Honors Course Archive

What is the specific power of narrative in structuring reality? What can narrative do that other structuring devices such as logics or archives cannot do? Why have various disciplines (such as history, the social sciences) experienced a “narrative turn”? In this course we will explore three different kinds of narrative in order to learn about “story logic” (David Herman): personal narratives (life writing), national narratives (national identity) and scientific narratives (explanations of “facts”). We will look at a number of written texts (Twain’s Tom Sawyer, Eggers’s What is the What, Hustvedt’s The Shaking Woman, Hawkins’s A Briefer History of Time), a graphic novel (Bechdel’s Fun Home), a number of movies (Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth, Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11) and some paintings to find out how narratives work. Alongside this source material we will read a number of essays on the theory of narrative. The goal of the class is to make participants aware (and critical) of the great power of narrative-for better or worse…

Students are expected to be curious about the workings of narratives (or stories), to do the reading (and viewing), to participate actively in class discussions and to complete three assignments over the course of the class: one written narrative (4-5 pages), the preparation of questions for one meeting, one final essay analyzing a narrative of your choice (5-6 pages).

The course From Manuscript to Kindle combines the reading of famous literary works that have impacted readers worldwide with the hands-on experience of the first editions or formats (manuscript, printed edition, digital text, kindle version) as well as with the theory of reading. We will begin our journey through literature and its various formats with Theodore Roethke, the Pulitzer Prize winner of 1954, whose poems in manuscript are housed in the University of Washington’s Special Collections at Suzzallo Library. Roethke’s works have been published in dozens of editions throughout the years and in five different formats, all available at Amazon.com: paperback, hardcover, audio CD, audio cassette, and digital as a HTML packet. Reading a set of poems by Roethke in all these formats will facilitate a discussion about how the formats might model our understanding and interpretation of the text. We will then become acquainted with theories of reading by Wolfgang Iser, and Stanley Fish, who take for granted that is, they take for granted that text equals book format.

The literary texts that we will read next range across major literary genres and come in several formats. We will first read a selection of episodes from James Joyce’s Ulysses as a search e-text from www.online-literature.com and experiment with the options offered by the digital text. To understand what lies behind the electronic text which is apparently identical with its printed version, we will discuss George Landow’s Hypertext 3.0 and Peter Shillingsburg’s From Gutenberg to Google. We will then compare the version of Washington Square by Henry James as it was serialized in Cornhill Magazine and illustrated by George du Maurier in 1880 to the first edition published in 1881 by Harper and Brothers in New York in which chapter 28 was missing. We will examine the two printed formats of this novel through the lens of Jerome McGann’s Textual Condition, which will introduce to us the partners involved in the production of this (or any) volume. We will also consider another, quite different format in which the novel is now available: theM4B, audiobook format, which preserves a reading of the novel over the course of 7 hours and 45 minutes, released in 2007 by Librivox. The theory of Matthew Rubery will help us interpret literature in connection to sound studies and understand how much the format itself contributes to the meaning of the text. Considering the multitude of formats in which we can “read,” or, better said, “interact” with a literary text, one may add to the old theory stating that a work is an event that epitomizes its epoch the complementary contemporary variation stating that the reading of the work is an even that epitomizes its epoch.

In the epoch of digital technology, the kindle or the e-reader emulates the book format and allows readers to have an experience almost identical to that of reading a physical book, yet doing so through an electronic device. Experimenting with several versions of Oscar Wilde’s play The Importance of Being Earnest, we will think about reading as an event that partially changes the meaning of the work: In this, our class will be paving new ground, because, although all of us have read texts in these many new formats, literary criticism has not yet addressed these common experiences. “Reading” Marjane Satrapi’s graphic novel Persepolis, both in print and on kindle, we will discuss the paradox of transferring the concreteness of illustrations on paper to a digital medium. While the appearance of the juxtaposition of image and text remains identical visually, the experience of reading the graphic novel holding the volume differs from reading it holding the kindle. The latter takes away the joy of tactile childhood memories such as those instilled by our early reading of comic strips. Writings by Johanna Drucker and Matthew Kirschenbaum will help us articulate and describe our experiences, provide the theoretical support for the next group of literary texts. We will end our reading experiment with the computer generated poem “Agrippa” by William Gibson.

