condition, personal dignity, social responsibility, cultural diversity, and the history of medicine. Through readings, class discussion, writing activities, and first-hand observation, students will practice critical analysis and reflection to instill in them a commitment to compassionate, community responsive, and culturally competent medical care. This course requires a service-learning component that involves close interaction with a physician at a local clinic and medically-relevant service hours at a local agency in addition to the classroom time commitment. This course is only open to premedical students, who must meet with the instructor or a premedical advisor in order to enroll.


ENGL 3923H 004: Writing History and Making Films

Professor: Sidney Burris

Colloquium Type: Humanities  or Social Science

No prior knowledge of film-editing is required.

 This innovative course and film-lab will introduce students to the two fundamental skills that structure the most important media outlets that we consult on a daily basis:  historical research and basic video editing skills. The course will focus on the Tibetan refugee situation and will work in conjunction with the extensive film archives of The TEXT Program (Tibetans in Exile Today), the University’s oral-history project that chronicles the lives of Tibetan refugees currently living in India. The course will require two projects that dynamically support and enrich one another:  1) a traditional research paper (8-10 pp.) that will supply the background for 2) a documentary film (5-10 minutes).


HIST 3923H 001: Rise of the U.S. Empire: War, Migration, and Expansion, 1789-1917

Professor: Sarah Rodriguez

Colloquia Type: Humanities or Social Science 

How did a collection of colonies on the margins of the British Empire eventually become the world’s most powerful nation? This course will explore the history of U.S. expansion and imperialism over the course of what historians call the “long nineteenth century.”  It will proceed both chronologically and thematically as we consider the trajectory of U.S. imperialism and its various manifestations - territorial, political, economic, and cultural – with particular attention to the following questions:  How inevitable was the United States’ rise to global dominance? What is an empire and how does this term apply to the United States?   How has U.S. imperialism shaped politics and society, both at home and abroad?  And finally, what is the legacy of the American Empire and how should we understand it today?


HNRC 4013H 001: Brain and Music

Professor Elizabeth Margulis and Chancellor Joseph Steinmetz

Colloquia Type: Natural Science or Social Science

This course intermingles science and the humanities to try to understand the pervasive and puzzling human behavior of music-making. How is it possible to design experiments that illuminate as complex a cultural phenomenon as music? What can neuroscience teach us about music, and what can music teach us about the brain? How can this research inspire new machines, tools, and interventions that affect health and society? Students in this course will learn to think flexibly, navigating back and forth between science and the humanities as they engage with the most cutting-edge approaches and discoveries in the neuroscience of music. 


HNRC 4013H 002: Aging 

Professor: Michelle Gray

Colloquia Type: Natural Science or Social Science

 Since 2005 the number of older adults has risen 30% and is expected to more than double by 2050, raising the average age of our nation.  Older adults are more prone to chronic illnesses such as heart disease and arthritis; however, not all older adults experience these traditional age-related issues.  While aging is typically defined in chronological terms, this definition assumes age and time are synonymous.  In reality human aging is dictated by the intersection of psychological, biological and social characteristics or processes, ultimately resulting in loss of adaptability, functional impairment and eventual death.  Understanding the process of aging and how it is accelerated is imperative to increasing the quality of life of this population.  This course will focus on the causes of aging, the importance of distinguishing between primary aging and accelerated aging processes due to illness/disease, and quality of life versus quantity of life.  Students will walk away with knowledge of theories of aging and information related to improving quality of life throughout the lifespan.   


HNRC 4013H 003: B.S.

Professor: Jay Greene

Colloquia Type: Social Science

We encounter B.S. all the time, but what exactly is it?  How can we detect B.S. and avoid its harms?  Why does so much B.S. exist?  Does it have some beneficial qualities? This course will explore these and other questions related to the topic of B.S.  The main purpose of the course is to improve the ability of students to engage in critical thinking and skeptically assess claims; that is, to avoid B.S..  We will consider examples of B.S. in a variety of fields, including education, psychology, business, medicine, politics and journalism.  From these examples we will attempt to develop a general understanding of B.S. that could be applied to any field.


HUMN: 3923H 001: Game Design II

Professor: David Fredrick

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Please contact instructor (dfredric@uark.edu) for more information.


HUMN 3923H 006, The Universe in a Single Atom

Professor: Geshe Thupton Dorjee

Colloquia Type: Humanities or Social Science

Following decades of intensive workshops between leading academics and His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the Universe in a Single Atom is the culmination of the mutual understanding and communication between two traditions that have increasingly found common ground in their pursuit of truth through analysis and reason. The course will follow the main presentations on cosmology, metaphysics, epistemology, and consciousness that are explored in the book while providing a thorough background of the covered information in a format suited for undergraduate coursework. Students will not only learn about the major philosophical tenets of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many activities that enhance their abilities for critical thinking and reasoning in the same way that Tibetan scholars have for nearly a millennia.


INST 4003H 002: Peace and Conflict Studies

Professor: Jared Phillips

Colloquia Type: Social Science

Peace Studies is atypical among academic disciplines in that it was founded to understand and address persistent violence in the world. As such, the field is inherently multi/transdisciplinarian. While understanding violence is crucial, this course focuses on the creation of and maintenance of peace in myriad situations. Thus, this course is designed to introduce students to the spectrum of ways of studying and understanding peace, as well as how scholars and activists define peace and work to secure it. This course provides students with ways of thinking about the issue through multiple disciplinary lenses, and gives students an opportunity to craft their own thinking about peace through individualized, in-depth case studies.


LAST 4003H: Migration and Belonging in Latino/American Film

Professor: Yajaira M. Padilla

Colloquia Type: Humanities or Social Science

In this course we will explore films (both fictional and documentaries) from Latin America and the United States that focalize the experiences of internal (rural to urban) and international migration. Our analyses of these films will consist of looking at how they represent the migratory experience, including the reasons why people migrate, the obstacles they face throughout the process, and the hopes and dreams they harbor. Among the most prominent themes guiding our discussion will be the notion of (cultural, social, and national) belonging, which is inherently linked to such processes of migration. However, we will also tend to related questions regarding gender and sexuality, class, race and ethnicity, and citizenship. Although the main cultural texts for this course will be the films assigned, students will be required to read secondary articles (contextual and theoretical) in Latin American and Latino film studies and be provided with a brief introduction to the analysis of and writing about film. Most, if not all of the films, will be in Spanish with English subtitles.


MEST 4003H 001: Middle East Popular Culture

Professor: Joel Gordon

Colloquia Type: Social Science or Humanities

This course will explore diverse manifestations of modern/contemporary popular culture in the Middle East and Islamic world.  We will discuss intersections of politics and culture, religion and ethnic-national identity, and the history of technology and its, at times, revolutionary appropriation.  Modes of popular culture will include movies, music, television, radio, pulp fiction, leisure, comedy and political dissent.  We will look top-down – government/corporate sponsored – as well as bottom-up – popular/vernacular.  How does popular culture reflect and shape who we are as consumers, fans and, at times, participants?


MUSC 3923H 001: VIENNA - BRAHMS TO SCHOENBERG

Professor: Micaela Baranello

Colloquia Type: Social Science or Humanities

“Fin-de-siècle Vienna” has been celebrated as the birthplace of modernism, from music to literature to psychoanalysis. In this course we will survey this era’s musical legacy in the context of the city’s cultural, social, and political developments. Students will read recent scholarly work and develop their academic writing through regular assignments. Topics of study will include the Brahms-Bruckner debates, the symphonies of Gustav Mahler, opera of Richard Strauss, the city’s popular music, and the Second Viennese School.


PHIL 3923H 001, PHYS 3923H 001: Consciousness

Professor: Jack Lyons, Woodrow Shew

Colloquia Type: Natural Science or Humanities

In this honors colloquium, team taught by faculty in Physics and Philosophy, we will seek to understand the nature of consciousness. We will examine the state-of-the-art neuroscience which attempts to identify the neural underpinnings of consciousness by doing experiments. We will explore traditional and contemporary philosophical theories of consciousness and debates about the limits of scientific measurements in understanding consciousness. We will learn (in a non-technical way) about the physics and mathematics of emergent phenomena - when the interaction of many simple parts gives rise to quite unexpected collective behavior of the whole. We will discuss the evolutionary origins of consciousness.


SOCI 4013H 001: Mental Health and Illness

Professor: Brittany Hearne

Colloquia Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course provides an introduction to sociological theories and research about mental health and illness. We will analyze and discuss three broad areas of sociological research: the definition and measurement of mental illness, the social correlates of mental health and mental illness, and personal, community, and societal responses to mental illness. The primary goal of this course is to see mental illness as a social phenomenon, not only as a medical or psychological problem. That is, we will frequently compare sociological, psychological, and biological understandings of mental illness. Mental illness will be examined as a consequence of interpersonal, institutional, and cultural factors. The class format will include a combination of lectures and discussions.


 

WLLC 3923H, RUSS 4133, WLIT 4133: Russia's Races: From Pushkin to Pelevin

Professor: Nadja Berkovich

Colloquia Type: Humanities

This course examines how Russian writers engaged with the anthropological discourse of their time, particularly with discourses regarding race, as well as how they gave voice to different ethnographic groups such as the indigenous peoples of Siberia, Jews, Ukrainians, and the peoples of the Caucasus region from the 19th century until the present day. The seminar aims to answer the question as to what extent the category of race was an eminent marker during the colonial and postcolonial periods. The seminar will focus on known texts such as Pushkin’s “Gypsies,” Gogol’s “Taras Bul’ba,” Tolstoy’s Khadzhi-Murat, Dostoevsky’s Notes from the Underground, as well on Russian Jewish writers such as I.Y. Peretz, Dovid Bergelson, Isaac Babel, and Vasilii Grossman.

HNRC 4013H 004: (Intersession) PLACE IN MIND: REIMAGING THE COURTYARD AT GEARHART HALL

Professor:  Carl Smith & Edmund Harriss
Colloquium Type:  Humanities or Natural Sciences

 

 This course will begin with students' personal perceptions of the Gearhart Hall courtyard and, working together, we will draw on the power of many different disciplines to (re)contextualize the area. In particular we will consider how to study the courtyard as an abstract space and a place of memory and emotion. Using the spatial setting of the courtyard, we will delve deeply into many different ideas of what makes a place a place, and how that might be expressed.

We will draw from two areas in particular:

The rich lineage of place-understanding established by philosophers and theorists and exemplified locally by landscape paintings at Crystal Bridges and by the Ozark architect Fay Jones.

The detailed analysis of space and pattern that lies at the heart of much of twentieth-century mathematics

In both cases we'll be applying these concepts in a local setting through hands-on exercises in observing, drawing, geometry, creativity and exploration.  As a group, we will develop a suite of creative outputs that develop from the expertise each student brings from his or her own major. Together we will produce a folio of work that provides conceptualizations for an artistic intervention in the Gearhart courtyard that demonstrates to the whole campus community the value of cross-disciplinary collaboration and creativity. Students are encouraged, for an additional single credit, to work with the faculty through the fall of 2018 to curate and exhibit our intersession’s collaborative explorations.

We are looking for students who enjoy working with people from a range of majors and are willing to tackle open-ended, creative problems, including how we can capture the essence of place we all know so well, and to which we may not give a second thought: the U of A campus.


AIST 4003H 001: THE RECLUSE IN EARLY EAST ASIA

Professor:  Elizabeth Markham & Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

"In reading (to use the Chinese term) a Chinese landscape painting, we are often moved by the pleasure of recognition, even of identification, occasioned by the one or more tiny human figures, almost imperceptible among the rocks and pines.  These figures, executed with a few  minute strokes of the brush, represent a solitary man, leaning on his staff along a mountain  path, or on the back of a donkey, crossing a bridge and followed by a boy who carries his lute, or among a group of similar figures lingering by the waterside, immersed in the landscape, insignificant and unobtrusive." (Li Chi, 1962)

This course, which studies recluses in their social and cultural context in both China and Japan, does not require specialized knowledge of East Asian languages (although students with knowledge of classical Chinese will have opportunity to work with original texts should  they wish).  It is open to majors in any field.  Students address their particular interests via individual projects, culminating in an extended research essay from each student.


AIST 4003H 002: SONG CHINA, 960-1279

Professor:  Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

The Song dynasty (960–1279) was culturally the most brilliant era in later imperial Chinese history. A time of great social and economic change, the period in large measure shaped the intellectual and political climate of China down to the twentieth century.

The momentous political shift during the early Song – from a society ruled by a hereditary aristocratic order to a society governed by a central bureaucracy of scholar-officials chosen through the civil-service examination – also had a major impact on the arts, music, and literature. As a ruling elite, these Neo-Confucian scholars regarded public service as their principal calling, but factional strife sometimes forced them to retire from political engagement, during which time they often pursued artistic interests. Eleventh-century scholars sought to revive the natural, spontaneous qualities of more archaic models; they also departed from the official view that art must serve the state. Instead, the amateur scholar-artist pursued music, painting and calligraphy for his own amusement as a forum of personal expression.

In 1125, when the Jurchen, a semi-nomadic people from northeast Asia, invaded Song China and captured the capital at Bianliang (modern Kaifeng), founding their own Jin dynasty in the north, the Song court reestablished itself in the south in Hangzhou, where it continued to rule for another 150 years as the Southern Song dynasty.

Southern Song society was characterized by the pursuit of a highly aestheticized way of life, taking as one particularly important source of inspiration the natural beauty of Hangzhou and its environs, especially West Lake, a famed scenic spot ringed with lush mountains and dotted with palaces, private gardens, and Buddhist temples.

The cultivation of a tranquil and detached mind free of material entanglements was a common concern of Song Neo-Confucian philosopher Zhu Xi (1130–1200): the “investigation of things [leading to] the extension of knowledge.”

 (adapted from The Metropolitan Museum of Art )


AIST 4003H 003/3923H 004: ASIAN MASCULINITIES/ASIAN FEMINITIES

Professor:  Kelly Hammond
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course takes a broad approach to the historical constructions of masculinity and femininity in East Asia. It acknowledges that in most cultures, certain behaviors commonly associated with the “feminine” and the “masculine” vary widely through time and are constantly evolving and changing. The course starts with an introduction to East Asian gender theory in order to familiarize students with some of the different ways that gender is approached by scholars beyond the western world. Following that, we will examine specific case studies, ranging from how Asian doctors approached androgynous babies to foot-binding and hairstyles in imperial China to American hip-hop’s cultural appropriation of Kung-Fu (think of the Wu Tang Clan, of instance) to the wide-ranging popularity of Korean soap operas in the Middle East and Latin America. The course will use a variety of sources including movies, TV shows, novels, medical texts, and scholarly articles to get students thinking about the different ways that gender is constructed and lived on a daily basis in East Asia and beyond. Students will write a final paper on a subject of their own choosing after consultation with the professor.


ANTH 3923H 001: BODY AND IDENTITY

Professor: Jonathan Marion
Colloquium Type: Social Science

For more information please contact the instructor. marion@uark.edu 


ANTH 3923H 002: ANCIENT CITIES

Professor: Wesley Stoner
Colloquium Type: Social Sciences

This course examines the origins, function, experience, perception, and social construction of early urbanism across the world. Roughly 10,000 years ago, human populations for the first time transitioned from their traditional mobile hunter-gatherer lifestyle to one relying on agriculture and pastoralism. This subsistence shift also fostered the world’s first dense human populations located in villages settled year-round. The “Urban Revolution” to follow transformed the human past more dramatically than any other cultural process to date. Living in close confines with other humans imposes constraints as well as provides affordances to the groups living there. Cities amass labor potential into a concentrated area that brought some of the world’s greatest monumental constructions into being. Political aggrandizers wielded this labor force to achieve their own ends, which contributed to the vertical structuring of society. While the ancient city united people of diverse cultural backgrounds, the partitioning of space within served to divide them into sectors or neighborhoods keeping people of different class, occupation, and ethnicity distinct. Needless to say, early urbanites experienced and perceived their built-environments very differently, and in many cases this divisive effect was the intent of the architect and their patrons.

We will explore pre-modern cities from the earliest in the world to those on the brink of industrialization. The course employs anthropological archaeology as its primary approach, but also draws upon formal/functional analysis of urban plans, historical documentation, urban planning and history, and semiotics to interpret the built-environment as a form of non-verbal communication. Cities provide a rich data source that can be interrogated from social, ethnic, political, economic, and experiential angles. In order to fully explore the impact of the city on human lives, we must use a variety of methods and theory. The class will involve lecture, in-class discussion of readings, and working with actual city footprints generated through archaeological and architectural research. <Depending on the skill level of the class we may conduct simple exercises in ArcGIS, which DISC 505 is set up to handle>. There are also several assignments through the course of the semester that require the student to actively engage with actual built environments and report on them. The goal of this class if to critically examine urbanism as a process and state of experience while learning substantive similarities and differences among the world’s pre-industrial cities.


BIOL 3923H 001: REPRODUCTION AND MATING SYSTEMS

Professor:  James Walker
Colloquium Type: Natural Science     

For more information please contact the instructor. jmwalker@uark.edu


CLST 4003H 001: AGE OF NERO

Professor: Charles Muntz
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Nero has gone down in history as one of the most infamous of all Roman emperors. It was Nero who fiddled while Rome burned and Nero who began the persecution of the Christians. But Nero’s reign also saw the greatest flowering of Roman art and literature after the time of Augustus. Latin poetry, such as the Civil War of Lucan, the tragedies of Seneca, and the satires of Persius, flourished. It was a time of great intellectual exploration, seen in the philosophical works of Seneca. Art and architecture advanced under Nero as well, with a revolution in brick and concrete taking place in Nero’s “Golden House.” We will consider the significance of these achievements, how they fit into the context of Nero’s reign, and how they can be reconciled with the negative views of Nero found in Roman historians such as Tacitus and Suetonius. Finally, we will look at how Nero has been depicted in the centuries since the Roman Empire. This class will explore the Age of Nero from all sides to reach a new understanding of this notorious emperor.


ENGL 3923H 001: COOL BOOKS ABOUT STUFF THAT REALLY HAPPENED (CREATIVE NONFICTION)

Professor: Sidney Burris
Colloquium Type: Humanities

For one semester, we’re going to read some of the coolest—the most important critical term I know—books in English.  And all of these books are about stuff that actually happened:  floods, fires, hurricanes, art-fights, culture wars, movies, graduation, music, love, and death.


GEOS 4043H 001: GEOGRAPHY OF THE MIDDLE EAST

Professor: Thomas Paradise
Colloquium Type: Social Science, Natural Science

 

An overview of the MENA countries from Morocco to Egypt, Jordan to Turkey, and Iraq to the Gulf States, addressing culture and language, politics and clan structures, geology and geography, agriculture and resources, art and architecture, etc.  The class also includes student-run banquets and presentations about foods, cuisines, and traditions. This course was designed for country-by-country briefings often used in U.S. diplomatic training.

 

GEOS 410VH 001: GEOGRAPHY OF FICTIONAL WORLDS

Professor:  Fiona M. Davidson
Colloquium Type:  Social Science

This course is designed to introduce students to the conceptual and practical geographic issues involved understanding the spatial nature of global popular culture. The course will be theoretically grounded in ideas of historical materialism, cultural hegemony and the globalization of cultural and economic consumption.  Using examples from food, music, film, television, comics and landscape the class will discuss the origins of different forms, genres and sub-genres of popular culture and will articulate the relationships between economic globalization, the spread of popular culture and spatial frameworks such as diffusion, dispersal, and regionalization.


HIST 3923H 003: SEX/GENDER/STATE-MOD EUROPE

Professor: Richard Sonn
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

This course focuses on interconnections between sexuality, gender roles and politics, in particular that of modern European states since the 17th c. (though with a brief look back at the ancient Greeks).  The term “body-politic” was taken literally in the era of kingship, yet in the modern era of “bio-politics” the body has been no less implicated in affairs of state.  We will see how nationalism, imperialism, fascism, antisemitism, and other 19th and 20th c. movements influenced and in turn were affected by prevailing sexual and gender norms.


HNRC 4013H 001: BAD MEDICINE

Professor: Trish Starks
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course will demonstrate how those who disturbed order or menaced authority were medically defined as deficient, abnormal or aberrant. Students will explore how modern, Western states used medicine to define and control their subjects, to incarcerate and harm those seen as deficient and to sterilize and kill those considered dangerous.


HNRC 4013H 002: WATER SCARCITY

PROFESSOR: Eric Wailes
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Natural Science 

This course will focus on deepening our understanding of the cultural importance of water and on the future of coping with water scarcity and sustainability. Students will also delve into various examples of water policy and management as it pertains to politics, engineering and technology.


HNRC 4013H 002: FREE SPEECH

PROFESSOR: Mark Killenbeck
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This Signature Seminar will examine both the national commitment to free speech and the realities of several central premises that comprise the Supreme Court's approach to speech. The goals of this course will include understanding the principles that inform these doctrines, the rules that govern their implementation, and the virtues and limits of a robust commitment to free speech. 


 HUMN 3923H 002:  GAME DESIGN

Professor:  David Frederick
Colloquium Type:  Humanities

For more information please contact the instructor. dfredric@uark.edu


HUMN 3923H 003:  INDIE VIDEO GAMES

Professor: David Fredrick
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This honors colloquium explores the construction of body, agency, and identity in a (very) select set of independent video games.  How do you, as a player, come to feel “embodied” in these games, and given a sense that you can do things...and are responsible for these actions?  How does this player-body come to have gender and a sexual identity through game narrative and mechanics--and is this sex/gender position open to question?  How is a sense of a stable body-world relationship challenged?  It turns out that these issues are closely connected to memory and the perception of causality.  Finally, is there an ethical point to this?  Contrary to the (dated) stereotype of video games as driven by violence and committed to a male, white, western player-self, these indie games construct a fluid, multiple, and (often) contradictory player-self/body.  The class will address how this intersects with contemporary issues of environment, inclusion, equality, and human rights, arguing for the increasingly important political voice of indie video games.


HUMN 3923H 005: TIBET BUDDHIST PHIL/CULTURE

Professor: Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology.


JOUR 3923H 001: GOVERNMENT AND THE MEDIA

Professor:  Gina H. Shelton
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This class examines relations between the media, politics and government, with analysis of the power, responsibility and performance of the media. Topics include evolving media technologies and trends like fake news, use of freedom of information laws, money in politics, international press and influence, and coverage of courts, Congress and the White House.


JOUR 3923H 002: ISSUES IN ADVERTISING & PR

Professor: Jan Wicks
Colloquium Type:  Humanities or Social Science

The primary goal of Issues in Advertising & Public Relations is to increase your awareness of the effects of the advertising and public relations industries and their messages on society. You’ll be encouraged to think about the implications of what you do when you create an advertisement or public relations message or campaign. You’ll read classic readings as well as current examples of major social, economic, cultural and ethical issues regarding advertising and public relations. You’ll develop a social marketing plan in teams to educate the public about a particular social problem or for a nonprofit or educational entity. This helps you to learn how advertising and public relations messages can be used to help society. You’ll write an individual literature review paper on a different topic (which can be the basis for a literature review for your thesis). You’ll consult with me to select a “doable” topic about an ethical issue or topic relevant to the course.


JOUR 3923H 003: LITERATURE OF JOURNALISM

Professor: Bret Schulte
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This seminar explores the growth of journalism as a field of literary pursuit, using the techniques that have long defined fiction. The semester consists of a survey of book and magazine-length narrative nonfiction from the mid-20th century to today. Authors include pioneering literary journalists, such as Hersey, Capote, Didion, as well as their successors, such as Frazier, Conover, and Orlean.


MUSC 3923H 001: COMPOSERS AND CHOREOGRAPHERS

Professor: Kimberly Hannon Teal 
Colloquium Type: Humanities

In this course, we will consider the relationship between music and movement through staged and social dance from the 19th and 20th centuries. Beginning with an introduction to Romantic ballet, we will go on to explore the central place of Tchaikovsky’s works in the classical ballet canon and the daring experiments in sound and movement that brought attention to the Parisian Ballets Russes in the early 20th century. We will also consider music and dance in popular culture both on stage and in dance halls during the Jazz Age and Swing Era, the origins of modern dance, and ongoing choreographer/composer relationships like those between Balanchine and Stravinsky and Cunningham and Cage. 


WLLC 3923H 001: FEMINISIM & FILM

Professor:  Rachel Ten Haaf 
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

In the wake of teh #metoo and #timesup movements, this course explores the relationship between feminism and film.  What is feminism? What makes a film feminist? Does feminist film even matter anymore?  Although we will dedicate time to exploring the historical past of feminism and film by viewing classics by Claire Denis and Chantal Akerman, we will devote much of our time to the contemporary moment, critically examining iterations of feminism such as postfeminism, third wave feminism and even transfeminism.  Other films we will explore include Paris is Burning, Women without Men, In a Foreign Land, and Tangerine.  This course will involve critical readings and guest speakers along with mandatory film viewing outside class.

AIST 4003H 001: EARLY CHINESE EMPIRES

Professor: Rembrandt F. Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Taking the Silk Road as our main artery, we shall concentrate on the most colorful changes in multi-ethnic, multi-cultural medieval China from the period of the Southern and Northern Dynasties, and in particular from the rise and following unification of Northern China.

Under the Northern Wei (386–534), to the subsequent unification of North and South under the Sui (589–618), through the resplendent Tang (618–907) and the most cultured of all Chinese dynasties, the Song (960–1279), the martial Jin (115–1234), to end with the culmination of power (at a price) in the largest empire emanating from Chinese soil, the Yuan (1271–1368).


AIST 4003H 002: READING JAPANESE NOH AS CULTURAL HISTORY

Professor: Elizabeth Markham
Colloquium Type: Humanities

We shall use original Noh chant books (utai-bon) alongside translations of librettos. Most plays will be viewed on film; the others listened to while reading. Our focus will be on the historical and the contextual: we shall work with the earlier poetry, songs, and dance-tunes, referred to as nostalgia in the plays, and also with early Buddhist, theatrical, and secular musical forms that have contributed to and borrowed from Noh. The course does not require specialized knowledge of music, nor of East Asian languages, and it is open to majors in any field. Students address their particular interests via individual projects, culminating in an extended research essay.


AIST 4003H 003: UNCOVERING HEIAN JAPAN (794--1192)

Professor: Elizabeth J. Markham
Colloquium Type: Social Science

The invention of an isolated, refined, purely aesthetic Heian Japan (794--1191) has been targeted in recent scholarship (Denecke, 2008, Heldt, 2008, Lamarre, 2000). An alternative placing of the early Heian court within the fold of Táng China (618--907), rather than in ethnolinguistic opposition to it, has been offered. This course traces the reasons for the former view but takes its cue from the alternative to focus on the early Heian court, temple, and shrine in terms of appropriation, assimilation, synthesis -- but also re-positioning and hybridization -- of “China'' in language, literature, religion, culture, and in terms of what these processes meant for the social and political order of the day.


ARHS 3923H 001: MEDIEVAL TRANSCRIPTS

Professor:  Lynn Jacobs 
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This colloquium will examine the wide variety of depictions of women in Dutch art of the seventeenth century, the golden age of Dutch painting.  We will consider how women are represented as housewives, maids, prostitutes, potential wives, mothers, and saleswomen, and what meanings were associated with the scenes of women dancing, drinking, writing letters, making music, seeing doctors, and cleaning their homes -- all extremely popular themes in Dutch art of this time.  Some of the artists whose works will be studied include Rembrandt, Hals, Vermeer, Pieter de Hooch, Jan Steen, and Ter Borch;  special attention will be given to women artists in seventeenth-century Holland, particularly Judith Leyster.  Students will have the opportunity to study a specific thematic strand within the imagery of women and to give a presentation of their findings.

This course does not require specialized knowledge of East Asian languages. It is examined via essays on assigned topics and an extended research essay on a course-related topic chosen by the individual student.


BIOL 3923H-001,  PLSC 3923H-002: MUSEUM MATTERS

Professor: William F. McComas
Colloquium Type:  Social Science, Natural Science

Museums are among the most respected and visited cultural institutions, yet few have thought much about their history, purpose, and what happens behind the scenes.  This class is an introduction to museology or the study of museums.  We will consider the goals and rationales of museums, examine the distinct types, learn what links these together and what distinguishes them, talk about the distinction between collections, displays and exhibitions and consider the reasons for the occasional controversies that have occurred in the museum context.  We will think employment opportunities, architecture, educational challenges, legal issues and other socio-cultural aspects of the wide world of museums.  

We will hear from local curators, visit several nearby museums in our region, spend some time in the UA museum storage facility and take a two-day field trip (March 30-31) to Oklahoma City to see museums that we do not yet have here.  This museum experience is highly interdisciplinary with students drawn from five departments.  Class size is limited because most of the expenses for the overnight field trip are covered by the Honors College.  Also, we will need leave campus earlier than our scheduled meeting time a few times for our local museum visits.  


CLST 4003H-001: CLASSICAL BACKGROUND TO ENGLISH LITERATURE

Professor: Joy Reeber
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course is an exploration of the many ways English poetry and prose has imitated, borrowed, and challenged literary themes and genres from classical antiquity, from Milton's epic to the satire of Swift, and from the Romantics' fascination with Greece to Auden's more prosaic take on Rome. The classical legacy, and knowledge of the Greco-Roman canon, has been put to many uses in the English-speaking world, and we will also spend a certain amount of time studying its reception more generally to help contextualize the literature we read.

The course is open to majors or minors in any field, and no prior knowledge of Greek or Roman literature, nor of the languages, will be required (though students with experience in Latin or Greek will have the opportunity to work with texts in the original if they wish). In addition to frequent shorter assignments throughout the semester, students will have the opportunity to research and write about a specific topic, author, or poem and present their findings to their peers. 


ENGL 3923H-001: MEDICAL HUMANITIES

Professor: Casey Kayser
Colloquium Type: Social Science

The kinds of issues we’ll focus on in this class will give you a different perspective on medicine than you’ll ever gain in your science classes, by attending to the social rather than technical aspects of medicine, focusing on such topics as the human condition; social responsibility; the history of medicine; and doctors’ and patients’ perspectives and how these are informed by larger cultural, economic, political, and social forces. Through readings, class discussion, writing activities, and first-hand observation, students will practice critical analysis and reflection to instill in them a commitment to compassionate, community-minded, and culturally competent medical care. This course requires a service-learning component that involves close interaction with a physician at a local clinic and service hours at a local agency in addition to the classroom time commitment. It is only open to premedical students who must meet with Dr. Jackson Jennings to enroll.


EUST: 4003H-002: SURVEY RUSSIAN LIT SINCE 1917

Professor: Nadja Berkovich 
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities 

The course examines four great novels: Nikolai Chernyshevsky’s What is To Be Done?, Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Demons, Der Nister’s The Family Mashber (Di Mishpokhe Mashber), and Dovid Bergelson’s Judgement (Mides-hadin). The latter two are lesser-known works of Yiddish modernism. Dostoevsky’s and Der Nister’s novels, set in the same time period, both deal with psychological crisis and ultimate death, although within different cultural backgrounds and circumstances. Chernyshevsky and Dostoevsky share a lot in common. They both advocated for political change, experienced a mock execution, and were exiled to forced labor prisons in Siberia. Der Nister and Bergelson were victims of Stalin’s anti-Semitic campaign. The former died in a GULAG in 1950 and the latter was shot in 1952. Bergelson’s novel centers around the Bolshevik, the embodiment of “judgment,” who enforces the new Soviet regime in a Jewish border town.


GEOS 4383H-001: HONORS HAZARD & DISASTER ASSESSMENT, MITIGATION, RISK & POLICY

Professor: Thomas Paradise
Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Social Science

The course addresses the broader perspectives of Hazards Studies that include comprehensive and inter-disciplinary approaches to various geologic, atmospheric, and environmental hazards including hurricanes, tornadoes, volcanoes, tsunami, and earthquakes. This course will also introduce students to aspects of law and policy-making, perception of risk and danger, mitigation of hazardous landscapes, and the diverse ways in which people, families, communities and nations deal with disaster, injury, destruction, and death.


HIST 4823-001: BLACK FREEDOM IN THE AGE OF EMANCIPATION

Professor: Caree A. Banton
Colloquia Type: Social Science or Humanities

This course is a comparative study of Black Atlantic World freedom movements and experiences of post-emancipation. Enslaved Africans in the US, Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa sought emancipation in different ways and had high expectations of freedom. But as they would discover, slave emancipation as a crowning achievement of freedom was merely a myth. Though former slaves and their descendants hoped that emancipation would give them, amongst other things, the vote, land, equality, and control over their time and labor, various factors affected their ability to fulfill their hopes of freedom. They would confront the legal and extra-legal constraints placed on their lives, a social hierarchy in which color coincided with class, and economic decline. These and other obstacles, however, did not prevent the former slaves and their descendants from trying to realize their dreams. Through such means as petitions, the formation of political organizations, unions, migration, and rebellions, they vigorously contested the terms of their freedom. In this course, we will explore how blacks sought to eek out some semblance of freedom in the varied conditions they found themselves as well as how the search for liberty mutated, evolved, and expanded across the Black Atlantic World. It explores the histories, meanings, legacies of the various types of black emancipations in the Atlantic World and the different types of cultural, social, economic and political technologies that enabled them. It thus highlights the social, political, and economic conditions of freedom for former slaves and their descendants. By tracing the continuities and discontinuities among the different types, forms, and experiences of emancipation in different nodes of the Black Atlantic World (the US, Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa), the course further explores the extent to which expectations of freedom were realized in the period between the slavery and independence movements in the post-world War II era. In bringing together the experiences of the emancipation of various groups of blacks in different spaces, we get to see the global dimensions and intersections of politics, economics, race, and freedom. By foregrounding the intersection of different disciplinary approaches to this topic, the ultimate goal of the course is to produce a perspective on black freedom across space and time, and locating them within a broader “Age of Emancipation.” 


HIST 3923H-002 (cross listed HIST 7133) REVOLUTIONARY RUSSIA

Professor: Trish Starks
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

In this course, students will read classic and new historical works that engage the Russian Revolutionary era (roughly 1905 -1932) from the perspectives of the many different constituencies of the imperial state across the divides of geography, class, gender, ethnicity, and creed. Students will be asked to engage vital questions of what conditions and groups precipitated change, how historians differ in their interpretation of these changes, and how perspectives, disciplinary approaches, and source materials can change the periodization and interpretation of Russia’s revolutionary era. In addition to weekly reading and writing assignments, students will create a final paper that follows the experience of one constituency through the tumultuous era to answer how revolution was interpreted across the empire.


HNRC 4013H 001: MANUSCRIPT

Professor: Joshua Smith 
Colloquium Type: Humanities

To register for this course, you must apply through the Honors College.  Here is the link to apply  Signature Seminar application form .


HNRC 4013H 002: INTERNET

Professor: Stephanie Schulte 
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

To register for this course, you must apply through the Honors College.  Here is the link to apply  Signature Seminar application form .


HNRC 4013H 003: SOCCER

Professor: Todd Cleveland 
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

To register for this course, you must apply through the Honors College.  Here is the link to apply  Signature Seminar application form .


HUMN 3923H 001: GAME DESIGN II 

Professor: David Fredrick
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science 

Please contact instructor (dfredric@uark.edu) for more information.


HUMN 3923H-004:  WRITING HISTORY & MAKING FILMS

Professor:  Sidney Burris and Craig Pasquinzo
Colloquium Type: Humanities OR Social Science

This innovative course and film-lab will introduce students to the two fundamental skills that structure the most important media outlets that we consult on a daily basis:  historical research and basic video editing skills.  No prior knowledge of film-editing is required.

