Honors Course Archive
Course Archive for Winter 2022
Except where noted*, current Interdisciplinary Honors students may self-register using the SLN/MyPlan. If you have any questions regarding what category a course will fulfill, please check your degree audit on MyPlan and/or contact us here.
* Add codes are placed on all courses one week after the first day of the quarter. If you need an add code, please email the course instructor for permission, and once approved, forward the confirmation from your instructor to uwhonors@uw.edu. We will be in touch with registration details as soon as possible.
- Honors Arts & Humanities (4)
- Honors Science (3)
- Honors Social Sciences (5)
- Honors Interdisciplinary (5)
- HONORS 100/496 (2)
- Honors Electives (11)
- Special Topics (2)
Honors Arts & Humanities (4)
HONORS-prefix courses
HONORS 211 A: Scandinavian Mythology (A&H, DIV, W)
HONORS 211 A: Scandinavian Mythology (A&H, DIV, W)
SLN 15477 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 5
Limit: 10 students
HONORS 211 B: Authoritarianism and its Appeal in Ancient Rome (A&H, W)
HONORS 211 B: Authoritarianism and its Appeal in Ancient Rome (A&H, W)
SLN 15478 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 5
Limit: 35 students
The transition from the Republic to the Imperial period in Roman history brought stability and a reprieve from generations of civil wars, but it also signaled a loss of rights. The central question of this course will be what the Romans ultimately gave up for this authoritarian stability and why. Through primary and secondary sources as well as archaeological evidence, we will use this period as a lens to investigate the curtailing of rights such as freedom of speech and democracy. Specifically, we will investigate the following trends and the role they played in the breakdown of the Republican system: 1. Civil War
2. Inequality
3. Cult of Personality
4. Imperialism
HONORS 241 A: Russian Crime Fiction (A&H, W)
HONORS 241 A: Russian Crime Fiction (A&H, W)
SLN 15487 (View UW registration info »)
Office: A219 Padelford Hall, Box 354335
Phone: 206-543-6848
Email: galya@uw.edu
Credits: 5
Limit: 15 students
Honors students required to complete a longer mid-term, and either a longer final exam or a 10-12 page paper.
Introduces important trends and movements in Russian literary and cultural history.
HONORS 241 B: Looted? Ethnomusicology, Archives, and Colonial Legacies (A&H, W)
HONORS 241 B: Looted? Ethnomusicology, Archives, and Colonial Legacies (A&H, W)
SLN 15488 (View UW registration info »)
Office: Suzzallo Library 370A, Box 352900
Phone: 206 616-1210
Email: vallier@uw.edu
Credits: 5
Limit: 35 students
Honors Science (3)
HONORS-prefix courses
HONORS 221 B: Emerging and Re-emerging Infectious Diseases (NSc, DIV, W)
HONORS 221 B: Emerging and Re-emerging Infectious Diseases (NSc, DIV, W)
SLN 15480 (View UW registration info »)
Email: auragsac@uw.edu
Credits: 5
Limit: 35 students
Emerging infectious diseases (IDs) are infections that have recently appeared within a population or those whose incidence or geographic range is rapidly increasing or threatens to increase in the near future. Emerging infections can be caused by: Previously undetected or unknown infectious agents Known agents that have spread to new geographic locations or new populations Previously known agents whose role in specific diseases has previously gone unrecognized. Re-emergence of agents whose incidence of disease had significantly declined in the past, but whose incidence of the disease has reappeared. This class of diseases is known as re-emerging infectious diseases.
This course will focus on an overview of the basic principles of infectious diseases (IDs) focusing on emerging and re-emerging IDs that affect public health in the U.S. and worldwide.
Topics include:
*Scope and nature of the problem of emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases (IDs).
*Factors involved in the emergence and re-emergence of IDs.
*Basic biology and epidemiology of selected emerging and re-emerging ID agents (bacteria, viruses, prions, helminths, and eukaryotic protozoans).
