English

This course interrogates the intersection of environmental studies with ethical and political theories of justice. It engages with issues of environmental justice and injustice on a global scale and provides special consideration to the intersecting dimensions of race, ethnicity, class, and gender as well as global economic inequality and settler colonialism. An important dimension of the course is learning about the understandings of environment and claims to justice mobilized by social movements seeking to address environmental injustice. Beginning with an introduction to theories of environment, justice, and scientific knowledge production and continuing with an investigation of themes in environmental in/justice, the course considers how capital flows and the distribution of power shape who has access to the necessities of life and to clean environments and who does not, and how the world itself is being radically altered by human action. Finally, it considers what ethical and political obligations humans may have to more-than-human beings, and how the struggle to protect these beings is often tied up with the social justice struggles of marginalized human groups. The course continually returns to the question of how plural understandings of justice and the environment underwrite or challenge environmental destruction and socio-economic inequality and examines the social movements locally and globally that are challenging and, in some cases, transforming such inequality. Through readings, in-class discussions, guest lectures, selected films and documentaries, and a final project, students reflect critically on the root causes of the uneven distribution of the basic resources necessary for life.

Surveying is fundamental in civil and environmental engineering. This course covers geo-spatial measurements of common civil and environmental engineering projects; the types of instruments, techniques and detailed procedures used for making geospatial measurements in a field environment; the techniques involved in collecting, processing and plotting the types of geospatial data necessary for constructing engineering-scale maps; spatial reference frameworks; and effective approaches to setting up and presenting solutions of positioning/location problems.

This course provides a holistic understanding of conflict and of how and why it occurs from the intrapersonal level to the international level. It introduces concepts and techniques related to the negotiation process as well as examines negotiation pitfalls, preparation, fixed-pie and mixed motive perceptions, distributive and integrative negotiations, negotiation styles, ethics, and key issues.

This course explores the philosophical, cultural, and political aspects of the growing polarization between secular and religious communities in Israel and other Western democracies, and examines prospects for a constructive dialogue between seemingly opposed worldviews. The course includes visits to religious and secular communities and organizations in Israel.

This course introduces Korean literature in English translation and explores the relationship between Korean literature and world literature. The first half of the semester is devoted to pre-modern texts, including prose fiction, essays, and poems with an emphasis on Buddhism and Confucianism. The second half of the course examines short stories and poems of the 1920's through the 1980's against the backdrop of the Japanese colonization and the Korean War.

This interdisciplinary course discusses the identities of nations in European space that have served as a crossroad of ideas and ideologies, as well as wars and totalitarian regimes. The course covers masterpieces of Russian, Hungarian, German, French, Georgian, Polish, and Czech cinematography, focusing on several crucial periods of history, in particular WWII, its aftermath, and the Stalinist years. Students are exposed to often controversial works of film art focusing on the moral dilemmas of individuals under the stressful times of history. Students map the European space through the means of film, analyzing the individual’s approach to historical events, and gain a general picture of Europe in its crucial periods of history. Students participate in open discussion sessions following each screening.