Thus, the overall goal of this course is to think about the relationship between text and format and to become more aware that the meaning of the literary text which is not revealed exclusively by the linguistic code, but it is emphasized or even created by its material support. We will also gain expertise in theories of reading and textual criticism, thus updating literary criticism to the level of the technologies we use while reading. Thus, both experimental learning and critical reading will help us think about our roles as readers and how our experiences are shaped by the
texts we read and their formats.

Mobility, both physical and virtual, is a key feature of modernity. This course examines various forms of geographic mobility in modern European literature and non-fictional travel writing. This includes literary portraits of tourism and migration, Italian journeys and Arctic exploration, beach vacations and road trips, encounters with urban modernity and global displacements. We will discuss the mobile subjects inside and outside of texts and their different kinds of endeavors. Questions include: Where are they going and why? What are their primary means of transportations and how do they shape their respective visions? What are they observing and experiencing in the course of their being on the move? How do the texts frame the notions of departure and arrival? What are the mythical and ideological dimensions of going east, west, north, and south? What are the boundaries crossed and the contact zones envisioned? What are the cultural frameworks they draw upon and the literary means for representing self and Other? How do they envision the emigrant and immigrant experience? Primary texts include major writers in the German literary canon such as Joseph von Eichendorff and Thomas Mann; young female world travelers such as the Swiss journalist and writer Annemarie Schwarzenbach who drove from Switzerland to Afghanistan in the late 1930s; literary adventurers such as the renowned Austrian mythopoet Christoph Ransmayr; transnational writers from Eastern Europe and Japan such as Joseph Roth, Alina Bronsky, and Yoko Tawada. The course has three major goals: Students can expect to expand their knowledge of world literature in translation; to sharpen their critical reading and writing skills, and to complete an independent course-related project, either creative or analytical. Requirements: Regular attendance and class participation; oral assignments and take-home essays, midterm and final project. Readings and discussion are in English.

The focus of the course is the social and cultural conditioning of everyday language use. It’s goal is to examine what is universal and what culture/language specific in linguistic expression of key human concepts: friendship, kinship, homeland/fatherland as well as linguistic expression of politeness/rudeness and prejudice, and to take a closer look at linguistic expression of gender differences in different cultures. The underlying premise is that language is a mirror of culture and national character, as well as means of communication. Students will be introduced to research methods in semantics, pragmatics and discourse and, hopefully, gain an appreciation of the social and cultural underpinnings of their own language and other languages. This is a comparative course, with enough Slavic content for it to be relevant for our majors and graduate students, yet appealing to people interested in other languages or language in general. Students can choose any language/culture for their projects.

The course is devoted to the greatest American novels by Vladimir Nabokov: Pnin, Lolita, and Pale Fire. We will also read some of his stories of this period, as well as his autobiographical writings. All readings, discussions, and papers are in English.

Over the past decade, there have been between 3,000 and 5,000 marine spill incidents annually. Marine oil spills are among the most visible and potentially damaging threats to fish and wildlife and their habitats, regional economies, and the people of a region in which a spill occurs. They can impact international relations, national energy policy, and even election outcomes, yet few people understand the scientific foundations of spills.

