Interdisciplinary Courses

Description
Course Descriptions

Interdisciplinary Courses (INT)
Humanities Courses (HUM)
Natural Sciences and Math Courses (NSCM)
Social Science Courses (SSC)

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Description

Interdisciplinary courses are designed to provide students with the opportunity to link disciplines within the liberal arts as they engage in the in-depth investigation and analysis of special topics. These courses are organized as follows:

Interdisciplinary (INT) courses involve study across disciplines. Such courses challenge the student to engage in an in-depth analysis of content within the context of the connection of seemingly diverse and separate disciplines such as art and science. Courses offered under the INT designation are often Seminar II courses for the Foundation for Leadership Curriculum and are offered in a seminar format. Listings follow and are also noted in various program sections.

Humanities (HUM) courses are offered by faculty in arts and humanities disciplines, including art, English, language and cultural studies, history, international studies, music, philosophy, theology, and women's studies.

Natural Science and Math (NCSM) courses are offered by faculty in the natural sciences and mathematics. These courses are a combination of any of the following: biology, chemistry, environmental science, mathematics, and physics.

Social Science (SSC) courses are offered by the faculty in the social sciences. These courses are a combination of the following disciplines: communication, economics, international studies, political science, public affairs, psychology, sociology, and women's studies, as well as business and education.

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Course Descriptions

Interdisciplinary Courses (INT)

INT 105 Critical Reading, Writing, and Thinking
Explores strategies for increasing critical reading, writing, thinking, and language skills. Topics will include the reading process, identifying arguments, reading across the disciplines, definitions, fallacies, identifying assumptions, making inferences, point of view, analogy, inductive reasoning, deductive reasoning, and the evaluation of putative knowledge for research. The course will focus on developing higher-level thinking skills, including analytical and critical thinking, and evaluation and synthesis of written information.
3 credits

INT 115 First-Year Seminar
Offers students the opportunity to confront both old and new ideas and issues in the context of multidisciplinary methodologies. Required of all first-year students.
3 credits
FLC Seminar I

INT 201 Instruction in Effective Peer Tutoring
Introduces students to tutoring techniques, learning methodologies, and study strategies. It provides students with an opportunity to tutor their peers for five to ten hours per week while earning reasonable pay.
3 credits

INT 202 Social Inequality and Social Action
Approaches economic inequality from sociological and theoretical perspectives. A unique feature of this course is an experiential component that will integrate theoretical perspectives into grass roots social action.
3 credits

INT 205 Effective Peer Mentoring
Designed specifically for Future Focus Peer Mentors, this course introduces students to effective mentoring techniques, student development theory, and leadership techniques. Students are challenged to critically evaluate these techniques and determine which aspects will shape their developing mentoring methods. The course is also designed to provide students with the knowledge and skills to become effective peer mentors and planners by employing student development theory and effective communication methods.
3 credits

INT 300 TELL Seminar
Encourages students to reflect on life experiences that have expanded their knowledge, skills, and awareness. Students will identify, analyze, and develop writing skills to document experiences that equate to college-level learning and produce a portfolio that demonstrates learning outcomes from personal and professional experiences as applications of their knowledge.
3 credits
Prerequisites: ENG 107 and completion of 12 credits at Trinity College; students must have extensive work, volunteer, or community service experience

INT 333 Culture and Society in Mexico
Invites students to a rewarding journey through the past and into the present of that extraordinary place we now call Mexico, aiming to understand the historical and cultural forces that have shaped - and still shape - the Mexican nation.  Starting with the Olmec civilization (1200-300 B.C.) we'll travel together to the magic of the Mayas and the power of the Aztecs until the fall of their empire (1521), learning about the three centuries of the richest viceroyalty that ever existed.  Attention will be paid to the philosophy behind the conquest and to the birth of human rights in the Americas.  After completing our way to the foundations of modern Mexico, we'll be able to better understand the struggles and glories of this vibrant culture.  Oral presentations and class discussions will further develop students' communication skills, in addition to contributing to a shared learning experience.  Written papers will be an opportunity for students to identify, analyze, reflect and express the knowledge acquired on the different topics presented and assigned.
Prerequisites:  English 107 or equivalent
3 credits

INT 340 Understanding AIDS: Interdisciplinary Seminar
Provides students with a multi-dimensional approach to understanding AIDS. The course examines AIDS as a social construct utilizing Writing Across the Curriculum and cooperative learning techniques to build an interdisciplinary knowledge of AIDS. 
3 credits
FLC Seminar II

INT 342 Women and Work: An Economic and Theological Perspective
Examines the literature on economics and theology on topics crucial to women at work, including employment status, pay equity, childcare, job trends, work ethic, welfare, and international working conditions.
3 credits

INT 373A Culture and Society in Latin America
Fosters a more precise understanding of those with whom we share this hemisphere, reconsiders accepted assumptions, and challenges the images that have shaped them. This course will orient students to gain insight into the future of the nations of the Americas, and the impact they will have on the rest of the world in the coming years. May be repeated as topic changes.
3 credits
FLC Seminar II