*Public health, economic, and social impact of emerging and re-emerging IDs.
*Compare strains of Sars-Cov-2 and other coronaviruses (SARS & MERS) and analyze pathogenicity based on amino acid variations.
*Work in research teams and use bioinformatics to elucidate variations in nucleotides sequences (changes in parts of the genome) of viruses associated with increased pathogenicity/virulence. *Predict the pathogenicity of future mutations and/or viruses that have yet to jump species.
*Strategies for diagnosis, prevention, and control of emerging and re-emerging IDs.
HONORS 221 C: Game Theory and its Applications (NSc, W)
HONORS 221 C: Game Theory and its Applications (NSc, W)
SLN 15481 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 5
Limit: 35 students
In game theory, a “game” is any interaction in which decisions must be made. Penalty kicks in soccer. Nuclear disarmament. Predator-prey behaviors. Hostage negotiation. Voting coalitions. Auction bidding. Insurance pricing. Cooperative hunting. Fish schooling. Political collusion. Information sharing. And on and on and on. Game theory is a math toolkit used to analyze games. It’s a way to formalize games, to think about their strategies, their dynamics, and the expected actions of others. Game theory is the study of how we do — and do not — get along.
Topics likely covered:
- payoffs, utility, moves, strategies
- nash equilibria, probabilistic strategies
- prisoners dilemma
- signaling
- credibility and non-credible threats
- risk management
- cultural conventions
- auction theory
- voting systems
- power & coalitions
- fair devision and envy
- two-sided matching
- decision heuristics
HONORS 221 D: The Science of Human Values (NSc, W)
HONORS 221 D: The Science of Human Values (NSc, W)
SLN 22117 (View UW registration info »)
Email: kc314@uw.edu
Credits: 5
Limit: 23 students
The Science of Human Values: An Exploration of how physics, chemistry, mathematics, neuroscience and evolutionary biology provide an underlying basis for the moral principles that guide human behavior. From antiquity to modern day.
Course Description
It’s a given among many scientists that understanding how the natural world works (including mathematics) is an invaluable guide to understanding both the origins and evolution of human values. Yet these ideas rarely make it into humanities courses. Quantum mechanics offers insight into how deep truths can appear to be mutually exclusive; special and general relativity demonstrate the power of constants that don’t change no matter what (symmetries), and how notions we accept as fundamental (like space and time) sometimes aren’t. The mathematics of game theory makes strong arguments that cooperative strategies are, in the long run, more successful than ruthlessly competitive ones, and that symmetry can inform fairness. Biology illuminates how symbiotic relations have been central to evolution, and how all life is connected. The “environment” is not something “out there,” separate from us. It IS us. Indeed, everything in the universe is connected, including matter and energy; a sense of community is built into nature. Neuroscience and psychology have given us an understanding of why we so easily fall into logical and destructive behaviors, why we fail to see the future consequences of our actions, why we find it nearly impossible to admit mistakes or “see” any “truths” we do not expect.
Students will read widely in physics, philosophy, mathematics, evolutionary biology. They will be responsible for written assignments based on those readings, independent study and presentations. Students will be encouraged to apply what they learn to their own fields of study and also to their personal lives.
Instructor Bio:
KC Cole is the author of eight non-fiction books, including The Universe and the Teacup: The Mathematics of Truth and Beauty. Currently a columnist for Wired magazine, she has written for the Los Angeles Times, The New Yorker, Quanta, Discover, The New York Times and many other publications. Professor Emerita at USC’s Annenberg School of Communication, she’s also taught at Yale, Wesleyan and UCLA.