We will begin with an introduction to oil spills that have had a major impact on response science, technology, and policy in the United States. Each spill will illustrate key disciplines that provide the scientific foundation for mitigating spill impacts, such as physical oceanography, chemistry, geomorphology, and ecosystem interactions. Understanding oil spills requires an interdisciplinary approach that considers both natural and social sciences. In exploring spill response science, we will examine:

Oil spill history – legal, science, and policy frameworks
o The social and political role of oil in the United States
o Spills of the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s
o Evolution of technology and policy
o Oil spill management

Oil spill fate and behavior in the marine environment.
o Oil chemistry and toxicity
o Transport and fate
o Natural resource sensitivity

Spill response methods for open water and shorelines.
o Mechanical and alternative response methods
o Determining cleanup endpoints
o Computer-based simulation models and tools

Natural resource and human effects
o Principles of ecological risk assessment
o Natural resource injury assessment and restoration
o Science and politics in disaster response

At the end of this course, the student will be able to:
– Explain how oil spills behave in the marine environment, with an emphasis on fate and effects on humans and ecosystems.
– List, describe, and compare the advantages and disadvantages of the basic spill response strategies and their differing impacts to the environment and humans.
– Demonstrate how to apply oil spill tools and models to an oil spill scenario in order to critique alternative response strategies.
– Recognize the role of old and new media in communicating science and affecting policy.
– Display a leadership role in the classroom community through discussion, group learning, and class presentations.

How did life arise on Earth ? Is there life elsewhere in the Universe ? If any, is it possible to find/detect it ? The mystery of our origins is a question that has preoccupied humans for millennia. Today, this question remains unanswered, although there are many ideas. In this course we will explore the possible approaches to answer these questions. We will first study the history of the sciences that led to approaching these questions, and the chain of thoughts that has guided scientists in the search for the origin of life. This is a new science called Astrobiology and it is based on interdisciplinary studies. We will define life. We will briefly study the life cycle of stars and the formation of the Solar System to understand the physical and chemical constraints to form and maintain an Earth-like planet where life can develop. We will then investigate the delivery of organic materials, in particular those molecules that are currently found in life forms, by meteorites and comets. We will learn about the various types of meteorites and we will even handle some. We will learn about comets, and we will explore each of the planets and moons in the solar system to understand which ones could potentially harbor life.

In this course, you will learn how information technology is transforming the study and practice of biology, medicine, and health care. We introduce the field of biomedical & health informatics through four modules that focus on current technologies in the field: (1) Electronic personal health records, (2) Medical imaging informatics, (3) Bioinformatics and synthetic biology, and (4) Public health surveillance systems. The technologies we cover in these modules arose from multi-disciplinary research-some blending of computer science, information science, biology research, and clinical research.

Each module includes (a) some hands-on experience with a specific software application, (b) discussion of the pragmatic uses and implications of the software, (c) discussion of the theory and concepts underlying that application, and (d) a hands-on assignment where students (or teams of students) must use, modify or adapt the software to a particular setting or purpose. In addition, across the modules, we will learn common themes and open research problems for the field of biomedical informatics.

See http://faculty.washington.edu/gennari/teaching/mebi498/.

Schooling is a major enculturating function of every society. It is a deeply embedded function in a society, so deeply embedded that it is often difficult to see how schooling works, and it is difficult to identify-let alone address- critical questions about its purpose, design, and functions. As the anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski said, nothing is as difficult to see as the obvious.

Undergraduate students have spent more time in formal schooling agencies than in any other agency in society (other than the family). Familiarity with schooling is often an obstacle to seeing the obvious. Honors students in particular usually have this difficulty. Honors students most likely have done very well in school: they know how to do school, as it were, and they have been rewarded accordingly. But doing well in school is not the same as understanding the social, economic, and political functions of education and schooling.

This course is directed to the developing and deepening of that understanding. We will identify and address some of the major perennial and critical questions of education and schooling, with a focus on the moral and political context out of which those questions have emerged. Our primary learning approach will be through close reading and discussion of classic and current texts plus conversations with selected education scholar/practitioners.

Some of the questions to be addressed:

1. What has been the historical role – and what should be the role- of schools in determining and legitimating the basic question of who gets what, considered within the context of such variables as social class, race, gender, economics, and culture?
2. What is the relationship between a given political regime and schooling in that regime?
3. What are the appropriate roles of higher education? Who determines these roles?
4. What is the appropriate role of the teacher? Given that role, how should teachers be prepared and selected and assessed?
5. Who should determine what is to be taught and how it is to be taught?
6. How should schools be funded (if at all)?
7. How do we know if we have “good” schools?
8. What are some of the factors that limit efforts to change education and schooling?