The course will focus on the Tibetan refugee situation and will work in conjunction with the extensive film archives of The TEXT Program (Tibetans in Exile Today), the University’s oral-history project that chronicles the lives of Tibetan refugees currently living in India.

For the documentary film, students will be given access to these archives and photographs that include not only interviews with Tibetans, but hours of footage from The TEXT Program’s travels throughout India—all of this material will be available to students in the class, as they plan their research paper and design their film.


HUMN 3923H 006: TIBET BUDDHIST PHIL/CULTURE

Professor:  Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities OR Social Science

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology.


MEST 4003H-003: HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY OF JERUSALEM FROM THE AMARNA TO OTTOMAN OCCUPATIONS

Professor: Spencer Allen
Colloquia Type: Humanities or Social Science  

Located in the hills along the trade routes between Asia and Africa, Jerusalem has captured the attentions and desires of ambitious empire makers. Hundreds of years before David conquered Jerusalem from the Jebusites and made it the capital of his Israelite kingdom (ca. 1000 BCE), the pharaohs of Egypt had already taken and lost control of the city. As a result of David’s conquest and his son Solomon’s building programs, over time, Jerusalem transformed from a strategic geographical center to the sacred city that it is today, holy to three billion Christians, Muslims, and Jews worldwide. This course will explore Jerusalem’s 4000-year history and its numerous conquests, settlements, and expansions through close examination of primary texts (ancient and modern, alike), archeological surveys, and historical circumstances. 


MUSC 3923H-001: AMERICAN MUSIC: DUKE ELLINGTON

Professor: Kim Hannon Teal
Colloquia Type: Social Science

As one of the most prominent creative voices in jazz, Duke Ellington had a significant and lasting impact on American music and culture. In this course, we will explore Ellington’s legacy as a composer, performer, band leader, and public figure, considering his career through a number of different lenses, including technical features of his music, the relationship between written scores and sounding performances, his business practices, and his public life in the context of twentieth-century American race relations. As a participant in this seminar, you will play an essential role in shaping the course by contributing to discussions of music and readings and by researching and presenting on topics of your own choosing related to themes of the course.


PLSC 3923H-001:  POLITICAL VIOLENCE

Professor: Jeffrey Ryan 
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science 

Please contact instructor (jeffr@uark.edu) for more information.


PHYS 3923H-001:  ECLIPSES AND THE HISTORY OF ASTRONOMY

Professor:  Daniel Kennefick
Colloquium Type:  Natural Science

This class will discuss the role of eclipses of the Sun and Moon in the development of Astronomy over the ages. We will discuss ancient ideas on eclipses and the possibility that their existence helped give birth to the science of Astronomy. In the classical period the development of astronomy proceeded to the point where eclipses could be predicted in advance, which is part of a story which includes the invention of calendars. In the middle ages we have quite a few records of eclipses and a comparative study of different societies and their reactions to eclipses will be made. In the modern period eclipses figure repeatedly as exemplars of human power over the material and social worlds through scientific knowledge. Columbus is said to have overawed the natives of he Caribbean through successfully predicting an eclipse. 19th century Astrophysics developed considerably through expeditions to study the Sun during eclipses. Finally the 1919 eclipse expedition to test Einstein's theory of General Relativity, which we will study in detail, brought eclipses to the forefront of world popular attention. The modern science of eclipses will be presented, but without any technical or mathematical prerequisites. The 2017 eclipse will be witnessed by enormous numbers of people, stimulating public interest in astronomy and science. In 2024 a total solar eclipse will pass through the state of Arkansas, providing a unique opportunity for Arkansans to witness one of the solar system's rarest events, since only Earth has a Moon which can provide such a remarkable show, just perfectly eclipsing the Sun's disk.


PSYC 3923H-001: BUILDING BRAINS: FROM IN VIVO TO IN SILICO

Professor: Nate Parks
Colloquia Type: Social Science

This seminar will be an interdisciplinary investigation of behavior, perception, and cognition from the perspectives of neuroscience, cognitive psychology, artificial intelligence, and robotics. 

AIST 4003H 001: THE RECLUSE IN EARLY EAST ASIA

Professor:  Elizabeth Markham & Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Social Science

"In reading (to use the Chinese term) a Chinese landscape painting, we are often moved by the pleasure of recognition, even of identification, occasioned by the one or more tiny  human figures, almost imperceptible among the rocks and pines.  These figures, executed with a few    minute strokes of the brush, represent a solitary man, leaning on his staff along a mountain    path, or on the back of a donkey, crossing a bridge and followed by a boy who carries his lute, or among a group of similar figures lingering by the waterside, immersed in the landscape, insignificant and unobtrusive." (Li Chi, 1962)

This course, which studies recluses in their social and cultural context in both China and Japan, does not require specialized knowledge of East Asian languages (although students with knowledge of classical Chinese will have opportunity to work with original texts should  they wish).  It is open to majors in any field.  Students address their particular interests via individual projects, culminating in an extended research essay from each student.


AIST 4003H 002: SONG CHINA, 960-1279

Professor:  Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Social Science

The Song dynasty (960–1279) was culturally the most brilliant era in later imperial Chinese history. A time of great social and economic change, the period in large measure shaped the intellectual and political climate of China down to the twentieth century.

The momentous political shift during the early Song – from a society ruled by a hereditary aristocratic order to a society governed by a central bureaucracy of scholar-officials chosen through the civil-service examination – also had a major impact on the arts, music, and literature. As a ruling elite, these Neo-Confucian scholars regarded public service as their principal calling, but factional strife sometimes forced them to retire from political engagement, during which time they often pursued artistic interests. Eleventh-century scholars sought to revive the natural, spontaneous qualities of more archaic models; they also departed from the official view that art must serve the state. Instead, the amateur scholar-artist pursued music, painting and calligraphy for his own amusement as a forum of personal expression.

In 1125, when the Jurchen, a semi-nomadic people from northeast Asia, invaded Song China and captured the capital at Bianliang (modern Kaifeng), founding their own Jin dynasty in the north, the Song court reestablished itself in the south in Hangzhou, where it continued to rule for another 150 years as the Southern Song dynasty.

Southern Song society was characterized by the pursuit of a highly aestheticized way of life, taking as one particularly important source of inspiration the natural beauty of Hangzhou and its environs, especially West Lake, a famed scenic spot ringed with lush mountains and dotted with palaces, private gardens, and Buddhist temples.

The cultivation of a tranquil and detached mind free of material entanglements was a common concern of Song Neo-Confucian philosopher Zhu Xi (1130–1200): the “investigation of things [leading to] the extension of knowledge.”

 (adapted from The Metropolitan Museum of Art )


AIST 4003H 003/3923H 004: ASIAN MASCULINITIES/ASIAN FEMINITIES 

Professor:  Kelly Hammond 
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course takes a broad approach to the historical constructions of masculinity and femininity in East Asia. It acknowledges that in most cultures, certain behaviors commonly associated with the “feminine” and the “masculine” vary widely through time and are constantly evolving and changing. The course starts with an introduction to East Asian gender theory in order to familiarize students with some of the different ways that gender is approached by scholars beyond the western world. Following that, we will examine specific case studies, ranging from how Asian doctors approached androgynous babies to foot-binding and hairstyles in imperial China to American hip-hop’s cultural appropriation of Kung-Fu (think of the Wu Tang Clan, of instance) to the wide-ranging popularity of Korean soap operas in the Middle East and Latin America. The course will use a variety of sources including movies, TV shows, novels, medical texts, and scholarly articles to get students thinking about the different ways that gender is constructed and lived on a daily basis in East Asia and beyond. Students will write a final paper on a subject of their own choosing after consultation with the professor.


ARHS 3923H 001: MEDIEVAL TRANSCRIPTS

Professor:  Lynn Jacobs 
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This colloquium will examine the wide variety of depictions of women in Dutch art of the seventeenth century, the golden age of Dutch painting.  We will consider how women are represented as housewives, maids, prostitutes, potential wives, mothers, and saleswomen, and what meanings were associated with the scenes of women dancing, drinking, writing letters, making music, seeing doctors, and cleaning their homes -- all extremely popular themes in Dutch art of this time.  Some of the artists whose works will be studied include Rembrandt, Hals, Vermeer, Pieter de Hooch, Jan Steen, and Ter Borch;  special attention will be given to women artists in seventeenth-century Holland, particularly Judith Leyster.  Students will have the opportunity to study a specific thematic strand within the imagery of women and to give a presentation of their findings.


BIOL 3923H 001: REPRODUCTION AND MATING SYSTEMS

Professor:  James Walker 
Colloquium Type: Natural Science     

For more information please contact the instructor. 


BIOL 3923H 002 BIOLOGY OF BREAST CANCER

Professor:  Tameka Bailey
Colloquium Type:  Natural Science 

Breast cancer is the second leading cause of cancer associated death in American women. Using peer reviewed journal articles students will develop knowledge of: 1) mammary gland development, 2) the etiology of breast cancer, 3) the molecular subtypes of breast cancer, 4) signal transduction pathways in breast cancer and 5) screening, diagnostic and therapeutic strategies for the treatment and prevention of breast cancer.  Course grades will be based on participation in round table discussions and written reviews of the literature.


GEOS 410VH 001: GEOGRAPHY OF POPULAR CULTURE

Professor:  Fiona M. Davidson
Colloquium Type:  Social Science

This course is designed to introduce students to the conceptual and practical geographic issues involved understanding the spatial nature of global popular culture. The course will be theoretically grounded in ideas of historical materialism, cultural hegemony and the globalization of cultural and economic consumption.  Using examples from food, music, film, television, comics and landscape the class will discuss the origins of different forms, genres and sub-genres of popular culture and will articulate the relationships between economic globalization, the spread of popular culture and spatial frameworks such as diffusion, dispersal, and regionalization.


HIST 3923H 001: ARTISTS AND BOHEMIANS: POLITICS, SEXUALITY AND THE AVANT-GARD

Professor: Richard Sonn
Colloquium: Humanities or Social Science 

Beginning with the realists and impressionists in 19th c. Paris, artists began to reject the academic art advocated by the Fine Arts (Beaux-Arts) establishment.  They organized their own shows, began painting out of doors rather than in studios, and accepted the derogatory names hostile critics gave them, including impressionism and cubism.  At the same time, artists and writers began to carve out a portion of urban space where they could live differently from the middle classes, which was called bohemia.  From the Latin Quarter on Paris’ left bank to Montmartre on the right bank and later to Greenwich Village, New York, Bloomsbury in London, and Schwabing in Munich, artist colonies spread across the western world, providing cafes for hanging out and sharing ideas and cheap studio space in which to create.  The bohemian ideal was glamorized in Rossini’s opera La Bohème, where starving artists like Rodolphe lived for their art in garrets they shared with working-class girls like Mimi.  The unconventional lives they led reinforced the modern artist’s credo to “make it new.”  We will explore this social and cultural nexus to see why artists and writers rejected bourgeois sexual standards of propriety, and will inquire to what degree they extended their rebelliousness to include political radicalism.  In the process we will learn what modernism meant in the late 19th and 20th centuries.


HIST 3923H 002: LGBTQI HISTORIES

Professor:  Ren Pepitone
Colloquium Type:  Social Science

Issues surrounding gender and sexual expression regularly make media headlines in ongoing cultural and political clashes over identity politics.  Yet left or right, we know that contemporary understandings of gender and sexuality differ from those of previous centuries.  In this class, we take a step back to ask: how have understandings of gender and sexual identity changed over time? To answer this question, we examine a variety of primary sources from the Anglophone world and its empires, as well as key contributions from historians, feminist scholars, and critical theorists.  We pay particular attention to the ways that gender and sexual identities intersected with and shaped other identity categories, including race, ethnicity, class, culture, and nationality. Tracing change over time, we come to understand how we in the present arrived at our various, often-contested notions of gender and sexual identity and expression.


HIST 3923H 001: BLACK MOVEMENTS & MESSIAHS

Professor: Caree A. Banton
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science 

This course will focus on movements and leaders in various fields in global African history since the Age of Revolutions to the present. We will closely examine the proposed strategies and visions of their movements to advance Africa, Africans, and the Diaspora. Political, economic and artistic movements throughout Africa and the diaspora ranging from Back-to-Africa, Harlem Renaissance, anti-colonialism/civil rights/ independence, Black Power, Negritude, Rastafarianism, Afro-pessimism, Afro-futurism to Black Lives Matter. Indeed, the question of "nationalism" will be key, as will key concepts such as racism, gender, sexuality, class, and intersectionality. We will contrast the rhetoric and discourse of the movements and its key figures through the ways in which they diverge and actively participate in the construction of a Pan-African, Afro-American, black nationalism, and Afrocentricity. We will conclude the course by considering the afterlife of contemporary movements such as Black Lives Matter movement ideas in early 21st century works.


HNRC 4013H 001: RACE: REDISCOVERED, UNRESOLVED

Professor: Charles Robinson
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Taught by history professor and vice chancellor, Charles Robinson, will explore “historical evolution of race in the United States and analyze its lingering impact on systemic functions, popular attitudes and the national identity.”  Students selected for Professor Robinson’s seminar will explore police shootings, campus protests, presidencies, and rhetoric of race and religion, as a part of their investigation into the past and present.


HNRC 4013H 002: CANCER: CONSTELLATION/DISEASE

Professor: Timothy Muldoone
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Natural Science

Taught by biomedical engineering professor, Timothy Muldoon, will explore the medical and social aspects of the disease, including the “way we understand, diagnose, treat, and present cancer.”  Students selected for Professor Muldoon’s seminar will assess allocation of resources to combat cancer, consider treatment of the whole person rather than just their disease, and address treatment for an aging population.


HUMN 3923H 001:  GAME DESIGN

Professor:  David Frederick
Colloquium Type:  Humanities 

For more information please contact the instructor.


HUMN 3923H 005: TIBET BUDDHIST PHIL/CULTURE

Professor: The Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science 

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology.


JOUR 3923H 001: GOVERNMENT AND THE MEDIA

Professor:  Gina H. Shelton
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This class examines relations between the media, politics and government, with analysis of the power, responsibility and performance of the media. Topics include evolving media technologies and trends like fake news, use of freedom of information laws, money in politics, international press and influence, and coverage of courts, Congress and the White House.


JOUR 3923H 002: ISSUES IN ADVERTISING & PR

Professor: Jan Wicks
Colloquium Type:  Humanities or Social Science 

The primary goal of Issues in Advertising & Public Relations is to increase your awareness of the effects of the advertising and public relations industries and their messages on society. You’ll be encouraged to think about the implications of what you do when you create an advertisement or public relations message or campaign. You’ll read classic readings as well as current examples of major social, economic, cultural and ethical issues regarding advertising and public relations. You’ll develop a social marketing plan in teams to educate the public about a particular social problem or for a nonprofit or educational entity. This helps you to learn how advertising and public relations messages can be used to help society. You’ll write an individual literature review paper on a different topic (which can be the basis for a literature review for your thesis). You’ll consult with me to select a “doable” topic about an ethical issue or topic relevant to the course.


JOUR 3923H 003: LITERATURE OF JOURNALISM

Professor: Bret Schulte
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This seminar explores the growth of journalism as a field of literary pursuit, using the techniques that have long defined fiction. The semester consists of a survey of book and magazine-length narrative nonfiction from the mid-20th century to today. Authors include pioneering literary journalists, such as Hersey, Capote, Didion, as well as their successors, such as Frazier, Conover, and Orlean.


MEST 4003H 001: THE RISE OF MONOTHEISM

Professor: Spencer Allen 
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science
 

For more information please contact the instructor. 


MEST 4003H 002: BIBLE AND KORAN: COMPARISONS

Professor: Spencer Allen
Type: Humanities: Humanities or Social Science

For more information please contact the instructor. 


MEST 4003H 003:  WOMEN OF THE BIBLE

Professor: Spencer Allen 
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course will consider the lives and times of famous biblical mothers, wives, and daughters, and it will offer a voice to the nameless women whose lives can only be reconstructed through family life and life-cycle events during the various biblical periods. We will read and discuss several passages focusing on women whose individual contributions to Israel were unparalleled, such as Ruth, Yael, Esther, and Judith; those who played critical roles in the establishment or survival of biblical Israel or the Church, including Leah, Rachel, Mary; and others, like Eve, Jezebel, and Mary Magdalene, who were unjustly vilified.


MUTH 3923H 001: MUSIC AND MIND

Professor:  Elizabeth Hellmuth Margulis
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course will examine music as a product of the human mind. What happens when cognitive science is used to make sense of a deeply cultural phenomenon like music? Students will read articles from this rapidly exploding field, participate in class discussions, and complete a number of hands-on projects, ranging from the use of software to manipulate audio files to the design and execution of a mini-experiment. They will grapple with the theories and methodologies used to address questions like: Is music a language? Why do some melodies get stuck on mental replay? Why are some performances deeply moving, and others just ok? How do people learn to clap along to a beat? Along the way, they will acquire the ability to think flexibly back and forth between the humanities and the sciences, a skill that is broadly relevant regardless of major.


PHIL 3923H 001: PHILOSOPHY OF MUSIC 

Professor: Richard Lee 
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science 

What is music?  Do musical works mean anything?  If so, how?  Does music have some special connection with emotion?  If so, what is that connection?  Can music be sad?  Is music a language?  Does music depict things similar to the way paintings do (only aurally instead of visually)?  What is the ontological status of a musical work?  Can music, once created, be destroyed?  (Does destroying the manuscripts and recordings destroy the music?)  We'll look at music from a philosophical perspective, not just concert hall music, but popular music, rock, and jazz as well.  We'll explore the views of such thinkers as Peter Kivy, Jerrold Levinson, Eduard Hanslick, Jenefer Robinson, Roger Scruton, Stephen Davies, Derek Matravers, R.A. Sharpe, Julian Dodd, and others.

AIST 4003H 001: READING JAPANESE NOH AS CULTURAL HISTORY

Professor: Elizabeth Markham
Colloquium Type: Social Science

We shall use original Noh chant books (utai-bon) alongside translations of librettos. Most plays will be viewed on film; the others listened to while reading. Our focus will be on the historical and the contextual: we shall work with the earlier poetry, songs, and dance-tunes, referred to as nostalgia in the plays, and also with early Buddhist, theatrical, and secular musical forms that have contributed to and borrowed from Noh. The course does not require specialized knowledge of music, nor of East Asian languages, and it is open to majors in any field. Students address their particular interests via individual projects, culminating in an extended re-search essay.


AIST 4003H 002: UNCOVERING HEIAN JAPAN (794--1192)

Professor: Elizabeth J. Markham
Colloquium Type: Social Science

The invention of an isolated, refined, purely aesthetic Heian Japan (794--1191) has been targeted in recent scholarship (Denecke, 2008, Heldt, 2008, Lamarre, 2000). An alternative placing of the early Heian court within the fold of Táng China (618--907), rather than in ethnolinguistic opposition to it, has been offered. This course traces the reasons for the former view but takes its cue from the alternative to focus on the early Heian court, temple, and shrine in terms of appropriation, assimilation, synthesis -- but also re-positioning and hybridization -- of “China'' in language, literature, religion, culture, and in terms of what these processes meant for the social and political order of the day.

This course does not require specialized knowledge of East Asian languages. It is examined via essays on assigned topics and an extended research essay on a course-related topic chosen by the individual student.


AIST 4003H 004: THE RECLUSE IN EARLY EAST ASIA

Professor: Rembrandt F. Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Social Science

"In reading (to use the Chinese term) a Chinese landscape painting, we are often moved by the pleasure of recognition, even of identification, occasioned by the one or more tiny human figures, almost imperceptible among the rocks and pines. These figures, executed with a few minute strokes of the brush, represent a solitary man, leaning on his staff along a mountain path, or on the back of a donkey, crossing a bridge and followed by a boy who carries his lute, or among a group of similar figures lingering by the waterside, immersed in the landscape, insignificant and unobtrusive" (Li Chi, 1962).

This course, which studies recluses in their social and cultural context in both China and Japan, does not require specialized knowledge of East Asian languages (although students with knowledge of classical Chinese will have opportunity to work with original texts should they wish). It is open to majors in any field. Students address their particular interests via individual projects, culminating in an extended research essay from each student.


AIST 4003H 003: EARLY CHINESE EMPIRES

Professor: Rembrandt F. Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Taking the Silk Road as our main artery, we shall concentrate on the most colorful changes in multi-ethnic, multi-cultural medieval China from the period of the Southern and Northern Dynasties, and in particular from the rise and following unification of Northern China.

Under the Northern Wei (386–534), to the subsequent unification of North and South under the Sui (589–618), through the resplendent Tang (618–907) and the most cultured of all Chinese dynasties, the Song (960–1279), the martial Jin (115–1234), to end with the culmination of power (at a price) in the largest empire emanating from Chinese soil, the Yuan (1271–1368).


ANTH 3923H 001: Violence and Social Suffering

Professor: Ram Natarajan
Colloquium Type: Humanities OR Social Science

A course that takes an anthropological look at violence, focusing first on how societies define injury and then on the costs of violence for those who suffer injuries and those who commit them. Topics to be covered include warfare, colonial violence, animal violence, climate change, pain, fear, and trauma. The last class unit will focus on violence in Arkansas: human trafficking, gas drilling, racial violence, and World War II internment. Our overall concern will be how violence encompasses more than bodily harm and is a long-term process that is part of everyday life.


ANTH 3923H 002, BIOL 3923H 001, HIST 3923H 003: THE DARWIN COURSE

Professor: William F. McComas
Colloquium Type: Social Science OR Natural Science or Mathematics

The Darwin Course is led by Parks Family Professor of Science Education William F. McComas (mccomas@uark.edu) who will be joined by a team of professors from a variety of specialization across campus who together bring a rich mix of perspectives designed to examine evolution from its history to Charles Darwin’s voyage on the H.M.S. Beagle to the Scopes Trial to continuing aftershocks in science classrooms today. Darwin and the ideas he supported have profound relevance across the fields of biology, history, literature, sociology and beyond, yet many misunderstand or even reject evolution. This course has been designed to demonstrate that the most complete view of any discovery, event or person can only be achieved through an interdisciplinary perspective and evolution is a superb example of a topic that demands an integrated consideration.

Darwin Course Faculty scheduled: William F. McComas (science education); Vince Chaddick (law); William Etges (biology); Daniel Kennefick (physics); David Jolliffe (English); Jack Lyons and Barry Ward (philosophy); Angie Maxwell (political science); Richard Sonn (history), J. Michael Plavcan, Claire Terhune and Lucas Delezene (anthropology);


CLST 4003H 001: VIRTUAL POMPEII

Professors: David Fredrick and Rhodora G. Vennarucci
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Help unlock the secrets of ancient life in Pompeii through Virtual Reality! While Pompeii is one of the oldest (and most famous) archaeological sites, under excavation since the 18th century, much about life in this ancient city remains unknown. This is partly because contemporary approaches to understanding human environmental cognition have not been systematically applied to Pompeii. How did people in this ancient Roman city perceive, process, and navigate space, interpreting architectural and decorative cues to movement and behavior? How does this compare to how we contemporary humans navigate our cities, houses…and Walmart? The emergence of video game engines and Virtual Reality headsets as serious platforms for scientific visualization is transforming our ability to do cognitive research on archaeological sites. Students in this colloquium will help develop a 3D model of a section of Pompeii presented through the immersive environments of desktop 3D, Virtual Reality headsets (especially the Oculus Rift and Samsung Gear) and the Mixed Reality experience offered by Microsoft’s Hololens. No prerequisites required.


ENGL 3923H 001: MEDICAL HUMANITIES

Professor: Casey Kayser
Colloquium Type: Humanities OR Social Science

This course combines literary and critical texts that attend to the social rather than technical aspects of medicine, focusing on such topics as the human condition, personal dignity, social responsibility, cultural diversity, and the history of medicine. Through readings, class discussion, writing activities, and first-hand observation, students will practice critical analysis and reflection to instill in them a commitment to compassionate, community responsive, and culturally competent medical care. This course requires a service-learning component that involves close interaction with a physician at a local clinic and medically-relevant service hours at a local agency in addition to the classroom time commitment. This course is only open to premedical students, who must meet with Dr. Jackson Jennings in order to enroll.


GEOS 410V 004: AMERICAN PUBLIC LANDS & POLICY

Professor: Tom Paradise
Colloquium Type: Social Science

The class will examine the role of our federal public lands in 19th and 20th century American geography, history, policy, and art. We will investigate the growth of conservation, preservation, and management movements in the US by looking at America's national parks and forests, dams, wildlife refuges, wilderness areas, and managed and agricultural lands. We will look into the major characters involved with these federal public lands and the role of natural resources in important policies and acts. Pivotal 19th and 20th C. personalities will include Muir, Roosevelt, Leopold, Thoreau, Bierstadt, Emerson, Pinchot, Audubon, and Stegner. Readings, lectures and round-table discussions will include various aspects including law, history, art, literature, geography, political science, environmental studies, perception of nature, and resource management.


HIST 3923H 001: BLACK MOVEMENTS & MESSIAHS

Professor: Caree A. Banton
Colloquium Type: Humanities OR Social Science

This course will focus on movements and leaders in various fields in global African history since the Age of Revolutions to the present. We will closely examine the proposed strategies and visions of their movements to advance Africa, Africans, and the Diaspora. Political, economic and artistic movements throughout Africa and the diaspora ranging from Back-to-Africa, Harlem Renaissance, anti-colonialism/civil rights/ independence, Black Power, Negritude, Rastafarianism, Afro-pessimism, Afro-futurism to Black Lives Matter. Indeed, the question of "nationalism" will be key, as will key concepts such as racism, gender, sexuality, class, and intersectionality. We will contrast the rhetoric and discourse of the movements and its key figures through the ways in which they diverge and actively participate in the construction of a Pan-African, Afro-American, black nationalism, and Afrocentricity. We will conclude the course by considering the afterlife of contemporary movements such as Black Lives Matter movement ideas in early 21st century works.


HIST 3923H 002: The Crusades: Islamic Perspectives

Professor: Nikolay Antov
Colloquium Type: Humanities OR Social Science

This colloquium will study the impact that the Crusades (defined as religious wars proclaimed and/or supported by the Papacy) and crusading politics in Western Europe and the Mediterranean had on the political, religio-cultural, and socio-economic development of the Islamic world. This includes an analysis of the ways in which the Crusades shaped Islamic legal and political theory (e.g., evolving conceptualizations of jihad), conduct of warfare, Muslim conceptualizations of Christianity and Christendom, as well as everyday life (including major aspects of the relations between Muslims and non-Muslims in the Islamic world). For the purposes of this colloquium the crusading era will be broadly defined, i.e. from the late 11th to the late 16th centuries (thus also including crusading campaigns and crusading politics following the fall of the Kingdom of Jerusalem in 1291).


HIST3923H 004: AFRICA, PAST AND PRESENT: HISTORY AND HISTORIOGRAPHY

Professor: Todd Cleveland
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This course explores African history and historiography in an attempt to better understand contemporary Africa by examining its recent past. Students will also engage with the series of shifting analytical and methodological approaches that scholars have employed in order to study the continent's peoples - past and present.


HNRC 4013H 001: TEETH: EVOLUTION’S BITE

Professor: Peter Ungar
Colloquium Type: Social Science

The course will be broken into three parts. The first part introduces key terms and concepts: tooth form, structure, and development, food and feeding. The second part focuses on the evolution of teeth and, in a broader sense, the animals in whose mouths they evolve. This section will cover teeth before the mammals, the origins of chewing, and the mammalian fossil record. The third part presents the teeth of mammals today – an amazing example of Darwin’s “endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful”. The course closes with a consideration of our teeth.

Millions of humans suffer fillings, crowns, wisdom tooth extractions, and braces each year. Most other mammals don’t have widespread dental disease and orthodontic disorders. Why are we so different? The answer is rooted in evolutionary history; and this course offers the student the perspective needed to understand this and, in doing so, to better appreciate our place in Nature.


HNRC 4013H 002: PROSECUTION: (UN)MAKING A MURDER

Professor: Brian Gallini (Law)
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Both investigative and trial errors pervade the prosecution of Steven Avery. Can officers simply walk onto your property without a warrant? Can a prosecutor call a press conference and outline unproven facts for the world reflecting a suspect’s guilt? Can investigators interrogate a juvenile suspect for hours at a time without a lawyer or at least an adult present? Should a defense lawyer ever allow her client to speak with the police alone? We’ll tackle these questions, among so many others, to understand why Steven Avery should, wholly apart from his factual innocence, be “unmade” as a murderer.


HUMN 3923H: WRITING HISTORY & MAKING FILMS

Professor: Sidney Burris and Craig Pasquinzo
Colloquium Type: Humanities OR Social Science

This innovative course and film-lab will introduce students to the two fundamental skills that structure the most important media outlets that we consult on a daily basis: historical research and basic video editing skills. No prior knowledge of film-editing is required.

The course will focus on the Tibetan refugee situation and will work in conjunction with the extensive film archives of The TEXT Program (Tibetans in Exile Today), the University’s oral-history project that chronicles the lives of Tibetan refugees currently living in India.

For the documentary film, students will be given access to these archives and photographs that include not only interviews with Tibetans, but hours of footage from The TEXT Program’s travels throughout India—all of this material will be available to students in the class, as they plan their research paper and design their film.


HUMN 3923H 006: Tibet Buddhist Phil/Culture

Professor: The Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities OR Social Science

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology.


LAST 4003H 001: Chicana/Latina Feminist Thought and Literature

Professor: Yajaira M. Padilla
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course centers on feminist literature written by U.S. Latinas. Although a significant portion of the course will be devoted to the works of Chicana authors, we will also read literature by Dominican American, Nuyorican, Cuban American, and U.S. Central American women. A central focus of the course is the exploration of how these authors use a gendered lens in their writings to theorize about the lives of Chicana/Latina women. Among the issues raised in their works, which we will be discussing, are: gendered forms of oppression, sexuality, racial and social inequality, ethnic identity, nationalism, bilingualism, violence, and relationships across generations. In addition to creative works of fiction, poetry, performance, and film, we will also read theory, personal essays, and critical histories by many of these same authors, as well as by other feminists of color that will help guide and foreground our discussions.


MEST 4003H 001: ISLAMIC ART & ARCHITECTURE

Professor: Tom Paradise
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course will examine the style, materials, beauty, and evolution of Islamic Arts and Architecture across the globe. We will address architecture and art through images, video, and readings as to how faith and function combine in religious structure (i.e. mosque, minaret, madrasa), and in civic structures (i.e. dams, public spaces, bridges, caravansaries).

In addition, we will address these wonders through practical workshops where we will be making practical workshops where we will be making Islamic mosaics, designing calligraphy, and metal-leafing paper, stone, and brick. We will learn about these beautiful art forms, and then make them ourselves.


MEST 4003H 002: ORTHODOXY AND HERESY IN ISLAM

Professor: Sarwar Alam
Colloquium Type: Humanities OR Social Science

Like any other religion, Islam is a contested religious tradition. It is contested not only among those who critically study but also among those who practice it. This contest officially began during the period of the first caliph of Islam, Abu Bakr (d. 634), when several groups of early Muslims wanted to elect other prominent figures as the successor of Prophet Muhammad. The early theological debate attained its zenith during the rule of the fourth caliph ‘Ali (d. 661), when a group of his supporters left him, accusing the caliph of being a deviant. This group later became known as the khawariji or kharajite (meaning those who went out), who claimed that only their belief was the right belief. It is also said that there is no papacy in Islam, leading many to believe that the religion lacks a figure to authoritatively define what Islam is. The question of heresy is thus an oblivious issue in Islam. Nevertheless, there are said to be 73 sects in Islam, all of which claim itself as orthodox or the correct Islam and the rest as bida or innovation or heresy. This course will address the issues of orthodoxy and heresy as defined by Muslim scholars at different points of history and explore how these definitions and interpretations affect Muslim communities of the past as well as the present.


PHYS 3923H 001: THE SCIENCE OF MUSIC AND SOUND

Professor: Hugh Churchill
Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Mathematics

This honors colloquium examines the nature of sound and what science (mostly physics) can tell us about music and musical instruments. After developing an understanding of what sound is and how it behaves that is both quantitative and intuitive, we will consider many real-world applications including musical acoustics, sound perception, and sound generation by the human voice, other instruments, sounds spaces, and more. We will take advantage of high quality (and usually free) phone apps and computer software that allow us to analyze, visualize, and understand sound in quantitative detail. Significant class time will be devoted to in-class “labs” making use of these tools. Musical experience of any kind is helpful but not necessary, and a mathematical background of algebra, geometry, and trigonometry (re-introduced as necessary) is required; there is no calculus or physics prerequisite.

**only 3 hours (or one course) can be earned in either a study abroad or intersession term toward the 9 hours required for college honors core.

AIST 4003H 002: Classical Thought in Asia
Professor:  Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type:  Humanities                                                                                                     

Please contact the instructor for more details.

AIST 4003H 003: Song China (960-1279)
Professor:  Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science                                                                                                

Please contact the instructor for more details.

ANTH 3923H 001: Primate Behavioral Ecology
Professor:  Joseph Plavcan
Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Social Science      

Please contact the instructor for more details.

ANTH 3923H 002: Ballroom Performance & Culture
Professor:  Jonathan Marion
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science        

Please contact the instructor for more details.

ARHS 3923H 001: The Medieval Illuminated Manuscript
Professor:  Lynn Jacobs
Colloquium Type:  Humanities                                                                                                     

The colloquium will study illuminated manuscripts from the fifth through the sixteenth centuries, focusing primarily on works produced in Europe (France, Belgium, Holland, Germany, England, Ireland, and Italy), but with some consideration of non-Western manuscript production.  Students will be introduced to key elements of manuscript studies, including  codicology (study of the physical structure of the book), paleography (study of scripts), types of manuscripts, and methods of production.  Special attention will be devoted to topics including:  narrative in Early Christian and Byzantine manuscript illumination;  varieties of literacy and the relation of word and image in Carolingian manuscripts;  women and the book, anti-Semitism in Hebrew manuscripts;  the treatment of space in Islamic manuscripts;  and images of peasants in the book of hours.  Students will have the opportunity to work closely on a specific Book of Hours and to give a presentation of their findings.   

BIOL 3923H 001: Types of Asexual Reproduction, Sexual Reproduction, and Mating Systems Among Different Species of Organisms
Professor: James Walker
Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Mathematics

Each student enrolled in BIOL 3923H will conduct an in-depth study of any one or two of several types of sexual reproduction, asexual reproduction, or mating systems. Examples of types or reproduction include parthenogenesis, gynogenesis, and hybridogenesis. Examples of types of mating systems (not restricted to humans) include monogamy, polygamy, polyandry, and promiscuity. The first two or three weeks of the Fall Semester will involve lectures presented by guest speakers. It will be during this period that each student shall select a study topic as the subject for a term paper and class presentation.

BIOL 3923H 002: Biology of Breast Cancer
Professor: Tameka Bailey
Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Mathematics

Breast cancer is the second leading cause of cancer associated death in American women. Using peer reviewed journal articles students will develop knowledge of: 1) mammary gland development, 2) the etiology of breast cancer, 3) the molecular subtypes of breast cancer, 4) signal transduction pathways in breast cancer and 5) screening, diagnostic and therapeutic strategies for the treatment and prevention of breast cancer.  Course grades will be based on participation in round table discussions and written reviews of the literature.

