English

The course conveys an understanding of the internal structure and implementation of digital computers. To impart this knowledge, we first explain how the interface between hardware and software is typically constructed. In addition to explaining the interface between hardware and software, this course introduces the ideas behind the hardware implementation of a processor. This course includes a brief introduction to the C programming language, which is widely used as a systems programming language.

This course explored and analyzes major institutions, actors, and trends in contemporary French and European Media and attempts to situate them in the larger contexts of “unifying” Europe and “globalized” world-media-scene. Students examine the operational schemes, performances, and internal decisional and power structures of different branches of French media: print national & regional press, specialized magazines, the publishing industry, advertising, radio, television, and the Internet. The course attempts a specific analysis regarding the international and French implications of the growing potential of social networks and “New Media.” Students review aspects of the growing confusion –both in terms of competition and compatibility—between “new” and “old” media and their political, social, and cultural impacts. In the domain of social and political presence students study and question practices of newsgathering, deontological principles and constraints, media performance under pressure of time, context, profit-making-structures, politics, violence, ethics, and ideologies. The course examines forms and styles of “information,” editorial policies and the variety of notions of “Democratic pluralism” and “freedom of expression” across the French and European Media landscapes. We will try to define, decode, and interpret distinctions between “news,” “commentary,” and “analysis” as they are being treated on the French and European media scenes. The course analyzes what all these may mean, encourage, cultivate, or block in terms of politics, society, culture, and media during “high times” of political turmoil, violent crisis, or social unrest. In the domain of entertainment and “services” offered by the Media, students examine different variations of publishing, broadcasting, and “accompanying” practices over the last 20-30 years. We may attempt a parallel analysis of possible interaction between these two domains (News/Entertainment), following political and ideological lines and some study of the dynamics of change along the ambitions, the strategies and the priorities of the media industries alongside “public demand.”

This course introduces the history of the modern Middle East from the nineteenth century to the start of the Arab Spring in 2010. Since the 600s C.E., the Middle East has been the heartland of Muslim peoples and empires. Along with other religious communities (Christian, Jewish, Zoroastrian) and a variety of ethno-linguistic groups (Arab, Persian, Turkish, Kurdish, Berber, Azeri), the Middle East constituted one of humankind’s critical intersections between religions and cultures. This course addresses a number of important themes in the lives of Middle Easterners in the past and provides the vital tools and skills to conduct such an investigation. More broadly, the course examines how Middle Easterners have engaged with and contribute to modernity; how traditions and customs has helped them shape and understand the world around them; and how individuals have related to society and state. The Middle East has played vital roles in international affairs today. While the study of contemporary politics is important, this is a history class and it focuses on the past that led to the present.

The first objective of the course is to explore and understand the storytelling epic, the symbolic imaginaries, and the ideological architectures of media events, both planned and unplanned. The specific focus on the recent "trauma television," the coverage of dramatic moments in human and medium history will provide students a further direct-experience based occasion to develop a critical and meaning creation oriented approach towards the medium. The final goal is to let students appreciate how television works, how it’s able to take a precise picture of constitutive parameters, problematic conjunctions, practices, moods, and contradictions of society, and why it still plays such a strategic role in social, cultural, and political issues in national and international contexts. The course main subject is essentially the relation of reciprocal influence between television and society. Built on a solid critical basis, mostly linked to cultural studies, sociology and journalism theories, the course is designed under the theoretical umbrella of the most important medium scholars, from McLuhan to Beaudrillard, and from Kellner to Dayan and Katz. The course discusses topics including television communication in general, its main theories, its complex spectrum of meanings, its storytelling processes, and its numerous social implications; the media events field, with ritual planned events (typically contests, conquests, coronations) and disruptive unplanned ones (disaster, terror, and war); and the "trauma television" of the last two years that is putting unexpected events in the television central stage as never before, even in some cases questioning their very notion – specifically the pandemic, the Capitol Hill riots, the various natural disasters caused by the climate change, and the Taliban takeover of Aghanistan – ground-breaking examples of the link between medium, contemporary history and our everyday life.

This course explores the global impact of economic phenomenon and social change in the advanced economies from the First World War to the present day. It introduces students to major themes including the causes of economic growth and recession, the sources of social change, and the impact of war on society and the economy in an international framework. The course charts the crises of the inter-war period: the Great Depression, mass unemployment, and the rise of fascism and communism, as well as the development of mass leisure and the growth of a consumer society. The course also explores the prolonged boom following the Second World War, a time of conspicuous consumption but also of commitment to social welfare, both of which fueled the sexual revolution and youth culture across national borders. The course then explores the impact of globalization following the oil crisis of 1973 and subsequent instability, and looks at developing nations and environmental concerns in the later decades of the 20th century. The emphasis on contemporary and international history enables students to understand the experience of their own society and economy more fully in the light of global and long-term trends. 

This course offers students an introduction to two key dimensions of globalization: international trade and international finance. The course covers both theoretical and empirical contributions and often refers to current policy issues in both international trade and macroeconomics. Using theoretical and empirical tools, students consider a wide range of topics such as: gains of specialization; effect of trade on inequality; market power effects on international trade; consequences of trade policy; international financial flows; relation between exchange rates and monetary policy; globalization impacts on macroeconomics policies; euro currency area; and international financial crises. Prerequisite for this course is a first year economics course. The course uses basic mathematical tools that are common in any economics course.

After completing this course students are able to:
 

• judge different energy scenarios and their potential to contribute to a sustainable future.
• work with numbers, units, and diagrams to come to arguments for and against different energy systems.
• gain a basic understanding of the role of the natural sciences in society while focussing on the numerous applications in energy technology, climatology and sustainability.
• think critically about the positive and negative influences of chemistry and physics on society.

Content

After completing this course students are able to:
 

• judge different energy scenarios and their potential to contribute to a sustainable future.
• work with numbers, units, and diagrams to come to arguments for and against different energy systems.
• gain a basic understanding of the role of the natural sciences in society while focussing on the numerous applications in energy technology, climatology and sustainability.
• think critically about the positive and negative influences of chemistry and physics on society.

Content