University College Dublin

This course introduces students to documentary film from a range of historical, aesthetic, and theoretical perspectives. Students examine a selection of key films and learn to correlate issues of form, ethics, and representation across eras as appropriate. Critical readings from leading writers in the field including Bill Nichols, Brian Winston, and Betsy McClane are examined.

This course provides an introduction to different aspects of trees and forestry in Ireland and worldwide. The first component is the basics of dendrology (tree species identification). It covers the theoretical concepts of identifying trees, along with the terminology associated with this. The general characteristics of a number of different tree genera and the specific qualities of a limited number of individual tree species are also covered. The second component introduces several aspects of forestry, including the basic theory of timber mensuration (tree and timber measurement) and the equipment and methodologies employed in measuring trees and timber; the main characteristics of the major forest biomes, the history of forests and forestry development (in Ireland and abroad), the pattern of tree growth, forest harvesting, and the relevance of forests and trees in the global carbon cycle.

This course is for students who already have an intermediate level of Spanish. Students develop communicative competence in a wide range of situations including more specialized topics. The course focuses on a broad range of contemporary themes and issues. Emphasis is placed on communication and comprehension skills as well as written communication, vocabulary building, and grammar review. Themes are introduced to develop an understanding of the culture and society of contemporary Spain. This course is delivered via small group teaching.

This course examines the developments that take place in French art from the mid-19th century until the turn of the 20th century. At a time when France was the focus of artistic innovation, the course focuses on developments there, with topics including the defiant realism of Gustave Courbet, Edouard Manet's paintings of modern Paris, the world of the Impressionist painters, and the individualism of Post-Impressionist artists such as Vincent van Gogh and Paul Cezanne. In addition to examining artists and art movements, other considerations include the significance of display in the context of temporary exhibitions; Great Exhibitions and museums; the influence of new art forms such as photography and non-Western art; the impact of urban expansion and industrialization; and the role of patronage.

With the rise in environmental concerns and the concepts of sustainable development in public policy at both European Union and national level, interest in regional and urban planning currently enjoys an unprecedented high profile. This course introduces key concepts related to regional and urban planning theory and practice. It presents a series of key topics in regional and urban planning, including sustainable urban growth; rural development; built and natural heritage, information, and communication technology; and public participation in planning. It explores the evolution of modern planning practice and the emergence of modern planning systems and their associated policies, including the Irish political and administrative framework and planning system. The other national systems and international practices are also noted, with European context and spatial planning providing the most relevant reference. Various planning policies and their implementation in practice are also explored and evaluated in the areas of housing, transport, urban design, environment, and community development.

This course develops students' knowledge of French beyond an elementary level of competence. While the four skills of speaking, listening, reading, and writing are covered, there is particular emphasis on improving oral and aural competence and extending vocabulary. The course deepens awareness and understanding of French society and culture. This course is delivered via small group teaching with classes having a maximum of 18 students. Students also have access to extra resources and materials via Moodle, the ALC's Virtual Learning Environment.

This course analyzes, at both a practical and theoretical level, the process of investment in financial markets. It introduces students to the various types of financial instruments in common use and to the economic theories that explain how they are priced. The types of securities considered include interest-bearing securities, equities, and derivatives (options, futures, etc.). The course first explores how financial markets operate and how securities are bought and sold. The trade-off between higher returns and more "risky" pay-offs is then discussed. The problem of determining an optimal investment strategy, given beliefs about the probability distribution of returns, is also addressed. Other issues considered include the informational efficiency of financial markets and the relative usefulness of fundamental analysis and technical analysis in predicting price movements.

This course provides students with an overview of anthropology, with an especial focus on cultural/social anthropology. Students examine the development of key concepts in the discipline, such as kinship and social organization, and ask what it means to think anthropologically. This includes considering how the development of human societies relates to other models of change, such as Darwinian evolutionary theory; whether there are universal features of human societies; and how one makes comparisons between different ways of understanding the world.

In this course, students gain a basic knowledge of inorganic chemistry. This includes a discussion of different types of molecular and solid state bonding, geometrical and steric considerations, and an introduction to the distribution of electron density and oxidation states. The solid state part of this course describes the structures of A, AB, AB2, and AB3 compounds and metallic, ionic, and covalent bonding in solid materials. In addition, X-ray diffraction as the key method of investigating the solid state experimentally is introduced. Trends across the periodic table are highlighted, and examples cited to illustrate the relevance of these concepts to applied fields, such as solar cells, batteries, and self-assembly.

This course introduces and discusses the key principles and concepts in computational social science (CSS). Some of the main approaches in the field are introduced beginning with a historical background to the main developments, up to and including an introduction to the most recent developments and applications of the methodological approaches discussed. In particular, this course provides the student with an overview of four main areas in the CSS field: automated social information extraction, social network analysis, social complexity theory, and social simulation modeling. Where possible the discussion of topics in this course are enhanced by presentation and discussion of some empirical examples and applications from industry, NGOs, and the public sector.