ENGL 3923H: Narratives of Passing in African American Literature
Professor: S. Marren
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Last year, Rachel Dolezal briefly erupted into unsought media celebrity when her white parents outed her--the Spokane NAACP president and an Africana Studies professor at Eastern Washington University--as a white woman passing for black. Why, everyone was wondering, would a white woman darken her skin and adopt elaborate African American hairstyles so as to seem black? Was this cultural appropriation, as her critics said, or was it an unusually public demonstration of the fictiveness of race, as her supporters held? It is quintessentially American to be a “self-made man”; why, then, has social mobility by means of passing most often been considered not enterprising but deceptive? In this honors colloquium, we will read an array of fictional and nonfictional narratives of racial passing, and watch a few films on the subject, examining how they seem both to reinforce and to undermine racial (and often gender and class) boundaries. We will attempt to make sense of the recent upsurge of interest in racial passing in our supposedly “postracial” society, and consider how the literature of passing challenges notions of family, social mobility and cultural progress.

GEOS 410VH: Geography of the Contemporary South
Professor: Fiona M. Davidson
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This class takes a geographical perspective on the last five hundred years of southern history to construct a narrative of economic, political and cultural change that has shaped the contemporary southern landscape. Using documentary film, literature, music and food to supplement more conventional analytical materials, the class will explore how the economic and political condition of the South in the 21st century is a function of both its own history and of the external expectations of the “non-South”.

GEOS 4043H: Geography of the Middle East and North Africa
Professor: Tom Paradise
Colloquium Type: Social Science

An overview of the MENA countries from Morocco to Egypt, Jordan to Turkey, and Iraq to the Gulf States, addressing culture and language, politics and clan structures, geology and geography, agriculture and cuisine, art and architecture, etc.  The class also includes student-run banquets and presentations about foods, cuisines, and traditions. This class was designed for country-by-country briefings often used in U.S. diplomatic training.

HIST 3923H 001: Christianity & Money
Professor: Lora Walsh
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Why have Christian perceptions of monetary wealth undergone such radical re-interpretations and reversals throughout history? In this course, we will examine the internal logic and external circumstances that influenced major shifts in Christian understandings of financial resources: from the early Christian ideal of financial redistribution to the church’s accumulation of institutional wealth; from the fierce medieval condemnations of usury to the near-total acceptance of lending money at interest; and from the embrace of personal and ecclesiastical poverty by late medieval reformers to the post-capitalist interpretation of financial gain as a pure reward for hard work or rigorous faith. Although we will emphasize early and medieval sources such as the economic parables of Jesus in their historical context and the writings of Francis and Clare of Assisi, we will also use a historical perspective to evaluate contemporary Christian phenomena such as the prosperity gospel and anti-poverty campaigns.

HIST 3923H 002: Machiavelli & the Origins of Modern Politics
Professor: Freddy C. Dominguez
Colloquium Type: Social Science

There is no more fitting time to embark on an in-depth investigation of Machiavelli and his works than a heated election cycle. With an eye to the political story unfolding in the Fall, professor and students will collaborate in a deeply contextualized reading of Machiavelli’s (in)famous sixteenth century book on politics and ethics,  The Prince.  To this end, we will read The Prince along with a series of texts from Antiquity through the Renaissance, several of Machiavelli’s  other works, his personal correspondence, and several Renaissance responses to his writings.  We will also take a look of some recent interpretations of the text. Though our main goal will be to understand The Prince,  by the end of the course we will have also  read and talked about several “classics” in the canon of political thought, we will have spent a lot of time thinking about the role of Christian ethics in modern political thought, and we will have a better understanding of Renaissance culture as a whole.   More broadly, this course will investigate how one goes about reading a book in (historical) context, what one means by this, and what sources one should use to do so. More broadly still, we will reflect on what The Prince can help us understand about our own political culture.

JOUR 3923H 001: Government & the Media
Professor:  Gina Shelton
Colloquium Type: Social Science        

Please contact the instructor for more details.

JOUR 3923H 002: Issues in Advertising/PR
Professor:  Jan Wicks
Colloquium Type: Social Science    

Please contact the instructor for more details.

JOUR 3923H 003: Literature of Journalism
Professor:  Bret Schulte
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science        

Please contact the instructor for more details.

MEST 4003H: Iranian Cinema
Professor:  Kaveh Bassiri
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science        

Please contact the instructor for more details.

MUTH 3923H: Music & Mind
Professor: Elizabeth Margulis
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course will investigate the cognitive mechanisms that underlie the experience of music. What can our understanding of the human mind tell us about music, and what can our understanding of music tell us about the human mind? Questions considered will include:  To what extent are musical and linguistic abilities neurally dissociable?  Why can people without formal musical training tap along to a beat?  What makes certain melodies get stuck on mental replay?  Why do some performances evoke more emotion than others? Are there musical universals? Disciplines touched by these questions include musicology, psychology, anthropology, neuroscience, philosophy, and cognitive science. No prior musical training is required to enroll in this class.

PLSC 3923H: Political Violence
Professor:  Jeffrey Ryan
Colloquium Type: Social Science        

Please contact the instructor for more details.

AIST 4003H 001: Reading Japanese Noh as Cultural History
Professors: Elizabeth Markham
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Noh is Japan’s profoundly beautiful, profoundly moving masked dance-drama. Seen as a form of total theater, it combines elements of poetry, music, chant, mime, dance, and drama, elements with roots – particularly music-and-dance based roots – far back beyond the 14th-century of its first great floraison. This course will explore ten representative Noh plays, concentrating on the “Mad Woman” category, plays that deal with poignant mental suffering of a woman’s intense grief. We shall include Hagoromo and Sumidagawa (linked in the West to Fenollosa, Pound, Yeats, and Britten). We shall use original Noh chant books (utai-bon) alongside translations of librettos. Most plays will be viewed on film; the others listened to while reading. Our focus will be on the historical and the contextual: we shall work with the earlier poetry, songs, and dance-tunes, referred to as nostalgia in the plays, and also with early Buddhist, theatrical, and secular musical forms that have contributed to and borrowed from Noh. The course does not require specialized knowledge of music, nor of East Asian languages, and it is open to majors in any field. Students address their particular interests via individual projects, culminating in an extended research essay.

AIST 4003H 002: Uncovering Heian Japan (794-1192)
Professors: Elizabeth Markham
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

The invention of an isolated, refined, purely aesthetic Heian Japan (794-1192) has been targeted in recent scholarship. An alternative placing of the early Heian court within the fold of Táng China (618–907), rather than in ethnolinguistic opposition to it, has been offered. This course traces the reasons for the former view, but takes its cue from the alternative to focus on the early Heian court, temple, and shrine in terms of appropriation, assimilation, synthesis – but also re-positioning and hybridization – of “China” in language, literature, religion, culture, and in terms of what these processes meant for the social and political order of the day. This course does not require specialized knowledge of East Asian languages. It is examined via essays on assigned topics and an extended research essay on a course-related topic chosen by the individual student.

AIST 4003H 003/HIST 4853H: Early Chinese Empires
Professors: Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Taking the Silk Road as our main artery, we shall concentrate on the most colorful changes in multi-ethnic, multi-cultural medieval China from the period of the Southern and Northern Dynasties, and in particular from the rise and following unification of Northern China under the Northern Wei.

ANTH 3923H 001: Digital Antiquity
Professors: Rachel Opitz
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Natural Science

Archaeology, the study of the past through its material remains, involves rather a lot of modern technology. Geophysical surveys let us see below the surface of the earth and help us identify walls and floors and pits  through their impact on soil properties; airborne laser scanning lets us see small humps and bumps on the surface of the earth that represent buried structures. At the surface, 3D reconstructions let us explore how people arranged and experienced buildings and cities, and 3D models made through structure from motion are used for rapid and detailed recording during excavations. This course provides a hands-on project based introduction to digital technologies as they are used in the study of the ancient world.

CLST 4003H: Greek Religion
Professors: Daniel Levine
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This colloquium uses class discussion and readings on Greek cult practices to learn how the Greeks worshipped their gods. We consider literary and archaeological evidence from the archaic to the hellenistic periods, including the major Homeric Hymns (to Demeter, Apollo, Hermes, Aphrodite, Dionysos). We will examine the worship of gods and heroes by families and in public in their sanctuaries, including Athena Polias, Demeter Eleusinia, Dionysos Cadmeios, Apollo Pythios, and Zeus Olympios.  We will look at numerous Athenian cults, and see how Greeks expressed religious ideas in several tragedies of Sophocles and comedies of Aristophanes. We will also consider magic, witchcraft and ghosts. Students will give short reports and write a term paper.  All readings are in English.  CLST 4003H is required for students majoring and minoring in Classical Studies, and may be repeated for credit when it has a different subject. Further information:  Dr. Daniel Levine (dlevine@uark.edu) and Dr. Joy Reeber (reeber@uark.edu).

ENGL 3923H:  Can Good Books Make Us Better People?
Professors: Padma Viswanathan
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course will discuss the ways that stories have, since our earliest extant literatures, been used for moral instruction—the ways human societies appear long to have presumed that the answer to the course title question is “yes.”  We will discuss various definitions of morality, across history and cultures, as well as the relationship of literature to empathy, empathy to morality, and morality to behavior. Since this is a course with a creative writing emphasis, students will also learn to analyze narrative texts for their literary value and effects, and become conversant in character development; narrative perspective; description; dialogue; doubling and repetition; metaphor; story structure; and the creation and use of dramatic conflict. We will evaluate the ways various texts evoke or elide truths, and the uses of beauty, including the times when such uses might be suspect. All majors and disciplines welcome.

EUST 4003H: HEC: European Union
Professors: Blake Duffield
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Please contact instructor (bduffiel@uark.edu) for more information.

HIST 3923H 001: Mao Zedong and the Chinese Cultural Revolution 
Professors: Kelly Hammond
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

More than one billion copies of Quotations from Chairman Mao Zedong (“The Little Red Book”) were published in 38 different languages (including braille) between 1964-1976, and the books were distributed by communists all around the world. Mao Zedong Thought had an incredible impact on the twentieth-century world in places as far afield as Burma to Peru. Placing Mao and Mao Zedong Thought in a global perspective, this class will help students comprehend the historical impact of this influential leader both inside and outside of China. The class will be divided into three sections. In the first section, we will study the historical development of Mao’s theories of peasant revolution, the Mass Line, and his Three Worlds Theory to understand the historical contingencies and historical legacies of his contributions in the development of Marxism. In the second section, we will focus specifically on the events of the Chinese Cultural Revolution in order to de-mystify and try to comprehend the chaos inflicted on Chinese society by the Red Guards between 1966-1969. In the third section, we will examine Maoism as an international movement to understand the lasting impact of this important figure and his ideas on world history both before and after his death in 1976. The class will be comprised of both discussions and lectures, and will draw from a wide variety of sources including Revolutionary Operas, biography, movies, news clips, memoirs, short stories, and propaganda posters in order to fully understand the social, political, and cultural impact of Mao Zedong on our world.

HIST 3923H 002: Medieval Prayer and Mysticism
Professors: Lora Walsh
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course examines the techniques and rhetoric of medieval Christians who sought and described their union with God and its transformative effects of on human beings. We will attempt to understand the experiences connoted by terms such as “vision,” “ecstasy,” and “contemplation,” as well as the more methodical routines of prayer such as the monastic hours, liturgical observances, and devotional exercises. In addition to close-reading of primary sources, we will identify the historical processes that shape “spiritual” experiences and the social and material changes that made such experiences available to audiences beyond religious elites. We will also employ experiential methods adapted from the contemporary study of prayer.

HUMN 3923H 001: Game Design II
Professor: David Fredrick
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Please contact instructor (dfredric@uark.edu) for more information.

HUMN 3923H 002: Humanities Heritage Representation
Professor: David Fredrick 
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course aims to introduce a mixed group of students (both architecture and liberal arts) to the theory and practice of immersive storytelling for heritage and architectural sites, using the Fay Jones houses as test cases. This crossdisciplinary, cross-listed course is focused on research and interpretation tasks, requiring student participants to analyze, document, and model Fay Jones’ Jones House (Fayetteville, 1955). You will also apply the same means and scope of research and documentation to an unbuilt (but well-documented) Fay Jones-designed (c. 1960) house on a site immediately adjacent to the Jones house.

The project addresses a fundamental question for arts and design education: how can virtual and mixed reality
technologies transform visitor experiences at museums, heritage, and architectural sites? This question is essential because many sites are at significant physical risk, as was this house before it was acquired by the Fay Jones School of Architecture + Design. Both digital and analog graphic means of representation will be pursued, as well as physical representation through construction of models of the Jones house. Through the process of researching, documenting, and modeling these Fay Jones houses, students will engage with fundamental issues involved in using 3D interactive models for architectural and heritage visualization: How does the interface support interpretive arguments without confusing or overwhelming the user? When should you use schematic vs. realistic modeling and texturing approaches (when is less more)? How do you distinguish hypothetical parts from parts well-supported by evidence? How do you leverage interactivity to help teach the user about the site?

HUMN 3923H 006: Tibet Buddhist Phil/Culture
Professor: The Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology.

General Class Information: Aside from the lecture/discussion format, class-time will be spent viewing movies and gaining a first-hand knowledge of the production of Tibetan culture. Cooking, chanting, making sand mandalas and prayer flags, as well as learning the fundamental progressions of Buddhist logic—all of these will contribute to a general understanding of Tibetan culture. It is a culture, of course, that has been heavily influenced by the Buddhist philosophy of non-violence and compassion for all sentient beings, and accordingly we will investigate the ways in which a community operates in an environment of cooperation and genuine concern for its fellow citizens. All Tibetan culture—according to Tibetan cosmology—is concerned with the five major sciences: 1) arts and crafts; 2) medicine; 3) grammar; 4) logic; 5) philosophy. We will explore various aspects of these sciences in our class. Note: Before class begins, it is recommended that you view two films. First of all, Kundun, and second, Seven Years in Tibet. These are widely available at the rental stores in town, or Professor Burris will be happy to loan you his personal copies of these films.

MATH 3923H 001: CAM design and programming
Professor: Edmund Harris
Colloquium type: Math or Natural Science

CAM design and programming is an interdisciplinary course aimed at bringing students from, mathematics, computer science, architecture and design to consider how to creatively use and control Computer Aided Manufacturing devices such as a three axis router. The course works in three worlds, the concrete world of the machine, the abstract world of our conception of what the machine can achieve, and the computational world of computer models that give instructions to the machine. Each of these worlds feeds into the next, watching the machine move helps us understand what it is doing, that understanding helps create instructions on the computer and those instructions in turn control the machine. This process builds a general understanding of how mathematical models can be created and used to model and control reality, as well as developing the specific skill of controlling and pushing the limits of the technology. 

Mathematics students gain experience of the link between mathematical models and real systems, thinking about how to adapt the mathematical ideas to fit the real picture well enough to gain some control.

MEST 4003H 001: The Rise of Monotheism 
Professors: Spencer Allen
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course will examine the emergence of Israelite monotheism from its polytheistic origins and neighbors – including the Sumerians, Egyptians, Babylonians, Indians, Greeks, and Phoenicians – and explore what ultimately prompted Israel to embrace a monotheistic theology. Israel’s theological transformation will be contrasted with the independent rise of monotheisms possible found in Egyptian, Classical, African, and Native American theologies. We will also compare the adoption of monotheism by the Israelites with the adoption of monotheism by Greco-Roman Christians and Arab Muslims.

MEST 4003H 002: Early Christian History: The First 300 Years
Professors: Spencer Allen
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course will introduce students to the dynamic and exciting histories, literatures, and philosophies of the various Christian sects located throughout the Roman Empire in the first three centuries of the Common Era. Major players, themes, and ideas, as well as the methodologies of contemporary New Testament and early Christian scholarship, will be presented as the foundation for further study. Special attention will be paid to the historical background of the Bible; the Greco-Roman world; the numerous and varied early Christian movements, including both the rising orthodoxies and the branded heresies; the subjugation of women believers; and the role of the prophet in the Christian Church.

MEST 4003H 003: Women of the Bible 
Professors: Spencer Allen
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course will consider the lives and times of famous biblical mothers, wives, and daughters, and it will offer a voice to the nameless women whose lives can only be reconstructed through family life and life-cycle events during the various biblical periods. We will read and discuss several passages focusing on women whose individual contributions to Israel were unparalleled, such as Ruth, Yael, Esther, and Judith; those who played critical roles in the establishment or survival of biblical Israel or the Church, including Leah, Rachel, Mary; and others, like Eve, Jezebel, and Mary Magdalene, who were unjustly vilified.

MUSC 3923H 001: Mozart’s Operas
Professors: Martin Nedbal
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This class introduces students to the operas that Mozart wrote during the last decade of his life (Abduction from the Harem, Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni, Così fan tutte, Clemency of Titus, and Magic Flute). These works soon became the cornerstones of operatic repertoire and are still considered among the most treasured "classics" of Western culture. The class focuses on analytical approaches to the text and music of the operas, it places these works into the social, cultural, and political contexts of the late eighteenth century, and explores twenty-first-century interpretations of Mozart's social and cultural viewpoints as represented in recent stage productions.

MRST 4003H 002: Shakespeare
Professors:
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Please contact MRST chair (wquinn@uark.edu) for more information.

PHYS 3923H: Relativity and Quantum Physics
Professors: William Harter
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

Please contact instructor (wharter@uark.edu) for more information.

 

AIST 4003H 002: The Recluse in Early East Asia
Professors: Rembrandt Wolpert & Elizabeth Markham
Colloquium Type: Humanities

In reading (to use the Chinese term) a Chinese landscape painting, we are often moved by the pleasure of recognition, even of identification, occasioned by the one or more tiny human figures, almost imperceptible among the rocks and pines. These figures, executed with a few minute strokes of the brush, represent a solitary man, leaning on his staff along a mountain path, or on the back of a donkey, crossing a bridge and followed by a boy who carries his lute, or among a group of similar figures lingering by the waterside, immersed in the landscape, insignificant and unobtrusive(Li Chi, 1962)

This course, which studies recluses in their social and cultural context in both China and Japan, does not require specialized knowledge of East Asian languages (although students with knowledge of classical Chinese will have opportunity to work with original texts should they wish). It is open to majors in any field. Students address their particular interests via individual projects, culminating in an extended research essay from each student.

AIST 4003H 003: Song China
Professor: Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Humanities

The Song dynasty (960–1279) was culturally the most brilliant era in later imperial Chinese history. A time of great social and economic change, the period in large measure shaped the intellectual and political climate of China down to the twentieth century.

The momentous political shift during the early Song – from a society ruled by a hereditary aristocratic order to a society governed by a central bureaucracy of scholar-officials chosen through the civil-service examination – also had a major impact on the arts, music, and literature. As a ruling elite, these Neo-Confucian scholars regarded public service as their principal calling, but factional strife sometimes forced them to retire from political engagement, during which time they often pursued artistic interests. Eleventh-century scholars sought to revive the natural, spontaneous qualities of more archaic models; they also departed from the official view that art must serve the state. Instead, the amateur scholar-artist pursued music, painting and calligraphy for his own amusement as a forum of personal expression.

In 1125, when the Jurchen, a semi-nomadic people from northeast Asia, invaded Song China and captured the capital at Bianliang (modern Kaifeng), founding their own Jin dynasty in the north, the Song court reestablished itself in the south in Hangzhou, where it continued to rule for another 150 years as the Southern Song dynasty.

Southern Song society was characterized by the pursuit of a highly aestheticized way of life, taking as one particularly important source of inspiration the natural beauty of Hangzhou and its environs, especially West Lake, a famed scenic spot ringed with lush mountains and dotted with palaces, private gardens, and Buddhist temples.

The cultivation of a tranquil and detached mind free of material entanglements was a common concern of Song Neo-Confucian philosopher Zhu Xi (1130–1200): the “investigation of things [leading to] the extension of knowledge.”

 (adapted from The Metropolitan Museum of Art )

ARCH 4863H 001/ARHS 3923H 002/ARHS 4733 001
Professor: Kim Sexton
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This seminar considers the history of sacred space and architecture surrounding St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome from antiquity to the present. From the presumed tomb of St. Peter two stories below ground, the course explores the religious, political, class, and gender factors that generated diverse architectural expressions over time on and around “the Rock,” as Christ famously appointed Peter. Beginning in the late antique world and focusing first on the early Christian basilica built by Constantine the Great, the course proceeds to sixteenth- and seventeenth-century when Europe's most visionary architects brought forth the present-day basilica, a monument as much to the memory of the martyr Peter as to the Vatican’s vision of itself as a Counter-Reformation victor and a New World colonial power. The seminar concludes with the 20th-century changes at the Vatican initiated under the fascist regime of Mussolini. The course offers a capsule history of ecclesiastical architecture in reference to the Petrine sanctuary. While the seminar presumes no prior course work in architectural history, students are expected to engage with the space and fabric of the architecture during the course. The course is open to majors in any field who may select a research project related to their own period and field of interests (history, gender theory, painting, sculpture, music, math, etc.) as long as it relates in some way to the space of the St. Peter's Basilica, the Vatican palace or grounds, or the influence of the Petrine church on architecture outside of Rome.

***Please contact Kim Sexton in order to waive prerequisites. ksexton@uark.edu

ARHS 3923H 001: Images of Women in Rembrandt's Holland
Professor: Lynn Jacobs
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This colloquium will examine the wide variety of depictions of women in Dutch art of the seventeenth century, the golden age of Dutch painting.  We will consider how women are represented as housewives, maids, prostitutes, potential wives, mothers, and saleswomen, and what meanings were associated with the scenes of women dancing, drinking, writing letters, making music, seeing doctors, and cleaning their homes -- all extremely popular themes in Dutch art of this time.  Some of the artists whose works will be studied include Rembrandt, Hals, Vermeer, Pieter de Hooch, Jan Steen, and Ter Borch; special attention will be given to women artists in seventeenth-century Holland, particularly Judith Leyster.  Students will have the opportunity to study a specific thematic strand within the imagery of women and to give a presentation of their findings.

Students interested in further information can contact the instructor:  Lynn F. Jacobs, Professor, Art Department, ljacobs@uark.edu

BIOL 3923H 001: Types of Asexual Reproduction, Sexual Reproduction, and Mating Systems
Among Different Species of Organisms
Professor: James Walker
Colloquium Type: Math or Natural Science

Each student enrolled in BIOL 3923H will conduct an in-depth study of any one or two of several types of sexual reproduction, asexual reproduction, or mating systems. Examples of types or reproduction include parthenogenesis, gynogenesis, and hybridogenesis. Examples of types of mating systems (not restricted to humans) include monogamy, polygamy, polyandry, and promiscuity. The first two or three weeks of the Fall Semester will involve lectures presented by guest speakers. It will be during this period that each student shall select a study topic as the subject for a term paper and class presentation.

Please contact the instructor (jmwalker@uark.edu) for more information.

BIOL 3923H 002: Biology of Breast Cancer
Professor: Tameka Bailey
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

Breast cancer is the second leading cause of cancer associated death in American women. Using peer reviewed journal articles students will develop knowledge of: 1) mammary gland development, 2) the etiology of breast cancer, 3) the molecular subtypes of breast cancer, 4) signal transduction pathways in breast cancer and 5) screening, diagnostic and therapeutic strategies for the treatment and prevention of breast cancer.  Course grades will be based on participation in round table discussions and written reviews of the literature. 

ENGL 3923H – 002 Medical Humanities
Professor: Casey Kayser
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course combines literary and critical texts that attend to the social rather than technical aspects of medicine, focusing on such topics as the human condition, personal dignity, social responsibility, cultural diversity, and the history of medicine. Through readings, class discussion, writing activities, and first-hand observation, students will practice critical analysis and reflection to instill in them a commitment to compassionate, community responsive, and culturally competent medical care. This course requires a service-learning component that involves close interaction with a physician at a local clinic and service hours at a local agency in addition to the classroom time commitment. This course is only open to premedical students, who must meet with Jeanne McLachlin, Associate Director of the Premedical Program, in order to enroll.

ENGL 3923H 003: Reel Narratives: Angling in Literature and Culture
Professor: Geffrey Davis
Colloquium Type: Humanities

The art of fishing has captured the imaginations in literary works from Izaak Walton’s Compleat Angler in the sixteenth century to Ernest Hemingway’s Old Man and the Sea in the twentieth. With its analogy to humanity’s ongoing search for truth and purpose in life, angling continues to inspire the creation of art. As such, this course will take a deeper look at literary and popular narratives that engage the subject of fishing: short stories, novels, poetry, memoir, and also film and television. While you will find that some texts assume an audience of anglers, you need never have picked up rod and reel to appreciate the insights discovered via cultural narratives and artwork about fishing. By the course’s end, however, you may feel compelled to find some fish “lies” of your own in order to contemplate angling’s meanings and metaphors.

ENGL 3923H 004/ HIST 3923H 002: History of the Book in Early America 
Professor: Beth Schweiger
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Early America was full of readers. People as different as Benjamin Franklin, Abigail Adams, Frederick Douglass, and Abraham Lincoln said that they built their lives around books. Why did people read? How did people acquire what they read? This seminar will examine what and why people read and how books were produced and distributed before 1860. Historical study can offer us wisdom and perspective at time when monumental changes are occurring in what is being read, how people read, and how texts are distributed. Are the changes brought to our reading by digital media good or bad? Why do we worry about reading? What difference does it make?

Required articles will be posted to Blackboard in addition to other readings including:

  • Manguel, A History of Reading, Penguin, 1996.
  • Finkelstein and McCleery, eds., The Book History Reader, 2nd ed., Routledge, 2006.
  • Franklin, Autobiography.
  • Nord, Faith in Reading: Religious Publishing and the Birth of the Mass Media in America, Oxford, 2004.

Germ 470V: German Migrant Experiences and National Identity
Professor: Kathleen Condray
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course will investigate German migration and national identity from two perspectives: 1) from that of Germans living in other countries who are confronted with what it means to be German by examining the differences between their native and current cultures and 2) from that of groups living within Germany who consider themselves German, wholly or to some extent, yet are not immediately recognized as such by other Germans.  We will begin by looking at Arkansas in the 19th century as German immigrants made their home here.  We will read excerpts from the work of Friedrich Gerstäcker, a novelist who made his living as a fur trapper and trader in Wild West Arkansas during its territorial years and learn about Das Arkansas Echo, a German weekly newspaper published out of Little Rock from 1891-1932.  Then, we will move on to works by Hans-Jürgen Massaquoi, an Afro-German who chronicles surviving his childhood in Germany during the Third Reich and who eventually moved to America and became the head editor of Ebony; by Stefanie Zweig, who writes about how her Jewish family escaped the Third Reich by moving to a farm in Africa; by Jana Hensel, an East German who came of age just as the German Democratic Republic was disintegrating and knew West Germany only as a foreign and hostile country; by Fatih Akin, an award-winning director who explores Turkish / German relations in his films; and by Wladimir Kaminer, a best-selling German writer and immigrant who has published ten books in eight years, although he knew no German when he moved to Berlin from Russia in 1989.  The course will incorporate traditional literary narrative, autobiography, film, and music.  Counts towards the major and the minor; all course discussions and texts are in German. Instructor: Dr. Condray. Mondays, 4:10-6:40.​

HIST 3923H 001: Sex, Gender and the State in Modern Europe
Professor: Richard Sonn
Colloquium Type: Social Science

From the age of Louis XIV, when an era of kingship took literally the term body politic, to the modern era of “bio-politics” and eugenics, sexuality, gender roles and the state have been interconnected.  We will see how nationalism, imperialism, fascism, antisemitism and other movements have shaped and been affected by prevailing sexual and gender norms.  Though Victorians may have liked to believe in the separate spheres of public and private life, in reality the two intersected continually.

HIST 3923H 002/ENGL 3923H 004: History of the Book in Early America  
Professor: Beth Schweiger
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Early America was full of readers. People as different as Benjamin Franklin, Abigail Adams, Frederick Douglass, and Abraham Lincoln said that they built their lives around books. Why did people read? How did people acquire what they read? This seminar will examine what and why people read and how books were produced and distributed before 1860. Historical study can offer us wisdom and perspective at time when monumental changes are occurring in what is being read, how people read, and how texts are distributed. Are the changes brought to our reading by digital media good or bad? Why do we worry about reading? What difference does it make?

Required articles will be posted to Blackboard in addition to other readings including:

  • Manguel, A History of Reading, Penguin, 1996.
  • Finkelstein and McCleery, eds., The Book History Reader, 2nd ed., Routledge, 2006.
  • Franklin, Autobiography.
  • Nord, Faith in Reading: Religious Publishing and the Birth of the Mass Media in America, Oxford, 2004.

HIST 3923H 003: The American Experience: Views from Abroad, 1776-Present
Professor: Alessandro Brogi
Colloquium Type: Social Science

At a time of deep questioning and self-questioning of America’s world role, analyses of foreign perceptions of the United States have abounded. The objective of this colloquium is to place this current and urgent theme in historical perspective. We will make sense of the renewed challenge of American power as myth, model, and cultural production system. The chronological spectrum is from Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in Americaof the early 19th Century (with brief introduction on colonial and post-colonial America) to the war on terrorism and its international ramifications.

Topics will include American Exceptionalism, American hegemony, U.S. foreign policy through its unilateral and multilateral phases, Americanization, Anti-Americanism, Cultural "Transmissions" and "Receptions," the politics of private and public initiatives of cultural exchange, the impact of the media, with particular attention to radio, television, and cinema. This course is also an example of genuine international history: besides helping Americans to understand themselves better, foreign observers who analyze the United States also tell us something about their own societies. Therefore this colloquium is useful not only to students focusing on U.S. History but also to those whose main interests are in other areas and countries. While focusing on 1) the transatlantic dialogue between Western Europe and the United States and 2) the roots of anti-American world terrorism, -- we will also consider the impact of American culture on other areas, such as Eastern Europe, China, Japan, particularly during and after the Cold War.

HUMN 3923H 001: Video Game Design: Theory and Practice
Professors: David Fredrick & Michael Riha
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Over the past decade, video games have emerged as the most lucrative form of popular media, and arguably one of the most culturally powerful.  This course provides a critical examination of the theory and practice of building video games, using the Unity game engine. Over the course of the semester we will explore the cultural role of play and games, critique several video games in depth, and discuss game design principles. We will also put these principles into practice by building a series of basic games (2D and 3D).  Along with a critical appreciation of the principles of design that shape interactive storytelling in contemporary video games, students will gain a hands-on grasp of the pipeline through which these games are made, including modeling and texturing 3D assets (in Cinema 4D and Photoshop), scripting the most common forms of interactivity, and creating a user interface. The course does not presume prior knowledge of game software or scripting, and is intended for students across the disciplines that contribute to games: Art, Architecture, Computer Science, English, History, Music, Theatre... Majors in these disciplines also stand to gain from learning about game design and the use of game engines for visualization.

Required Books:

  • Jesse Schell - The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses
  • Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman - Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals
  • Jeff Vandermeer - Wonderbook: The Illustrated Guide to Creating Imaginative Fiction 

***Please email dfredric@uark.edu to receive permission to enroll.

HUMN 3923H 005: Tibet Buddhist Phil/Culture
Professor: The Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology. General Class Information: Aside from the lecture/discussion format, class-time will be spent viewing movies and gaining a first-hand knowledge of the production of Tibetan culture. Cooking, chanting, making sand mandalas and prayer flags, as well as learning the fundamental progressions of Buddhist logic—all of these will contribute to a general understanding of Tibetan culture. It is a culture, of course, that has been heavily influenced by the Buddhist philosophy of non-violence and compassion for all sentient beings, and accordingly we will investigate the ways in which a community operates in an environment of cooperation and genuine concern for its fellow citizens. All Tibetan culture—according to Tibetan cosmology—is concerned with the five major sciences: 1) arts and crafts; 2) medicine; 3) grammar; 4) logic; 5) philosophy. We will explore various aspects of these sciences in our class. Note: Before class begins, it is recommended that you view two films. First of all, Kundun, and second, Seven Years in Tibet. These are widely available at the rental stores in town, or Professor Burris will be happy to loan you his personal copies of these films.

JOUR 3923H 001: Media and Politics
Professor: Hoyt Purvis
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This course will focus on the relationship between the media, politics, and government, and on the role and impact of the media in public and international affairs and campaigns and elections. It will involve analysis of the power, responsibility, and performance of the media, including the significance of evolving media technologies, particularly the increasing importance of the Internet and social media in politics and government around the world. There will also be examination of government policies and regulations affecting the media and of significant developments and trends within the media.

JOUR 3923H 002: Literature of Journalism
Professor: Bret Shulte
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This seminar explores the growth of journalism as a field of literary pursuit, using the techniques that have long defined fiction. The semester consists of a survey of book and magazine-length narrative nonfiction from the mid-20th century to today. Authors include pioneering literary journalists, such as Hersey, Capote, Didion, as well as their successors, such as Frazier, Conover, and Orlean. 

JOUR 3923H 003: Issues in Advertising & Public Relations
Professor: Jan Wicks
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

The primary goal of Issues in Advertising & Public Relations is to increase your awareness of the effects of the advertising and public relations industries and their messages on society. You’ll be encouraged to think about the implications of what you do when you create an advertisement or public relations message or campaign. First you’ll develop a social marketing plan in teams to educate the public about a particular social problem or for a nonprofit or educational entity. This helps you to learn how advertising and public relations messages can be used to help society. Then you’ll develop an individual literature review paper on a different topic (which can be the basis for a literature review for your thesis). You’ll consult with me to select a “doable” topic about an ethical issue or topic relevant to the course.

LAST 4003H 002: Migration and Belonging in Latino/American Film
Professor: Yajaira Padilla
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

In this course we will explore films (both fictional and documentaries) from Latin America and the United States that focalize the experiences of internal (rural to urban) and international migration. Our analyses of these films will consist of looking at how they represent the migratory experience, including the reasons why people migrate, the obstacles they face throughout the process, and the hopes and dreams they harbor. Among the most prominent themes guiding our discussion will be the notion of (cultural, social, and national) belonging, which is inherently linked to such processes of migration. However, we will also tend to related questions regarding gender and sexuality, class, race and ethnicity, and citizenship. Although the main cultural texts for this course will be the films assigned, students will be required to read secondary articles (contextual and theoretical) in Latin American and Latino film studies and be provided with a brief introduction to the analysis of and writing about film. Most, if not all of the films, will be in Spanish with English subtitles.

LAST 4003H 003: Latin American Eco-Polotics
Professor: Sergio Villalobos-Ruminott
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Please contact the instructor (svillal@uark.edu) for more information.

MUTH 3923H 001: Music and Mind
Professor: Elizabeth Margulis
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course will investigate the cognitive mechanisms that underlie the experience of music. 

Questions considered will include: how does music impart pleasure?  Why is a 2-second stop on the radio scan sufficient to identify whether a station plays jazz or pop or classical?  To what extent are musical and linguistic abilities neurally dissociable?  Why can people without formal musical training tap along to a beat?  What makes certain melodies get stuck on mental replay?  Why do some performances evoke more emotion than others?  Disciplines touched by these questions include musicology, psychology, anthropology, neuroscience, philosophy, and cognitive science. More broadly, this colloquium will help you move flexibly between humanistic and scientific modes of thought. 

MRST 4003H 004: Late Middle Ages
Professor: Lora Walsh
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Please contact the instructor (ljwalsh@uark.edu) for more information.

