English

Development economics is a relatively new and unique field, emerging after post-World War II decolonization and is unique in certain aspects. This course covers the leading issues in economic development for social science students, promoting a balanced understanding based on theories and empirical research. Starting from a basic understanding of poverty, inequality and economic growth, this class focuses more on international issues that less developed economies face in present time, such as trade, foreign direct investment, balance of payment crisis, and structural adjustment, as well as other policy issues. 

This course focuses on the basic knowledge of biological phenomena and the principles underlying the life of all living organisms. It covers basic concepts of microbiology, plant biology and animal biology. 

This course stimulates critical thinking and personal development rather than providing clear-cut management recipes. The course covers management myths and realities, paradox thinking, organizational design, teams, learning, leadership, and corporate social responsibility.

The course introduces students to a range of contemporary critical theories and debates on the body and identity. Students explore the body as a site on which social constructions of difference are inscribed, as well as how these constructions can be challenged and resisted. Bodies are regulated and self-regulated, marginalized, oppressed, erased, owned, visualized, textualized, and designed. The body is not isolated; rather, it extends and connects with other bodies, practices, human and non-human entities, and technologies. The course also examines the ways in which digital developments are reshaping our understanding of our bodies and question what it means to be human.

This course builds students’ understanding of the causal mechanics underlying conflicts across a variety of settings and periods, the character of the violence in these conflicts, and the prospects for resolution. Drawing on major theoretical approaches to the explanation of violence, students apply these theoretical frameworks to an empirical examination of political violence in a range of periods and settings, including Rwanda, Sri Lanka, Syria, Ireland, Sierra Leone, and others. Students explore how and to what extent the major approaches in the scholarship explain the reality of conflict in different regional, cultural, and historical contexts.

This course is an introduction to finance. It starts by introducing the value of money, interest rates, and financial contracts, in particular, what are fair prices for contracts and why no one uses fair prices in real life. Then, there is a review of probability theory followed by an introduction to financial markets in discrete time. In discrete time, students learn how the ideas of fair pricing apply to price contracts commonly found in stock exchanges. The next block focuses on continuous time finance and contains an introduction to the basic ideas of Stochastic calculus.

This course discusses and develops critical social-scientific perspectives on citizenship, belonging, and difference in contemporary, late-capitalist societies. In a world characterized by flux and the transgression of geographic and symbolic boundaries, a great deal of effort is invested in fixing and freezing identities and controlling and regulating borders. This dialectic of flow and closure is examined from a critical perspective that places contemporary social and cultural dynamics in the historical context of the rise of modern capitalism and nationalism while taking into account 19th and 20th-century experiences of colonialism, authoritarianism, and fascism. The first part of the course focuses on theories of modernity, citizenship, and differences in the political and social sciences, political philosophy, and the humanities. In the second part, several contemporary issues, including (the rise of) new forms of nationalism and the far right; debates about religious diversity and secularism; gender and sexuality; race and racism; and the transformation & politics of identity in neoliberal societies are the focus. The course brings together perspectives from various fields, while especially focusing on perspectives from the global south and from (relatively) marginalized academic fields, like queer studies, critical race perspectives, and postcolonial studies. Students develop and undertake a small research project on identity, based on which they write a final paper.

This course introduces students to a selection of independent American films which are frequently overlooked by the dominant histories of American cinema. The films selected are chosen from a diverse range of American filmmakers from the 1960s to the present, and the course therefore hopes to provide an account of American film which reaches beyond the dominant Hollywood model. This leads to consideration of the divisions in American society and how these can be perceived through the work of independent filmmakers. 

The mythologically masculine figure of the creative genius has often been employed to minimize and excuse violence against marginalized people. In exchange for great art, audiences might be more than willing to look the other way when women, people of color, queer people and children get hurt. With the arrival of social media, the violent price of art by monstrous men has become harder to ignore. Their crimes are all over the internet. When knowledge of the wrongdoings by artists spread, it becomes challenging for fans to ignore the reprehensible behavior of people like Michael Jackson, Roman Polanski, Louis CK, Woody Allen, Bill Cosby, Kevin Spacey and R. Kelly. In this course, we reflect on the dilemma this leaves for audiences: How do we deal with great art made by horrible people? Students will learn how to make use of an intersectional feminist toolbox to engage with questions like: -- Does art have to be moral? -- Can we separate art from artist? Is this dependent on the medium? -- Is the audience complicit or culpable if they continue consuming the work created by monstrous men? -- How does the art by monstrous men play into discussions around individual taste and political identity as shaped by cultural consumption? -- What do strategies of ethical cultural consumption look like? -- Can we have harmless, morally sound cultural products in patriarchal, white supremacist capitalism? -- What is “woke capitalism” and does canceling culture ever work? -- What do accountability and consequences look like? -- Can monstrous men redeem themselves through confessions, apologies and contrition?

The course focuses on prejudice, discrimination, and intergroup relations. In particular, it discussed how the majority group reacts to minority groups in society. How prejudices develop, for instance, how negative attitudes follow from threats to people's identities, or their belongings are studied. The consequences of prejudices for intergroup interactions and, in particular, which political decisions are made, and which policies are implemented are examined. A special focus is on approaches to reduce prejudice and foster the cohesion of majority and minority groups in society. Attention to paid to existing prejudice toward other social groups such as religious or sexual minorities.