Requirements: Fourteen short (1-2 pages, single-spaced) summary/analytical papers will be prepared for most of the readings; one longer (9-10 pages, single-spaced) final paper synthesizing and discussing the whole. No formal final exam. Numerical grading on a 4.0 scale. Given that class discussion is very important, consistent attendance is critical.

I’ll be glad to talk further about any aspect of the course. You can reach me, Roger Soder, at rsoder@u.washington.edu.

This Honors course is an introduction to Theory and Method in Anthropology and Religious Studies. We read religious worlds along the Guinea Coast of West Africa to grasp the violent conflict of a range of colonial modernities. The tools are simple: Who are the agents and participants? How do mean and women, rich and poor, educated and less than educated move? What do they exchange? What must be produced and exchanged? Why? And what are the consequences for participation for different people at different times. Over ten weeks we come to see Guinea Coast religious systems as local and global, dynamic and fluid, expanding and contracting, stable and unstable, as well as prone to crises and collapse. There is no birth into a genesis without human cost and consequence.
Eventually, we may find that actual and symbolic violence are key currency to systemic participation. Here, what is good, right, and expected forever carry their antithesis. Hence, crises and collapse go hand in hand with with genesis and world making. There are two short papers, specific rewrites, word work, diagrams, student Presentations and performances, and a final accumulation paper.

How do second-generation immigrant youth and young adults form national and transnational identities? What kinds of civic and political projects do they engage in? How does citizenship policy, neighborhood, economy, school, ethnic community, family, friends, race, class, and gender influence their civic engagement, political participation, and social belonging? We explore these and related questions in a set of interdisciplinary readings from the social sciences, literature, and film. Students will be evaluated based on active participation and discussion, response papers, and a research project based in part on using skills taught in class about doing fieldwork and interviews.

Do you want to make this world a better place? How do you know if you are truly making a difference? What does it mean to be civically engaged? What does it mean to engage in socially responsible leadership? To address these questions, this service-learning course offers a hands-on opportunity to explore the concept of civic engagement and the role of leadership in working towards the common good. Students will critically reflect on their own service experiences through the lens of several contemporary leadership theories, engage with principles of community work, and learn from the experiences of community leaders. The course will draw heavily on students’ involvement in service and will weave these together with elements of other academic coursework and future academic and career goals. Students will be required to engage in 20-40 hours of service in the community throughout the Spring Quarter. This course fulfills one of the Honors experiential learning requirements.

Course expectations and assignments: The following assignments will be required for this course:

-Service engagement for 3-5 hours/week with a community-based organization (service oriented campus organizations will be permitted with instructor consent).
-Weekly journal entries (~500 words) responding to assigned readings.
-Leadership theory teach-in: Working in small groups, students will design and deliver a creative 30-minute teach-in session on a particular contemporary leadership theory or concept.
-Academic synthesis project: To facilitate connections between students’ academic explorations and community-based work, students will write an essay
(~1000-1500 words) that explores how social issues addressed through their service work are perceived through the lens of their chosen academic field.
-Community leader interview: Students will interview one community leader around the theme of leadership lessons learned in the field and summarize highlights in a ~1000 word essay.
-Final reflection paper for Honors portfolio: This culminating paper will summarize students’ significant learning from this service-learning course.

This course focuses on the history of cattle to explore patterns in human-animal interaction throughout human history. Our principal goal is to gain insight into the use and conception of animals in various societies, including our own. To keep the topic within manageable bounds, we will focus on just one type of animal: the cow, since, arguably, no animal has had a greater impact on the evolution of human societies and the environment. We will concentrate on three broad geographical and chronological areas — the ancient world, Western Europe, and America — but with forays into other regions and periods (India, Iran, South America).