PHIL 3923H 001: Belief and Deception
Professor: Eric Funkhouser
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Philosophers often think that people should be rational and believe according to the evidence. Indeed, they sometimes claim that you are not even a believer unless you are sensitive to rational and evidential considerations. However, empirical psychology and behavioral economics reveal that actual human beings deviate from these standards in certain predictable ways. And some of these deviations appear to be to our advantage – they help us better succeed at our jobs, find mates, remain healthy, and so on. In this colloquium we will investigate the logic that might explain such cognitive biases – many of them self-enhancing or pro-social – that go against the philosopher’s standard of rationality. Readings will be drawn from philosophy, evolutionary biology, psychology, and (non-mathematical) game theory.

PLSC 3923H 001: Political Violence
Professor: Jeffrey Ryan
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Please contact the instructor (jeffr@uark.edu) for more information.

PSYC 3923H 001: The Psychology of Ownership and Property
Professor: Douglas Behrend
Colloquium Type: Social Science

What's your most valued possession? Why is it so valuable to you? Ownership and property are nearly universal across human cultures.  In this colloquium, we will discuss the developmental, cognitive, social, legal, and evolutionary bases of ownership as it pertains to both physical and intellectual property both cross-culturally and (in some cases) across species.  We will tie our discussions to current issues including (but not limited to) music streaming, hoarding disorders, and nostalgia. Please contact the instructor (dbehrend@uark.edu) for more information.

WLLC 4023H 001: Language, Culture, and Web 2.0 Technologies
Professor: Linda Jones
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course provides advanced level undergraduate, honors and graduate students with innovative ways to teach and communicate through the use of Web 2.0 technologies as applied to second languages. Topics of discussion include instructional systems design, Web 2.0 technologies (blogs, wikis, Facebook, and other interactive tools), presentation technologies, online facilitation, and effective utilization of technological tools in language and culture courses.        

ANTH 3923H 001: Ballroom Culture & Performance in the West
Professor: Jonathan Marion
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This seminar explores the world of competitive ballroom dance as a concentrated microcosm of social issues and dynamics pertaining to spectacle, art, sport, ritual, ethnicity, performance, dress, gender, body, and identity. From the origins of modern ballroom competitions to current media depictions of ballroom in advertising, film, and television, we will examine the cultural aesthetics and values involved in dancesport—the term used to differentiate competitive from social ballroom dancing—as well as the personal experiences and ramifications of participation and belonging.

ANTH 3923H 002: Body & Identity
Professor: Jonathan Marion
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This course is designed to explore personal, social, and cultural constructions and performances of the body and identity, highlighting key intersections of embodiment including gender, “race,” sexuality, and abilities. Key topics related to these themes that we will discuss include: what is the body, and how can we decode the meanings that are inscribed on it by our everyday practices (e.g. wearing makeup, working out) and our choices of decorative markers (e.g. clothing, tattoos, piercings)? How are gender, race, ethnicity, and power/status signaled by the body? How is rebellion enacted through the body? Do all people approach these issues in essentially the same fashion? Throughout the semester we will begin to consider such questions through texts, films, regular class discussions, and dialogue with guest speakers. Using selected readings form anthropology, sociology, psychology, and related disciplines, the class will emphasize a cross-cultural examination of these topics, including an exploration of the paradigms within which we experience our bodies.

Please contact the instructor (marion@uark.edu) for more information.

ANTH 3923H 003/HIST 3923H 004/BIOL 3923H 003/CIED 4503H 001: The Darwin Course
Professor: William McComas
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Natural Science

Ten professors from a variety of specializations across campus will bring a rich mix of perspectives from a variety of disciplines designed to examine evolution from its history to Charles Darwin’s voyage on the H.M.S. Beagle to the Scopes Trial to continuing aftershocks in science classrooms today. The course has been designed to demonstrate that the most complete view of any discovery, event or person can only be achieved through an interdisciplinary perspective and evolution is a superb example of a topic that demands such an integrated consideration.

BIOL 3923H 001: Rivers in Peril
Professor: Art Brown
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

The objectives of this course are to provide students an opportunity to learn the major models and theories of watershed ecosystem structure and functioning during the first few meetings, then examine various forms of anthropogenic disturbances to rivers while sharpening their skills at oral and written scientific communication and the peer review process. The first meeting will consist of an overview followed by selection of topics by individual students. The science librarian will assist with efficient research of the subjects selected, if necessary. During the preparation time I will lecture about river ecosystem models, how to write abstracts, deliver oral presentations, construct posters, and write good reviews. After a few weeks to prepare, students will begin presentations of their papers to the class. The week before their presentations students will post abstracts they have composed along with peer-reviewed publications (primary literature) they have selected for the class to read prior to their presentations. Each class member will prepare a brief critique of each abstract and oral presentation, which will be graded and then given to the presenter along with my grade/critique of his or her presentation. Course grades will be based on students’ reviews of their peers’ abstracts and oral presentations, questions asked following presentations, and their own abstracts and presentations.

BIOL 3923H 002: Brain, Body, and Mind
Professor: Cynthia Sagers
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

Brain, Body and Mind charts how human behavior and culture have been molded by the landscape of the brain. Our brains govern virtually every action we take. It is the unprecedented human brain that enables the human species to dominate the earth. This course is about the nature of the brain, how it is structured, how it functions, and how it changes through life. We will look at how our personalities reflect the biological mechanisms underlying thought and emotion and how behavioral eccentricities may be traced to abnormalities in the geography of the brain. The course explores issues such as addiction, depression, eating disorders, alcoholism, faith, free will, and culture by reading recent, non-technical works in evolutionary biology and cognitive science. What does it mean to think about thinking? Are we hard wired for culture? Are we inclined toward religious faith by the nature of our minds? Brain, Body and Mind will change how you think about your self.

CLST 4003H 001: Greek Tragic Theater
Professor: David Fredrick & Joy Reeber
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Please contact the instructor (dfredric@uark.edu) for more information.

ENGL 3923H 002 Can Good Books Make Us Better People?
Professor: Padma Viswanathan
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course will discuss the ways that stories have, since our earliest extant literatures, been used for moral instruction—the ways human societies appear long to have presumed that the answer to the course title question is “yes.” We will discuss various definitions of morality, across history and cultures, as well as the relationship of literature to empathy, empathy to morality, and morality to behavior. Since this is a course with a creative writing emphasis, students will also learn to analyze narrative texts for their literary value and effects, and become conversant in character development; narrative perspective; description; dialogue; doubling and repetition; metaphor; story structure; and the creation and use of dramatic conflict. We will evaluate the ways various texts evoke or elide truths, and the uses of beauty, including the times when such uses might be suspect. All majors and disciplines welcome.

ENGL 3923H 004: Medical Humanities Colloquium
Professor: Casey Kayser
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course combines literary and critical texts that attend to the social rather than technical aspects of medicine, focusing on such topics as the human condition, personal dignity, social responsibility, cultural diversity, and the history of medicine. Through readings, class discussion, writing activities, and first-hand observation, students will practice critical analysis and reflection to instill in them a commitment to compassionate, community responsive, and culturally competent medical care. This course requires a service-learning component that involves close interaction with a physician at a local clinic and service hours at a local agency in addition to the classroom time commitment. This course is only open to premedical students, who must meet with Jeanne McLachlin, Associate Director of the Premedical Program, in order to enroll.

EUST 4003H 001: European Union
Professor: Fiona Davidson
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Please contact the instructor (fdavidso@uark.edu) for more information.

GEOG 410VH: American Public Lands & Policy
Professor: Thomas Paradise
Colloquium Type: Social Science

American Public Lands is an honors colloquium which will examine the role of our American federal public lands in 19th and 20th century geography, history, politics, policy, and art. We will investigate the growth of conservation, preservation, and management movements in the US by looking at America's national parks and forests, dams, wildlife refuges, wilderness areas, and managed and agricultural lands. We will look into the major characters involved with these federal public lands and the role of natural resources in important policies and acts. Pivotal 19th and 20th C. personalities will include John, Muir, Teddy Roosevelt, Fred Harvey, John Wesley Powell, Aldo Leopold, Henry David Thoreau, Albert Bierstadt, Wallace Stegner, and Gifford Pinchot. Readings, lectures and round-table discussions will include various aspects including law, history, art, literature, geography, political science, environmental studies, perception of nature, resource management and our ‘imagined’ environments. Come to a class that will open your eyes.

HIST 3923H 001: Sex, Class, Race, & Disease
Professor: Trish Starks
Colloquium Type: Social Science

The course has been divided into five units – the citizen, the female, the underclass, the deviant, and the defective – to explore how modern states use medicine to define and control citizens. The focus of the class is on members of groups who occasioned anxiety from white, European, male, patriarchal authority in the nineteenth century and the methods by which state officials, medical professionals, social authorities, and cultural pundits used science, statistics, and medicine in their quest to control people and behaviors defined as deficient, abnormal, or aberrant. Students will be expected to discuss critically the ways in which science has been employed to define behaviors and peoples as “unhealthy” even when there was little medical evidence to justify these views.

HIST 3923H 002: Machiavelli/Political Thought
Professor: Freddy Dominguez
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Professor and students will collaborate in a deeply contextualized reading of Machiavelli’s (in)famous sixteenth century book on politics and ethics,  The Prince.  To this end, we will read The Prince along with a series of texts from Antiquity through the Renaissance, several of Machiavelli’s  other works, his personal correspondence, and several Renaissance responses to his writings.  We will also take a look of some recent interpretations of the text. Though our main goal will be to understand The Prince,  by the end of the course we will have also  read and talked about several “classics” in the canon of political thought, we will have discussed such weighty issues as the role of Christian ethics in modern political thought, and we will have a better understanding of Renaissance culture as a whole.   More broadly, this course will investigate how one goes about reading a book in (historical) context, what one means by this, and what sources one should use to do so.

Please contact the instructor (fcdoming@uark.edu) for more information.

HIST 3923H 003: Witches, Spitfires, and Virgins: Latin American Women in History
Professor: Kathryn Sloan
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This course examines Latin American women from pre-Columbian to modern times. Students will study gender ideology and women’s contributions to shaping family, society, and politics through history. While female archetypes delineated women as either whores and witches or long suffering mothers and virgins, the experience of women reveals a more nuanced and complex history. Students will learn about the daughters of Indian nobles who forged a new race, religious mystics who challenged colonial officials, sorceresses who employed love magic and faced the Inquisition, wives and daughters that forged economic independence, female soldiers that fought for social justice and land, and contemporary women who fought to assert and define their citizenship.

HUMN 3923H 001: Honors Colloquium
Professor: David Fredrick
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Please contact the instructor (dfredric@uark.edu) for more information.

HUMN 3923H 006: Tibet Buddhist Phil/Culture
Professor: The Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology. General Class Information: Aside from the lecture / discussion format, class-time will be spent viewing movies and gaining a first-hand knowledge of the production of Tibetan culture. Cooking, chanting, making sand mandalas and prayer flags, as well as learning the fundamental progressions of Buddhist logic—all of these will contribute to a general understanding of Tibetan culture. It is a culture, of course, that has been heavily influenced by the Buddhist philosophy of non-violence and compassion for all sentient beings, and accordingly we will investigate the ways in which a community operates in an environment of cooperation and genuine concern for its fellow citizens. All Tibetan culture—according to Tibetan cosmology—is concerned with the five major sciences: 1) arts and crafts; 2) medicine; 3) grammar; 4) logic; 5) philosophy. We will explore various aspects of these sciences in our class. Note: Before class begins, it is recommended that you view two films. First of all, Kundun, and second, Seven Years in Tibet. These are widely available at the rental stores in town, or Professor Burris will be happy to loan you his personal copies of these films.

LAST 4003H: Latin American Indigenous Movements
Professor Sergio Villalobos
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This seminar will explore recent developments with indigenous movements in the region. Starting with the Maya in post-war Central America, and the Zapatistas in Mexico, we will also cover the particularities of the Mapuches in Argentina and Chile and will focus on the Bolivian MAS, as well as different aspects related to the indigenous communities and the government of Evo Morales. What organizes this seminar, however, is not a general narrative about cultural diversity in Latin America, but rather the need to understand the current transformations of classical identitarian categories (class, ethnicity, race, gender) in the context of the ongoing processes of globalization and the neoliberal policies at work in these countries.

MRST 4003H 001: Honors Med & Ren Colloquium
Professor: John Duval
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Please contact the instructor (jduval@uark.edu) for more information.

MRST 4003H 002: Shakespeare
Professor: Joseph Candido
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Please contact the instructor (candido@uark.edu) for more information.

MUSC 3923H 001: Beethoven’s Symphonic Music
Professor: Martin Nedbal
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course explores the critical and analytical approaches to the symphonic works of Ludwig van Beethoven, particularly his nine symphonies as well as his concert, opera, and theater overtures. Throughout the semester we will analyze these works from a variety of perspectives and place them into the context of late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century society and culture. The course will pay particular attention to the political aspects of Beethoven’s music. Some specific questions we will consider are: how do the Eroica and Fifth Symphonies reflect the ideals of the French Revolution; how is the Ninth (Choral) Symphony subservient to the ideologies of post-Napoleonic Europe; in what ways is Beethoven’s only opera Fidelio a nationalist work; how and why is Beethoven understood as a major “genius” of Western music; how did Beethoven’s symphonies influence the development of instrumental music in the following centuries. Basic music analytical skills are a necessary prerequisite for taking this class.

PHYS 3923H 002 Cosmology: Through the Middle Ages to Modern Times
Professor: Julia Kennefick
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

We will discuss the structure and evolution of the Universe, first as seen by ancient scholars, and our changing ideas through the middle ages up to modern times. Topics will include the Copernican revolution, including contributions by Kepler and Galileo, Newtonian Universal Laws, the discovery of galaxies, the discovery of the expanding universe, and our current ideas on the era of inflation and the accelerating Universe. The course will be mainly descriptive, and very little math is required.

PSYC 3923H 001/NURS 481VH 001/SCWK 399VH 011: Cultivating Interprofessional Collaboration to Improve Health Outcomes
Professor: Sara Collie, Ana Bridges, & Yvette Murphy-Erby
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Cultivating Interprofessional Collaboration to Improve Health Outcomes is a new multidisciplinary course geared towards honor's students who are seeking careers in health professions (medicine, nursing, social work, psychology, public health, kinesiology, etc.). The goals of the course are to promote effective, collaborative patient care through (1) increasing awareness of the roles, responsibilities, and ethics governing diverse health care workers; (2) learning how interprofessional health care teams function "in the real world"; and (3) encouraging self-reflection and appreciation for the complexities of health care service delivery. This 3 credit hour course will be team taught by a group of four faculty from nursing, social work, and psychology. Students may enroll for the class under an honor's special topics course from Nursing, Psychology, or Social Work.

THTR 3993H 001: The History of Theatres and Theatrical Design
Professor: D. Andrew Gibbs
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Theatres and auditoriums and scenery and lighting… A historical and contemporary look at the places where theatre happens and the visual effects that bring performances to life and light. Instructor and students will explore together the antiquarian theatres that provided the foundation upon which our contemporary theatres are built and the early approaches to scenery and lighting that we have become the basis of modern staging. Expect to visit several theatres and attend several play productions to help provide context for class discussion. Significant figures in the history of both the theatre building and theatrical design will be studied with particular emphasis on how our contemporary production process has evolved from early precedents.

ANTH 3923H 001: Primary Behavioral Ecology
Professor: Joseph Plavcan
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Natural Science

This course covers primate behavioral ecology and sociobiology – a rapidly changing and growing field. The goal of the course is to understand basic primate and human behavior in an ecological and evolutionary context. The course will cover the diversity of primate mating systems, ecological adaptations, and social behavior. A strong emphasis will be placed on adaptive models that synthesize the relationships between the environment and behavior. The evolution of human behavior will be studied in the context of these broader models.

ARHS 3923H 001: The Medieval Illuminated Manuscript
Professor Lynn Jacobs
Colloquium Type: Humanities

The course will study illuminated manuscripts from the fifth through the sixteenth centuries, focusing primarily on works produced in Europe (France, Belgium, Holland, Germany, England, Ireland, and Italy), but with some consideration of non-Western manuscript production.  Students will be introduced to key elements of manuscript studies, including codicology (study of the physical structure of the book), paleography (study of scripts), types of manuscripts, and methods of production.  Special attention will be devoted to topics including:  narrative in Early Christian and Byzantine manuscript illumination; varieties of literacy and the relation of word and image in Carolingian manuscripts; women and the book; anti-Semitism in Hebrew manuscripts; the treatment of space in Gothic and Islamic manuscripts;  love and death in medieval manuscripts;  and images of peasants in the book of hours.  Students will have the opportunity to work closely with selected manuscripts and to give a presentation of their findings.   Students from a variety of disciplines are welcome; this course is also cross-listed as MRST 3013H.

Students interested in further information can contact the instructor:  Lynn F. Jacobs, Professor, Art Department, ljacobs@uark.edu

ARHS 4573H 001: The Artists of New Spain
Professor: Ana Pulido-Rull
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course provides an introduction to colonial art in sixteenth-century New Spain through a survey of works of art from different media (mural painting, architecture, featherwork, sculpture, and painting, among others). Although the class will focus primarily on native art and its transformation in the colonial period, we will also examine the transatlantic cultural exchanges of the early Modern world. Questions of native agency, the social function of art, and cross-cultural communication will be explored. Topics include indigenous materials and techniques, the use of images in legal contexts, ritual liturgy and the role of architecture and painting in the conversion of the Indians. The class will include artworks from the viceroyalty of Peru to gain a broader perspective of the Spanish viceroyalties.

BIOL 3923H 001: Types of Asexual Reproduction, Sexual Reproduction, and Mating Systems Among Different Species of Organisms
Professor: James M. Walker
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

Each student enrolled in BIOL 3923H will conduct an in-depth study of any one or two of several types of sexual reproduction, asexual reproduction, or mating systems. Examples of types or reproduction include parthenogenesis, gynogenesis, and hybridogenesis. Examples of types of mating systems (not restricted to humans) include monogamy, polygamy, polyandry, and promiscuity. The first three weeks of the Fall Semester will involve lectures presented by guest speakers. It will be during this period that each student shall select a study topic as the subject for a term paper.

BIOL 3923H: Rivers in Peril
Professor: Art Brown
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

The objectives of this course are to provide students an opportunity to learn the major models and theories of watershed ecosystem structure and functioning during the first few meetings, then examine various forms of anthropogenic disturbances to rivers while sharpening their skills at oral and written scientific communication and the peer review process.  The first meeting will consist of an overview followed by selection of topics by individual students.  The science librarian will assist with efficient research of the subjects selected, if necessary. During the preparation time I will lecture about river ecosystem models, how to write abstracts, deliver oral presentations, construct posters, and write good reviews.  After a few weeks to prepare, students will begin presentations of their papers to the class.  The week before their presentations students will post abstracts they have composed along with peer-reviewed publications (primary literature) they have selected for the class to read prior to their presentations.  Each class member will prepare a brief critique of each abstract and oral presentation, which will be graded and then given to the presenter along with my grade/critique of his or her presentation.  Course grades will be based on students’ reviews of their peers’ abstracts and oral presentations, questions asked following presentations, and their own abstracts and presentations.

BIOL 480VH 001: Collaborative Ecological Research
Professor: Art Brown
Colloquium Type: Natural Sciences

The purpose of this course will be to provide students an opportunity to learn how to perform collaborative ecological research by actually performing a research project and co-authoring a publication.   During this semester we will study recolonization of disturbed areas of a stream by macroinvertebrates and/or meiofauna.  Initially we will examine the literature on the subject, plan our methods, and write a research proposal.  Each student will write a research proposal to contribute to a final version.  We will collect quantitative samples before disturbance, then disturb the streambed and sample daily for a couple of weeks to monitor recolonization.  We will identify and count organisms in the samples, analyze the data, discuss the results, prepare abstracts, posters and/or oral papers, choose a scientific journal, write a manuscript, and submit it for publication.  Each student will be expected to contribute to each part of the project, but perhaps more to some aspects than others, as is characteristic of collaborative research.  Grades will be based on class participation, the writing assignments, written peer reviews of the research proposals (graded by the instructor), poster or oral paper preparations/presentations, and a lab practical covering methods, equipment, and the taxa collected.

CHEM 3923H 001: Molecular Gastronomy
Professor: Ya-Jane Wang and Josh Sakon
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

Molecular gastronomy is a sub-discipline of food science that seeks to investigate the physical and chemical transformations of ingredients that occur while cooking. Lecture, demonstration, and three laboratory exercises providing students with experience of applying the knowledge learned from the class to explicate fundamental principles in chemistry and physics. Lecture 3 hours per week.  Prerequisite: none. High school physics and chemistry will be useful.

COMM 3923H 001: New Media and its Discontents
Professor: Stephanie Schulte
Colloquium Type: Social Science

For better and worse, expansions of networking technologies over the past decades transformed the ways many of us interact, work, play, learn, and organize. New media—in particular video games, social networking, mobile phones, and wearable technologies—are cultural locations that highlight fundamental tensions between the individual, the collective, and the national, between our identities, bodies, goals, and impulses. In this interdisciplinary seminar, we look both backward and forward to explore how these (and other) new technologies serve as locations for important debates about our individual and collective futures.

ENGL 3923H 001: Medical Humanities Colloquium
Professor: Casey Kayser
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course combines literary and critical texts that attend to the social rather than technical aspects of medicine, focusing on such topics as the human condition, personal dignity, social responsibility, cultural diversity, and the history of medicine. Through readings, class discussion, writing activities, and first-hand observation, students will practice critical analysis and reflection to instill in them a commitment to compassionate, community responsive, and culturally competent medical care. This course requires a service-learning component that involves close interaction with a physician at a local clinic and service hours at a local agency in addition to the classroom time commitment. This course is only open to premedical students, who must meet with Jeanne McLachlin, Associate Director of the Premedical Program, in order to enroll.

ENGL 3923H 008: Cool Books about Stuff that Really Happened (Creative Nonfiction)
Professor: Sidney Burris
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Class Topic:  For one semester, we’re going to read some of the coolest—the most important critical term I know—books in English.  And all of these books are about stuff that actually happened:  floods, fires, hurricanes, art-fights, culture wars, movies, graduation, music, love, and death.

Class Format & Requirements:  The class is discussion-based, with a mid-term, and a final creative nonfiction essay, written in the spirit—subject matter, style, perspective:  your choice—of one of the authors you read during the semester.  Also:  three 100-word essays, designed to help you master the paragraph.  Not to worry:  these will be due after we’ve read some great paragraphs and know just what defines paragraph greatness.

The Books:  The list isn’t complete yet, but so far, these have made the cut (I won’t add many more):  Zeitoun, Dave Eggers; Human Smoke, Nicholson Baker; Reality Hunger, David Shields; This is Water, David Foster Wallace; The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion, On Writing Well, William Zinsser;

HUMN 3923H 002/007: Game Design
Professor: David Fredrick
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Please contact the instructor for more information.

HUMN 3923H 005: Tibetan Buddhist Philosophy & Culture
Professor: The Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology. General Class Information: Aside from the lecture / discussion format, class-time will be spent viewing movies and gaining a first-hand knowledge of the production of Tibetan culture. Cooking, chanting, making sand mandalas and prayer flags, as well as learning the fundamental progressions of Buddhist logic—all of these will contribute to a general understanding of Tibetan culture. It is a culture, of course, that has been heavily influenced by the Buddhist philosophy of non-violence and compassion for all sentient beings, and accordingly we will investigate the ways in which a community operates in an environment of cooperation and genuine concern for its fellow citizens. All Tibetan culture—according to Tibetan cosmology—is concerned with the five major sciences: 1) arts and crafts; 2) medicine; 3) grammar; 4) logic; 5) philosophy. We will explore various aspects of these sciences in our class. Note: Before class begins, it is recommended that you view two films. First of all, Kundun, and second, Seven Years in Tibet. These are widely available at the rental stores in town, or Professor Burris will be happy to loan you his personal copies of these films.

HUMN 3923H 006: Visual Gender and Immersive Media
Professor: Lisa Corrigan
Colloquium Type: Humanities/Social Science

This course examines visual representations of gender from antiquity to the present in photography, television, film, music videos, and video games to understand how race, gender, class, and place converge to create gendered possibilities for American culture. Throughout the semester, we will look at several major themes in the representation of gender including hegemonic masculinity, the male gaze, racial tourism, and camp to understand how representations build and/or resist masculinities and femininities. 

JOUR 3923H 001: Media and Politics
Professor: Hoyt Purvis
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This course will focus on the relationship between the media, politics, and government, and on the role and impact of the media in public and international affairs and campaigns and elections.    It will involve analysis of the power, responsibility, and performance of the media, including the significance of evolving media technologies, particularly the increasing importance of the Internet and social media in politics and government around the world.    There will also be examination of government policies and regulations affecting the media and of significant developments and trends within the media.

JOUR 3923H 003: Issues in Advertising & Public Relations
Professor: Jan Wicks
Colloquium Type: Social Science

The primary goal of Issues in Advertising & Public Relations is to increase your awareness of the effects of the advertising and public relations industries and their messages on society. You’ll be encouraged to think about the implications of what you do when you create an advertisement or public relations message or campaign. First you’ll develop a social marketing plan in teams to educate the public about a particular social problem or for a nonprofit or educational entity. This helps you to learn how advertising and public relations messages can be used to help society. Then you’ll develop an individual literature review paper on a different topic (which can be the basis for a literature review for your thesis). You’ll consult with me to select a “doable” topic about an ethical issue or topic relevant to the course.

JOUR 3923H 002: Literature in Journalism
Professor: Bret Schulte
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

A survey of book-length narrative nonfiction from mid-20th century to today. Authors may include pioneering literary journalists, such as Hersey and Capote; New Journalists, such as Didion and Wolfe; and their successors, such as Frazier and Orlean.

LAST 4003H 001: Latinos, Migration, and the New South.
Professor: Juan Bustamante
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course delves closely into the social, economic, and population changes that have taken place in the U.S. South. It focuses on issues associated with the shift of Latinos’ settlement patterns, from historical places – e.g. Mexicans in the Southwest, Puerto Ricans in the Northeast, Cubans in Florida, and Central Americans in California – to the South as a new destination. This course intends to examine how and to what extent Latino population growth, distribution, and age-structure impact the region’s educational, health, housing, labor, and public safety services. What actions do policy makers take to adapt to the new demographic context of the region? It emphasizes an examination of the social interaction between the larger society and Latinos as an individual group.

LAST 4003H 002/PLSC 399VH: Educational Equity & Civil Rights
Professors: Robert Muranto & Luis Restrepo
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Much of social and economic inequity can be traced to educational inequity. Policy-makers from George W. Bush to Barack Obama agree that the movement for educational equity is thus the new civil rights movement.  Yet beyond the consensus that the advantaged and traditionally disadvantaged students should achieve at similar levels lie vast disagreements over the causes of educational inequity, how to achieve equity, and at what cost.  Do differences in academic achievement reflect economic inequity, institutional failure, current racism, or history? Will equalizing funding lessen inequities?  What about school choice or school reform?  To what degree must students give up their culture to conform to schooling?  How does the educational achievement of African American and Latino students differ? This course will investigate these questions through readings, data analyses, and some fieldwork in schools. The instructors have done fieldwork in over 150 schools and have published widely in this and related areas.

MATH 3923H Mathematical design and manufacturing
Professor: Edmund Harris
Colloquium Type: Mathematics

This course will explore the possibilities for creation in modern computer controlled manufacturing machines. We will consider all aspects of the use of the machines, from the abstract mathematical description of movements, to the software used to implement these ideas to the practical concerns of running the machine through material. Students from a variety of backgrounds are welcome. Experience in mathematics, programming or making is beneficial but most important is a willingness to engage, experiment and explore the possibilities. In addition to learning about this important modern technology students will also get the opportunity to work within a group with a diverse range of skills.

MUTH 477VH 001: Music & Mind
Professor: Elizabeth Margulis
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course investigates the mental and neural mechanisms that underlie the experience of music.
Questions considered include: how can listening to music be pleasurable?  Why is a 2-second stop on the radio scan sufficient to identify whether a station plays jazz or pop or classical?  To what extent are musical and linguistic abilities neurally dissociable?  Why can people without formal musical training tap along to a beat?  What makes certain melodies get stuck on mental replay?  Why do some performances evoke more emotion than others? Disciplines touched by these questions include musicology, psychology, anthropology, neuroscience, philosophy, and cognitive science.

PHIL 3923H 001: Philosophy of Music
Professor: Richard Lee
Colloquium Type: Humanities

What is music? Do musical works mean anything? If so, how? Does music have some special connection with emotion? If so, what is that connection? Can music be sad? Is music a language? Does music depict things similar to the way paintings do (only aurally instead of visually)? What is the ontological status of a musical work? Can music, once created, be destroyed? (Does destroying the manuscripts and recordings destroy the music?) We'll look at music from a philosophical perspective, not just concert hall music, but popular music as well. We'll explore the views of Eduard Hanslick, Peter Kivy, and others.

WLLC 4023H 001: Language, Culture, and Web 2.0 Technologies
Professor: Linda Jones
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course provides advanced level undergraduate, honors and graduate students with innovative ways to teach and communicate through the use of Web 2.0 technologies as applied to second languages. Topics of discussion include instructional systems design, Web 2.0 technologies (blogs, wikis, Facebook, and other interactive tools), presentation technologies, online facilitation, and effective utilization of technological tools in language and culture courses.

WLLC 4043H 001: New France Archives
Professor: Linda Jones
Colloquium Type: Humanities

The course, taught in English, examines segments of the history of New France through authentic French documents in their original handwritten form as well as in translation. Therefore, completion of French 2013 is strongly encouraged for those who will work with the French documents. Those without French skills will work with the material in translation form.  The course will include:

Jacque Cartier's explorations of Canada beginning in 1534; Marquette and Joliet's travel down the Mississippi and contact with the Arkansas and Illinois Indians in 1673; LaSalle and de Tonty’s additional encounters and descent to the mouth of the Mississippi River; the establishment of the early French Posts in the Lower Mississippi Valley.

AIST 4003H 001/HIST 4913H 001: Reading Japanese
Professor: Elizabeth Markham
Colloquium Type: Humanities
Please contact instructor for more information.

AIST 4003 002/HIST 4633H 002: HEIAN Japan
Professor: Elizabeth Markham
Colloquium Type: Humanities
Please contact instructor for more information.

ANTH3923H/GEOS3923H: Digital Antiquity
Professors: Jesse Casana and Jackson Cothren
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Natural Science

This course will explore how digital technologies, particularly in the geospatial realm, are transforming the ways in which we discover, explore and interpret the human past. Students will investigate archaeological questions while learning both the art and science of rapidly developing software, instruments and techniques. The course involves lectures, lab activities, and hands-on training at local archaeological sites, working alongside ongoing research projects at the Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies.

ANTH 3923H-001/HIST 3923H-005: The Darwin Course: An Interdisciplinary Investigation of Evolution
Professor: William F. McComas (science education); Vince Chaddick (law); William Etges (biology); Daniel Kennefick (physics); Mary Leigh (English); Jack Lyons and Barry Ward (philosophy); Angie Maxwell (political science); J. Michael Plavcan (anthropology); Richard Sonn (history).
Colloquium Type: Humanities & Social Sciences

Ten professors from a variety of specializations across campus will bring a rich mix of perspectives from a variety of disciplines designed to examine evolution from its history to Charles Darwin’s voyage on the H.M.S. Beagle to the Scopes Trial to continuing aftershocks in science classrooms today. The course has been designed to demonstrate that the most complete view of any discovery, event or person can only be achieved through an interdisciplinary perspective and evolution is a superb example of a topic that demands such an integrated consideration.

The Darwin Course is led by Parks Family Professor of Science Education William McComas (mccomas@uark.edu) who will be joined by a team from across the University of Arkansas campus who will make weekly presentations

ARHS 3923H 001/HUMN 3923H Images of Women in Rembrandt's Holland
Professor: Lynn Jacobs
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This colloquium will examine the wide variety of depictions of women in Dutch art of the seventeenth century, the golden age of Dutch painting. We will consider how women are represented as housewives, maids, prostitutes, potential wives, mothers, and saleswomen, and what meanings were associated with the scenes of women dancing, drinking, writing letters, making music, seeing doctors, and cleaning their homes -- all extremely popular themes in Dutch art of this time. Some of the artists whose works will be studied include Rembrandt, Hals, Vermeer, Pieter de Hooch, Jan Steen, and Ter Borch; special attention will be given to women artists in seventeenth-century Holland, particularly Judith Leyster. Students will have the opportunity to study a specific thematic strand within the imagery of women and to give a presentation of their findings.

Students interested in further information can contact the instructor: Lynn F. Jacobs, Professor, Art Department, ljacobs@uark.edu

BIOL 3923H 001 Rivers in Peril
Professor: Art Brown
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

The objectives of this course are to provide students an opportunity to 1) learn the major models/theories of watershed ecosystem structure and functioning during the first few weeks of class, and 2) examine various anthropogenic disturbances to rivers around the world while sharpening their skills at oral and written scientific communication and the peer review process. The first meeting will consist of an overview followed by selection of topics by individual students. This course can be used to satisfy the senior writing requirement. The science librarian will assist with efficient research of the subjects selected, if necessary. During the preparation time preceding presentations I will present lectures about river ecosystem models, how to write abstracts, prepare scientific manuscripts, do peer reviews, and construct posters. After a few weeks to prepare, students will begin presentations of their papers to the class. Each class member will prepare a brief critique of each abstract and oral presentation, which will be graded and then given to the presenter along with my critique/grade. Grades will be based on abstracts, oral presentations, and reviews of peers’ abstract & presentations. Reviews of peers’ work cannot be completed without being present therefore attendance is essential.

BIOL 580V/BIOL 480V: Collaborative Ecological Research
Professor: Art Brown
Colloquia Type: Natural Science

The purpose of this course will be to provide students an opportunity to learn how to perform collaborative ecological research by actually performing a research project and co-authoring a publication. During this semester we will study recolonization of disturbed areas of a stream by macroinvertebrates and/or meiofauna. Initially we will examine the literature on the subject, plan our methods, and write a research proposal. Each student will write a research proposal to contribute to a final version. We will collect quantitative samples before disturbance, then disturb the stream bed and sample daily for a couple of weeks to monitor recolonization. We will identify and count organisms in the samples, analyze the data, discuss the results, prepare abstracts, posters and/or oral papers, choose a scientific journal, and write a manuscript to submit for publication. Each student will be expected to contribute to each part of the project, but perhaps more to some aspects than others, as is characteristic of collaborative research. Grades will be based on class participation, the writing assignments, written peer reviews of the research proposals (graded by the instructor), poster or oral paper preparations/presentations, and perhaps a lab practical covering methods, equipment, and the taxa collected.

CLST 4003H 001: Greek Tragic Theater.
Professor Daniel B. Levine
Colloquium Type: Humanities


This course will explore tragic productions from Athens of the 5th century BCE. We will read good English translations of 14 tragedies, write about them, and discuss them. We will consider their historical context, the ideas they convey, and the details of their performance, culminating in a detailed study of an individual play.

ENGL 3923H 001: Medical Humanities Colloquium
Professor: Casey Kayser
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course combines literary and critical texts that attend to the social rather than technical aspects of medicine, focusing on such topics as the human condition, personal dignity, social responsibility, cultural diversity, and the history of medicine. Through readings, class discussion, writing activities, and first-hand observation, students will practice critical analysis and reflection to instill in them a commitment to compassionate, community responsive, and culturally competent medical care. This course requires a service-learning component that involves close interaction with a physician at a local clinic and service hours at a local agency in addition to the classroom time commitment. This course is only open to premedical students, who must meet with Jeanne McLachlin, Associate Director of the Premedical Program, in order to enroll.

