Utrecht University

This course examines the role of multinational corporations in history. It covers the economic and social contribution of big corporations to home and host countries; the damage the multinational corporations may have done to the world through their handling of natural resources and the environment; the contributions these companies may have made to inequality by their activities in the Global South; and how these huge and powerful organizations contribute to solve the ecological and social challenges we face today.

Upon completion of the course, students are able to …..

1.. understand and apply key concepts and ideas relating to food and nutrition from a social science/human geography approach.
2.. understand and analyze food issues from a relational perspective, in terms of both its geographical dimensions as well as systems thinking.
3.. understand food as a contested domain, and being able to identify and analyze major issues of social justice and sustainability relating to food.
4. reflect critically on social and geographical issues of food, and develop and communicate an informed argument about them (academic skills).
5. apply a set of specific analytical tools with respect to food and nutrition issues.   

 

This course provides an introduction to the basic principles and areas of application of public international law. The course consists of weekly lectures and interactive seminars designed to provide a solid understanding of the most important rules and principles of international law. Additionally, the course covers the place of international law within the international (legal) system. The course covers the most important topics in international law such as sources, subjects, jurisdiction and immunities, peaceful dispute settlement, collective security and the use of force, law of the sea, and environmental law by reviewing the basic rules and general principles and critically analyzing their application to contemporary problems in international relations.

This course offers an interdisciplinary perspective on influences on child and youth development. This course focuses on different societal issues related to child and youth development, such as the effects of being born preterm, minorities in classrooms, and vulnerability to substance abuse. This course provides a broad view on influences on child and youth development. In a series of lectures, experts from various disciplines discuss important findings of child research in their field (e.g., psychology, neuroscience, law, geography, animal models, philosophy, linguistics). Knowledge in integrated by discussing topical issues in child and youth development with other students during interdisciplinary working groups. Interdisciplinary knowledge is applied to a topic of choice by writing a literature review within a small group of students.

This course provides a survey of the conflict between literary creativity and control by society, in a wide historical, European context. A series of case studies on controversial texts and authors are discussed in connection with the regulations imposed to suppress or regulate the distribution of these works. Official secular and religious censorship, the development of copyright, and protests against “inflammatory”, “blasphemic”, or “amoral” texts are studied through authors like Erasmus, Montaigne, Vondel, Spinoza, Stuart Mill, Nabokov, and Rushdie who used literary strategies to avoid censorship and repression, such as the use of metaphor, humor, satire, or hiding their name.

This course is intended for students who have not taken any other courses in academic writing as this course provides the basic knowledge and skills required to produce written academic work in your field of study. Students learn to use the most important grammatical structures of English appropriately and expand their vocabulary and register required in formal academic writing in your subject. Some attention is paid to the mechanics of academic writing in English (structure, punctuation, referencing).