University College Dublin

This course introduces students to a variety of sociological debates that surround human body. It explores various theoretical perspectives of how we experience and live in our bodies , including theories by Foucault, Elias, Goffman, Judith Butler, and others. It focuses on the roles our bodies are prescribed to, or play in our everyday interactions, how they are socially constructed. The main topics of this course range from exploring the mind/body relationship, the historical accounts of how attitudes to our bodies have been changing, the politics of the body, including gender and racial inequalities, disabilities, medicalization, and commodification of bodies. Processes behind sexualization, ageing, and dying are also discussed.

This course provides an overview of key issues in the triangular intersection of gender, religion, and colonialism. While aiming to bring together the literature Western and non-Western contexts on these debates, the course introduces the students the key texts in feminist theory, feminist religious studies, masculinities and religion, and postcolonial and decolonial feminism from a critical interdisciplinary perspective.

In this course, students explore the intersection between land use planning and environmental sustainability within the context of urban and rural development. Through a multidisciplinary approach, students study the principles, theories, and practical applications necessary for promoting sustainable land use practices in contemporary settings. The course explores the factors influencing land use patterns and methodologies to assess the environmental impacts of land use decisions, including climate change, biodiversity, and natural resource impacts. Through international case studies and policy reviews, students compare existing land use policies and develop strategies for integrating sustainability principles into land use planning, while exploring strategies to engage diverse stakeholders for equitable and inclusive decision making.

This course is an introduction to meat science. The course covers meat in the context of the human diet, the structure and composition of meat, and meat quality attributes. The impact of pre-slaughter factors on carcass and meat composition and on the sensory and nutritional quality of meat are explored. The impact of post-mortem factors, including aging and packaging of meat, on meat quality attributes, particularly color, flavor and texture, are studied. Students learn how selected meat products are manufactured.

This course focuses on the processes associated with knowledge sharing and decisions for change by farmers. It explores the link between agricultural research, farm advisory services, and agricultural education as part of the Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation System (AKIS). It examines agricultural extension and education approaches for working with farmers/farm households to support learning, the adoption of innovation and behavior change. This is critically important for farm productivity, profitability, and sustainability. 

The course is intended to be a (non-exhaustive) survey of regression techniques from both a theoretical and applied perspective. Time permitting, the methods students study include: exploratory data analysis, simple linear regression; multiple linear regression; regression with categorical variables; regression with interaction terms; polynomial regression; model selection for multiple linear models; and regression diagnostics.

The course familiarizes students with core concepts and techniques used in farm financial management. It teaches students concepts that assist with appraisal of farm financial management performance and enable informed business decision making. Students study techniques and principles of farm business financial analysis, planning, and strategic decision-making. Topics include operational and strategic principles of farm business management; preparation and analysis of basic farm management accounts; application of farm planning techniques: enterprise, partial and whole farm budgets; farm financial control and cash flow budgeting; and assessment and management of risk in farm decision-making.

This course equips students with basic research and analytical skills that are needed to understand and respond to social policy problems. Its main focus is on statistical data available in online databases that are widely used to describe such problems and design policy solutions to them. Students learn about major relevant databases for Ireland and the EU and receive guidance and hands-on experience on how to access those databases, search through them for data on specific social policy topics, select and extract particular relevant indicators into Excel spreadsheets, present the data in graphs and tables, and write brief descriptive commentaries on what the data reveal. For illustrative purposes, the course focuses on unemployment as a representative social problem and concentrates on analyzing that problem and policy responses to it in Ireland and in the EU. A special focus is on the impact of Covid-19 on the labor market and its effects on employment and unemployment among younger cohorts in particular.

This course is for engineering students intending to focus in the area of environmental engineering. The course lays a foundation for more intensive courses in later stages by introducing concepts about, among other things, environmental ethics, engineering calculations, and the fundamental biological, chemical, and physical processes used in environmental engineering. Applications of these concepts to developing engineering solutions for several contemporary environmental problems are also examined.

In this course, students review the major groups of invertebrates which, apart from arthropods, account for most of the animal species on the planet. The course provides the tools for describing and understanding biodiversity and many of the species discussed play key ecological and economic roles. Students review classification of invertebrates into major groups and examine some of the extraordinary solutions they have developed to movement, feeding, sensing, and reproduction. Practical sessions illustrate the variety of invertebrate life and include a field trip to search for specimens on the shore. Key skills include scientific drawing and dissection and, above all, the skill of species identification, including classification, use of keys and guidebooks and taxonomic conventions.