ENGL 3923H 005: Religion and Literature
Professor: Shaun Dempsey
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This class will explore the variety of ways we can understand the role of the religious imagination within modernity. One overarching question to be addressed is that if scripture can be understood as writing that perpetuates the performance of religious meaning for a community of believers, then how are we to understand the work of literature–can it also produce meaning for its readers? By what standard can we judge the value of this meaning? By analyzing and comparing shifts in diction, concepts, symbols, vocabulary, genre, and theme in a variety of different authors and time periods we will explore how larger historical, cultural, and religious transformations are made manifest in works of literature.

EUST 4003H 001 Genocide in Modern Europe
Professor: Fiona Davidson
Colloquium Type: Humanities & Social Science

This is a colloquium on the history, causes and consequences of genocidal movements in Europe from the mid 19th century to the Balkan wars of the 1990s. The class will focus particularly on state promoted campaigns of ethnic cleansing in Russia and Eastern Europe with an emphasis on the political/economic and ideological contexts of these events. The class will consist of lectures/films/discussions with assessment conducted through exams, film reviews and an end of semester project.

EUST 470VH 001: Current Issues in the EU
Professor: Fiona Davidson
Colloquium Type: Humanities & Social Science

This colloquium can substitute for EUST 4003 as either a required class or an elective. The class will be taught by the Right Honorable Henry McLeish; former first minister of Scotland. It will focus on current issues in the EU such as the financial crisis, ongoing separatist movements in EU member states and the current immigration and constitutional crises. The class will begin with four weeks of readings followed by six weeks of lectures/test and finish with a paper due at the end of the semester.

GEOG 4383H 001: Hazards, Disasters & Risk
Professor: Thomas Paradise
Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Social Science

Hazards, Disasters & Risk is a comprehensive introduction to interdisciplinary approaches to natural and environmental hazards and risk. Hazards and disaster assessment, mitigation, and policy are the focus of the class with a unique look at cultural and social issues (e.g. risk perception, recovery, ‘Acts of God’), scientific inquiry and assessment (e.g. earthquakes, flooding, tornadoes, tsunami), and political relationships to disaster recovery and relief (e.g. public policy, legislation). For Spring 2014, Honors contributions in the class will include Fayetteville’s ‘safe haven’ mapping. Prerequisite: Junior standing or higher is suggested.

HIST 3923H 001/MUSC 3923H 002/WLLC 3923H 001/ Opera, Nations, and Empires
Professor: Laurence Hare and Martin Nedbal
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course will take an interdisciplinary approach to examine changing concepts of the Western “self” and the non-Western “other” in the artistic and intellectual spheres of Central Europe. The course will bring together students in music, history, and literature to study six German-language operas from Mozart, Weber, Wagner, Strauss, and Lehár spanning the period from the late eighteenth to the early twentieth centuries. In each of the selected works, students will uncover the ways in which European artists constructed national identities through appeals to peasant folklore and a mythic past. At the same time, we will consider how those images were shaped through exoticist portrayals of the Orient. Along the way, the course will help students place the artistic works in their historical context in order to inquire into the ways European artists participated in Western racism and imperialism. The course will emphasize learning across disciplines, and will therefore introduce students to opera appreciation, assess the connections between music and literature, and review the historical eras in which they emerged. Finally, the course will help students understand important theories of imperialism, nationalism, and orientalism. Knowledge of German is not required.

HIST 3923H 002: Sex, Class, Race, and Disease
Professor: Trish Starks
Colloquium Type: Social Science

The course has been divided into five units – the citizen, the female, the underclass, the deviant, and the defective – to explore how modern states use medicine to define and control citizens. The focus of the class is particularly on members of groups who occasioned anxiety from white, European, male, patriarchal authority in the nineteenth century and the methods by which state officials, medical professionals, social authorities, and cultural pundits used science, statistics, and medicine in their quest to control people and behaviors defined as morally aberrant or abnormal. Students will be expected to discuss critically the ways in which science has been employed to define behaviors and peoples as “unhealthy” even when there was little medical evidence to justify these views.

HIST 3923H 004/AIST 4003H 004: Poetry as Political Act in Early China: Between Science and Arts
Professor: Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Social Science
Please contact instructor for more information.

HUMN 3923H 003: Game Design
Professor: David Fredrick
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science
Please contact instructor for more information.

HUMN 3923H 006: Tibet Buddhist Philosophy & Culture
Professor: Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science
Please contact instructor for more information.

LAST 4003H 002: Latin American Studies Colloquium
Professor: Juan Bustamante
Colloquium Type: Humanities
Please contact instructor for more information.

MRST 4003H 002/ENGL 4303/MRST 4003 002: Introduction to Shakespeare.
Professor: Joe Candido
Colloquium Type: Humanities
Please contact instructor for more information.

MUSC 3923H 001: Mozart and His World
Professor: Martin Nedbal
Colloquium: Humanities

This course will introduce students to critical and analytical approaches to the music of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791). We will mainly focus on Mozart's public genres, especially opera, symphony, and concerto. As far as the operas are concerned, we will focus on representative examples of the operatic styles that Mozart worked with: an Italian serious opera (Idomeneo), the three famous Italian comic operas (Don Giovanni, The Marriage of Figaro, and Così fan tutte), and Mozart's most famous German opera (The Magic Flute). In terms of symphonic music, we will compare early examples of Mozart's symphonies and concertos to later ones, written during his last decade in Vienna. We will explore the musical and dramaturgical structures in these works, their social, cultural, and political contexts, as well as the ways in which these works continue to acquire new meanings through present-day performances. The course will also use Mozart's works and the composer's biography to introduce students to the social structures, political outlooks, and cultural sensibilities of late eighteenth-century Europe. Enrollment in the course requires prior training in music analysis.

PHYS 3923H 001: The Physics of Sound
Professor: Julio Gea-Banacloche
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

This course will introduce the students to the basic physical principles behind the generation, propagation, and perception of sound. It will cover general wave phenomena (such as reflection, diffraction and interference) with a special application to sound waves, and will include introductions to such topics as the workings of musical instruments, our sense of hearing, and the physics behind harmony and musical scales. Other topics, such as room acoustics and sound recording and reproduction, may be covered as time allows. The math will be kept to a relatively low level throughout, although some algebra will be unavoidable and prior exposure to calculus will certainly help.

PSYC 3923H 001: Cultivating Interprofessional Collaboration to Improve Health Outcomes
Professor: Ana Bridges
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Cultivating Interprofessional Collaboration to Improve Health Outcomes is a new multidisciplinary course geared towards honor's students who are seeking careers in health professions (medicine, nursing, social work, psychology, public health, kinesiology, etc.). The goals of the course are to promote effective, collaborative patient care through (1) increasing awareness of the roles, responsibilities, and ethics governing diverse health care workers; (2) learning how interprofessional health care teams function "in the real world"; and (3) encouraging self-reflection and appreciation for the complexities of health care service delivery. This 3 credit hour course will be team taught by a group of four faculty from nursing, social work, and psychology. Students may enroll for the class under an honor's special topics course from Nursing, Psychology, or Social Work. The course limit is 24 students.

 

AIST 4003H 001/HIST 4903H 001: Edo Japan: Music and Arts
Professor: Elizabeth Markham
Colloquium Type: Humanities
Please contact instructor for more information.

AIST 4003 002/HIST 4923H 001: Song China, 960-1279
Professor: Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Humanities
Please contact instructor for more information.

AIST 4003 004/HIST 4933H: AD Paradisum in East Asia
Professor: Elizabeth Markham and Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Humanities
Please contact instructor for more information.

ANTH 3923H 001: Ballroom Culture and Performance

Professor: Jonathan S. Marion

Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This seminar explores the world of competitive ballroom dance as a concentrated microcosm of social issues and dynamics pertaining to spectacle, art, sport, ritual, ethnicity, performance, dress, gender, body, and identity. From the origins of modern ballroom competitions to current media depictions of ballroom in advertising, film, and television, we will examine the cultural aesthetics and values involved in dancesport—the term used to differentiate competitive from social ballroom dancing—as well as the personal experiences and ramifications of participation and belonging.

ANTH 3923H 002: Digital Antiquity
Professor:
Jesse Casana and Jackson Cothren
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

The course will explore how digital technologies, particularly in the geospatial realm, are transforming archaeology and related fields. Students will investigate archaeological questions while learning both the art and science of rapidly developing software, instruments and techniques. The course involves lectures, lab activities, and hands-on training at local archaeological sites, working alongside ongoing research projects at the Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies.

 

ANTH 3923H 003: Primate Behavioral Ecology

Professor: Joseph Plavacan
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Natural Science

This course covers primate behavioral ecology and sociobiology – a rapidly changing and growing field. The goal of the course is to understand basic primate and human behavior in an ecological and evolutionary context. The course will cover the diversity of primate mating systems, ecological adaptations, and social behavior. A strong emphasis will be placed on adaptive models that synthesize the relationships between the environment and behavior. The evolution of human behavior will be studied in the context of these broader models.

ECON 4003H: Financial Crises:Analyst & History
Professor: William Cawthon
Colloquium: Social Science
Please contact instructor for more information.

EDRE 498VH/LAST 4003/PLSC 399VH: Educational Equity
Professors: Robert Maranto, Luis Restrepo, and Patrick Stewart
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Much of society’s social and economic inequity can be traced back to educational inequity. A broad range of policy-makers from Republican George W. Bush to Democrat Barack Obama agree that the movement for educational equity is the new civil rights movement. Yet beyond the consensus that advantaged and traditionally disadvantaged students should achieve at similar levels lie vast disagreements over the causes of educational inequity, how to achieve equity, and at what cost. More specifically, questions ask: Do differences in academic achievement reflect economic inequity, institutional failure, current racism, or history? Will equalizing funding lessen inequities? What about school choice or school reform? To what degree must students give up their culture to conform to schooling? How does the educational achievement of African American and Latino students differ?
Join an interdisciplinary team of faculty to investigate these fundamental questions in educational policy today through readings, data analyses, and some fieldwork in schools.

ENGL 3923H 002: Medical Humanities Colloquium
Professor: Dr. Casey Kayser
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Using a variety of literary and critical texts as well as writing activities to promote reflection on topics such as the human condition, personal dignity, social responsibility, cultural diversity, and the history of medicine, this course will guide premedical students in the practice of self-reflection, critical analysis, and first-hand observation to instill in them a commitment to humane medical care. This course requires a service-learning component that involves close interaction with a physician at a local clinic in addition to the classroom time commitment. Students should contact Jeanne McLachlin, Associate Director of the Premedical program, for permission to enroll in the course.

ENGL 3923H 003/ MEST 4003H 001: Muslim Mystical Literature
Professor: Kaveh Bassiri
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Muslim mystical writing includes not only some of the greatest spiritual teachings but also some of the greatest works of world literature. In this class, we will discuss Sufism and Islamic mysticism by studying selected literary works in their cultural, historical, and theological contexts. We will begin with stories of the early mystics like Rabi’a, who, we are told, ran down the streets carrying a torch in one hand and a bucket of water in the other, wanting to put out the fire of hell and burn down the reward of heaven so that people would come to God for love, without the fear of hell or the promise of heaven. We will read about Hallaj, who felt to be one with God and was executed for it. We will read Jami’s Yusuf and Zulaikha, a retelling of the love story of Joseph (from the Hebrew Bible and the Qur’an) as a mystical allegory; Attar’s The Conference of the Birds, an animal fable that chronicles the steps of the spiritual path; and Rumi’s The Masnavi, a collection of stories and anecdotes considered to be a mystical companion to the Qur’an. We also will look at more recent works of mysticism by Muhammad Iqabl and Sohrab Sepehri.

ENGL 3923H 004/HIST 3923H 005/PLSC 3923H 002: THE MANY AMERICAN SOUTHS
Professors: Dr. Lisa Hinrichsen, Dr. Jeannie Whayne, Dr. Angie Maxwell
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

A foundational course for the minor in southern studies, “Introduction to Southern Studies” provides an overview of the history, politics, literature, and culture of the U.S. South from the colonial era to the present, while allowing students the opportunity to study a rich and complex region from a multitude of disciplines, conveying the different and sometimes competing theoretical frameworks that have been used to analyze the American South over time. Readings and lectures will explore questions about the distinctiveness of the region both past and present and examine the role that history, art, literature, pop culture, material culture, gender, sexuality, religion, race, and politics have played in shaping the many Souths and the many southern identities that exist today. Objectives for the course include: 1) an introduction to the interdisciplinary study of the South; 2) an opportunity for students to discuss, both orally and in writing, their observations about the South and the complexities of southern history, politics, literature, and culture; 3) increased awareness of various issues facing southerners; and 4) a foundation for further study of the South.

ENGL 3923H 006: Samuel Johnson and His Circle
Professor: Vivian Davis
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This honors colloquium/graduate seminar explores the life and work of one of British literature's towering figures: Dr. Samuel Johnson. Because of his influence as a literary tastemaker, lexicographer, and editor of Shakespeare, the last half of the eighteenth century is often referred to as the "Age of Johnson"; however, we will challenge this categorization by reading Johnson’s major works alongside the literary output of his vast network of professional and social acquaintances. We will explore Dr. Johnson's friendship with actor and theater manager David Garrick, his relationship with biographer James Boswell, and his involvement with Bluestockings such as Elizabeth Montagu, Elizabeth Carter, and Hester Thrale. Additionally, students will read the writings of members of Johnson's famous literary Club, a group that included artists, politicians, and philosophers such as Sir Joshua Reynolds, Edmund Burke, Adam Smith, and Oliver Goldsmith. Critical and theoretical readings will address collaborative authorship, social networks, literary friendships, fictive kinship, and eighteenth-century sociability.

ENGL 3923H 007: Herbert and Donne
Professor: Dr. Joseph Candido
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course will involve extensive reading in the poetry and prose of George Herbert and John Donne. The course will divide in two segments, the first half on Herbert and the second half on Donne. We will also read the two brief biographies of Herbert and Donne by their famous contemporary, Isaac Walton. The class will be conducted in a lecture/discussion format. Students will give periodic short 2-3 page papers in class on assigned readings (i.e. the explication of a poem or poems or discussion of a prose work by either Herbert or Donne) and be prepared to answer questions on their presentation(s). Each student will write a final research project (15-20 pages), approved in advance by the instructor.

Reading List:
Herbert, The Complete English Poems (Penguin)
Herbert, The Country Parson
Donne, The Complete Poems and Selected Prose of John Donne (Modern Library)
Isaac Walton, Lives of Herbert and Donne
This course gives ENGL honors credit or MRST honors credit.

HIST 3923H 001: The American Experience: Views from Abroad, 1776-Present:History, American Studies, European Studies, International Relations
Professor: Alessandro Brogi
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

At a time of deep questioning and self-questioning of America’s world role, analyses of foreign perceptions of the United States have abounded. The objective of this colloquium is to place this current and urgent theme in historical perspective. We will make sense of the renewed challenge of American power as myth, model, and cultural production system. The chronological spectrum is from Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America? of the early 19th Century (with brief introduction on colonial and post-colonial America) to the war on terrorism and its international ramifications.

Topics will include American "Exceptionalism," American hegemony, U.S. foreign policy through its unilateral and multilateral phases, Americanization, Anti-Americanism, Cultural "Transmissions" and "Receptions," the politics of private and public initiatives of cultural exchange, the impact of the media, with particular attention to radio, television, and cinema.

More specifically we will examine: a) positive and negative reactions from around the world to the rise of the United States as a global power; b) the merits and the contradictions inherent in other countries’ fears and hopes about American-style modernization; c) how foreign observers managed to identify certain "truths" and contradictions of American society and politics.

This course is also an example of genuine international history: besides helping Americans to understand themselves better, foreign observers who analyze the United States also tell us something about their own societies. Therefore this colloquium is useful not only to students focusing on U.S. History but also to those whose main interests are in other areas and countries. While focusing on 1) the transatlantic dialogue between Western Europe and the United States and 2) the roots of anti-American world terrorism, we will also consider the impact of American culture on other areas, such as Eastern Europe or Japan, particularly during and after the Cold War.

Given the broad scope of questions we deal with, the selection of readings includes intellectuals, studies on cultural perceptions, political analyses, ideological evaluations, and comparative approaches. Prior participation in at least a general U.S. 20th century history course is strongly recommended. Reading knowledge of a foreign language is not required, but it’s a plus for the research paper.

HIST 3923H 003: Honors Colloquium: Intellectual Origins of National Socialism
Professor: Dr. J. Laurence Hare
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This colloquium will provide an introduction to the intellectual history of the Nazi Era by identifying key themes in the writings of Nazi functionaries and in National Socialist publications and considering their connections to major trends of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century thought. We will study the contours of Nazi political and moral thought and seek its antecedents through readings of works by such thinkers as Herder, Fichte, Wagner, and Nietzsche. Along the way, we will investigate changing conceptions of difference by studying debates about nationalism, racism, anti-Semitism, and gender, and we will consider the ways in which German responses to modernization crystallized in the Nazi political program. We will also discuss how changing attitudes toward religion, history, and science shaped the intellectual context in which National Socialism emerged. Finally, we will place Nazism in the broader framework of European fascist movements as we seek to understand the ways in which Germany’s “crisis of ideology” was also a crisis of European and Western thought.

HIST 3923H 004: Religion/American Politics since 1865
Professor: Bob McMath
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science
Please contact instructor for more information.

HUMN 3923H 001: Digital Pompeii
Professor: David Frederick
Colloquium: Humanities
Please contact instructor for more information.

HUMN 3923H 002: Game Design
Professor: David Frederick
Colloquium: Humanities
Please contact instructor for more information.

 

HUMN 3923H 003/PHIL 3923H 001: Thomas Merton
Professor: Lynne Spellman
Colloquium: Humanities

Who was Thomas Merton? After a childhood of moving from New York to the Caribbean, France, and England with his artist father, and a tumultuous student career at Cambridge and Columbia, as a graduate student Merton converted to Catholicism and entered a Trappist monastery in Kentucky just before World War II. There at 26 he wrote a best-selling autobiography (The Seven Storey Mountain). He thought the rest of his life would be peaceful, but it wasn't. Always restless, unpredictable, and profoundly human, Merton went on to think deeply about nonviolence, to practice Zen and meet the Dalai Lama, and much else, all the while becoming one of the 20th century's most significant spiritual writers. Limited to Honors students, this course counts toward the Religious Studies minor. If taken as PHIL 3923H 001 it can count toward the philosophy major/minor. For more information, email: spellman@uark.edu.

HUMN 3923H 005: Tibetan Buddhist Philosophy & Culture
Professor: The Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium: Humanities or Social Science

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology. General Class Information: Aside from the lecture / discussion format, class-time will be spent viewing movies and gaining a first-hand knowledge of the production of Tibetan culture. Cooking, chanting, making sand mandalas and prayer flags, as well as learning the fundamental progressions of Buddhist logic—all of these will contribute to a general understanding of Tibetan culture. It is a culture, of course, that has been heavily influenced by the Buddhist philosophy of non-violence and compassion for all sentient beings, and accordingly we will investigate the ways in which a community operates in an environment of cooperation and genuine concern for its fellow citizens. All Tibetan culture—according to Tibetan cosmology—is concerned with the five major sciences: 1) arts and crafts; 2) medicine; 3) grammar; 4) logic; 5) philosophy. We will explore various aspects of these sciences in our class. Note: Before class begins, it is recommended that you view two films. First of all, Kundun, and second, Seven Years in Tibet. These are widely available at the rental stores in town, or Professor Burris will be happy to loan you his personal copies of these films.

HUMN 3923H 006: TBA
Professor: Staff
Colloquium: Humanities
Please contact instructor for more information.

JOUR 3923H 001: Media, Politics, and Government
Professor: Dr. Hoyt Purvis
Colloquium Type: Social Science


This course will focus on the relationship between the media, politics, and government, and on the role and impact of the media in public and international affairs and campaigns and elections. It will involve analysis of the power, responsibility, and performance of the media, including the significance of evolving media technologies, particularly the increasing importance of the Internet and social media in politics and government around the world. There will also be examination of government policies and regulations affecting the media and of significant developments and trends within the media.

JOUR 3923H 002: Literature of Journalism
Professor: Dr. Bret Schulte
Colloquium Type: Humanities

A survey of book-length narrative nonfiction from mid-20th Century to today. Authors may include pioneering literary journalists, such as Hersey and Capote; New Journalists, such as Didion and Wolfe; and their successors, such as Frazier and Orlean.

JOUR 3923H 003: Issues in Advertising & Public Relations
Professor: Jan Wicks
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science
Please contact instructor for more information.

LAST 4003H 002: Latinos, Migration, and the New South
Professor: Juan Bustamante
Colloquium Type: Humanities
Please contact instructor for more information.

 

MUTH 477VH 001: Music and Mind
Professor: Elizabeth Margulis
Colloquium Type: Humanities and Social Sciences
This course will investigate the cognitive mechanisms that underlie the experience of music.

Questions considered will include: how does music impart pleasure? Why is a 2-second stop on the radio scan sufficient to identify whether a station plays jazz or pop or classical? To what extent are musical and linguistic abilities neurally dissociable? Why can people without formal musical training tap along to a beat? What makes certain melodies get stuck on mental replay? Why do some performances evoke more emotion than others? Disciplines touched by these questions include musicology, psychology, anthropology, neuroscience, philosophy, and cognitive science.

 

MRST 4003H 001: Samuel Johnson and His Circle
Professor: Dr. Dorothy Stephens
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This honors colloquium/graduate seminar explores the life and work of one of British literature's towering figures: Dr. Samuel Johnson. Because of his influence as a literary tastemaker, lexicographer, and editor of Shakespeare, the last half of the eighteenth century is often referred to as the "Age of Johnson"; however, we will challenge this categorization by reading Johnson’s major works alongside the literary output of his vast network of professional and social acquaintances. We will explore Dr. Johnson's friendship with actor and theater manager David Garrick, his relationship with biographer James Boswell, and his involvement with Bluestockings such as Elizabeth Montagu, Elizabeth Carter, and Hester Thrale. Additionally, students will read the writings of members of Johnson's famous literary Club, a group that included artists, politicians, and philosophers such as Sir Joshua Reynolds, Edmund Burke, Adam Smith, and Oliver Goldsmith. Critical and theoretical readings will address collaborative authorship, social networks, literary friendships, fictive kinship, and eighteenth-century sociability.

PLSC 3923H 001: Political Violence
Professor: Jeffrey Ryan
Colloquium Type: Social Science
Please contact instructor for more information.

PLSC 3923H 003/ ECON410VH /AIST 4003/AIST 4003H 005/HIST 3923H 002: China’s Foreign Trade and International Order: History, Policy, and Theory
Professors: Dr. Ka Zeng, Dr. Jingping GU, and Dr. Liang CAI
Colloquium Type: Social Science

One hundred years ago, the trade imbalance between China and the West directly triggered the famous Opium War. Today, trade frictions between the United States (U.S.) and China have not only become topics for heated debate among policymakers and academics, but also directly shape the bilateral relations of these two world powers. This interdisciplinary course aims to explore China’s foreign trade and international order from history to present, beginning with China’s dominant role in world trade before European hegemony, extending over the post- Cold War period and into the contemporary era. Bridging the disciplinary boundaries of history, political science, and economics, this course consists of three closely related and mutually reinforcing components: (a) globalization before globalization: China and international trade before 19th Century; (b) China’s phenomenal rise and the global trading system; and (c) economic theories and practices: analyze the contemporary world system through the lens of trade.

 

AIST 4003H 001/HIST 4633H, Uncovering Heian Japan (794--1192)
Professors: Elizabeth Markham & Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Humanities

The invention of an isolated, refined, purely aesthetic Heian Japan (794-1192) has been targeted in recent scholarship. An alternative placing of the early Heian court within the fold of Táng China (618--907), rather than in ethnolinguistic opposition to it, has been offered. This course traces the reasons for the former view, but takes its cue from the alternative to focus on the early Heian court, temple, and shrine in terms of appropriation, assimilation, synthesis -- but also re-positioning and hybridization -- of "China" in language, literature, music, religion, culture, and in terms of what these processes meant for the social and political order of the day.

This course does not require specialized knowledge of East Asian languages. It is examined via essays on assigned topics and an extended research essay on a course-related topic chosen by the individual student.

AIST 4003H-002, Texts & Transmission -- Cross-cultural perspectives
Professors: Elizabeth J. Markham & Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This seminar is interested in how knowledge operates, especially in how techniques and technologies of memory and writing worked in pre-modern, early-modern, and selected later cultures of East Asia and Europe to support both the acquisition of knowledge as well as its maintenance and passing-down.

Readings are drawn from current scholarship on “tangible” and “intangible” transmission – the text as inscribed document, the text as performance, for instance. Case studies stretch from Gregorian liturgical chant, medieval Sino-Japanese Buddhist chant, Latin versus vernacular in Staufer Germany, transmission via ideograph in early China, through “secret transmission” in medieval Japanese arts, “the world on paper” or Platin-Moretus in Renaissance Antwerp and typography as global process, alienating “songs to be sung” from their written medium in the early colonial Cantares mexicanos, and across to preservation in performance in indigenous Australian song-in-ritual today.

The seminar does not require specialized knowledge of foreign languages, scripts, and cultures, although primary sources used (in translation) will be available also in original languages for those who wish.

ARHS 3923H 001, Planes, Trains, and Automobiles: Transportation Imagery in American Art
Professor: Dr. Leo G. Mazow
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course explores transportation, mobility, stasis, and related topics as subject matter, formal components, and theoretical constructs in American art and cultural history. We will consider selected engagements with railroads, canals, car culture, lodging, public transportation, roads and streets, travel and tourism, in fine arts media (mostly two-dimensional) and visual culture in nineteenth- and twentieth-century America. Among the artists to be highlighted are Edward Hopper, Georgia O’Keeffe, Margaret Bourke-White, Winslow Homer, Norman Rockwell, Alfred Stieglitz, and Dorothea Lange.

BIOL 3923H 001, Rivers in Peril
Professor: Art Brown
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

The objectives of this course are to provide students an opportunity to 1) learn the major models/theories of watershed ecosystem structure and functioning during the first few meetings, and 2) examine various forms of anthropogenic disturbances to rivers while sharpening their skills at oral and written scientific communication and the peer review process. The first meeting will consist of an overview followed by selection of topics by individual students. This course can satisfy the senior writing requirement. The science librarian will assist with efficient research of the subjects selected, if necessary. After a few weeks to prepare, students will begin presentations of their papers to the class. During the preparation time I will lecture about river ecosystem models, how to write abstracts, how to deliver oral presentations, construct posters, and prepare scientific manuscripts. Each class member will prepare a brief critique of each abstract and oral presentation, which will be graded and then given to the presenter along with my grade/critique of his or her presentation. Written manuscripts will be submitted for review three weeks before the end of the semester to facilitate peer reviews. Students will have two weeks for revisions before manuscripts will be re-submitted for grading and posting/distribution to each class member. Course grades will be based on 1) their reviews of their peers’ abstracts and oral presentations, 2) reviews of manuscripts, 3) oral presentations, and 4) their own manuscripts.

 

BIOL 3923H 002, Why Evolution is True
Professor: Cynthia Sagers
Colloquium Type: Natural Sciences

This course focuses on modern approaches to the study of Darwinian evolution, examining the question, as Jerry Coyne did, of “Why Evolution is True.” After considering the works of Darwin himself, it examines the 150 years of discoveries that followed, including most of what scientists now understand about evolution: Gregor Mendel’s patterns of heredity (which provided a mechanism for Darwin’s idea of natural selection), the discovery of DNA (which gave genetics a mechanism), and developmental biology (which gave DNA a mechanism). The course also take up studies documenting evolution in nature, disease, medicine, and even the course of human societies. Topics will include population genetics (or how humanity’s family tee was created), courtship and mating (r how sexual choice drives evolution), human anatomy (or how the structure of the body derives from ancient fish), evolutionary development biology (or why you have five fingers and toes), and the unforeseen consequences of civilization (or why do we have obesity, cancer, infectious disease, and religion).

CLST 4003H 001, Ancient Greek Comedy
Professor: Daniel B. Levine
Colloquium Type: Humanities

In this colloquium we will read the comedies of Aristophanes (our best source for Old Comedy), and some of the work of Menander (our best source for New Comedy).

We will look at Comedy through TEXT and CONTEXT. That is, our discussions will first concentrate on the works themselves. These original texts will cause us to ask certain questions about intent, staging, and social/political/literary references. We will ask questions of the text as we read, and devote part of our time addressing both these issues, as well as some questions that others have posed about the comedies and their place in ancient Greek life.

Students will write and submit short assignments, and will read selected articles and book chapters relevant to ancient comedy. Each student will present in-class summaries and critiques of secondary sources, and will provide the other students with written handouts that make their points. Every student will write a term paper.
Students will participate actively in the class. This is a colloquium, which means that "speaking together" is the basis of our learning experience. Our purpose is to share ideas in the spirit of collective inquiry -- and to have fun.

ENGL 3923H 001, Childhood in Renaissance Literature
Professor: Dorothy Stephens
Colloquium Type: Humanities

In this course, we’ll ask what the word “childhood” meant to writers living in the time of Shakespeare and how their conceptions differed from our own. If adults sometimes thought of children as short, uncivilized, sinfully incomplete adults, parents could also write about their sons and daughters in achingly tender terms. The typical woman lost half of her babies before they grew to adulthood, but this did not mean that most parents got used to these losses or grew blasé about their hopes for their living children.

We’ll investigate some of the roles available to children—heir, pupil, marriage pawn, beloved favorite, mouth to feed—as well as some of the occupations held by children. We’ll look at boy actors, who became so popular that they eventually formed entire companies in which they played all of the parts while the audience remarked how cute they were. (Playwrights occasionally used this cuteness as a mask for dangerous political commentary.) We’ll learn about apprentices, who were sometimes half-starved and sometimes treated like valued relatives. We’ll look at the tremendously important cultural position occupied by teenage ladies-in-waiting and at the sonnets that both praised and dismissed them. We’ll ask ourselves why so many princesses were raised as shepherds (at least according to fiction of the period) and why so many young male characters were gorgeously depressed.

We’ll ask what “play” and “game” meant to people living in the English Renaissance—using, among other sources, some wonderful paintings of children collaborating in games of all sorts. We’ll try to figure out what books were written for children in the sixteenth century. (Hint: children were more likely to read about religious martyrs than about little ducks crossing the road.)

We’ll read not only plays and poems by Shakespeare and others—such as A Winter’s Tale, “On My First Son,” The Knight of the Burning Pestle, and The Alchemist—but also at paintings of children, parents’ diaries, a manual describing the ideal school for boys, a mother’s letter to her unborn child whom she fears she will not live to see, a father’s advice to his son, a pamphlet about the dangers of letting strangers breast-feed your infants, letters written by Elizabeth Tudor to her brother when she was fourteen, and letters written by a boy named James Basset to his parents while he was at boarding school (yes, he asks for money).

There will be one short essay and one longer project, the latter written in stages. Discussion will be our main mode, so class participation will be important. Naive questions will be positively welcomed.

ENGL 3923H 002/HUMN 3923H 001, Representations of the Jew in Medieval England
Professor: Dr. William Quinn
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course is an Honors Colloquium that will consider the literary references and societal situation of Jews in medieval England. It will consider the characterization of Biblical Hebrews in Old English poetry before the arrival of Jews after the Norman Invasion. It will consider the precarious status of English Jews during the Anglo-Norman period. Particular attention will be paid to the Expulsion of Jews in 1290. It will then consider the subsequent constructions of the Jew as “Other” in Middle English and Renaissance literature.

EUST 4003H 001, Issues in the EU
Professor: Dr. Raymond Eichmann
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

The EUST Colloquium will focus on the European Union, its institutions, politics, and issues such as the Euro crisis, relations with the USA, etc... This colloquium will feature 8 lectures and presentations by the Honorable Henry McLeish, former Prime Minister of Scotland. In addition, students will be asked to participate in simulations regarding issues within the EU.

 

GEOG 410V/GEOG 410H/GEOG 520/HIST 3983/HIST 3983H, American Public Land & Policy
Professor: Dr. Tom Paradise
Colloquium Type: Social Science

The class will examine the role of our American federal public lands in 19th and 20th century geography, history, policy, and art. We will investigate the growth of conservation, preservation, and management movements in the US by looking at America's national parks and forests, dams, wildlife refuges, wilderness areas, and managed and agricultural lands. We will look into the major characters involved with these federal public lands and the role of natural resources in important policies and acts. Pivotal 19th and 20th C. personalities will include Muir, Roosevelt, Leopold, Thoreau, Bierstadt, Emerson, Pinchot, Audubon, and Stegner. Readings, lectures and round-table discussions will include various aspects including law, history, art, literature, geography, political science, environmental studies, perception of nature, resource management and our ‘imagined’ environments.

 

HIST 3923H 001, Sex, Class, Race, and Disease
Professor: Trish Starks
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Rather than a traditional history of medicine, this course offers a discussion and writing intensive exploration of biopower in the modern period. The course has been divided into five units – the citizen, the female, the underclass, the deviant, and the defective – to explore both how modern states define citizens and also how these definitions result from the rise of professions and nation stations then end with deploying various authorities and different types of control to discipline citizens.

Students will be expected to discuss critically the ways in which medicine has been employed to control behaviors that often were not proven to be injurious but were considered morally aberrant or abnormal by state officials, medical professionals, social authorities, andcultural pundits. The focus of the class is particularly on members of groups who, because of their gender, social class, ethnicity, or behavioral choices occasioned anxiety in their confrontations with definitions of white, European, male, patriarchal authority.

 

HIST 3923H 002, Early Modern: East and West (1450-1750)
Professor: Nikolay Antov
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This course will explore some major aspects of the history of Western Europe and the Islamic world during the early modern period (1450-1750). It will study the nature and importance of the interaction between the two regions and will also compare different processes and phenomena as they took place in Western Europe and the early modern Islamic world (defined here as the empires of the Ottoman, the Safavids and the Mughals). Being a conceptually and thematically oriented, rather than providing a straight chronological coverage, the course will deal with a number of aspects of the early modern experience in comparative perspective, such as dynastic legitimacy and imperial cultures; trade, exploration and exchange of ideas; imperial expansion; millenarian movements; the perception of the ‘other’ and the treatment of minorities. Readings will include a selection of modern works as well as various contemporary primary sources in English translation.

MUSC 3923H 001, Nationalism and Exoticism in Music
Professor: Dr. Martin Nedbal
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This class will explore how composers of Western art music represent their national “self” and the foreign, exotic “other” in symphony and opera, and how these representations reflect or confound the tenets of nationalism and orientalism. The exploration will start in the time of the Enlightenment with the “Turkish” works of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (especially his opera The Abduction from the Seraglio). In the nineteenth century we will focus on the musical traditions of Russia (Glinka’s A Life for the Tsar, Borodin’s Prince Igor, and Tchaikovsky’s symphonies and ballets), the Czech Republic (Smetana’s The Bartered Bride and Dvořák’s Symphony No. 9—“From the New World”), and France (Bizet’s Carmen and Saint-Saëns’s Samson and Dalilah). Within the twentieth-century, we will focus on American music (Scott Joplin’s Treemonisha and Aaron Copland’s The Appalachian Spring). Students wishing to take this class should have at least some basic training in music analysis.

