English

This course examines the role of gender in Western political theory and the implications for the practice of politics.

This course examines how optimization principles are of undisputed importance in modern design and system operation and illustrates how algorithms can be designed from mathematical theories for solving optimization problems. Topics include fundamentals, unconstrained optimization: one-dimensional search, Newton-Raphson method, gradient method, constrained optimization: Lagrangian multipliers method, Karush-Kuhn-Tucker optimality conditions, Lagrangian duality and saddle point optimality conditions, and convex programming: Frank-Wolfe method. The course requires students to take prerequisites.

This course explores basic concepts of cognitive linguistics and their application to the analysis of the English language. It examines the structure of English through the study of linguistic conceptualization and basic results of cognitive science.

This course examines the fundamentals of photonic technologies, and how these technologies are applied to and influence daily life. Topics include how photonics contributes to the fundamental platform for nanotechnology, green energy, home entertainment, data storage, sensing, imaging, biomedical healthcare, and modern optical communications. This course is intended for students with various engineering backgrounds (e.g. electrical, electronic, chemical, biological, mechanical, civil, aerospace, etc.) to learn the impact of photonics in fields ranging from nanotechnology to communications at a fundamental level rather than a mathematical-based formulated course. 

This course examines the psychological dimensions of prominent literary texts and looks at the complex relationship between literature and psychology from a broad range of perspectives. Students will read a range of literary texts with a view to understanding—both analytically and empathetically—problems and adaptations, focusing particularly on trauma in its various manifestations. Further, instead of simply considering the resulting post-traumatic "pathologies" the property of individuals, the course adopts a psychosocial lens to emphasise the broader social dimensions underpinning maladaptive psychological formations, as well as their (frequently unconscious) transgenerational transmission. It concludes with a reflection on the little or big "madnesses" that may lie hidden within the very fabric of what is considered to be "sane" and "normal" in Western society.

This course examines the fundamental processes in the marine environment with an emphasis on interdisciplinary linkages in the functioning of marine ecosystems. Topics include: the role of fluid dynamics in the lives of marine animals and in shaping the physical marine environment, and interdisciplinary studies of marine ecosystems.

This course deepens understanding of Singapore history through an examination of different representations of history: academic scholarship, social memory and oral history, heritage. Each section incorporates fundamental concepts and debates behind the production of history, together with the application of these ideas to specific Singapore case studies. At the end of the course, students will be able to critically analyze Singapore history as a whole in terms of historiography and heritage studies, whilst gaining familiarity with the treatment of key issues in Singapore's past.

The course is designed to expose students to different styles of qualitative and mixed methods research including, among many others, comparative case studies; process tracing and historical methods; interpretive and discursive methods; social network analyses, and natural experiments. The course uses practical sessions to help students prepare their own research design into an important and real-world question of their own choosing. Participants present their research designs in the final two weeks of the class and receive feedback from their peers.

The course is divided into three parts. The first introduces the fundamentals of positivist and interpretative qualitative methods. The next investigates case selection, mixed method, and causal inference. The third considers more specific techniques including the practical considerations involved in collecting primary materials, considering logics of historical process, and designing social experiments.

This course familiarizes students with the fundamental techniques of linear algebra so that they can eventually master the "diagonalisation" of square matrices, which is one of the most important subjects in linear algebra. Upon completion, students understand the basic notions of linear algebra, such as matrices, determinants, eigenvalues, eigenvectors and diagonalisation, projections, and others, and be able to apply these techniques in various cases.

This introductory course on intelligent robots and systems is at the intersection of machine learning, artificial intelligence, computer vision and control theory. Students learn the fundamentals of developing systems which can sense, plan and act in the world based on various topics from the domains. Emphasis is on algorithm design, probabilistic reasoning, decision making under uncertainty and learning to improve behaviors using data. The course requires students to take prerequisites.