Honors Social Sciences (5)
HONORS-prefix courses
HONORS 231 A: Revealing the Unequal Burden of COVID-19: Structural Racism and the Social Determinants of Health (SSc, DIV, W)
HONORS 231 A: Revealing the Unequal Burden of COVID-19: Structural Racism and the Social Determinants of Health (SSc, DIV, W)
SLN 15482 (View UW registration info »)
Email: damarys@uw.edu
Credits: 5
Limit: 35 students
HONORS 231 B: How to Write the History of the Aztecs (SSc, DIV, W)
HONORS 231 B: How to Write the History of the Aztecs (SSc, DIV, W)
SLN 15483 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 5
Limit: 10 students
This course examines the challenges historians face when writing the history of the Aztecs (Mexica), a people whose codices, or written pictorial records of their past, were largely destroyed by the Spanish after colonization in 1521. In asking how historians investigate and interpret the histories of populations when traditional forms of primary source evidence are unavailable, we will complicate our thinking about how historical knowledge is produced. In the process, we will also examine the broader history of the Aztec Empire and the Spanish colonial society that formed in its aftermath. Particular attention will be paid to notions of religion, cosmology, and daily life among the Aztecs.
HONORS 231 C: Gender, Diplomacy, and Human Rights (SSc, DIV, W)
HONORS 231 C: Gender, Diplomacy, and Human Rights (SSc, DIV, W)
SLN 15484 (View UW registration info »)
Email: eacr@uw.edu
Credits: 5
Limit: 35 students
HONORS 231 D: Abolishing Poverty: shelter, mutual aid and care (SSc, DIV, W)
HONORS 231 D: Abolishing Poverty: shelter, mutual aid and care (SSc, DIV, W)
SLN 15485 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 5
Limit: 18 students
We will unlearn poverty and homelessness as framed in popular discourse and public policy. We will learn the recent history of homelessness in Seattle and explore root causes of impoverishment — both socio-economic processes and representations that frame people and places as ‘poor’. We will explore the role of the historical and structural causes in the production of poverty/inequality. In our course we will ethically engage with unhoused people and homelessness activists that are addressing the immediate and root causes of homelessness. We will work on understanding root causes of homelessness in Seattle, considering the role of intersecting forms of oppression and discrimination (race, gender, class, sexuality, citizenship and more), criminalization and state-sponsored violence. Throughout our class, we will consider abolitionist activism and mutual to think through forms engagement, research and action that collectively address intersectional impoverishment.
HONORS 231 E: Leadership, Democracy, and a More Thoughtful Public (SSc, W)
HONORS 231 E: Leadership, Democracy, and a More Thoughtful Public (SSc, W)
SLN 15486 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 5
Limit: 30 students
We will consider the following six interrelated propositions, and we will consider the implications of these propositions for the conduct of good (i.e., ethical and effective) leadership.
1. Leadership involves at its base the creation of a persuaded audience; but beyond that, leadership involves creating and sustaining a more thoughtful public, a public capable of rising above itself.
2. A more thoughtful public must not only be created and sustained, but, given that things inevitably fall apart, must be recovered and reconstituted.
3. Good leadership involves ethical and effective information seeking. A leader must have knowledge of what must be done, knowledge of what it takes to persuade others of what must be done (and, in persuading, helping to create a more thoughtful public), and knowledge of how an audience/public will respond. Only with a thorough understanding of the principles, strategies, and costs of information seeking will one be able to engage in ethical and effective leadership.
4. Leadership always has a political context; leadership in a democracy is necessarily different than leadership in other kinds of political regimes.
5. Leadership always involves assumptions (tacit and acknowledged) about human nature.
6. In a free political regime, assuming free and fair elections, we get the kinds of leaders we deserve and we must consider how to behave in ways to deserve the kinds of leaders we say we want.
Sources of texts will include Tocqueville, Orwell, Machiavelli, Bacon, Dostoevsky, and Sophocles, as well as contemporary authors. Method of instruction: close reading of texts, coupled with fifteen 1-2 page single-spaced papers on texts, plus a longer (approximately 6,500 words) synthesis paper; small and large group discussions with each other, two lectures, and two visiting scholars/practitioners. Throughout the quarter, we will make theoretical and practical applications of key concepts to consideration of the critical issues of climate change and climate change communication.