PHIL 3923H 001/PSYC 3923, Music, Language, and Thought
Professor: Elizabeth Margulis
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Music and language are two distinctively human capacities, both of which seem to be closely linked to our capacity for thought. The exact nature of this link, however, is still somewhat uncertain. Cognitive scientists and developmental psychologists are busy applying rigorous scientific methods to answer foundational questions regarding the complex relations between language, music, and thought. This research touches on questions of deep and broad interest: what are the origins of human communicative systems? Why can only some people sing or play instruments but almost everyone can talk? Why is melodic intonation therapy (a form of singing) one of the only known treatments for aphasia (a speech impairment)? How does musical training impact language development? How do language and music influence other areas of cognitive development? What are the musical and linguistic capacities of other animals, and what does this tell us of their inner lives? The course brings together three disparate fields: music, philosophy, and developmental psychology. Critical reading/discussion and creative project-based pedagogical approaches will be employed. The class is team-taught by faculty in Music, Philosophy, and Psychology.

SOCI/LAST 4003H 002, The Latin American City
Professor: Dr. Juan Jose Bustamante
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Drawing on sociological explanations, this colloquium delves closely into the social, economic, and demographic changes that have taken place in the Latin American City. Emphasis is on the topics of urban space, social exclusion and community organization, and the social implications of the commodification of the public space, urban violence, and place as nurturing and socializing resource.

ANTH 3923H-001, Primate Behavioral Ecology
Professor Joseph Plavcan
Colloquium Type: Social or Natural Science

This course covers primate behavioral ecology and sociobiology – a rapidly changing and growing field. The goal of the course is to understand basic primate and human behavior in an ecological and evolutionary context. The course will cover the diversity of primate mating systems, ecological adaptations, and social behavior. A strong emphasis will be placed on adaptive models that synthesize the relationships between the environment and behavior. The evolution of human behavior will be studied in the context of these broader models.

ARCH 4023H/HIST 3923H-004: Medieval Bodies/Medieval Spaces
Profs. Coon (HIST) and Sexton (ARCH)
Colloquium Type: Humanities

For full description, see HIST 3923H-004

BIOL 3923H
Types of Asexual Reproduction, Sexual Reproduction, and Mating Systems
Among Different Species of Organisms
Professor James M. Walker (SCEN 720)
Colloquium Type: Math/Natural Science (Fall Semester 2012)

Students will conduct an in-depth study of any one of several types of sexual reproduction, asexual reproduction, or mating systems. Some examples of the types of reproduction that will be included are parthenogenesis, gynogenesis, and hybridogenesis. Monogamy, polygamy, polyandry, and promiscuity are just a few of the types of mating systems that will be covered in this course. These topics will not be exclusive to the human species. The first three weeks will involve lectures presented by guest speakers, as well as the topic selection for a term paper and oral presentation.

 

DRAM 3923H-002, African American Theater
Professor Clinnesha Sibley
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This is an African American Dramatic Literature course. It will be a study of select plays by African American playwrights from 1950-present.

ENGL 3923H-001, Cool Books about Stuff that Really Happened (Creative Nonfiction)
Professor Sidney Burris
Colloquium Type: Humanities
http://uark.edu/ua/sburris/CreativeNonfiction/engl_3923h__creative_nonfiction.html

Class Topic: For one semester, we’re going to read some of the coolest—the most important critical term I know—books in English. And all of these books are about stuff that actually happened: floods, fires, hurricanes, art-fights, culture wars, movies, graduation, music, love, and death.

Class Format & Requirements: The class is discussion-based, with a mid-term, and a final creative nonfiction essay, written in the spirit—subject matter, style, perspective: your choice—of one of the authors you read during the semester. Also: three 100-word essays, designed to help you master the paragraph. Not to worry: these will be due after we’ve read some great paragraphs and know just what defines paragraph greatness.

The Books: The list isn’t complete yet, but so far, these have made the cut (I won’t add many more): Zeitoun, Dave Eggers; Human Smoke, Nicholson Baker; Reality Hunger, David Shields; This is Water, David Foster Wallace; The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion.

ENGL 3923H-002 : The English Religious Lyric of the Seventeenth Century
Professor Joseph Candido
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course will consist of a thorough and systematic reading of the poetry of several important Seventeenth-Century English religious poets. We will study the work of each of these poets primarily from an aesthetic and thematic point of view, but we will also be interested in the theological and cultural aspects of the works. Poets to be read will include the following:

John Donne
George Herbert
Richard Crashaw
Henry Vaughan
Thomas Traherne
John Milton

The class will consist of lectures/discussion on the works of each individual poet as well as periodic oral reports and short papers by students on a particular poem or group of poems by each poet covered in class. Each student will write a final research paper on a subject of his/her choice. There will be no final exam.

ENGL 3923H-003 / MEST 4003H-001, The Modern Iranian Novel
Instructor: Kaveh Bassiri
Colloquium Type: Humanities
See MEST 4003H-001 for full description.

GEOG 4033H-001, Geography of the Middle East & North Africa
Professor T. R. Paradise
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Geography of the Middle East & North Africa is a comprehensive class which examines the environmental setting, natural and cultural resources, human use, art and architecture, and current problems and issues of the North African countries bordering the Mediterranean Sea, and of the lands of the Arabian Peninsula, Near East, and the Anatolian Peninsula. Cultural, physical, social, political and environmental landscapes are all addressed, in addition to regular banquets, related music, and outside lecturers and discussions. Honors contributions in the class have included banquet coordination, music and art presentations, and film-making. Prerequisite: junior standing.

GEOS 4563H-001, Honors Geology of Our National Parks
Professor John Brahana
Colloquium Type: Social or Natural Science

Our National Parks and related facilities administered by the National Park System stand as some of the most spectacular natural areas in the world. They offer the history and development of our country, and provide direct observation into geologic/ecosystem/biologic/chemical/physical settings in which students can visualize interdisciplinary processes much more easily than most other field sites; they motivate students with the grandeur and beauty of scale that ranges from landscape to microscopic; and they have immediately applicable lessons to teach us regarding the interaction of humans, the biosphere, the hydrosphere, and in fact most of the natural world in a geologic framework that is more obvious than most other settings.

As field areas, the National Parks allow students/faculty to collect data that will facilitate their growth as researchers, as well as help with problems that are directly relevant to the Park Service. The stresses on the Park Service are significant as federal funds come under continued competition in our modern society. Some of the parks are "loved to death", and the sheer number of visitors and human encroachment has altered the parks-yet another area of potential research at the interface of human activity/geology.

HIST 3923H-001, Recluse in Early East Asia
Professor Elizabeth Markham and Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

"In reading (to use the Chinese term) a Chinese landscape painting, we are often moved by the pleasure of recognition, even of identification, occasioned by the one or more tiny human figures, almost imperceptible among the rocks and pines. These figures, executed with a few minute strokes of the brush, represent a solitary man, leaning on his staff along a mountain path, or on the back of a donkey, crossing a bridge and followed by a boy who carries his lute, or among a group of similar figures lingering by the waterside, immersed in the landscape, insignificant and unobtrusive." (Li Chi, 1962)

This course, which studies recluses in their social and cultural context in both China and Japan, does not require specialized knowledge of East Asian languages (although students with knowledge of classical Chinese will have opportunity to work with original texts should they wish). It is examined via essays on assigned topics and an extended research essay on a course-related topic chosen by the individual student.

HIST 4913H-001/AIST 4003H-002, Reading Japanese Noh as Cultural History
Professor Elizabeth Markham
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

Noh is Japan’s profoundly beautiful, profoundly moving masked dance-drama. Seen as a form of total theater, it combines elements of poetry, music, chant, mime, dance, and drama, elements with roots – particularly music-and-dance based roots – far back beyond the 14th-century of its first great floraison. The course will explore ten representative Noh plays, concentrating on the “Mad Woman” category, plays that deal with poignant mental suffering of a woman’s intense grief. We shall include Hagoromo and Sumidagawa (linked in the West to Fenollosa, Pound, Yeats, and Britten). We shall use original Noh chant books (utai-bon) alongside translations of librettos. Most plays will be viewed on film; the others listened to while reading. Our focus will be on the historical and the contextual: we shall work with the earlier poetry, songs, and dance-tunes, referred to as nostalgia in the plays, and also with early Buddhist, theatrical, and secular musical forms that have contributed to and borrowed from Noh.

This course does not require specialized knowledge of music, nor of East Asian languages. It is examined via essays on assigned topics and an extended research essay on a course-related topic chosen by the individual student.

HIST 3923H-003/AIST 4003H-003, Between Science and the Arts: Poetry as Political Act in Early China
Professor Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium type: Social Science or Humanities

The early Chinese scholar-official, educated in both the humanities and the sciences, was trained to express himself in poetry and painting, in his public as well as in his private capacities. These modes of communication and social ritual were ubiquitous: so much so, indeed, that a picture now of how knowledge of technology, science, diplomacy, ritual was produced in early China would be impossible without that “artistic” articulation. Timewise this course is situated in the 500 years or so between 420 and 907—from the Southern and Northern Dynasties to the end of the Táng. We shall focus on poetical essays (fu) on such diverse topics as astronomy, ethics, good government, and theories of art and music from the Wen Xuan, “Selections of Refined Literature”, compiled by Xiao Tong (501-31), Crown Prince of the Liang dynasty. This was the work that became the text from which all literary men, from the Táng (618-907) dynasty on, obtained their literary education. Everyone who sat for the civil service examinations was expected to have mastered this work. The Wen Xuan also was influential in Japan and Korea, where it was studied, imitated, and printed into modern times.

(David Knechtges in http://www.washington.edu/research/showcase/1982a.html). We shall also examine a set of late Táng-period memoranda reprimanding an Emperor in standard poetical verse-form, and we shall work with the contemporaneous graphic culture, from technical diagrams to maps and on to landscape and genre paintings.

This course does not require specialized knowledge of East Asian languages. It is examined via essays on assigned topics and an extended research essay on a course-related topic chosen by the individual student.

HIST 3923H-004/ARCH 4023H: Medieval Bodies/Medieval Spaces
Profs. Coon (HIST) and Sexton (ARCH)
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Medieval Bodies/Medieval Spaces is a team-taught, interdisciplinary Honors Colloquium located at the intellectual crossroads between the School of Architecture and Fulbright College. This course traces the evolution of western medieval history (c. 300-1400) through the agency of material, textual, and ritual sources. In so doing, it introduces students to the complex process of inscribing sacred, secular, and even warrior bodies onto the built environment. During the semester, the teaching-team will guide Colloquium participants through the intensive study of major medieval architectural sites and their attendant cultures:

• The late Roman circus basilica and the athletic bodies of Christian martyrs
• The Carolingian monastery and the ritual bodies of monks
• Crusading fortresses and the bodies of Christ’s soldiers
• The Gothic cathedral and the king’s body
• The mercantile commune and the body of the Crucified One

The overall goal of this Colloquium is to demonstrate the degree to which medieval culture is produced by the lively interaction of architectural and narrative spaces.

HUMN 3923H-001, Digital Pompeii
Professor David Fredrick
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Prerequisite: Instructor consent.

HUMN 3923H-002, Game Design
Professor David Fredrick
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Prerequisite: Instructor consent.

HUMN 3923H-005, Tibetan Buddhist Philosophy and Culture
The Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology. General Class Information: Aside from the lecture / discussion format, class-time will be spent viewing movies and gaining a first-hand knowledge of the production of Tibetan culture. Cooking, chanting, making sand mandalas and prayer flags, as well as learning the fundamental progressions of Buddhist logic—all of these will contribute to a general understanding of Tibetan culture. It is a culture, of course, that has been heavily influenced by the Buddhist philosophy of non-violence and compassion for all sentient beings, and accordingly we will investigate the ways in which a community operates in an environment of cooperation and genuine concern for its fellow citizens. All Tibetan culture—according to Tibetan cosmology—is concerned with the five major sciences: 1) arts and crafts; 2) medicine; 3) grammar; 4) logic; 5) philosophy. We will explore various aspects of these sciences in our class. Note: Before class begins, it is recommended that you view two films. First of all, Kundun, and second, Seven Years in Tibet. These are widely available at the rental stores in town, or Professor Burris will be happy to loan you his personal copies of these films.

JAPN 4313H-001, Language and Society of Japan
Professor Tatsuya Fukushima
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Insight into Japanese civilization and culture with special emphasis on the areas such as social life and environment, education, religion and customs, and visual and performing arts. This course also discusses western influence on Japanese society, culture and language and how traditional and modern values are manifested in Japanese society.

JOUR 3923H-001, The Media, Politics, and Government
Professor Hoyt Purvis
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This colloquium will focus on the relationship between the media, politics, and government, and on the role and impact of the media in public and international affairs and campaigns and elections. There will be a major focus on the media role in the 2012 presidential campaign. The course will involve analysis of the power, responsibility, and performance of the media, including the significance of evolving media technologies, particularly the increasing importance of the Internet and social media in politics and government around the world. There will also be examination of government policies and regulations affecting the media and of significant developments and trends within the media.

JOUR 3923H-002, Literature of Journalism
Professor Bret Schulte
Colloquium Type: Social Science

A survey of landmark work of narrative nonfiction and the literary trends and historical context that produced them. From the mid-20th century to today. Includes such authors as Hersey, Capote, Didion.

JOUR 3923H-003, Issues in Advertising & Public Relations
Professor Jan Wicks
Colloquium Type: Social Science

The primary goal of Issues in Advertising & Public Relations is to increase your awareness of the effects of the advertising and public relations industries and their messages on society. Economic, social, ethical, regulatory and/or self-regulatory issues are considered from varying perspectives, including pro- and anti-industry views. You’ll be encouraged to evaluate your own personal beliefs and values regarding a number of issues. You’ll develop a social marketing plan with a team and write a literature review/research paper on a social issue regarding advertising or public relations.

You’ll be encouraged to think about the implications of what you do when you create an advertisement or public relations message or campaign. First you’ll develop a social marketing plan for a non-profit organization to educate the public about a particular health or social problem. This will help you to see how advertising and public relations messages can be used to help society. Then you’ll write a literature review/research paper on a topic you select (that isn’t the same as the social marketing plan). You may select the topic to research, in consultation with me, as long as it is a topic concerning an ethical, social, economic, legal, regulatory or self-regulatory issue regarding the effect(s) of advertising and/or public relations on individuals, organizations, societies, etc.

Catalog Description: Seminar course involving the critical examination of the major cultural, social, political, economic, ethical and persuasion theories and/or issues relevant to advertising and public relations affecting individuals, organizations and societies.

Seminar Design: JOUR 5063/3923H is a seminar course. You are responsible for discussing the assigned readings every week. Your thoughtful opinions, analysis and reasoning based on the assigned readings are valued contributions to the class.

LAST 4003H-001, Latin American Arts
Professor Sergio Villalobos-Ruminott
Colloquium Type: Humanities

MEST 4003H-001 / ENGL 3923H-003, The Modern Iranian Novel
Instructor: Kaveh Bassiri
Colloquium Type: Humanities
Class Description:

While modern Iran is known for its tumultuous politics -- and its cinema has won international acclaim (including this year’s Oscar for best foreign film) -- the nation’s vibrant literary tradition is largely unknown outside of Iran. This course will examine a number of compelling 20th-century novels by leading Iranian authors and places these works in their social and political contexts, from Asia’s first constitutional revolution and the discovery of oil to the first Islamic revolution and the Iran-Iraq War. They capture not only the unique history of modern Iran but also major socio-political issues of the 20th century, such as war, revolution, colonial resistance, dictatorship, censorship, nationalism, ethnic strife, modernization, and the influences of Marx and the West, as well as the enduring role of tradition and faith. These great works of world literature also employ a variety of styles -- realism, surrealism, magic realism, allegory, and satire -- to provide an exceptional perspective on Iranian society, one that goes beyond what can be learned from the news or historical texts.

The class will include lectures on the writers and their historical backgrounds as well as film presentations, but the majority of time will be used for classroom discussions of the literary works. While this course is a study of literature, students can draw on the literary works to reflect on pertinent Iranian socio-political topics. There will be weekly one-page responses to the reading and a short paper (5-7 pages) for the mid-term that should be expanded to a longer paper (12-15 pages) for the final. No knowledge of Persian is required.

Texts:

Hushang Golshiri, The Prince (Random House UK)

Sadiq Chubak, The Patient Stone (Mazda Publishing)

Simin Daneshvar, Savushun (Mage Publishers)

Iraj Pezeshkzad, My Uncle Napoleon (Modern Library Paperbacks)

Shahrnush Parsipur, Touba and the Meaning of Night (The Feminist Press at CUNY)

Mahmoud Dowlatabadi, The Colonel (Melville House)

Ervand Abrahamian, A History of Modern Iran (Cambridge University Press)

[Recommended book for historical background.]

MUTH 477VH-001, Music and Mind
Professor Elizabeth Margulis
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

This course will investigate the mental and neural mechanisms that underlie the experience of music. This semester, the class will be taking a project-based, hands-on approach.

Questions considered will include: how does music impart pleasure? Why is a 2-second stop on the radio scan sufficient to identify whether a station plays jazz or pop or classical? To what extent are musical and linguistic abilities neurally dissociable? Why can people without formal music training tap along to a beat? What makes certain melodies get stuck on mental replay? Why do some performances evoke more emotion than others? Disciplines touched by these questions include musicology, psychology, anthropology, neuroscience, philosophy, and cognitive science. There are no prerequisites for this course; in particular, prior musical training is not required. Students must enroll in three hours to receive colloquium credit for this course.

PLSC 3923H-001, The 2012 Election
Profs. Angie Maxwell and Pearl Dowe
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This seminar will focus on the 2012 Presidential election. The course will explore such integral topics as: the American nomination process, presidential debate analysis, campaign finance, the influence of the media, wedge issues, and political mobilization. In addition to assigned readings on presidential election history, students will also be required to follow election coverage and news closely.

PSYC 3923H-001, "Truth? Lies? or Statistics?"
Professor Joel Freund
Colloquium Type: Social Science


Prerequisite: General Psychology and MATH 1203.

As a Psychologist Views It

In this Psychology colloquium we will explore a number of issues and topics involving statistics. These issues may include ethical issues associated with the use and misuse of statistics. Are statistics moral, amoral, or immoral? We will also consider other questions, some of which may even have answers, including: How do researchers use statistics, and is that behavior different from what we should do? Are there ways to use and present statistics to tell a story but not a lie? Are statistics the salvation of a poor design? Do complex statistical procedures give us simple answers to complex questions? Do they provide any answers? Because psychologists use statistics as tools in research, we will get experience with using statistics in research situations. That is we will ask, and try to answer some research questions using statistics. While the exact nature of the evaluation has not been determined, I am planning on at least one project and resulting paper, with the possibility of one or two “exams.” The class will have significant input into the nature and type of evaluation. For Psychology majors who have not taken PSYC 2013 (Statistics), this course can be used to fulfill that requirement.

 

AIST 4003H-001 (HIST 3923H-002), The Mongols 1260-1368 Professor Rembrandt Wolpert Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

As the first foreign rulers over a unified China, the Mongols with their Yuan dynasty (1271--1368) soon fell in line with earlier Chinese dynastic models. Not just barbaric conquerers, ruthless victors, they soon ruled China in the traditional style of Chinese and Chinese-educated officials. Our period here (roughly coinciding with that Yuan dynasty) will examine science, technology, and culture -- literature, painting, and the performing arts -- in 13th and 14th century China alongside evaluating the massive impact the imperial Mongol clan claimed over the greatest land empire the world has ever seen.

AIST 4003H-002, Early Chinese Empires: Mythology, Archeology and Historiography Professor Liang Cai Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Our understanding of ancient China is primarily determined by the available sources and our methodologies. This seminar will provide graduate students and advanced undergraduates with a critical introduction to the most important sources and major themes, both textual and archaeological, for the study of ancient China. We will consider materials from the earliest historical period, circa 1300 B.C., down to the consolidation of the empire in the first century B.C. We will focus on outstanding problems and controversies pertaining to this period, such as the relationship between archaeology and classical historiography, the nature of the Chinese writing system, myth and history, the textual history of the transmitted texts, and gender issues in ancient China. Finally, we will consider the basic methodological tools presently used by historians, textual critics, paleographers, and archaeologists.

CLST 4003H-001, The Argonautica Professor Darcy Krasne Colloquium Type: Humanities

Have you ever wondered what lies behind the movie Jason and the Argonauts? Do you like epic tales of adventure, magic, love, and betrayal? Come explore ancient accounts of the Greek prince Jason and his valiant crew of heroes, who sailed the world’s first ship to the distant reaches of the east in order to reclaim the legendary Golden Fleece.

This course introduces students to the extensive ancient Argonautic tradition that spanned both art and literature, from early Greece to the Roman empire, with a particular focus on the Roman side of the tradition. We will read classics of western literature, such as the Argonautica by Apollonius of Rhodes and Euripides’ tragic drama Medea, in addition to many lesser-known works by authors such as the Roman poets Catullus and Ovid. Students will also read and present on scholarly articles throughout the semester.

In class, we will discuss persistent issues such as the temporal and political relevance of the Argonautic theme, changes imposed or encouraged by considerations of genre, and the “literary conversation” in which Argonautic authors engage. Philosophy, religion, expansionist politics, civil war, and gender stereotypes are just a few of the themes that will concern us throughout the semester.

Knowledge of Greek and Latin is not required, and majors from all fields are welcome. The semester will culminate in the writing and presentation of a research paper (approximately 10 pages) on a course-related topic of the student’s choice. Instructor permission is required for enrollment.

ENGL 3923H-001, Shakespeare’s Histories: Text and Film Professor Joseph Candido Colloquium Type: Humanities

We will be reading the four plays of Shakespeare’s so-called second tetralogy as well as viewing film adaptations of these plays. The purpose of the course is 1) to have students acquire a familiarity with the themes and ideas of Shakespeare’s four historical masterpieces and 2) to analyze and discuss the films of the plays as critical interpretations of Shakespeare’s art.

Plays to be read: Richard II 1 Henry IV 2 Henry IV Henry V Films: The BBC productions of all the plays Orson Welles’s Chimes at Midnight Laurence Olivier’s Henry V Kenneth Branagh’s Henry V

Assignments: Three in-class oral presentations (roughly 5 minutes) on a single aspect of the film adaptations of Richard II, 1 Henry IV, and 2 Henry IV. These presentations will be polished papers that the students will read aloud in class and over which they will field questions. The paper will be handed in on the day of the presentation. Grades on these papers will be based on three factors: 1) the quality of the paper; 2) the quality of the presentation; 3) the student’s ability to field questions.

A final research project (minimum 15 pages) on the film adaptations of Henry V or Chimes at Midnight.

ENGL 3923H-003, The Arkansas Delta Oral History Project Anne Raines Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Textbooks Required Bolsterli BORN IN THE DELTA Gatewood and Wayne ARKANSAS DELTA: LAND OF PARADOX Assigned Readings

Purpose: This innovative, service learning colloquium will give University of Arkansas students the opportunity to learn about collecting oral histories, to study the rich culture and lore of the Arkansas Delta , to explore sustainability in Arkansas, and to work collaboratively with students from high schools in the Delta. The course will include an intensive workshop on February 13th focused on oral history in Helena, AR. At the conclusion of this event, University of Arkansas students and students from the participating high schools will form virtual writing groups, which will “meet” online regularly for the semester. During this time, all students will be working on their oral history projects focused on one of the seven areas of sustainability —

Academics & Research Energy Water Resources Food, Agriculture & Forestry Land Use & Development Pollution Prevention & Waste Minimization Social & Community

UA students will complete each step of the project the week prior to the high school students and serve as mentors to the high school students via the virtual writing groups as they research topics , plan and conduct interviews, and create projects based on those interviews. All students will participate in discussion commenting on each other’s work via the Internet. Then March 9th and 10th, all participants will come to Fayetteville for a weekend of face-to-face work, University campus visit, and fun. The online collaborative work will continue for another several weeks, and the course will end with a public celebration and performance of student work in Helena on April 23rd. All expenses of travel, lodging, and meals for the two trips to Helena will be paid by the Brown Chair in English Literacy Initiative. Overnight travel to Helena, Arkansas, is required February 12th-13th and April 22nd-23rd.

Special Procedures: Students will explore sustainable practices in Arkansas, complete their own oral history project, and share their experience with high school students via virtual writing groups.

EUST 4003H-001, Empires of the Mediterranean Professor Fiona Davidson Colloquium Type: Social Science

Description : This class is an in-depth look at the way in which the Mediterranean Sea has functioned as a hub of commercial and political empires from the late middle ages to the present. The class will deal specifically with Venice, the Ottomans, The Spanish/French Bourbons, the British and the 20th Century Italian attempt at trans-Medieterranean imperial expansion.

GEOG 3003H-001, Conservation of Natural Resources Professor Sonja Hausmann Colloquium Type: Social or Natural Science

GEOG 4383H-001, Hazards and Risk Professor Thomas Paradise Colloquium Type: Social Science or Natural Science

It's an overview of the emerging field of Hazards Studies. Addressing the cultural, sociological, legal and physical aspects of natural and technological hazards, hurricanes, earthquakes, tornadoes, landslides, and floods are all discussed in depth. Aspects of risk perception, relief and recovery are also integrated into the class. Hazards Studies represents an emerging program in universities and new career direction; the class discussion will bridge practical and theoretical applications.

GEOS 4693H-001, Environmental Justice Professor Byron Winston Colloquium Type: Social or Natural Science

This seminar will involve students in an interdisciplinary examination of some fundamental environmental problems faced by communities of color. In particular we will consider the proposition that people of color and socio-economically disadvantaged individuals, whether residing in urban or rural communities, bear a disproportionate burden of environmental pollution and its health consequences. Studies suggesting that people of color have environmental burdens imposed upon them unfairly due to over-siting of industrial plants and landfills in their communities and from exposures to pesticides and other toxic chemicals at home and on the job will be reviewed and analyzed. Consideration will be given to the viewpoint that there exists within the United States, as well as globally, a pattern of environmental inequity, injustice and racism. Key topics to be considered during the semester include racism and social justice, environmental racism, pollution impacts and health effects in communities of color, risk assessment, community responses to environmental threats, pollution in developing nations, indigenous peoples, and climate change. We will review studies and analyses that document environmental injustice. The possible causes for patterns of injustice will be examined and discussed. Considerable attention will be paid to grassroots and community-based efforts to deal with environmental threats. Recent proposals to address the problem of environmental racism and injustice will be discussed and analyzed. Occasionally, community leaders, lawyers, organizers, academics, and government officials will join the class to discuss current issues and problems.

HIST 3923H-001, Sex, Class, Race and Disease Professor Trish Starks Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

In this course, students will explore the emergence of epidemic disease and its threat not just to the individual but the entire body politic. The concept of protecting the public’s health is set against the backdrop of the rise of the nation state and increasing anxieties over the behavior of women, the lower classes, and the other. The rise of modern, public health programs will guide the course but along the way, students will confront the cultural construction of health and medicine, the biases of scientific inquiry and the tensions between paternalism, liberty, and prejudice in public health programs.

The course has been divided into five units – the citizen, the female, the underclass, the deviant, and the defective – to explore both how modern states define citizens and also how these definitions result in the state employing different types of control and deploying various authorities to discipline citizens. Students will be expected to discuss critically the ways in which science has been employed to control behaviors that often were not medically proven to be dangerous but were considered morally aberrant or abnormal by state officials, medical professionals, social authorities, and cultural pundits.

HIST 3923H-003, CLST-002, Epic & History Professor Charles Muntz Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This class will explore the genre of epic poetry in the ancient world, and how epic poems are reflections of the societies that created them and what this means both for the historian and the literary critic. The earliest works of western literature are epics, the Iliad and the Odyssey, and scholars have debated for years how they were composed and what they reveal about the early Greeks. We will examine all facets of these works, along with archaeological evidence, to determine how the Homeric poems can be useful for reconstructing early Greek civilization. Next we will turn to the Argonautica, and see how this Hellenistic poem builds on the Homeric model, but also reflects a very different society, one as far removed as possible from the Homeric warrior culture. From there we will turn to Virgil's Aeneid, the great Roman epic, and see how Virgil builds on his earlier models, but at the same time creates a new epic that reflects Roman values and history, and the propaganda of the Augustan period, a time of immense social and political change in the Mediterranean world.

HIST 3923H-005, The American Experience: Views from Abroad, 1776-Present Professor Alessandro Brogi Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

At a time of deep questioning and self-questioning of America’s world role and of America as “World’s Dream,” analyses of foreign perceptions of the United States have abounded. The objective of this colloquium is to place this current and urgent theme in historical perspective. We will make sense of the renewed challenge of American power as myth, model, and cultural production system. The chronological spectrum is from Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America? of the early 19th Century to the war on terrorism and its international ramifications.

Topics will include American "Exceptionalism," American hegemony, U.S. foreign policy through its unilateral and multilateral phases, Americanization, Anti-Americanism, Cultural "Transmissions" and "Receptions," the politics of private and public initiatives of cultural exchange, the impact of the media, with particular attention to radio, television, and cinema.

More specifically we will examine: a) positive and negative reactions from around the world to the rise of the United States as a global power; b) the merits and the contradictions inherent in other countries’ fears and hopes about American-style modernization; c) how foreign observers managed to identify certain "truths" and contradictions of American society and politics.

This course is also an example of genuine international history: besides helping Americans to understand themselves better, foreign observers who analyze the United States also tell us something about their own societies. Therefore this seminar is useful not only to students focusing on U.S. History but also to those whose main interests are in other areas and countries. While focusing on 1) the transatlantic dialogue between Western Europe and the United States and 2) the roots of anti-American world terrorism, we will also consider the impact of American culture on other areas, such as Eastern Europe or Japan, particularly during and after the Cold War. A few comparative studies on developing areas besides the Middle East are also included.

Given the broad scope of questions we deal with, the selection of readings includes studies on cultural perceptions, political analyses, ideological evaluations, and comparative approaches. Prior participation in at least a general U.S. 20th century history course is strongly recommended. Reading knowledge of a foreign language is not required, but it’s a plus for the research paper.

HUMN 3923H-006, Tibetan Philosophy and Culture The Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology. General Class Information: Aside from the lecture / discussion format, class-time will be spent viewing movies and gaining a first-hand knowledge of the production of Tibetan culture. Cooking, chanting, making sand mandalas and prayer flags, as well as learning the fundamental progressions of Buddhist logic—all of these will contribute to a general understanding of Tibetan culture. It is a culture, of course, that has been heavily influenced by the Buddhist philosophy of non-violence and compassion for all sentient beings, and accordingly we will investigate the ways in which a community operates in an environment of cooperation and genuine concern for its fellow citizens. All Tibetan culture—according to Tibetan cosmology—is concerned with the five major sciences: 1) arts and crafts; 2) medicine; 3) grammar; 4) logic; 5) philosophy. We will explore various aspects of these sciences in our class. Note: Before class begins, it is recommended that you view two films. First of all, Kundun, and second, Seven Years in Tibet. These are widely available at the rental stores in town, or Professor Burris will be happy to loan you his personal copies of these films.

HUMN 3923H-003 or 004, Game Design Professor David Fredrick Colloquium Type: Humanities

LAST 4003H-002, Politics of Immigration Professor Rafael Jimeno Colloquium Type: Social Science

MEST 4003H-001, Gender and Middle Eastern Religion Professor Joel Gordon Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

MUSC 3923H-001, Haydn and His World Professor Martin Nedbal Colloquium Type: Humanities

PHIL 3943H /PHYS 3923H, Quantum Mechanics and Measurement, Professor Barry Ward Colloquium Type: Humanities or Natural Science

Quantum mechanics is a hugely successful physical theory, but more than three quarters of a century after its inception it remains fundamentally problematic. The standard formulation says that physical systems evolve in one way (specified by the Schrodinger equation) between measurements and in a completely different way when measured (when the system’s wave-function is said to collapse). This is puzzling to say the least. Why should measurement feature at all in our fundamental description of reality? Perhaps more worryingly, the concept seems unpardonably vague. Can cats perform measurements? Or small children? Does one need a PhD? This is the measurement problem, and in this course we shall explore the numerous proposed solutions including the Copenhagen Interpretation, Many Worlds Theories, Decoherence, Dynamic Collapse Models, and Bohmian mechanics. Treatment shall be largely (although not entirely) non-mathematical, but precise and conceptually rigorous.

PLSC 3923-001, Political Violence Professor Jeffrey Ryan Colloquium Type: Social Science

WLLC 398V-002, Mississippi French Archives Professor Linda Jones Colloquium Type: Humanities

This innovative course will give students the opportunity to explore aspects of French Colonial Arkansas and the Lower Mississippi Valley utilizing the French historic record. That is, students will read select authentic French documents in their original handwritten format, will transcribe and translate documents, and will respond to questions devoted to comprehending the authentic record. This course itself will include an overview of French Arkansas history from 1673-1750, an introduction to historic French grammar in handwritten documents, paleography, that is the process of learning to read old French handwriting, as well as opportunities to explore online archival resources devoted to the region and timeframe. Key topics within the historic realm will include but are not limited to a focus on the French missionaries of the region, in particular Fathers Davion, Bergier, Foucault and St. Côsme, the French and Chickasaw War of 1739, initial cultural exchanges between the French and the Quapaw Indians beginning in 1673, literary narratives by such explorers as Bossu and Dumont de Montigny, as well visual representations of the region by various French artists and cartographers.

In class we will discuss the topics above and will also spend time reading and analyzing documents, responding to questions, as well as comparing and analyzing different transcriptions, translations and images. The course will include regular homework assignments, two exams, and the culmination of a course portfolio focused on a particular French Arkansas personality or event of the student’s choice. Though reading the historic record will take place in French, discussions, assignments and exams will take place in English. French language study beyond the 2013 level is strongly preferred.

 
 

SUMMER 2011

ANTH 3923H-011, Male and Female
Professor Ted Swedenburg
Colloquium Type: Social Science

HUMN 3923H-902-Tibetans in Exile Today (TEXT)
Professor Sidney Burris and the Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science


HUMN 425V-011 (6269), Jewish Thought: The Promised Land
Professor Jacob Adler
Colloquium Type: Humanities

The course will investigate the ways in which Jewish thinkers have assessed the significance and meaning of the Land of Israel/Palestine for Jewish life and religion, from Biblical times to the present.  Topics will include:  The various Biblical, Talmudic and midrashic viewpoints on the Land;  the concept of Exile; Messianism; Zionism, Territorialism, and Anti-Zionism.  One special topic will focus on questions arising in Jewish law such as:  the status of the commandments the Land as opposed to elsewhere; special commandments relevant only in the Land of Israel, and commandments relevant only elsewhere.

Although the instructor has some definite opinions on these subjects, the purpose of the course is to let the sources speak for themselves.  No prerequisites.  Students must enroll in three hours to receive colloquium credit for this course.

FALL 2011

AIST 4003H-001/HIST 3923H-005, Ad Paradisum: Ideal worlds, Imaginary Places, and the Afterlife in the Literary, Visual, and Performing Arts of East Asia 
Professors Elizabeth Markham and Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

Confucian, Daoist, and Buddhist ideal communities (“utopias”), of imaginary places (“paradise islands”), and of the afterlife (“heaven and hell”) in China and Japan will be traced in a broad sweep across literature, painting, and the performing arts. In contrast to the West, these ideas and ideals tend to be more “realistic” when filtered through Chinese thought. The course will touch upon Confucian and Neo-Confucian political ideas, examine some of the great utopian writings of the “mad” Daoists of the 2nd to 5th centuries AD, allow us to indulge in reading descriptive writings by the great medieval poets of China imagining a world they wished to see, and encourage us to link literary descriptions to paintings, music, and performing arts of their time. We shall focus on primary sources (in translation).

