Course Catalog

Examines the Allied partition of Berlin, the politics of the Cold War, the Berlin Air Lift, the emergence of two German states, the division by the Berlin Wall, and the reemergence of a unified city in a new Germany. Films, drama, and novels trace the historical development of the city. Includes a study trip to Berlin.

Seeks to understand how Paris elucidates the history of France by following its history from its origins to the present. The site of religious and political revolution, Paris testifies to the trials and glories of French history.

Studies Vienna's culture and Austria's history against a background of spatial transformations from Baroque palaces to the historicist style of the Ringstrasse and the modernist architecture of Wagner and Loos. Investigates building styles, paintings, novels, memoirs, music and films to document the city's development. Some readings are: Freud, Roth, Schnitzler, Zweig. Includes a study trip to Vienna.

Traces the development of Edinburgh from the Act of Union with England (1707) to the present, through architecture, philosophy, religion, cultural history, literature, and film. Links the city to Scotland's attempt to define its identity and achieve greater political autonomy. Some authors studied include David Hume, Adam Smith, Irvine Welsh. Includes a study trip to Edinburgh.

Surveys the history of urban form in the predominantly Muslim cities of the Middle East and North Africa. Students will study the relationship between urban morphology and society, practices of sacred space, and the interplay of power, belief, and architectural form. Also covered are the politics behind the forms now seen as the defining features of Islamic building and the question of the image in Islamic building. On a contemporary note, students will explore the symbolic politics of the Muslim built heritage and examine the extreme conditions facing many Middle Eastern urban populations today. Includes a Study Trip. Please note that an additional fee will be charged for this course.

Offers a detailed investigation of The Divine Comedy. Traces Dante's development in several related areas (love, mysticism, allegory, poetics, politics) and his affinity with other key cultural figures (Virgil, St. Augustine, St. Bernard, St. Thomas, Boccaccio). Includes an overview of medieval history.

In the Age of the Enlightenment, the classification and organization of facts and objects gave birth to the concept of the modern 'museum'. This course investigates the construction and communication of national, cultural, and community identities through the medium of the contemporary museum, where material culture is exhibited to express narratives that evoke particular definitions and interpretations of history and values.

Explores the work of Anglo-American modernist writers in Paris, concentrating on the works of Ernest Hemingway, Wyndham Lewis, Gertrude Stein, Djuna Barnes, Jean Rhys, and other writers. Relates their formal experimentation to the visual arts and to the psychic dynamics of exile: the experience of liberation from the constraints of one culture and an alienated relation to the new environment.

Presents an anthropological approach to the study of cities, providing students with theoretical and methodological tools to think critically about the meaning of urban life today. Approaches this topic from a cross-cultural perspective, with a number of readings focusing on Paris in particular. Students will undertake a Paris-based qualitative research project during the course of the semester.

How do contemporary films make meaning? How does cinematic language convey emotion and raise ideas? how do we, as contemporary spectators, relate to and make sense of the screen? This course, while centered on contemporary films, is an introduction to cinematic language, its techniques, and the social and cultural factors that have made it one of the most influential art forms of our time. Looking at international films from just the last 20 years, we will explore and discover the ways these films creatively explore ideas and look at the technological, economic and political forces that fuel their production. Together with readings and screenings, individual and group assignments will help students deepen their understanding of lectures, readings and films and develop new critical skills and aesthetic understanding.