Professor Soder is glad to talk with you further about any aspect of the course, please reach him via email: rsoder@uw.edu
Honors Interdisciplinary (5)
HONORS-prefix courses
HONORS 345 A: Calderwood Seminar in Public Writing: Public Communication of Science (C)
HONORS 345 A: Calderwood Seminar in Public Writing: Public Communication of Science (C)
SLN 15489 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 5
Limit: 12 students
HONORS 391 A: Race, Gender, Diaspora & Population Health (A&H / SSc / NSc, DIV, W)
HONORS 391 A: Race, Gender, Diaspora & Population Health (A&H / SSc / NSc, DIV, W)
SLN 15490 (View UW registration info »)
Office: H-692 Health Sciences Building, Box 357660
Phone: 206 616-2948
Email: cspigner@uw.edu
Credits: 5
Limit: 35 students
This 300-level 5-credit course explores the health of populations across the planet. Multiculturalism and the Problem Based Learning (PBL) allow students to investigate inequalities in health. More than 35 open-ended topics/cases include sex-worker rights, white saviors, Ebola, anti-immigration policies, #MeToo, incarceration, female circumcision, racial admixture, and LGBTQ issues. Randomly selected cohorts of 3-4 students investigate and present on a randomly selected case/topics. Also, a possible mid-term and a definite 5-7 page, typewritten double-spaced written reflection on a critically read book, essay of short story from a reading list more than 40 titles (I&S, VLPA, NW, Diversity, W).
HONORS 394 A: Ways of Feeling (A&H / SSc, W)
HONORS 394 A: Ways of Feeling (A&H / SSc, W)
SLN 15491 (View UW registration info »)
Office: Padelford A217, Box 354335
Phone: 206-543-7691
Email: dziwirek@uw.edu
Credits: 5
Limit: 25 students
The key questions that are addressed in the Ways of Feeling class are:
- Are there “emotional universals”, that is, feelings that all people share independent of language, culture, gender, and race?
- Are there “culture-specific” emotions?
- Are there “gender-specific” emotions?
The class is suitable for all students who are interested in Language, languages, and meaning. Ways of Feeling is a comparative course, with enough Slavic content for it to be relevant for Slavic majors and graduate students, yet accessible to those interested in other languages. Students will be introduced to research methods in semantics, pragmatics and discourse, and will be required to produce a thorough examination of underlying conceptualizations and a semantic analysis of a linguistic expression of emotion in a language of their choice. They will gain an appreciation of the social and cultural underpinnings of their own language and other languages.
Honors students:
Term paper (7-10 pages) INSTEAD OF SHORT PAPER #5: Honors students will work with the instructor to plan the final term paper. The final project includes an oral presentation of your research with handout.
HONORS 394 B: Seattle's "Color Line" and Mediterranean Imprints on the Pacific Northwest (A&H / SSc, DIV, W)
HONORS 394 B: Seattle's "Color Line" and Mediterranean Imprints on the Pacific Northwest (A&H / SSc, DIV, W)
SLN 15492 (View UW registration info »)
Email: denaar@uw.edu
Credits: 5
Limit: 35 students
As W. E. B. Dubois famously observed, “The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color-line.” Where, how and by whom that line has been drawn has changed over time and across geography. In Seattle, a relatively large but now mostly invisible set of communities from the lands of the former Ottoman Empire–Sephardic Jews, Armenians, Greeks, Turks, and Arabs–troubled the “color line” a century ago. Under the influence of “race science” thinking of the era, in 1925 the Seattle Times classified these populations as “half-breeds”–partly European and partly “Asiatic,” but not quite “white.”
This course explores the experiences of those from the former Ottoman Empire who settled in Seattle, their encounters with U. S. immigration and naturalization policies, their establishment of new communities, their civic engagement in the city, and the ways in their presence contributed to defining the boundaries between who is “white” and who is not. Despite their precarious position, members of these communities contributed to the establishment of major local icons, such as Pike Place Market, Benaroya Hall, and Applets and Cotlets, Washington’s unofficial state candy.