The social critical writings of Chinese during foreign rule of the Manchu-period will be complemented by a set of writings by radical Chinese authors of the early 20th century.

At the core of the course, however, will be Buddhist views of the afterlife, from the Indian-inspired paradises and hells of the early medieval introduction of Mahayana Buddhism to China to the intricate methods of ensuring a path to paradise in the Japanese worlds of Pure Land Buddhism from the 11th to 14th centuries – worlds also full of beautiful paintings and sculpture, music, sung liturgies, paradise-gardens, and descriptive poetry.

This course does not require specialized knowledge of East Asian languages, nor of music and the arts, and it is open to majors in any field. Students address their particular interests via individual projects, culminating in an extended research essay from each student.

AIST 4003H-002/HIST 3923H-003/MUSY 4313H-002, Hidden Views of Edo Japan
Professor Elizabeth Markham
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

Hidden views of Edo Japan (1600-1868): Music and the arts

The culture of the Edo period ... was the product of a juxtaposition of samurai values and an ever-more vigorous urban popular culture that emerged with the prosperity of the merchant classes. (de Ferranti 2000)

The urban pleasure quarters of the Floating World associated with Edo Japan (1600-1868) hold an endless fascination, as too the popular theatrical forms whose actors vie with courtesan and geisha in the well-known wood-block culture of the day. But this time is characterized as well by refined solo and chamber music, the poetry of the haiku master Matsuo Bashô, song-cycles of profound beauty and sadness, by the songs and the arts of the geisha herself ... We shall move between the two, situating our historical interests in music, song, and theater --- and our present-day listening and viewing too --- against their socio-cultural background. Through accompanying, broad-based readings drawn from literature, aesthetics, history, religion, science, we shall take up a ``music and arts'' view of the almost 300-year long Edo period, of a Japan officially cut-off from the world in a self-imposed policy of seclusion, but actually heavily occupied with European and Chinese intellectual, scientific, and artistic thinking. Central to our study throughout will be readings (in translation), listenings, and viewings of original materials.

This course does not require specialized knowledge of music, nor of East Asian languages. It is open to majors in any field. Students address their particular interests via individual projects, culminating in an extended research essay from each student.

Special guest:
Professor Dan Sutherland, Department of History, Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences, on the artist James Whistler (1834--1903).

AIST 4003H-003/HIST 3923H-001, Song China 960-1279
Professor Rembrandt Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

The Song dynasty (960–1279) was culturally the most brilliant era in later imperial Chinese history. A time of great social and economic change, the period in large measure shaped the intellectual and political climate of China down to the twentieth century. 
(Metropolitan Museum of Art)

ANTH 3923H-001, Primate Behavioral Ecology
Professor J. Michael Plavcan
Colloquium Type: Social or Natural Science

This course covers primate behavioral ecology and sociobiology – a rapidly changing and growing field. The goal of the course is to understand basic primate and human behavior in an ecological and evolutionary context. The course will cover the diversity of primate mating systems, ecological adaptations, and social behavior. A strong emphasis will be placed on adaptive models that synthesize the relationships between the environment and behavior. The evolution of human behavior will be studied in the context of these broader models.

ANTH 3923H-002, Topics of the Middle East: Mideast Popular Culture 
Professor Ted Swedenburg
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This course aims to introduce students to some of the most important trends and examples of popular culture in the Middle East. By popular culture, we mean works of expressive culture that are mass-produced, marketed as commodities, and have mass audiences. Among the themes that we will address will be Egyptian cinema (Hollywood on the Nile) and modernity; Algerian rai music and youth rebellion; "Mediterranean" music in Israel, performed by Jews of Arab background; heavy metal and Islam; bellydancing; and rap in Palestine. No prior knowledge of the Middle East required. The course will involve the examination of lots of video clips of music, cinema, bellydancing, and the like.

BIOL 3923H-001, Watershed Ecology
Professor Art Brown
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

The objectives of this course are to provide students an opportunity to 1) learn the major models/theories of watershed ecosystem structure and functioning during the first few meetings, and 2) examine various forms of anthropogenic disturbances (pollution etc.) to rivers while sharpening their skills at oral and written scientific communication and the peer review process. The first meeting will consist of an overview followed by selection of topics by individual students. This course can satisfy the senior writing requirement. The science librarian will assist with efficient research of the subjects selected. After a few weeks to prepare, students will begin presentations of their papers to the class. During the preparation time I will lecture about how to write abstracts, deliver oral presentations, prepare scientific manuscripts, and write meaningful reviews. Class members will prepare a brief critique of each abstract and oral presentation, which will be graded and then given to the presenter along with my grade and critique of their presentation. Written manuscripts (4 copies) will be submitted for review about three weeks before the end of the semester to facilitate timely peer reviews. Students will have two weeks for revisions before manuscripts will be re-submitted for grading and posting/distribution to each class member. Course grades will be based on grades received for 1) reviews of abstracts and oral presentations, 2) reviews of manuscripts, 3) oral presentations, and 4) manuscripts. This class should help students prepare for oral presentations to their honors committees and writing their honors theses.

COMM 3923H-001, New Media and Communication Technologies
Professor Stephanie Schulte
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This interdisciplinary colloquium examines the most recent research on new media. Focusing on the historical and cultural contexts in which communication technologies emerged and developed, this course traces the origins of current new media issues: What are the potentials and cultural functions of debates around Singularity, or the moment (estimated: 2045) when humans and machines merge into a singular entity? Why have news media implicated Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube in coverage of Middle East regime change movements and what assumptions are embedded in that implication? Why have sexting, cyber-bullying, and internet addiction become international issues? What is at stake in the battle over Facebook privacy, digital mapping, and cell phone tracking?

GEOG 3003H-001, Conservation of Natural Resources
Professor Sonja Hausmann
Colloquium Type: Social Science

GEOG 4033H-001, Geography of the Middle East & North Africa
Professor T.R. Paradise
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Physical and cultural landscapes, natural and cultural resources, art and architecture, land use, political history, OPEC, and current problems of North Africa and the Middle East region west of Afghanistan are discussed. Discussion will involved Morocco, across North Africa into the Levant, Arabia and Gulf regions. Class participation, discussions, mixed media (film, music, powerpoints), banquets and short student presentations round out this exciting and informative class.

GEOG 410VH-011 , American Public Land Policy
Professor T. R. Paradise
Colloquium Type: Social or Natural Science

Students must enroll in 3 credit hours

The class will examine the role of our federal public lands in 19th and 20th C. American geography, history, policy and art. We will investigate the growth of conservation, preservation, and management movements in the US by looking at America's national parks and forests, dams, wildlife refuges, wilderness areas, and managed and agricultural lands. We will look into the major characters involved with these federal public lands and the role of natural resources in important policies and acts. Pivotal 19th and 20th C. personalities will include Muir, Roosevelt, Leopold, Thoreau, Bierstadt, Emerson, Pinchot, Audubon, and Stegner. Readings, lectures and round-table discussions will include various aspects including art history, law, literature, environmental studies, geography, history, political science, and resource management.

Reading excerpts will include Cadillac Desert by Marc Reisner, Thoreau's Walden, Muir's Grand Cañon and the Mountains of California, Stegner's Beyond the 100th Meridian, Leopold's Sand County Almanac, Carson's Silent Spring, McPhee's Encounters with the Archdruid, and a number of period reports, news pieces, and laws regarding water use and dams (1930s), grazing, mining, and soil conservation (1930s), debates on preservation vs. conservation (1890-1930s), and period perspectives on ‘Manifest Destiny’ and Western expansion (1840s-1860s).

GEOS 4563H-001, Geology of our National Parks
Professor Van Brahana
Colloquium Type: Social or Natural Science

Our National Parks and related facilities administered by the National Park System stand as some of the most spectacular natural areas in the world. They offer the history and development of our country, and provide direct observation into geologic/ecosystem/biologic/chemical/physical settings in which students can visualize interdisciplinary processes much more easily than most other field sites; they motivate students with the grandeur and beauty of scale that ranges from landscape to microscopic; and they have immediately applicable lessons to teach us regarding the interaction of humans, the biosphere, the hydrosphere, and in fact most of the natural world in a geologic framework that is more obvious than most other settings.

As field areas, the National Parks allow students/faculty to collect data that will facilitate their growth as researchers, as well as help with problems that are directly relevant to the Park Service. The stresses on the Park Service are significant as federal funds come under continued competition in our modern society. Some of the parks are "loved to death", and the sheer number of visitors and human encroachment has altered the parks-yet another area of potential research at the interface of human activity/geology.

GERM 470VH, Deutsche als Ausländer / Ausländer als Deutsche
Professor Kathleen Condray
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course will investigate German national identity from two perspectives: 1) from that of Germans living in other countries who are confronted with what it means to be German by examining the differences between their native and current cultures and 2) from that of groups living within Germany who consider themselves German, wholly or to some extent, yet are not immediately recognized as such by other Germans.

Works to be examined include those by Friedrich Gerstäcker, a 19th century novelist who made his living as a fur trapper and trader in Arkansas during its territorial years; Hans-Jürgen Massaquoi, an Afro-German who chronicles surviving his childhood in Germany during the Third Reich and who eventually moved to America and became the head editor of Ebony; Stefanie Zweig, who writes about how her Jewish family escaped the Third Reich by moving to a farm in Africa; Jana Hensel, an East German who came of age just as the German Democratic Republic was disintegrating and knew West Germany only as a foreign and hostile country; Fatih Akin, an award-winning director who explores Turkish / German relations in his films; and Wladimir Kaminer, a best-selling German writer and immigrant who has published ten books in eight years, although he knew no German when he moved to Berlin from Russia in 1989.

The course will incorporate traditional literary narrative, autobiography, film, and music. The language of the course is German; all participants must have completed at least German 3013 (Introduction to Literature) or have instructor permission, and the completion of German 3003 and 4003 is preferred.

HIST 3923H-001, Religion in America
Professor Beth Schweiger
Colloquium Type: Social Science

HIST 3923H-002/WLLC 3923H-001/MUSC 3923H-001
Lord of the Ring: Wagner and the World
Professors John Laurence Hare, Jr., Jennifer Hoyer, Martin Nedbel
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

This course will introduce students to intellectual inquiry and critical thinking through an interdisciplinary study of Richard Wagner, one of history’s most famous, yet problematic figures. Students will study Wagner as a composer, dramatist, aesthetician, poet, political commentator, and scholar, while at the same time considering the context of his times and the controversies surrounding his work. The course will explore the connections between Wagner’s work and early German nationalism, and its later links to National Socialism in the twentieth century. Along the way, students will become acquainted with the history of Germanic languages in myths, beginning with Runic inscriptions and Gothic incantations, moving through Germanic myths in most medieval Germanic languages, and culminating in a comparative examination of the Siegfried/Bruenhilde story arc that Wagner eventually scored and minted as the German myth. The course will also deal with the nexus of these legends and Wagner’s notorious anti-Semitism. 

The course will explore Wagnerian issues through the frame of his monumental operatic tetralogy The Ring of the Nibelung and its lasting effects on modern intellectual and cultural imagination. The Ring Cycle is a significant object of study due to its continued popularity in every conceivable form of American popular culture, from commercials to Hollywood blockbusters and Indie films. It therefore provides an ideal bridge for students’ shared cultural backgrounds and new interdisciplinary academic skills. 

With Wagner as a unifying theme, students will discover the ways in which the differing perspectives of disciplines such as German studies, history, and musicology can come together to answer shared questions about the development of art and culture within society and politics and about the links between the past and the present.

HIST 3923H-004, Jews, Antisemitism, and the Holocaust
Professor Richard Sonn
Colloquium Type: Social Science

The Holocaust is a watershed event in human history that raises fundamental questions about human nature, modern society, and our potential for destruction. We will examine the modern history of the Jewish people, inquire into the causes of antisemitism, and see why the Nazis targeted the Jews for destruction. Much of this course will focus on Central and Eastern Europe, where most European Jews lived and died, before and during the Second World War. The study of genocide will take us beyond the immediate historical circumstances to consider its ethical and philosophical implications.

HUMN 3923H-005, Tibetan Buddhist Philosophy and Culture
The Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology. General Class Information: Aside from the lecture / discussion format, class-time will be spent viewing movies and gaining a first-hand knowledge of the production of Tibetan culture. Cooking, chanting, making sand mandalas and prayer flags, as well as learning the fundamental progressions of Buddhist logic—all of these will contribute to a general understanding of Tibetan culture. It is a culture, of course, that has been heavily influenced by the Buddhist philosophy of non-violence and compassion for all sentient beings, and accordingly we will investigate the ways in which a community operates in an environment of cooperation and genuine concern for its fellow citizens. All Tibetan culture—according to Tibetan cosmology—is concerned with the five major sciences: 1) arts and crafts; 2) medicine; 3) grammar; 4) logic; 5) philosophy. We will explore various aspects of these sciences in our class. Note: Before class begins, it is recommended that you view two films. First of all, Kundun, and second, Seven Years in Tibet. These are widely available at the rental stores in town, or Professor Burris will be happy to loan you his personal copies of these films.

JAPN 4313H-001, Honors Language and Society of Japan
Professor Tatsuya Fukushima
Colloquium Type:  Humanities or Social Science

JOUR 3923H-001, The Media, Politics and Government
Professor Hoyt Purvis
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This course will focus on the relationship among the media, politics, and government, and on the role and impact of the media on politics, political campaigns, and in public and international affairs. It will involve analysis of the power, responsibility, and performance of the media and the significance of evolving media technologies, particularly the increasing importance of the Internet and social media for politics and government around the world. There will also be examination of government policies and regulations affecting the media and of significant developments and trends within the media.

JOUR 3923H-002, Literature of Journalism
Tues/Thurs, 11:00-12:20
Professor Bret Schulte
Colloquium Type: Social Science

A survey of landmark works of narrative nonfiction and the literary trends and historical context that produced them. From the mid-20th century to today. Includes such authors as Capote, Didion, McPhee.

JOUR 3923H-003, Issues in Advertising and Public Relations
Professor Jan Wicks
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Seminar course involving the critical examination of the major cultural, social, political, economic, ethical and persuasion theories and/or issues relevant to advertising and public relations affecting individuals, organizations and societies. The course also serves as an introduction to research methods for Journalism Honors students interested in ad/pr. Students in the course develop a social marketing plan and/or research proposal. Therefore students who are not Journalism majors should understand they are expected to develop a research proposal or social marketing plan in the class.

MATH 3923H-001/HUMN 3923H-003, Explorations in Computing
Professor Russell Deaton
Colloquium Type:  Natural Science or Humanities

Computer software and the technologies that it enables is everywhere around us (social net-working, computer games, smart phones). In addition, computer code is increasingly important as a medium for generating and analyzing cultural artifacts. Some examples are http://artport.whitney.org/commissions/thedumpster and http://www.understanding-shakespeare.com. In this course, we will learn basic programming skills and apply them to the generationof art and the analysis of a literary text. Thus, the course is a rst step in learning how toimplement the important computer technologies of our time, as well as exploring the role of the computer in the arts and humanities.

In Fall 2011, the course will be offered as CSCE1013, MSCI3932H, HUMN3932H, and ARTS439V at 200p-320p TuTh. For information or to enroll, contact Prof. Russell Deaton (rdeaton@uark.edu).

MUTH 477VH-001, Music and Mind
Professor Elizabeth Margulis
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

This course will investigate the mental and neural mechanisms that underlie the experience of music. This semester, the class will be taking a project-based, hands-on approach.
Questions considered will include: how does music impart pleasure? Why is a 2-second stop on the radio scan sufficient to identify whether a station plays jazz or pop or classical? To what extent are musical and linguistic abilities neurally dissociable? Why can people without formal music training tap along to a beat? What makes certain melodies get stuck on mental replay? Why do some performances evoke more emotion than others? Disciplines touched by these questions include musicology, psychology, anthropology, neuroscience, philosophy, and cognitive science. There are no prerequisites for this course; in particular, prior musical training is not required.  Students must enroll in three hours to receive colloquium credit for this course.

 

ANTH 3923H, Primate Behavioral Ecology
Professor J. Michael Plavcan
Colloquium Type:  Social Science or Natural Science

ANTH 3923H-001/HUMN 3923H-002: Queer Theory
Professor Ted Swedenburg
Colloquium Type:  Social Science

BIOL 3923H-005/CHEM 3923H-005, Drug Development Process
Professors Matt McIntosh and Ralph Henry
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

CHEM 3923H-004: The Exploration of Space:  A Perspective from the Visual Arts
Professor Derek Sears
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

CHEM 3923H-001: Quantum Reality and the Spiritual Quest
Professor Lothar Schäfer
Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Humanities

ENGL 3923H-001: Shakespeare and Opera
Professor Joseph Candido
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

ENGL 3923H-003/HIST 3923H-004: Arkansas Delta Oral History
Professor Anne Raines
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

EUST 4003H-001, Europe and the Environment
Professor Donald Kelley
Colloquium Type: Social Science

GEOG 4383H-001, Hazards & Risk
Professor T.R. Paradise
Colloquium Type:  Social Science or Natural Science

HIST 3923H-001, Sex, Class, Race and Disease
Professor Trish Starks
Colloquium Type: Social Science

HIST 3923H-002/AIST 4003H-001, Uncovering Heian Japan (784-1192)
Professors Elizabeth Markham and Rembrandt Wolpert.
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HIST 3923H-003,  Archaeology and Nation
Professor John Hare
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

HUMN 3923H-001/CLST 4003H-002,  Digital Pompeii
Professor David Fredrick
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

HUMN 3923H-002, Tibetan Buddhist Philosophy and Culture
Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HUMN 3923H-006, Tibetan Buddhist Philosophy and Culture
Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HUMN 3923H-007,  Introduction to Gender Studies
Professor Lisa Corrigan
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HUMN 3923H-008, Medieval Architecture
Professor Kim Sexton
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HUMN 3923H-001, Game Design
Professor David Fredrick
Colloquium Type: Humanities

LAST 4003H-003, Making the Americas
Professor Lindsay Puente
Colloquium Type: Social Science

MEST 4003H-001, Gender and Middle Eastern Religion
Professor Moja Kahf
Colloquium Type: Social Science


AIST 4003H/HIST 3923H-002, The recluse in early East Asia
Professors Elizabeth Markham and Rembrant Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

"In  reading (to  use  the Chinese  term)  a Chinese  landscape painting, we are often moved  by the pleasure of recognition, even of  identification,  occasioned by  the  one  or  more tiny  human figures, almost  imperceptible among  the rocks and  pines.  These figures,  executed  with  a  few  minute  strokes  of  the  brush, represent a  solitary man, leaning  on his staff along  a mountain path, or on  the back of a donkey, crossing  a bridge and followed by a boy who carries his lute, or among a group of similar figures lingering   by   the  waterside,   immersed   in  the   landscape, insignificant and unobtrusive." (Li Chi, 1962)

This  course, which  studies  recluses in  their  social and  cultural context  in  both  China  and  Japan,  does  not  require  specialized knowledge of East Asian languages (although students with knowledge of classical Chinese  will have opportunity  to work with  original texts should  they wish).  It is examined via essays on assigned topics and an extended research essay on a course-related topic chosen by the individual  student.

ANTH 3923H-001,  Primate Behavioral Ecology
Professor J. Michael Plavcan
Colloquium type:  Social or Natural Science

This course covers primate behavioral ecology and sociobiology – a rapidly changing and growing field. The goal of the course is to understand basic primate and human behavior in an ecological and evolutionary context. The course will cover the diversity of primate mating systems, ecological adaptations, and social behavior. A strong emphasis will be placed on adaptive models that synthesize the relationships between the environment and behavior. The evolution of human behavior will be studied in the context of these broader models.

BIOL 3923H, Section 001, Watershed Ecology
Professor Art Brown
Colloquium Type: Natural Science
 
This course will provide students an opportunity to learn the major models/theories of watershed ecosystem structure and functioning while improving their skills at oral and written scientific communication, and participating in the peer review process.  The first meeting will consist of an overview followed by selection of topics by individual students (small group projects will not be allowed).  The science librarian will be asked to assist with efficient research of the subjects selected.  After a couple of weeks to prepare, students will begin presentations of their papers to the class.  During the first three weeks students will have lecture/discussion meetings with supplementary materials regarding how to deliver oral presentations and prepare scientific manuscripts.  Each class member will prepare a brief critique of each oral presentation, which will be graded and then given to the presenter along with my grade/critique of his or her presentation. Written manuscripts (4 copies) will be submitted for review at least three weeks before the end of the semester to facilitate peer reviews during that week.  Students will have two weeks for revisions before manuscripts will be re-submitted for grading and posting/distribution to each class member.  Course grades will be based on grades received for 1) reviews of oral presentations, 2) reviews of manuscripts, 3) oral presentations, and 4) manuscripts.  Reviews cannot be submitted by students not in attendance, resulting in zeroes, therefore grades will be directly affected by attendance.

CHEM 3923H-002, Exploration of Space
Professor Derek W. G. Sears
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

The Nation is poised for a new enterprise in space exploration, completion of the International Space Station and a return to the solar system exploration program began in the 1960s. In the next few decades, humans will return to the Moon, land on Mars, and slowly explore regions beyond, including the asteroids that provide new insights into the formation of the solar system while being an impact threat to life on Earth. The story of humanity's exploration of space is as colorful as it is complex. War, fear, greed, genocide, global competition, local amusement, the loftiest goals of science, extraordinary developments in technology, and the innate need to explore, have all played a pivotal role. Above all, it is an intensely personal venture on the part of those involved. In order to illustrate the various forces that have sculpted our exploration of space and the intensely human nature of the undertaking, this colloquium series will examine the life and work of ten people, William Congreve/Tipu Sultan, Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, Robert Goddard, Hermann Oberth, Wernher von Braun, Sergei Korolev, James Webb, Robert Gilruth, James Van Allen, and Gerard Kuiper.

COMM 3923H-001: New Media and Communication Technologies
Professor Stephanie Schulte
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This interdisciplinary colloquium examines how and why technologies are venues for larger political, social, and cultural debates. Focusing on the contexts in which communication technologies emerged and developed, this course traces the origins of current new media issues: Why have sexting, cyber-bullying, and internet addiction become international issues? What is at stake in the battle over Facebook privacy, digital mapping, and cell phone tracking? This class engages a wide range of source materials, pairing classic and contemporary scholarship with popular media.

ENGL 3923H-001, Character and Stereotype in 18th Century British Literature
Professor  Amy Witherbee
Colloquium Type: Humanities

GEOG 3003H-001, Conservation of Natural Resources
Professor Sonja Hausmann
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

GEOS 4563H-001, Honors Geology of Our National Parks
Professor John Brahana
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

Our National Parks represent some of the most spectacular scenery in the United States, and in many cases, these rare jewels are society’s rapidly diminishing portal to the natural world. This class seeks 1) to describe the geology of selected parks for the purpose of illustrating scientific processes and controls that create these unique settings, and 2) to examine the interplay between humans, society, and parks. We will take well-described geologic hazards from selected parks, and extrapolate our understanding to non-park regions where hazards are not so obvious, in hopes of enlightening ourselves and optimizing future decision-making. We will show anticipated stresses to aspects of selected parks, that we might better understand and manage these glorious public preserves.

This course requires two weekend field trips to nearby parks, and incorporates a true hands-on, multidisciplinary approach to assess underlying science (geology, hydrology, ecology, biology) with history, politics, economics, education, communication, sociology, and ethics. Class format will emphasize a combination of lectures, student discussions, and team projects, guided in part by the diversity and interest of the students. The course will rigorously challenge us with detailed science of spectacular areas, while concurrently evaluating the social, economic, and ethical controversy surrounding key parks. Join us!

For more information, contact Dr. Brahana at brahana@uark.edu

HIST 3923H-001, Reading Japanese Noh as cultural history
Professor Elizabeth Markham
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

Noh is  Japan’s profoundly beautiful,  profoundly moving masked dance-drama.  Seen as a form of total theater, it combines elements of poetry, music,  chant, mime, dance,  and drama, elements with  roots – particularly  music-and-dance  based  roots  –  far  back  beyond  the 14th-century of its first great floraison. The course  will  explore  ten  representative  Noh  plays, concentrating  on the  “Mad Woman”  category, plays  that  deal with poignant  mental suffering  of a  woman’s intense  grief.   We shall include Hagoromo and Sumidagawa (linked in the West to Fenollosa, Pound, Yeats, and Britten). We  shall  use  original Noh chant  books  (utai-bon) alongside translations  of librettos.  Most plays will  be viewed on film; the others listened to while reading. Our focus will be on the historical and the contextual: we shall work  with the earlier poetry, songs,  and dance-tunes, referred to  as  nostalgia  in  the   plays,  and  also  with  early  Buddhist, theatrical,  and secular musical  forms that  have contributed  to and borrowed from  Noh.

This course does not require  specialized knowledge of music, nor of East  Asian  languages. It is examined via essays on assigned topics and an extended research essay on a course-related topic chosen by the individual  student.

HIST 3923H-002, Between Science and the Arts: Poetry as Political Act in Early China
Professor Rembrandt Wolpert
Collouquium type: Social Science or Humanities

 
The early Chinese scholar-official, educated in both the humanities and the sciences, was trained to express himself in poetry and painting, in his public as well as in his private capacities.  These modes of communication and social ritual were ubiquitous:  so much so, indeed, that a picture now of how knowledge of technology, science, diplomacy, ritual was produced in early China would be impossible without that “artistic” articulation.  Timewise this course is situated in the 500 years or so between 420 and 907—from the Southern and Northern Dynasties to the end of the Táng.  We shall focus on poetical essays (fu) on such diverse topics as astronomy, ethics, good government, and theories of art and music from the Wen Xuan, “Selections of Refined Literature”, compiled by Xiao Tong (501-31), Crown Prince of the Liang dynasty.  This was the work that became the text from which all literary men, from the Táng (618-907) dynasty on, obtained their literary education. Everyone who sat for the civil service examinations was expected to have mastered this work.  The Wen Xuan also was influential in Japan and Korea, where it was studied, imitated, and printed into modern times. 
(David Knechtges in http://www.washington.edu/research/showcase/1982a.html).  We shall also examine a set of late Táng-period memoranda reprimanding an Emperor in standard poetical verse-form, and we shall work with the contemporaneous graphic culture, from technical diagrams to maps and on to landscape and genre paintings.

This course does not require specialized knowledge of East Asian languages.  It is examined via essays on assigned topics and an extended research essay on a course-related topic chosen by the individual student.

HIST 3923H-003, Aztecs and Conquistadors
Professor Robert Finlay
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

This course examines the conflict between the Aztec Empire and the Spanish kingdom in the early sixteenth century, the most famous and dramatic encounter of alien peoples in the Age of Discovery. The first part of the course looks at the foundations of that epic clash: the rise of the Aztecs in the Valley of Mexico, Columbus' discovery of America in 1492, and European perceptions and assumptions about the New World. The second part of the course focuses on the Aztecs: their religion, poetry, art, society, and warfare. The last third of the course considers the encounter itself from the arrival of the conquistadors in Mexico in 1519 to the destruction of Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital, in 1521. The entire course is devoted to illuminating one of the great, perennial historical mysteries in world history: How were a few hundred Spanish warriors able to destroy the most powerful and dynamic empire in pre-Columbian America?  

HUMN 3923H-002, St. Peter's and the Vatican
Professor Kim Sexton
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This seminar considers the history of sacred space and architecture surrounding St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome from antiquity to the present. From the presumed tomb of St. Peter two storeys below ground, the course explores the religious, political, class, and gender factors that generated diverse architectural expressions over time on and around “the Rock,” as Christ famously appointed Peter. Beginning in the late antique world and focusing first on the early Christian basilica built by Constantine the Great, the course proceeds to sixteenth- and seventeenth-century when Europe's most visionary architects brought forth the present-day basilica, a monument as much to the memory of the martyr Peter as to the Vatican’s vision of itself as a Counter-Reformation victor and a New World colonial power. The seminar concludes with the 20th-century changes at the Vatican initiated under the fascist regime of Mussolini. The course offers a capsule history of ecclesiastical architecture in reference to the Petrine sanctuary. While the seminar presumes no prior course work in architectural history, students are expected to engage with the space and fabric of the architecture during the course. The course is open to majors in any field who may select a research project related to their own period and field of interests (history, gender theory, painting, sculpture, music, math, etc.) as long as it relates in some way to the space of the St. Peter's Basilica, the Vatican palace or grounds, or the influence of the Petrine church on architecture outside of Rome.

HUMN 3923H-003, Game Design
Professor David Fredrick
Colloquium Type: Humanities

HUMN 3923H-005, Tibetan Philosophy and Culture
The Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology. General Class Information: Aside from the lecture / discussion format, class-time will be spent viewing movies and gaining a first-hand knowledge of the production of Tibetan culture. Cooking, chanting, making sand mandalas and prayer flags, as well as learning the fundamental progressions of Buddhist logic—all of these will contribute to a general understanding of Tibetan culture. It is a culture, of course, that has been heavily influenced by the Buddhist philosophy of non-violence and compassion for all sentient beings, and accordingly we will investigate the ways in which a community operates in an environment of cooperation and genuine concern for its fellow citizens. All Tibetan culture—according to Tibetan cosmology—is concerned with the five major sciences: 1) arts and crafts; 2) medicine; 3) grammar; 4) logic; 5) philosophy. We will explore various aspects of these sciences in our class. Note: Before class begins, it is recommended that you view two films. First of all, Kundun, and second, Seven Years in Tibet. These are widely available at the rental stores in town, or Professor Burris will be happy to loan you his personal copies of these films.

HUMN 3923H-009, Digital Pompei
Professor David Fredrick
Colloquium Type: Humanities

JOUR 3923H-001, Media, Politics, and Government
Professor Hoyt Purvis
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This class will focus on the relationship among the media, politics, and government, and on the role and impact of the media on politics, political campaigns, and in public and international affairs.  It will involve analysis of the power, responsibility, and performance of the media and the significance of evolving media technologies and delivery systems for politics and government.  There will also be examination of government policies and regulations affecting the media and of significant developments and trends within the media. 

JOUR 3923H-003, Issues in Advertising and Public Relations
Professor Jan Wicks
Colloquium Type: Social Science

Seminar course involving the critical examination of the major cultural, social, political, economic, ethical and persuasion theories and/or issues relevant to advertising and public relations affecting individuals, organizations and societies. The course also serves as an introduction to research methods for Journalism Honors students interested in ad/pr. Students in the course develop a social marketing plan and/or research proposal. Therefore students who are not Journalism majors should understand they are expected to develop a research proposal or social marketing plan in the class.

MUTH 477V, Music and Mind
Professor Elizabeth Margulis
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

This course will investigate the mental and neural mechanisms that underlie the experience of music. This semester, the class will be taking a project-based, hands-on approach.

Questions considered will include: how does music impart pleasure? Why is a 2-second stop on the radio scan sufficient to identify whether a station plays jazz or pop or classical? To what extent are musical and linguistic abilities neurally dissociable? Why can people without formal musical training tap along to a beat? What makes certain melodies get stuck on mental replay? Why do some performances evoke more emotion than others? Disciplines touched by these questions include musicology, psychology, anthropology, neuroscience, philosophy, and cognitive science.

There are no prerequisites for this course; in particular, prior musical training is not required.

 

ANTH 3923H-001,Sexual Meaning
Professor Ted Swedenberg
Colloquium Type: Social Science

HIST 3923H-001, The South in Film
Professor Jeannie Whayne
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

This course explores the history of the South through film.  The goal is to cover the broad sweep of southern history from the early nineteenth through the twentieth century, examining the major issues that have confronted southerners by exploring the connection between popular films and history, the perpetuation of certain historical myths in film, and locating the kernel of historical fact or fiction in each movie.   We will watch ten to eleven films over the course of the semester and read five books and several articles.  We will use the books and articles to establish the factual historical narrative and examine the films in that light.  For example, we will read Grady McWhiney’s Cracker Culture and view the first two films, The Journey of August King and Belizaire the Cajun.  Students will then write an analytical paper, six pages in length, analyzing the films from the perspective the book.   Students will write four such papers over the course of the five weeks.

PHIL 3923H, Space, Time, Time Travel, and Time Machines
Professor Barry Ward
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Natural Science

Does time pass, or is the appearance that it does a mere subjective illusion?  Does the past exist?  If not, what could possibly make claims about the past true or false?  If so, could we travel to the past—are time machines possible?  Are space and time real?  If so, are they substances, like material things, or things of an entirely different kind?  In this course we consider what philosophy and physics have to say about these, and related, questions.  We shall be particularly interested in what contemporary physical theories, notably relativity and quantum theory, have to say about time, time machines and time travel.   Treatment of the relevant physics shall be entirely non-mathematical, but careful and precise.  No prerequisites.

 

ANTH 3923H-001, Primate Behavioral Ecology      
Professor J. Michael Plavcan
Colloquium Type:  Social Science or Natural Science

This course covers primate behavioral ecology and sociobiology – a rapidly changing and growing field. The goal of the course is to understand basic primate and human behavior in an ecological and evolutionary context. The course will cover the diversity of primate mating systems, ecological adaptations, and social behavior. A strong emphasis will be placed on adaptive models that synthesize the relationships between the environment and behavior. The evolution of human behavior will be studied in the context of these broader models.

CHEM 3923H-001, Quantum Reality and the Spiritual Quest
Professor Lothar Schäfer
Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Humanities

What is the nature of this strange world, the Quantum Reality? Are elementary particles lumps of matter, or are they waves? The wave-particle duality provides amazing answers. What is Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle? What is non-locality? Is the universe an indivisible Wholeness in which all things are interconnected and Consciousness is a cosmic property? Why did physicist Hans-Peter Dürr write: “Matter is not made up of matter. Basically there is only spirit”?

These and similar questions will be discussed in this Colloquium, describing the nature of Quantum Reality as it appears in Quantum Physics and Quantum Chemistry, and its significance for other fields of study. Many who heard about the quantum phenomena for the first time in this class, testified that it radically changed their outlook on Life. The relevant topics of Quantum Theory will be presented in a non-mathematical way, understandable to students with majors in all fields. We will make connections with some of the Grand Philosophical Systems of our history, and with Indian and Buddhist teaching, in which many of the same issues were discussed thousands of years ago that are now reemerging in physics and chemistry.

The Colloquium will be offered in two sections: the regular section is MWF from 1:30 to 2:20. For those who have a conflict with this time, a second section will be offered TuTh 7:00PM - 8:20PM. For further questions contact Dr. Schäfer, 5-5079; schafer@uark.edu

CHEM 3923H-003, Astrobiology and Alien Life in the Popular Culture
Professor Vincent Chevrier
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

Life in the universe and astrobiology have been a fantastic source of inspiration for generations of artists, in diverse domains including cinema, books, comics, etc. This movement started with the first observations of “canals” on Mars which prompted H.G. Wells to write War of the Worlds. In the 60’s, the Drake equation attempted a first scientific estimation of the probability to come in contact with some extraterrestrial intelligence, leading to the establishment of the Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) institute helped by the first radiotelescopes sounding space for signals. The first interplanetary Voyager missions revealed the variety of planets and satellites in our Solar System, and thus of potential environments in which life could appear. Later, extra solar planets were detected by optical spectroscope and photometry, largely expanding the possibility of life outside the boundaries of the Solar System. The popularity of these topics lies in the profound technological, scientific, religious and philosophical implications of the question “are we alone?”. In this colloquium we will explore and discuss several artistic oeuvres that attempt to, if not answering, at least exploring the implications of other life forms in the Universe.

