Minor in History

Cultivate students’ understanding of “the global” as a complex web of local events and their sense of themselves as “global citizens”, whose everyday decisions are inextricably linked to larger social, political, and economic forces and structures. Investigate global issues to enable students to develop competencies that enhance their abilities to make informed decisions throughout their lives about how their actions and/or inactions fit into the broader global context.

Prerequisite: ENG 102

Places contemporary cultural, economic and technological issues in a global and historical perspective. Examines the ways that capitalism, culture, and technology have interacted over the past 500 years to shape the places, peoples and societies that have come into existence in the modern world.

Prerequisite: ENG 102

Human migration is the story of individual lives enmeshed in larger historical issues of identity, culture, work, social institutions and various forms of coercion. Explores how work and migration have intersected in the last 500 years to shape the world in which we live today.

Prerequisite: ENG 240

Examines changes associated with globalization since World War II, including changes in technology, urbanization, finance, markets, lending, the internationalization of production, the organization of work, and power relations among nations and world cultures. Investigates both theories of and popular responses to the new global economy.

Prerequisite: ENG 240

Examines the relationships between humans and the natural environment over the last 500 years. Topics include conceptions of nature, the use of resources in different societies, the consequences of various forms of economic organization (particularly capitalism) on the environment, and the impact of technological change on the world’s ecology.

Prerequisite: ENG 240 and LIT 100

Study of contemporary literary works from diverse cultures outside the Anglo-American literary tradition.

Prerequisite: ENG 102

An exploration of localized musical traditions and practices across a variety of cultures, including Native America, India, the Arabic-speaking world, Indonesia, Europe, Africa, Latin America, and Black America. Promotes understanding of both music and the social circumstances that create music-cultures.

Prerequisite: ENG 102

Major world religions, including Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, are surveyed in their philosophical, historical, art historical, and literary contexts. Important aspects of the philosophy and sociology of religion are addressed, and parallels in the study of myths, rituals, conversion experiences, and rites of passage are compared. Recent and contemporary religious trends are also addressed.

Prerequisite: ENG 102

A survey of the nature of the international system and the theoretical framework used by political scientists to examine it; in particular, this course focuses on the decision-making process within the international arena. International negotiation and decision-making are utilized.

Examination of relationships between geographical features of the earth and human societies. Includes the study of map construction, mapping tools, geographical data, and the influence of geomorphological features on the development and spatial distribution of political systems, languages, and religions

Prerequisite: ENG 102

Introduction to social movements and collective action, covering several theoretical perspectives on how to understand and analyze social movements in recent global history, from their origins to their demise; a global survey of the processes of social and political awareness, mobilization, and development of such movements.

Prerequisite: ENG 102

An expansive overview of the history of world consciousness through various civilizations, exploring the interconnectedness of art, culture, politics, religion, economies, and the social environment in which they emerge. Draws on the contributions of people from different fields of creativity, the world’s outstanding thinkers, and the interconnectedness of their works.

Prerequisite: ENG 240

Examines how international cinema represents various aspects of societies and cultures outside the U.S. Representative films of Asia, Africa, Europe, Latin America, Australia and Oceania, and Canada may be studied.

Prerequisite: ENG 240

Examines the sociological and historical experiences of sex, sexuality, and gender in the USA, focusing on their intersectionality with race, class, and other social variables. Analyzes dominant representations of gender roles and stereotypes in public culture as well as LGBTQ and other representations that challenge prevailing power structures.