This course offers opportunities for field trips to important sites pertaining to the past and present of these communities–in the Central District and elsewhere—as well as conversation and dialogue with members of the communities today. Finally, the course enables students to embark in public facing digital projects related to oral history, local history, digital mapping projects, and more.
HONORS 394 C: Liberation Movement - Embodied Research Methodologies and Practice (A&H / SSc, DIV, W)
HONORS 394 C: Liberation Movement – Embodied Research Methodologies and Practice (A&H / SSc, DIV, W)
SLN 21940 (View UW registration info »)
Email: rrc4@uw.edu
Credits: 5
Limit: 35 students
This course provides opportunity for new and advanced students from any discipline or major to experiment with short-term and group performance ethnography exercises that build individual and collective capacity for using the body and rebel creativity as core approaches to independent ethnographic inquiry. Through studio movement practice and the centering of bodily ways of knowing, participants build heightened exposure and awareness of when and how such methods and inquiry might be useful to community understanding, wellness and justice. Course materials exam and theories of ethnographic practice, afro-futurism, freedom, social change, community histories of strength and continuity from a variety of perspectives within anthropology, performance studies, queer, crip, critical race and cultural studies, global literature and ethics. Participants are challenged to engage a vibrant intellectual toolkit and movement modalities, to identify core values, ideas, questions and approaches most helpful to their own personal, academic and social development and liberation. With these tools in hand we invite participants to investigate, experience and create movement that matters and transforms in a world on fire.
“The creative act requires not only freedom of expression, but the assumption we will be free tomorrow.” Salman Rushdie 2015, World Voices Festival
HONORS 100/496 (2)
Honors Electives (11)
Other Honors courses (without HONORS-prefix)
BIOCHEM 451 A: Honors Biochem (NSc)
BIOCHEM 451 A: Honors Biochem (NSc)
SLN 11329 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 4
Limit: 30 students
Contact advisers@chem.washington.edu to enroll
Add Code required
BIOC 451 is the honors version of BIOC 441; it covers the same topics in metabolism and gene expression using the same textbook, but is taught as a group discussion of selected publications from the primary literature, with an emphasis on research strategy, experimental design, creative thinking, and scientific communication.
CHEM 155: Honors General Chemistry (NSc)
CHEM 155: Honors General Chemistry (NSc)
SLN 12201 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 5
Limit: 72 students
Prerequisite: 2.2 in Honors CHEM 145.
Students must also sign up for Section AA, AB, or AC. See Time Schedule for day/time information.
$75 course fee – auditors exempt
Fee purpose: Lab
LAB SECTIONS CANNOT BE OVERLOADED.
NO WAITLISTS. VISIT NOTIFY.UW.EDU.
Continuation of CHEM 145. Includes laboratory. Together CHEM 145 and 155 cover material in CHEM 142, 152, and 162. No more than the number of credits indicated can be counted toward graduation from the following course groups: CHEM 152, 155 (5 credits); 145, 155, 162 (10 credits).
CHEM 336: Honors Organic Chemistry (NSc)
CHEM 336: Honors Organic Chemistry (NSc)
SLN 12340 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 4
Limit: 72 students
Prerequisite: 2.2 in Honors CHEM 335.
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. No more than 4 credits can be counted toward graduation from the following course groups: CHEM 238, CHEM 336.
CHEM 346: Organic Chemistry Honors Laboratory (NSc)
CHEM 346: Organic Chemistry Honors Laboratory (NSc)
SLN 12341 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 3
Limit: 24 students
Prerequisite: 2.2 in Honors CHEM 335.
Students who do not complete the prerequisites will be dropped from this course.
$75 course fee – auditors exempt
Fee purpose: Lab
LAB SECTIONS CANNOT BE OVERLOADED.
NO WAITLISTS. VISIT NOTIFY.UW.EDU.