CHEM 3923H-004, The Exploration of Space:  A Perspective from the Visual Arts
Professor Derek Sears
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

The Nation is poised for a new enterprise in space exploration; completion of the International Space Station and a return to the solar system exploration program began in the 1960s. In the next few decades, humans will return to the Moon, land on Mars, and slowly explore regions beyond, including the asteroids that are fragments of the early solar system and impact threats to Earth. The story of humanity's exploration of space is as colorful as it is complex. War, fear, greed, genocide, global competition, developments in technology, the loftiest goals of science, and the innate need to explore, have all played a major role. Above all, it is an intensely personal venture manifesting itself in most forms of art. In order to illustrate the various forces that have sculpted our exploration of space and the intensely human nature of the undertaking, this colloquium series will examine twelve works of art from the realms of painting, engraving, sculpting, drawing, architecture, and the cinema.


CLST 4003H: Greek Tragic Theater
Professor D. B. Levine (Registration by Instructor Permission only)
Colloquium Type: Humanities

This course will explore tragic dramas of Athens in the 5th century BCE. We will look at the ideas which they convey, and study details of their performance, culminating in detailed student studies of individual plays. Students will: 1. Lead discussion on "their" play on the date assigned, and choose what part(s) of the play the class will read aloud; 2. Write a very brief summary of the main points of each chapter of Arnott’s book; 3. Write a very brief summary of the important points of each play we read; 4. Create a Tragedy Game as a Midterm Project and share it with the class; 5. Make a Report on the performance of "their" play, with a handout outlining their main points; 6. Write a research paper on the performance of the assigned play. 

Required Texts:
1. Public and Performance in the Greek Theatre, by Peter D. Arnott.  Routledge, 1991. (9780-415-06299-3)
2.  Aeschylus, I, Persians. Seven Against Thebes. Suppliants. Prometheus Bound. Loeb Classical Library. Edited and translated by Alan H. Sommerstein. 2009.  (978-0-674-99627-4) 3. Sophocles II: Antigone The Women of Trachis, Philoctetes, Oedipus at Colonus, Loeb Classical Library, edited and translated by Hugh Lloyd-Jones. 1998. (978-0-674-99558-1) 4. Euripides I: Cyclops, Alcestis, Medea. Loeb Classical Library. Edited and translated by David Kovacs, 2001. (978-0-674-99560-4) 5. EuripidesVI: Bacchae. Iphigenia at Aulis. Rhesus. Loeb Classical Library. Edited and translated by David Kovacs. 2003. (978-0-674-99601-4) We will discuss the plays and Arnott’s book, and read selections from each play aloud. This course is a Colloquium, which implies that students will speak with one another (Latin colloqui, to converse).

DRAM 3803H: Development of Drama
Professor Andrew Gibbs
Colloquium Type: Humanities

A survey of theoretical approaches to theatre and drama, incorporating dramatic literature, Greeks to modern. Readings include a cross-section of literary and performance theories ranging from the classical to the post-modern. The course is a survey of dramatic literature, Greeks to modern.

ENGL 3923H-001, The Personal Essay:  History, Theory, and Practice
Professor Sidney Burris
Colloquium Type: Humanities

Over the past twenty years, creative non-fiction has developed into a much talked-about, over-crowded, and bustling genre.  From diaries to memoirs, from laundry lists to explorer’s narratives, from the confessional to the editorial, writing that falls outside of fiction, poetry, and drama most often winds up in this amorphous category.  But standing behind all of these current incarnations is the personal essay, a genre that has a long and varied history in our literature, and it is to the personal essay that we turn our attention in this class.

We will begin with a whistle-stop tour of the essay’s history, which will take several weeks, and arrive as quickly as possible in the twentieth century.  Before we get there, though, we’ll look at brief samples of work by Seneca, Plutarch, Kenko, Montaigne, Addison, Steele, Johnson, Hazlitt, Thoreau, and Emerson.  Next, a little theory concerning the essay’s purpose and direction—What can it do and why?—will lead us to Adorno and Woolf.  And then we arrive at the twentieth century:  Woolf again, Mary McCarthy, Edward Hoagland, Annie Dillard, Truman Capote, Joan Didion, Richard Rodriguez, George Orwell, Max Beerbohm, James Baldwin, and a few more contemporary essayists appearing in such journals as The New Yorker and Harpers..  Throughout this diverse cast of writers, we will be trying to get a handle on the essay by asking three questions:  What is it?  Where has it been?  Where will it go?

I will lecture very infrequently.  Each student will informally lead a class discussion, make regular contributions to a blog site and prepare two essays:  one, a traditional academic piece devoted to the essay’s history or to the essays of a single author, and two, a more personally oriented literary essay based on one of the readings encountered over the semester..

EUST 4003H Europe and the Environment
Professor Fiona Davidson
Colloquium Type: Social Science

The class will cover the causes and consequences of human and natural changes in the European environment and efforts by national governments and the EU to mitigate those changes in the 21st century.

GEOG 4383H-001, Hazards & Risk
Professor T.R. Paradise
Colloquium Type:  Social Science or Natural Science

It's an overview of the emerging field of Hazards Studies.  Addressing the cultural, sociological, legal and physical aspects of natural and technological hazards, hurricanes, earthquakes, tornadoes, landslides, and floods are all discussed in depth. Aspects of risk perception, relief and recovery are also integrated into the class.  Hazards Studies represents an emerging program in universities and new career direction; the class discussion will bridge practical and theoretical applications.

GEOL 436V: Spring Break in the Parks of the Colorado Plateau (to receive colloquium credit, students must register for 3 hours of course credit)
Professors Van Brahana and Ralph Davis
Colloquium type: Natural Science

Our National Parks and related facilities administered by the National Park System stand as some of the most spectacular natural areas in the world.  They offer the history and development of our country, and  provide direct observation into geologic/ecosystem/biologic/chemical/physical settings in which students can visualize interdisciplinary processes much more easily than most other field sites; they motivate students with the grandeur and beauty of scale that ranges from landscape to microscopic; and they have immediately applicable lessons to teach us regarding the interaction of humans, the biosphere, the hydrosphere, and in fact most of the natural world in a geologic framework that is more obvious than most other settings. 

As field areas, the National Parks allow students/faculty to collect data that will facilitate their growth as researchers, as well as help with problems that are directly relevant to the Park Service.  The stresses on the Park Service are significant as federal funds come under continued competition in our modern society.  Some of the parks are "loved to death", and the sheer number of visitors and human encroachment has altered the parks-yet another area of potential research at the interface of human activity/geology.   We will interact closely with National Park Service personnel, and we will hopefully allow Honors College students and Geoscience students to explore multiple opportunities for relevant, needed, meaningful thesis projects directly related to the parks.  Questions?  Contact Dr. Brahana at brahana@uark.edu

GEOS 4693H: Introduction to Environmental Justice
Professor Van Brahana, Geosciences & Angela Hines, Ph.D. Candidate in Public Policy
Colloquium Type:  Social Science or Natural Science

I.Course Background
This seminar will involve students in an interdisciplinary examination of some fundamental environmental problems faced by communities of color. In particular we will consider the proposition that people of color and socio-economically disadvantaged individuals, whether residing in urban or rural communities, bear a disproportionate burden of environmental pollution and its health consequences. Studies suggesting that people of color have environmental burdens imposed upon them unfairly due to over-siting of industrial plants and landfills in their communities and from exposures to pesticides and other toxic chemicals at home and on the job will be reviewed and analyzed. Consideration will be given to the viewpoint that there exists within the United States, as well as globally, a pattern of environmental inequity, injustice and racism. Key topics to be considered during the semester include racism and social justice, environmental racism, pollution impacts and health effects in communities of color, risk assessment, community responses to environmental threats, pollution in developing nations, indigenous peoples, and climate change. We will review studies and analyses that document environmental injustice. The possible causes for patterns of injustice will be examined and discussed. Considerable attention will be paid to grassroots and community-based efforts to deal with environmental threats. Recent proposals to address the problem of environmental racism and injustice will be discussed and analyzed. Occasionally, community leaders, lawyers, organizers, academics, and government officials will join the class to discuss current issues and problems.

II.Required Texts :
Cole, Luke and Sheila Foster, 2001 From the Ground Up: Environmental Racism and the Rise of the Environmental Justice Movement. New York: New York University Press
Rechtschaffen, Clifford and Eileen Gauna, 2002 Environmental Justice: Law, Policy and Regulation, Durham, NC: Carolina Academic Press

HIST 3923H:  History of Christian Monasticism
Professor Lynda Coon
Colloquium Type:  Humanities or Social Science

This colloquium introduces students to the history of Christian asceticism from its roots in biblical texts and evangelical portraits of Jesus to its fruition in the urban communes of the later Middle Ages.  Special topics include desert spirituality, monk-missionaries, liturgical practices, conflict with secular powers, and the formation of monastic rules.      

HIST 3923H: Medicine, Disease and Society
Professor Tricia Starks
Colloquium Type:  Humanities or Social Science

Students in the colloquium Medicine, Disease, and Society will explore the emergence of epidemic disease and its threat not just to the individual but the entire body politic.  The rise of modern, public health programs will guide the course but along the way, students will be expected to confront major questions about the cultural construction of health and medicine, the biases of scientific inquiry, prejudices in public programs, and the tensions between paternalism and liberty in health programs.

HIST 3923H/AIST 4003H: Uncovering Heian Japan (784-1192)
Professors Elizabeth Markham and Rembrandt Wolpert.
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

The invention  of an isolated,  refined, purely aesthetic  Heian Japan  (784--1192)    has    been     targeted    in    recent    scholarship (Lamarre 2000). An  alternative placing of  the early Heian court back within  the fold of Táng China  (618-- 907), rather than in ethnolinguistic opposition to it, has been offered. This course traces the  reasons  for  the  former  view,  but  takes  its  cue  from  the alternative  to  focus on  the  Heian court  and  temple  in terms  of appropriation, assimilation,  and synthesis of  ``China'' in language, literature, culture,  and in terms  of what these processes  meant for the social and political order of the day.  This  course does  not  require specialized  knowledge  of East  Asian languages.   It is  examined  via  essays on  assigned  topics and  an extended  research  essay on  a  course-related  topic  chosen by  the individual student.

HIST 3923H-001, The South in History, Literature, and Film
Professor Jeannie Whayne
Colloquium Type:  Humanities or Social Science

Most of the films will be films that came out of a novel.  We’ll read the novel – or excerpts from it – and some appropriate history-related materials to provide a grounding in the historical narrative/facts.   We will also watch at least one documentary.  We’ll be meeting in a three hour stretch so we can watch films together and then discuss them.  Some of the films include:

  • The Journey of August King (we’ll read the novel by the same name)
  • Belizaire the Cajun
  • To Kill a Mockingbird (and the novel by the same name)
  • Cookie’s Fortune
  • Gone With the Wind (you won’t be reading this novel! Instead we will read Foner’s Reconstruction)
  • Birth of a Nation (The full text of Leopard’s Spots, from which this movie was made, is available online through the Documenting the South site; we’ll  also read on the site the full text of Albion Tourgee’s novel from another point of view).  We’ll have to spend two weeks on this one. Inherit the Wind (we’ll read some articles to go along with this and may read excerpts from the play)
  • Places in the Heart
  • Norma Rae 

HIST 3923H-003, Jews, Antisemitism and the Holocaust
Prof. Richard Sonn
Colloquium Type: Social Science

This course on modern Jewish history will begin with the Enlightenment of the 18th c., when Jews began to emerge from the ghettos of Europe to participate more fully in European politics and society.  We will survey the rise of many Jews to positions of prominence and the concomitant rise of antisemitism; the appearance of modern Zionism; and the genesis and complex actuality of the Holocaust.  A Polish-Jewish émigré named Raphael Lemkin coined the term “genocide” in 1944 to refer to the Nazi attempt to exterminate the Jewish people.  We will discuss the extent to which the Holocaust is a unique event in world history, or whether it should be subsumed under the larger category of genocidal acts which have proliferated in the 20th c.  A short essay and a longer research paper will be required, as well as essay-format midterm and final exams.

HIST 3923H-006: Arkansas Delta Oral History
Professor Anne Raines
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

Purpose:  This innovative, service learning colloquium will give U of A students the opportunity to learn about collecting oral histories, to study the rich culture and lore of the Arkansas Delta, and to work collaboratively with students from high schools in the Delta.  The course will begin with an intensive workshop on oral history at the Delta Cultural Center in Helena, AR.  At the conclusion of this event, U of A students and students  from the participating high schools will form virtual writing groups, which will “meet” online regularly for six weeks following the workshop.  During this time, all students will be working on their oral history projects—researching topics, planning and conducting interviews, drafting initial versions of stories and projects growing out of the interviews.  U of A students will complete each step of the project the week prior to the high school students and serve as mentors to them via the virtual writing groups.  All students will participate in discussion commenting on one another’s work via the Internet.  Around midterm, all participants will come to Fayetteville for a weekend of face to face work, and fun.  The online collaborative work will continue for another several weeks, and the course will end with a public celebration and performance of student work in Helena.  All expenses of travel, lodging, and meals for the two trips to Helena will be paid by the Brown Chair in English Literacy Initiative.

Special Procedures:  Students will complete their own oral history project and share their experience with high school students via virtual writing groups.

HUMN 3923H-001, Digital Pompeii
Professor David Frederick
Colloquium Type: Humanities

HUMN 3923H-006, Tibetan Buddhist Philosophy and Culture
Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

Until the time of the Chinese invasion in the 1950’s, Tibet had maintained one of the richest cultural and religious traditions in the world. Now, with many of its citizens living in exile, Tibetans have been striving to maintain abroad the same traditions that were native to their homeland. This course will examine many of those traditions and offer the student a unique opportunity to participate in them under the guidance of an extraordinary teacher: a Tibetan Buddhist monk who has received the highest degree awarded by an Indian institution in Buddhist studies and who has passed examinations administered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Students will not only learn about the major traditions of Tibetan Buddhism from an acknowledged authority, but they will also have an opportunity to participate in many of the activities that are central to the culture. Students, for example will construct a simple sand mandala as well as work side-by-side with Geshe Dorjee in preparing authentic Tibetan cuisine. Students will also study Tibetan chanting and construct simple religious objects, such as the prayer flag, while gaining an understanding of the place each of these objects occupies in the Tibetan cosmology. General Class Information: Aside from the lecture / discussion format, class-time will be spent viewing movies and gaining a first-hand knowledge of the production of Tibetan culture. Cooking, chanting, making sand mandalas and prayer flags, as well as learning the fundamental progressions of Buddhist logic—all of these will contribute to a general understanding of Tibetan culture. It is a culture, of course, that has been heavily influenced by the Buddhist philosophy of non-violence and compassion for all sentient beings, and accordingly we will investigate the ways in which a community operates in an environment of cooperation and genuine concern for its fellow citizens. All Tibetan culture—according to Tibetan cosmology—is concerned with the five major sciences: 1) arts and crafts; 2) medicine; 3) grammar; 4) logic; 5) philosophy. We will explore various aspects of these sciences in our class. Note: Before class begins, it is recommended that you view two films. First of all, Kundun, and second, Seven Years in Tibet. These are widely available at the rental stores in town, or Professor Burris will be happy to loan you his personal copies of these films.

HUMN 3923H-007 Introduction to Gender Studies
Professor David Frederick
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

This course will introduce you to contemporary gender theory in the humanities, organized by four major themes: vision, space, the body, and performance. While biology and genetics provide an important background, the majority of the theories we study are concerned with the cultural, rather than the natural, construction of gender. You will learn several different critical approaches toward gendered behavior, and how to apply these approaches plausibly and (hopefully) creatively to your everyday life: the movies you watch, the buildings you inhabit, how and what you eat, your fashion choices and body posture. Please bear in mind that you do not have to accept these theories as truth. You are free to disagree with them--but you must understand them to do well in this course. Honors students will complete a 10-12 page final paper (or website) on a topic addressing all four themes in the course.

HUMN 425V-002: Non-Violence
The Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee  
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

LAST 4003H-002, Fray Bartolome De Las Casas, Imperial Reason and Human Rights
Professor Luis Fernando Restrepo  
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities
 
Known for his relentless defense of the rights of the Indians, fray Bartolomé de Las Casas is one of the most influential writers of the Americas and a key thinker in modern political thought.  Debating the legality of the Spanish conquest of America, Las Casas’ writings and intellectual exchanges touched on some fundamental issues of the modern world order-- imperialism, sovereignty, human rights, and the just war theory.  His legacy offers an important critical reflection on key issues today, such as the war on terrorism, torture, genocide, and international law.    We will read a selection of Las Casas’ writings and other related texts on imperialism, the political foundations of the modern state, human rights, ethics, and the representation of violence. 

“War to convert is unjust”, The Only Way, Las Casas

LAST 4003: Identity and Culture in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands
Professor Kirstin Erickson
Colloquium Type: Social Science

In this seminar, we examine the U.S.-Mexico border as a historically created and richly imagined space.  The borderlands is a region of complex identity politics where economic need contrasts with enormous wealth; it is a place of vibrant cultural practices and acute social tensions. This course takes an interdisciplinary approach: we will focus on the interplay of Mexican, Latino/a, Native American, and Anglo identities, experiences, and social claims through the lenses of anthropology, history, literature and critical social analysis. We will explore and assess “borderlands theory” as a unique tool in our analysis of cultural hybridity and the intersections of race, gender, and cultural identities in this distinctive geographical space.  If you would like to earn honors credit for this course, you need to notify me within the first two weeks of class; honors students will engage in a specific, semester-long research project for honors credit.

PHYS 3923H-001: History of the Physical Sciences
Professor Daniel Kennefick
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

This course is intended as an introduction to the History of Science which will inform students about the evolution of the physical sciences since Antiquity (primarily physics and astronomy, but with some discussion of physical chemistry and geology). Although I say the course will cover the history of science since Antiquity, much more time will be spent on the history of modern science, since the Copernican Revolution. In addition students will be introduced to the major modern ideas in the history of science, including the work of such figures as Karl Popper and Thomas Kuhn, and debates over how best to approach the history of science. Is the aim of the subject mainly to answer the question of how we got where we are (that is to say, how did the scientists of yesteryear eventually figure out what we now believe to be the right answer) or should we take a value neutral approach and treat all of history's protagonists on an equal footing (even those who are now thought to be have been wrongheaded)? If we take the former view (what has sometimes been called the Whiggish view of history) then is it meaningful to speak of studying the recent or contemporary history of science? Is it possible to study the history of a scientific controversy if the scientists themselves haven't yet figured out what is the right answer? This question naturally plays into the role of the expert in society. How are the woman and man in the street to distinguish between a scientist who has it right and one who has it wrong, if both lay claim to some mysterious scientific expertise?

The purpose of this course is to provide an introduction to and in-depth study of Dostoevsky, examining him within the context of the Russian cultural milieu.  Readings trace the progression of Dostoevsky's career from his earliest Petersburg stories through the crucible of his Siberian experience (House of the Dead) and first major post-Siberian work (Notes from Underground) to the great novels for whichhe is regarded as a master of world literature. Papers: 3 Short papers, 5-10 pages; 1 long paper, 15-20 pages undergraduate, 20-25 pages graduate.

WLLC 3923H, Section 002: Dostoevsky
Professor Janet Tucker
Colloquium Type: Humanities

The purpose of this course is to provide an introduction to and in-depth study of Dostoevsky, examining him within the context of the Russian cultural milieu. Readings trace the progression of Dostoevsky's career from his earliest Petersburg stories through the crucible of his Siberian experience (House of the Dead) and first major post-Siberian work (Notes from Underground) to the great novels for which he is regarded as a master of world literature. Papers: 3 Short papers, 5-10 pages; 1 long paper, 15-20 pages undergraduate, 20-25 pages graduate.

 

AIST 4003H /HUMN 3923H/MUSC 3923H Hidden Views of Edo Japan (1600-1868): Music and the Arts
Elizabeth J. Markham
Colloquium Type: Social Sciences or Humanities

BIOL 3923H Watershed Ecology
Art Brown
Colloquium Type: Natural Science
 
CHEM 3923H The Exploration of Mars
Vincent Chevrier
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

CHEM 3923H-002, Exploration of Space
Derek W. G. Sears
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

ECON 4003H Economics of Life
Amy Farmer
Colloquium Type: Social Science

GEOG 4033H-001 Geography of the Middle East & North Africa
T.R. Paradise
Colloquium Type: Social Science

GEOS 4563H Geology of Our National Parks
Van Brahana
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

HIST 3923H The Civil Rights Era
Professor Calvin White
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

HIST 3923H-003, The Rise And Fall (?) Of The Conservative Movement In American Politics, 1970S To The Present
Robert McMath
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

HIST 3923H Bandits and Social Rebels
Joel Gordon
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

HUMN 3923H-005, Tibetan Buddist Philosophy and Culture
Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HUMN 425VH-001, Community Development in a Global Context
Professor Amy Farmer
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

JOUR 3923H Issues in Advertising & Public Relations
Jan Wicks
Colloquium Type: Social Science

JOUR 3923H The Media, Politics and Government
Hoyt Purvis
Colloquium Type: Social Science

LAST 4003H Contemporary Latin American Cinema and Society
Sergio Roberto Villalobos-Ruminott
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

MEST 410V/HUMN 425V/HUMN 425VH Searching for the Historical Paul and Jesus
Spencer L. Allen
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

MEST 410V The Koran & the Bible
Tom Paradise and Allen Spencer
Colloquium Type: Social Science

MUTH 477VH Music and Mind
Elizabeth Margulis
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

PSYC 3923H-001, The Science of Subjective Well-Being
Denise Beike
Colloquium Type: Social Science

PSYC 3923H-003/PHIL 3923H-001, Mind, Brain and Body
Jack Lyons
Colloquium Type: Social or Natural Science

 

ANTH 3923H Sexual Meaning
Profesoor Ted Swedenburg
Colloquium Type: Social Science

DRAM 4953 or DRAM 3923H-901, Theatre in Britain (Course offered abroad, only)
Profesoor Mavourneen Dwyer
Colloquium Type: Humanities

ENGL 3223 or ENGL 3923H-902 Theatre in London: A Critical Introduction to the Genre (Course offered abroad, only)
Professor Joseph Candido
Colloquium Type: Humanities

HIST 3923H  Special Topics: Africa in the 20th Century
Professor Andrea Arrington
Colloquium type: Social Science or Humanities

HIST 3923H Special Topics: Africa and the Transatlantic Slave Trade
Professor Andrea Arrington
Colloquium type: Social Science or Humanities

CHEM 3923H Quantum Reality
Lothar Schafer
Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Humanities

CHEM 3923H The Exploration of Space
Derek W. G. Sears
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

CLST 4003H Romans & Provincials
C.E. Muntz
Colloquium Type: Humanities

ENGL 3923H/HIST 3923H Arkansas Delta Oral History Project
Anne Raines
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

EUST 4003H United Kingdom/European Union Relations
Fiona Davidson
Colloquium Type: Social Science

GEOG 4383H Hazards and Risk
T. R. Paradise
Colloquium Type: Social Science

GERM 470V Deutsche als Ausländer / Ausländer als Deutsche
Kathleen Condray
Colloquium Type: Humanities

HIST 3923H The American Century: Views from Abroad
Alessandro Brogi
Colloquium Type: Social Science

HIST 3923H-004/LAST 4003H Latin American Women
Kathryn Sloan
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

HUMN 3923H Intro to Gender Studies Honors
Lisa Corrigan
Colloquium Type: Humanities

HUMN 3923H Tibetan Philosophy and Culture
Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

HUMN 425VH Global Community Development
Laura Gray
Colloquium Type: Social Science

HUMN/BIOL/PSYC 3923H Creative Thinking
J. M. Durdik
Colloquium Type: Natural Science, Social Science or Humanities

LAST 4003H Identity and Culture of US Borderlands
Kirstin Erickson
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

MEST 4003H The Bible and the Qur'an
T.R. Paradise
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

PHYS 3923H-001, Cosmology
Michael Lieber
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

PLSC 3923H-001, Political Reform
Professor Jeffrey Ryan
Colloquium Type: Social Science

 

AIST 4003H Music at Court
Markham & Wolpert
Colloquium Type: Social Science and Humanities

BIOL 3923H Watershed Ecology
Art Brown
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

CHEM 3923H Quantum Reality
Lothar Schafer
Colloquium Type: Math, Natural Science or Humanities

GEOL 3923H Extinctions and Life History
Walter Manger
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

German 4123 The German Novella
Kathleen Condray
Colloquium Type: Humanities

HIST 3923H-001, Modern Terrorism
Professor Benjamin Grobh-Fitzgibbon
Colloquium Type: Social Science

HIST 3923H The Little Rock Crisis and School Integregation in Arkansas
Michael Pierce
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

HIST 3923H African American Biographies
Calvin White
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HIST 3923H  Honors Colloquium
Elliott West
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HUMN 3923H Tibetan Buddhist Philosophy and Culture
Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HUMN 3923H  Honors Colloquium
David Fredrick
Colloquium Type: Humanities

HUMN 425V Early Christian History

Colloquium Type:  Humanities

HUMN 425V Introduction to the New Testament

Colloquium Type:  Humanities

JOUR 3923H Issues in Advertising & Public Relations
Jan Wicks
Colloquium Type: Social Science

JOUR 3923H Media Politics and Government
Hoyt Purvis
Colloquium Type: Social Science

MATH/BIOL 4163 Dynamic Models in Biology
Brewer & Smith
Colloquium Type: Natural Science  

MUTH 4773H Music and Language
Elizabeth Margulis
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

PHIL 3923H Deception and Delusion
Eric Funkhouser
Colloquium Type: Humanities

PSYC 3923H The Psychology of Eyewitness Testimony
James Lampinen
Colloquium Type: Social Science

ANTH 3923H Honors Colloquium
Ted Swedenberg
Colloquium Type: Social Science

FLAN 3923H Honors Colloquiuum
Tatsuya Fukushima
Colloquium Type: Humanities

AIST 4003H or HUMN 3923H or MUSY 5323 Reading Japanese NOH
Elizabeth Markham
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Sciences

BIOL or CHEM 3923H The Drug Development Process: Scientific, Medical, Economic, Ethical and Legal Issues
Ralph Henry
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

CHEM 3923H Quantum Reality and the Spiritual Quest: The Conceptual Foundations of Quantum Theory
Lothar Schafer
Colloquium Type: Math, Natural Science or Humanities

CHEM 3923H 003 Exploration of Space
Derek W. G. Sears
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

COMM 3923H HEALTH COMMUNICATION
Patricia Amason
Colloquium Type: Social Science

DRAM 3923H  HONORS COLLOQUIUM
Terry Brusstar
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

ENGL 3903 Applied Linguistics and Literacy
David Jolliffe
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

ENGL 3923H The Southern Wild Remembered: An Honors Colloquium on Contemporary Southern Memoir
Suzanne McCray
Colloquium Type: Humanities

ENGL 3923H or COMM 3923H  Rhetoric, Literacy and Civic Community: The living tradition of civic discourse: its history, theory, and practice
Tom Rosteck
Colloquium Type: Social Science

ENGL 3923H or HIST 3923H  Writing, Tutoring, Serving: The Arkansas Delta Oral History Project
David Jolliffe
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

EUST 4003H  HONORS EUST COLLOQUIUM
Fiona Davidson
Colloquium Type: Social Science

FLAN 3923H Dostoevsky
Janet Tucker
Colloquium Type: Humanities

GEOG 4383H Hazards and Risk
Thomas Paradise
Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Social Science

GEOL 3923H  Natural disasters: Hollywood vs. Reality
Pamela Jansma and Glen Mattioli
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

GEOS 4563H  Geology of Our National Parks
John Brahana
Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Social Science

GEOS 4693H  Environmental Justice
John Brahana
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Natural Science

HIST 3923H  Modern Terrorism
Benjamin Grob-Fitzgibbon
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HIST 399VH  Women of Sub-Saharan Africa
Andrea Arrington
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HUMN 3923H Introduction to Gender Studies
David Fredrick
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HUMN 3923H German-Jewish Texts before and after the Holocaust
Jennifer Hoyer
Colloquium Type: Humanities

HUMN 3923H (ANTH 3923H, GEOG 410VH), (for CLST credit); ARCH 4023H Visualizing the Roman City
Jackson Cothren, Timothy de Noble, David Fredrick, and Frederick Limp
Colloquium Type: Social Sciences or Humanities

HUMN 3923H  Tibetan Buddhist Philosophy and Culture
Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HUMN 3923H  Honors Colloquium on Thomas Merton
Lynne Spellman
Colloquium Type: Humanities

LAST 4003H  Latin American History Through Film
Kathryn Sloan
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

LAST 4003H  Visual Arts in Latin America Today
Sergio Villalobos-Ruminott
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

PHIL 3923H Philosophy of Music
Richard Lee
Colloquium Type: Humanities

PHYS 3923H  Chaos
William Harter
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

PLSC 3923H  HONORS COLLOQUIUM
Jeffrey Ryan
Colloquium Type: Social Science

ANTH 3923H  Primate Behavioral Ecology
Joseph Plavacan
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Natural Science

ANTH 3923H (HIST 3923H, HUMN 2923H) Middle East Media Cultures
Joel Gordon and Ted Swedenburg
Colloquium Type: Social Science

BIOL 3923H Types of Asexual Reproduction, Sexual Reproduction, and Mating Systems Among Different Species of Organisms
James M. Walker
Colloquium Type: Math or Natural Science (Fall Semester 2007)

DRAM 3923H  African Dance Diaspora
Terry Brusstar
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

ECON 4003H  The Economics of Life
Amy Farmer
Colloquium Type: Social Science

ENG 3923H  Sadists, Vampires and Fallen Angels: The Byronic Figure from Byron to the Present Day
Emily A. Bernhard Jackson
Colloquium Type: Humanities

GEOL 3923H  Extinctions and Life History
Walter L. Manger
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

HIST 3923H  Caribbean History
Kathryn Sloan
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HIST 3923H  Civil Rights
Jeannie Whayne
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HIST 3923H  History of Sex and Sexuality in American History
Charles Robinson
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HIST 3923H  Sacred Bodies, Sacred Spaces
Kim Sexton and Lynda Coon
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HUMN 3923H  Tibetan Philosophy and Culture
Instructor: Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HUMN 3923H (ANTH 3923H, GEOG 410VH)  Visualizing the Roman City
Profs. Jackson Cothren, Timothy de Noble, David Fredrick, and Frederick Limp
Colloquium Type: Social Sciences or Humanities

JOUR 3923H  Issues in Advertising & Public Relations
Jan Wicks
Colloquium Type: Social Science

JOUR 3923H  Media, Politics, and Government
Hoyt Purvis
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

MGMT 4103H or MEEG 491VH  Engineering and Business Globalization
Vikas Anand and Ajay Malshe
Colloquium Type: Coloquium Type: Social Science

MUTH 477VH  Music and Mind
Elizabeth Margulis
Colloquium Type: Social science or Humanities

PSYC 3923H  Emotion in Autobiographical Memory
Dr. Denise Beike
Colloquium Type: Social science or Natural science

ANTH 3923H Sexual Meaning
Professor Ted Swedenburg
Colloquium Type: Social Science

ENGL 3923H, Section 001  Gender in Renaissance Literature
Dorothy Stephens
Colloquium Type: Humanities

PHIL 3923H  Advanced Symbolic Logic
Barry Ward
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Natural Science

ANTH 3923H Queer Theory
Ted Swedenburg
Colloquium Type: Social Science

BIOL 3923H Infectious Disease Epidemiology
Gary Huxel
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

CHEM 3923H Quantum Reality and the Spiritual Quest
Lothar Schafer
Colloquium Type: Math or Natural Science or Humanities

CLST 4003H Parties, Poetry, and Pots: The Ancient Greek Symposium
Alexandra Pappas
Colloquium Type: Humanities

COMM 3923H Honors Colloquium in Health Communication
Patricia Amason
Colloquium Type: Social Science

ENGL 3923H The Role of the beautiful in Romantic Poetry
Emily A. Bernhard Jackson
Colloquium Type: Humanities

ENGL 3923H Writing, Tutoring, Serving: The Arkansas Delta Oral History Project
David Jolliffe
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

GEOG 4383H Sect 001 Hazards and Risk
Thomas Paradise
Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Social Science

GEOS 3923H Natural disasters: Hollywood vs. Reality
Pamela Jansma
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Natural Science

GEOS 4563H Geology of Our National Parks
John Brahana
Colloquium Type: Natural Science or Social Science

GEOS 4693H Environmental Justice
John Brahana and Janie Hipp
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Natural Science

HIST 3923H Human Rights in the Post-World War II World
Dave Chappell
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

HIST 3973H Honors Methods
Jeannie Whayne
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

HUMN 3923H TIBETAN BUDDHIST PHILOSOPHY AND CULTURE
Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HUMN 3923H - AIST 4003H - AIST 4003 - MUSY 5313 Ad paradisum: Ideal worlds, imaginary places, and the afterlife in the literary, visual, and performing arts of East Asia
Rembrandt Wolpert and Elizabeth Markham
Colloquium Type: Social Sciences or Humanities

LAST 4003H Visual Arts in Latin America Today
Sergio Villalobos-Ruminott
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

LAST 4003H, Section 001 Identity and Culture in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands
Kirstin Erickson
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

MUTH 4773H Music-ologies
Elizabeth Margulis
Colloquium Type: Humanities

PHYS 3923H Chaos: The birth of a new frontier at the edge of order
Dr. Eitan Gross
Colloquium Type: Math or Natural Science

PLSC 3923H Normative Political Economy
Conrad Waligorski
Colloquium Type: Social Science

PLSC 3923H Sect 002 Law and Justice
Steve Sheppard
Colloquium Type: Social Science

AIST 4003H China-USA-Taiwan Triangular Relations
Henry Tsai & Hoyt Purvis
Colloquium Type: Social Science

ANTH 3923H Primate Behavioral Ecology
J. Michael Plavcan
Colloquium Type: Math or Natural Science or Social Science

BIOL 3923H Anthropogenic Disturbances to Riverine Ecosystems
Art Brown
Colloquium Type: Math or Natural Science

DRAM 3923H Dance as Popular Culture
Brusstar
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

ECON 4003H The Economics of Life
Amy Farmer
Colloquium Type: Social Science

ENGL 3923H Multicultural Britain
Debra Rae Cohen
Colloquium Type: Humanities

GEOL 3923H Extinctions and Life History
Walter L. Manger
Colloquium Type: Natural Science

HIST 3923H The American West & The American Myth
Elliott West
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HIST 3923H Shiite Islam
William Tucker
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

HUMN 3923H   Tibetan Philosophy and Culture
Venerable Geshe Thupten Dorjee
Colloquium Type: Humanities or Social Science

JOUR 3923H Media, Politics and Government
Hoyt Purvis
Colloquium Type: Social Science or Humanities

JOUR 3923H Teen Pregnancy and the Media
Louise Montgomery
Colloquium Type: Humanities

JOUR 3923H Issues in Advertising & Public Relations
Jan Wicks
Colloquium Type: Social Science

MGMT 4003H Management Honors Colloquium
Nina Gupta and Ms. Deidre Davis
Colloquium Type: Social Science

MUTH 477VH Music and Mind
Elizabeth Margulis
Colloquium Type: Humanities

PHIL 3923H Free Will
Eric Funkhouser
Colloquium Type: Humanities

PSYC 3923H Puberty and Adolescence
Ellen Leed-Feldner
Colloquium Type: Social Science