McGill University

This course offers a broad overview of the trajectory of politics, society, and economic development in Africa. The course provides an analysis of the role that pre-colonial and colonial legacies have played in shaping the formation and consolidation of particular forms of political rule in Africa. Students learn the evolution of state-society relations to explain both the persistence of authoritarianism as well as the transition to political liberalization in a number of African countries.

This courses focuses on the biological underpinnings of human social cognition and behavior, including neural, hormonal, and genetic mechanisms. It integrates multiple levels of analysis (biological, psychological), as well as different perspectives (basic, clinical, applied) to understand classic social psychological processes. Topics include: social cognition/theory of mind; empathy and understanding others; cooperation and prosocial behavior; interpersonal relationships; the self/agency; morality; anti-social behavior. Finally this course discusses basic methodological approaches to the study of social neuroscience and emerging issues in the field.

This course offers an examination of the functions of visual culture in merchant capitalist society, and the changing status of art, artists, and patrons after the Protestant reformation. A wide range of visual imagery (from Rembrandt and Vermeer to popular culture) is linked with 17th-century economic, historic, religious, colonial, scientific, and literary developments.

Philosophy can be seen as a search for wisdom, a quest for better understanding of ourselves, the world, and the best ways to live. This course examines how this idea is carried out in three of the world's major philosophical traditions, in classical Greece, China, and India. However, these ideas are not merely historical curiosities; they are alive and meaningful in our world today. Students read works by recent and contemporary philosophers who are responding to these ancient ideas and are in a dialogue with them. The course discusses topics including life, truth, and lies; the concepts of I, thou, and we; law and justice; self; and recent philosophy.

This course offers a general introduction to linguistics, the scientific study of human language. Topics include: phonetics; phonology; morphology; syntax; semantics; sociolinguistics; pragmatics; historical linguistics; linguistic variation; language acquisition.

This course is an introduction to particle physics. Students are required to have an academic background in quantum mechanics and special relativity as a prerequisite. The course emphasizes phenomenology within the standard model of particle physics. The course discusses topics including an overview of the standard model and fundamental forces; continuous and discrete symmetries, and elementary group theory; special relativity; quarkonium and baryonic bound states; Feynman rules, decay rates, and cross sections; Dirac equation and Feynman rules for quantum electrodynamics; weak interaction decay rates; and neutrino oscillations, and solar and atmospheric neutrinos.

This course offers a study of sets, functions, mappings, and relations; groups, subgroups, cyclic groups, and cosets; homomorphism and isomorphism; group actions on sets; methods of proof; complex numbers; divisibility theory for integers and modular arithmetic; divisibility theory for polynomials; rings, ideals, and quotient rings; and fields and construction of fields from polynomial rings.

This course explores the nature of existentialist thought as represented in various philosophical and literary texts. The course examines themes including freedom, alienation, responsibility and choice, and the nature of self.