The course explores the prevailing but often unquestioned values and principles about the notion of normalcy across disciplines. We will discuss species typical functioning, biological impairments and defects, abnormality, and social constructions of human differences. We will examine dominant social models of disability in conjunction with rights-based frameworks. We will question the role of medicalization and the effect of unequal power relationships on the understanding of what normal is. We will analyze how these understandings translate into policies, like the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Course discussions will involve assigned texts, which include films, articles and books. In addition to active participation in course discussions, students will prepare a research portfolio. This portfolio will include a proposal, presentation, and final product. Students will also have opportunities to select from an instructor-provided list of readings and engage with a small reading group.

Through participation in this course, students will learn to think critically about how societal factors influence our understanding of what normal means. Building from this exploration, students will be able to articulate the complexities of race, ethnicity, class, nationality, sex, disability, gender, and other social categories. We will encourage students to expand their understanding of intersectionality through the lens of Disability Studies by creating an inclusive environment that engages diverse perspectives.

As part of course requirements, students will present a current event based on each day’s readings or lectures, to be turned in twice weekly by midnight the day before each class period. Link to current event story can be emailed to professors, or turned in as a hard or scanned copy each class period.

Students will be required to write a 15 page research paper. Students will choose a developing country and describe an in-country plan to hit the US Obama Administration goal of ZERO HIV infections (an AIDS-free generation) in their chosen country. Students will describe the in-country AIDS epidemic in terms of its epidemiology (disease transmission and spread), including risk behaviors, and access to treatment. Students will then describe how to reach a goal of zero transmissions within the country by the end of this decade (2019). Students will make evidence-based recommendations targeting the AIDS epidemic for their chosen country and describe whether or how these recommendations will serve to achieve zero HIV transmissions. Papers will be due last week of class (week of June 7, 2013).

At the end of this course, students will be able to:
– Summarize the history of the AIDS epidemic
– Explain how the human-immunodeficiency virus enters the body and attacks the immune system
– Describe clinical symptoms and manifestations of HIV and AIDS, outline disease stages and describe disease progression, including acquisition of opportunistic illnesses
– Compare the treatment policies and options for HIV and AIDS disease between developed and developing countries
– Summarize issues related to effective treatment of HIV in both developed and developing countries
– Describe the factors associated with differing nations’ patterns of HIV spread
– Discuss transmission patterns in relation to risk behaviors, describing sexual, drug and maternal-child transmission of HIV
– Recognize the differing patterns in the national and international spread of HIV and AIDS and explain how risk behaviors and risk factors vary around the world
– Distinguish the differential risk patterns of the spread of HIV in different countries around the world, and describe how these patterns create different AIDS epidemics
– Identify how biological and behavioral co-factors, including other sexually transmitted diseases, play a role in the world-wide spread of HIV
– Discuss effective medical/clinical, vaccine and behavioral HIV prevention strategies
– Summarize the psycho-social, medical, and economic impact of HIV or AIDS on individuals, families, communities and nations
– Delineate how a chosen country can hit the WHO UNAIDS goal of an “AIDS-free generation”
– Respond to individuals with HIV who present in class as a panel

Invented by the Northwest poet Richard Hugo, “The Triggering Town” was an imaginary method he used to help poets begin new poems. The poet would imagine a town, one created with real memories of actual towns he had been to, and then furnish the place with made-up oddities. Then, the poet would stumble upon a compelling subject, one humming below the surface of the “triggering town.” By following the music of the language, the poet would find the real subject of the emerging draft, and follow it into a new, and surprising, poem.

In this class, we’ll read a selection of poems that began in particular places. Then, we’ll follow the poems and see how far they travel from their origins. Reading critical responses to the poems will give us different lenses to imagine the places, the poems and the relationship between the two. Students will write (and revise) three poems and one midterm literary analysis paper, along with delivering a team project on a particular poet’s work.

