National University of Singapore

The course introduces fundamentals of study in communications and new media, explores ways in which people create and use the variety of emerging networked, mobile, and social media channels to communicate meaning in a globalized world. It explores organizational and societal contexts in such areas as games, health, politics, business, public relations, design and activism, with attention paid to creating applications with social impact. Students explore phenomena such as relationships and social life in cyberspace, activism for social change, performance art, deviant behavior online, communication and community, new business paradigms and economic models of organizing and issues in human computer interaction.

Located within one of the global centers of biodiversity, Singapore is endowed with a rich natural heritage that is impacted by expanding urbanization. Development poses a great challenge to nature conservation and Singapore is an excellent model to study how a balance can be achieved. This course introduces the country's natural heritage, its historical, scientific and potential economic value; provides the opportunity to explore important habitats, and to think critically about the issues of sustainable development and the nation's responsibility to posterity and to regional and international conventions related to biodiversity conservation. Field practicals form the main component of the course and double-up effectively as tutorials. Guest speakers provide further enrichment on the challenges of conservation management in a densely-populated and highly urbanized city state. 

Cultures influence how sustainability issues are viewed and addressed in different contexts and situations. They determine the ways in which environmental, social, and economic considerations connect to sustainability and sustainable urban development. Success in our global sustainability efforts depends on our understanding of the underlying cultures and the connections between them, particularly in the face of urbanization. This coursre raises awareness of these issues and equips students with the critical thinking and collaborative decision-making skills necessary to find solutions to local and global problems of societal concern. Appropriate cross-cultural case studies will be discussed.

Shakespeare's plays have been known in many parts of Asia for about 100 years, and contemporary Asian theater practice shows at once a great diversity of approaches to them, and patterns of common interest in production and reception. This course takes recent productions from different theater cultures to compare how Shakespeare's texts are engaged through non-realist aesthetic principles, and how self-reflexive treatments of naturalism, as well as new scripts based on his plays, interact with the cultural values represented by Shakespeare in the East and Southeast Asian region. Assessment includes the option of a creative project. The course requires students to take prerequisites.