—————————
OFFERED VIA REMOTE LEARNING
To accompany CHEM 336. No more than the number of credits indicated can be counted toward graduation from the following course group: CHEM 241, CHEM 346 (3 credits).
CSE 142 / CSE 390 HA: Computer Programming I (NSc, W)
CSE 142 / CSE 390 HA: Computer Programming I (NSc, W)
SLN 13059 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 4+1
Limit: 25 students
Honors
Credit/No Credit
CSE 142 STUDENTS REGISTER FOR
CSE 390 H & HA
To earn Honors credit, students must register for and complete ALL of the following:
- Register for CSE 142 lecture A or B AND a corresponding CSE 142 section
- Register for CSE 390 H lecture AND corresponding CSE 390 HA section
(See Time Schedule/MyPlan for course day, time and SLN for both CSE 142 and CSE 390)
CSE 142 will cover 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. The Honors CSE 390 course will be a special topics discussion section decided on by the instructor.
CSE 143 + CSE 390 HB: Computer Programming II (NSc)
CSE 143 + CSE 390 HB: Computer Programming II (NSc)
SLN 13060 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 5+1
Limit: 24 students
Contact CSE Advising to Register
CSE 143 was recently changed to 5 credits so the additional seminar will be 6 credits total.
To earn Honors credit, students must register for and complete ALL of the following:
- Register for CSE 143 lecture A or B AND a corresponding CSE 143 section
- Register for CSE 390 H lecture AND corresponding CSE 390 HB section
(See Time Schedule/MyPlan for course day, time and SLN for both CSE 143 and CSE 390)
CSE 143 is a 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.
The Honors CSE 390 course will be a special topics discussion section decided on by the instructor.
ENGL 182 H: Composition: Multimodal (C)
ENGL 182 H: Composition: Multimodal (C)
SLN 14297 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 5
Limit: 23 students
Cannot be taken if student has already received a grade of 2.0 or higher in ENGL 109/110, 111, 121, 131, or 182
Priority I Registration for Freshmen & Sophomore.
English 182 focuses on teaching strategies and skills for effective writing and argument that are required of traditional academic genres, such as the research essay, while also expanding the skills for composing in multimodal genres that our increasingly digital and media saturated world demands.
ENGL 282 (section B): Honors Intermediate Multimodal Composition (C)
ENGL 282 (section B): Honors Intermediate Multimodal Composition (C)
SLN 14340 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 5
Limit: 23 students
Intermediate Multimodal Composition:Strategies for composing effective multimodal texts for print, digital physical delivery, with focus on affordances of various modes–words, images, sound, design, and gesture–and genres to address specific rhetorical situations both within and beyond the academy. Although the course has no prerequisites, instructors assume knowledge of academic writing.
MATH 135: Accelerated Honors Calculus (NSc)
MATH 135: Accelerated Honors Calculus (NSc)
SLN 17131 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 5
Limit: 35 students
Students must have completed or be in Honors MATH 134.
Covers the material of MATH 124, 125, 126; 307, 308, 318. First year of a two-year accelerated sequence. May receive advanced placement (AP) credit for 125 after taking 135. For students with above average preparation, interest, and ability in mathematics.
MATH 335: Honors Accelerated Advanced Calculus (NSc)
MATH 335: Honors Accelerated Advanced Calculus (NSc)
SLN 17209 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 5
Limit: 40 students
Prerequisite: minimum grade of 2.0 in MATH 334.
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 MATH 300, MATH 309, MATH 324, MATH 327, MATH 328, and MATH 427. Second year of an accelerated two-year sequence; prepares students for senior-level mathematics courses. Prerequisite: minimum grade of 2.0 in MATH 334. Offered: W.