The Borderlands of Western Civilization” will survey some of the key “border-making” events and forces in the Atlantic World. While not strictly a history course, it would be organized chronologically and thematically as an interdisciplinary exploration of some of the critical borderlands of the modern world. Briefly, the course will explore the workings of religion, race, gender, empire and nation in the construction of modernity. Some of the topics covered include the Re-Conquest in Iberia, Conquest in the Americas, state-making and revolution in the Atlantic World.

Student learning goals:
The goals of the course would include providing students with opportunities: (1) to gain a strong grasp on key historiographical and theoretical debates on the construction of empires and nations; (2) to understand the multiple and shifting boundaries of political belonging, within and between national states; and (3) to acquire fluency in key concepts in Western political theories and post-colonial critiques.

Recommended preparation:
No pre-requisites, but some knowledge of world history and philosophy would be great.

Class assignments and grading:
Short weekly response paper and one longer research paper. Students will also be expected to take turns in leading class discussion.

This quarter we will reflect deeply on literature and ethnography, and engage with the following questions: what are the politics and pleasures of hearing other people’s stories? How might we appreciate stories from cultural contexts we know little about? Whose voices get heard and why? How do we hold the multiple stories we both tell and hear as we travel? Our conversations, readings, film screenings, and assignments all work toward cultivating a humble global traveling spirit, a stance that will serve us well during the summer in India and far beyond.

Architecture 352 presents a survey of architecture from 1750 to the present (primarily, but not exclusively, in Europe and North America). Emphasis is placed on the development of the architecture of this period including significant buildings and projects, important theories and critical writings.

Architecture 352 is the third course in the architecture 350-351-352 series. Knowledge of material covered in Architecture 350 and Architecture 351 is expected of those enrolled in Architecture 352. Like other courses in the 350 series, Arch 352 is offered as a series of lectures illustrated with slides. The Honors Section will also include a weekly discussion session focused on additional readings (including primary texts and articles of scholarly research) that address relevant events, practitioners, movements, influences, or broad cultural factors that influenced modern architecture from 1750 to the present. The principal objective in the Honors Section is to serve as an enrichment for the course lectures, exploring (in greater depth) issues that have been raised during the lecture sessions. The readings and assignments are designed to facilitate discussion and an in depth, critical inquiry of architecture, history and theory from 1750 to 2000. Architecture is seen not only as built form but also as consisting of the social practices and cultural discourse that it embodies. The aim of the Honors Section is to develop a deeper understanding of the past by incorporating a diversity of viewpoints.

Resources for the course include two texts that are available at the University Bookstore: Trachtenberg and Hyman, Architecture from Prehistory to Post-Modernism/The Western Tradition (New York, 2002); and William J.R. Curtis, Modern Architecture Since 1900 3rd Edition (New York and London, 1996).

A complete course guide (slide list) for all lectures may be purchased in a single bound booklet at the University Bookstore (available by the first day of class). A web site will also be accessible to those enrolled in the course.

The Honors Section will have a selection of focused readings that will enhance the content of the lectures, but address topics in greater depth. These readings will be available on e-reserves. Course requirements for students in the Honors Section will include an in-class midterm, a final exam, and regular written assignments based on the additional readings.

Introduces a range of theories, ideas, techniques, and processes of still photography in a fine art context. Assignments emphasize photography’ s creative potential.

Biochemistry and molecular biology (with quiz sections) for undergraduate students in molecular and cellular biology, for biochemistry majors, and graduate students in other science departments. Prerequisite: either 2.2 in BIOC 406 or 2.2 in BIOC 441.

Introduction to systematic inorganic chemistry: representative elements, metals, and nonmetals. Includes coordination complexes, geochemistry, and metallurgy. Additional material on environmental applications of basic chemistry presented. Includes laboratory. No more than the number of credits indicated can be counted toward graduation from the following course groups: 162, 165 (5 credits); 165, 312 (5 credits).

For chemistry majors and otherwise qualified students planning three or more quarters of organic chemistry. Structure, nomenclature, reactions, and synthesis of organic compounds. Theory and mechanism of organic reactions. Studies of biomolecules. Includes introduction to membranes, enzyme mechanisms, prosthetic groups, macromolecular conformations, and supramolecular architecture. No more than 4 credits can be counted toward graduation from the following course groups: CHEM 239, CHEM 337.

Basic programming-in-the-small abilities and concepts including procedural programming (methods, parameters, return values) , basic control structures (sequence, if/else, for loop, while loop), file processing, arrays and an introduction to defining objects.

Continuation of CSE 142. Concepts of data abstraction and encapsulation including stacks, queues, linked lists, binary trees, recursion, instruction to complexity and use of predefined collection classes. Prerequisite: CSE 142.

Cultural interaction among societies and civilizations, particularly Western and non-Western. Intellectual, cultural, social, and artistic aspects; historical factors.

Third quarter in calculus sequence. Introduction to Taylor polynomials and Taylor series, vector geometry in three dimensions,introduction to multivariable differential calculus, double integrals in Cartesian and polar coordinates.

Sequence covers the material of 124, 125, 126; 307, 308, 318. Third quarter of the first year of a two-year accelerated sequence. May not receive credit for both 126 and 136. For students with above average preparation, interest, and ability in mathematics.

Introduction to proofs and rigor; uniform convergence, Fourier series and partial differential equations, vector calculus, complex variables. Students who complete this sequence are not required to take 309, 324, 326, 327, 328, and 427. Third quarter of the second year of an accelerated two-year sequence; prepares students for senior-level mathematics courses.

Electromagnetic waves, optics, waves in matter, and experiments in these topics for physical science and engineering majors. Lecture tutorial and lab components must all be taken to receive credit. Credit is not given for both PHYS 116 and PHYS 123. Prerequisite: MATH 126, MATH 129, or MATH 134, any of which may be taken concurrently; PHYS 122.

It’s been called a Constitution within the Constitution, and it contains some of the most important clauses in American legal culture: equal protection, due process, citizenship. From immigration reform to affirmative action to the debt ceiling to voting rights to the wartime assassination of citizens, the 14th Amendment is implicated in countless ways every day in contemporary national life. In this seminar we will examine the content and history of the 14th Amendment, and then develop research projects that explore how it shapes current debates on social, political, and economic issues. Students will come out of this seminar better equipped to sort out some of our most contentious civic questions. Previous knowledge of, or declared interest in, the study of law is *not* a requirement. This course is for artists, scientists, activists, and students of every stripe. Lecturer Eric Liu is an author, a former speechwriter and policy adviser to President Clinton, and a graduate of Harvard Law School. He teaches the popular Honors seminar “How to Read, Write, and Speak.”

This honors seminar seeks to explore the interface between poetry and the healing arts and science. In an age when technology dominates our daily experience, the emotional parameters of illness are often overlooked. The human brain has not changed in the last ten thousand years in its need for expression surrounding fear and grief. We will discuss the limbic system and correlates of functional MRI in understanding patterns of brain activation. Students will start by acquiring basic poetic craft and techniques to bring music and emotion into language. The history of poetry in medicine will be examined: its value in retrospective reflection, as a tool for teaching compassion to medical students, and as a vehicle for expression in mentally and physically afflicted patients. Renowned physician-poets will be discussed and each student will participate in vocalization of a selection of their poems. Examples of cross cultural traditions of poetry will be briefly reviewed. Each student will be required to generate “in-class” writing as well as writing assignments, and to create 3 poems; one about personal experience of illness or injury, the second about an illness sustained by a friend or loved one that has affected the student’s life, the third about an environmental or societal illness. An editor, co-editor and “tech” production advisor will be chosen by the class to produce a 30 page book of poetry for publication by the university by the end of the seminar. A group reading at the University Bookstore or Seattle venue, in which all students must participate, will be graded as the final examination. My role will be as its facilitator and guide to provoke thought, to generate innovative poems, and to open minds and hearts to the possibilities of poetry for self exploration in the realm of illness, death and healing.