PHYS 142: Honors Electromagnetism (NSc)
PHYS 142: Honors Electromagnetism (NSc)
SLN 19244 (View UW registration info »)
Credits: 5
Limit: 44 students
HONORS STUDENTS MUST REGISTER FOR THE HONORS SECTION AND ASSOCIATED QUIZ SECTION TO RECEIVE INTERDISCIPLINARY HONORS CREDIT FOR THIS COURSE
See Physics department for more information and review their Honors Physics 142 and the Honors Physics overview pages:
https://phys.washington.edu/courses/2021/winter/phys/142a
https://phys.washington.edu/141-142-143-courses
Addresses same material as PHYS 122 in more depth and with additional topics such as current research and cross-disciplinary applications. For students with strong calculus preparation. Maximum 5 credits allowed for any combination of PHYS 115, PHYS 118, PHYS 122, and PHYS 142. Prerequisite: a minimum grade of 2.5 in PHYS 141; and MATH 125 or MATH 134, either of which may be taken concurrently; recommended: high-school-level physics course. Offered: W.
Special Topics (2)
HONORS-prefix courses
HONORS 397 A: Natural History and Culture Museums in the 21st Century (SSc, W)
HONORS 397 A: Natural History and Culture Museums in the 21st Century (SSc, W)
SLN 15493 (View UW registration info »)
Office: Burke Museum, Room 203E, Box 353010
Phone: 206-221-7170
Email: freyma@uw.edu
Credits: 3
Limit: 20 students
Traditionally, natural history and culture museums have served both as a repository for collection objects, and as a place of exhibition, education, and engagement. Today, visitors are still captivated by these museum collections, drawn in by dinosaurs, whales, masks and canoes. However, most natural history and culture museums are able to share only a small fraction of their vast collections and their in-depth research. A key challenge is to connect visitors to museum collections, to share the relevance of museum research, and to make museums matter.
The aim of this seminar is to consider both the public faces (exhibit/education programs) and the behind-the-scene spaces (collections/research) of a modern natural history and culture museum. Students will examine first-hand the Burke Museum’s culture, biology, and paleontology collections, learn about current museum research, and evaluate existing museum exhibits. We will assess how these collections and their stories can be shared in creative and novel ways, and together, what they can teach us about our communities and ourselves.
The course will be hosted at the new Burke Museum, where students will engage with a variety of museum professionals and explore multiple collections. Assignments will include weekly course readings and discussions, two short papers, and a final group project. This seminar will be offered as CR/NC; grading will be based on participation (40%), written assignments (20%), and final presentation (40%).
HONORS 398 A: Calderwood Seminar in Public Writing: WRITING AND EDITING PAPERS ON CLASSICAL TOPICS INTENDED FOR A PUBLIC AUDIENCE (A&H, W)
HONORS 398 A: Calderwood Seminar in Public Writing: WRITING AND EDITING PAPERS ON CLASSICAL TOPICS INTENDED FOR A PUBLIC AUDIENCE (A&H, W)
SLN 22108 (View UW registration info »)
Email: jjc@uw.edu
Credits: 3
Limit: 5 students
Modern science and technology have so overwhelmed contemporary society that lost among the terabytes and google searches is a sense of our shared humanity, often threatened by the powers-that-be: wealthy oligarchs, powerful autocrats, brutal dictators, nationalistic institutions from whom the weak and the marginalized have no protection. Ancient Greek and Roman writers and thinkers observed first-hand the near impossibility of speaking to power. Their observations, demonstrate that nothing has changed except for technology, but they can help moderns see that, unless we learn from the past, we will continue to repeat mistakes. During the seminar, students will examine ancient texts—literary, historical and cinematic—with the goal of learning how to communicate what we observe among the texts in various forms of public writing with the following objectives:
- To develop an ability to write with greater clarity, concision, engagement and effectiveness and to acquire editorial skills that will help you achieve this goal.
- To reflect on what constitutes effective public writing and how such writing influences our perspectives.
- To gain a greater insight into what the humanities, in particular Classical antiquity, have to contribute to contemporary discussions of the difficulty of preserving our humanity in the face of political and technological power structures.