INT 373B Culture and Society in the Caribbean
Emphasizes cultural commonalities without neglecting political chronology but with the history traced from a defined Caribbean and Latin American perspective. Text from contemporary authors may include literary works by Jamaica Kincaid, Julia Alvarez, and Edwige Danticat among others. Class presentations, films, and discussions will also deal with the review of the political factors that infiltrate on the social and economic structures.
3 credits
FLC Seminar II

INT 407 Human Rights in the Americas - Special Topics: Women and Children Rights
Focuses on domestic violence and its relationship to social violence, seeking to raise awareness and calling for leadership within families and communities as they constitute the cradle of respect for the rights of children and women and where the protection of those rights are born. Offers a basic multidisciplinary perspective from educators, economists, international organizations, legislators and policy-makers, as well as from popular writers of fiction. A program of guest speakers will be an integral part of the course.
3 credits

INT 412 Executive Women in Government
Examines social change strategies and the impact of women's organizations in bringing about societal change in an in-depth, independent study seminar. By analyzing archival documents of the Executive Women in Government, students will construct a case study of how one organization uses their knowledge of the public policy process and intervention strategies to break the "glass ceiling."
3 credits
Prerequisite: Junior standing 

INT 415 Seminar on Death and Dying
Explores the interdisciplinary and cross-cultural meaning and experience of death, including its religious and moral interpretation, as well as the technological and social dimensions of the experience. Students take a central role in conducting the seminar. 
3 credits
FLC Seminar II 
Core IV 

INT 420 Philosophy and Public Policy
Surveys topics at the intersection of ethics and economics, focusing on the impact of economic and social factors on the formation of policy. Students take a central role in conducting the seminar. 
3 credits
FLC Seminar II

Humanities Courses (HUM)

HUM 300 Women in Love: Novel in Europe and the Americas
Analyzes the social construction of gender and gender roles in the contexts of marriage and heterosexual and lesbian relationships as explored in the 19th and 20th century novels drawn from canonical and non-canonical literature and film produced in Europe and the Americas. Representative readings may include such works as Flaubert's Madame Bovary, Bombal's Shrouded Woman, Minot's Evening, and Esquivel's Like Water for Chocolate.
3 credits
FLC Seminar II 

HUM 304 The American Musical on Film: Song and Narrative
Examines the filmed versions of selected American musicals, paying particular attention to the interaction between story and song. Explores the transition from stage to screen during the golden age of Broadway and Hollywood musicals. Films to be studied include Grease, West Side Story, and The Wiz. 
3 credits
Core V  
FLC Seminar II

HUM 330 Cultural History and Literature: Ancient Near East and Greece
Introduces the student to the cultural life and history of the ancient Mediterranean, with a specific focus on ancient Greece. The period of study ranges from the seventh to the fourth century B.C. and will explore Greek drama, Homer's Iliad, Herodotus' account of the Greek and Persian wars, and works of modern scholarship regarding women during this ancient period.
3 credits
FLC Seminar II
Core IV 

HUM 331 Cultural History and Literature: Rome and Early Christianity
Explores the cultural life and history of the ancient Mediterranean, with a specific focus on ancient Rome. The period of study ranges from the seventh century B.C. to the fourth century A.D. and will span the Roman Republic, the period during which Rome was founded and grew, through the Roman Empire, when Rome perfected the methods of vast governmental administration and cultural domination and eventually collapsed under its own affluence.
3 credits

HUM 350 Medieval Moment: Age of Cathedrals
Explores the period in which medieval culture reached its highest development the 12th and 13th centuries through an examination of texts drawn from a wide variety of disciplinary fields, including philosophy, literature, history, art, and theology. Topics include life in a medieval university, the scholastic mentality, the mystical vision, the iconography of Gothic sculpture and stained glass, relics and pilgrimage, the economics of cathedral-building, light metaphysics, developments in architectural technique, and the high medieval view of the natural world.
3 credits
FLC Seminar II

HUM 381 Victorian Studies
Discusses the art, literature, history, politics, and society of Victorian England within the context of their own time, as well as their effect on future generations. 
3 credits
FLC Seminar II

Natural Science and Math (NSCM)

NSCM 499 Divisional Seminar
Examines selected topics in the natural sciences. Requires written and oral presentations based on reading and analysis of the current scientific literature.
3 credits

Social Sciences Courses (SSC)

SSC 201 Documentary Film
Explores the history and craft of documentary film making. Special attention is paid to the political and social issues dealt with in documentary film and whether they have the power to be a vehicle of change.
3 credits

SSC 300 Politics and Film
Investigates the intersection of film with political institutions, processes and behaviors. It examines the portrayal of politics on film and the contributions film makes to our understanding and opinion of politics and society. Through weekly readings and screening the course invites students to see film politically.
3 credits

SSC 317 The Cold War and Its Legacies
Examines the Cold War, the world order that it created, and its enduring effects on contemporary international issues, with particular emphases on its social, political, and economic contexts. Among questions to be addressed are: What events and ideas provoked the Cold War? How did the Cold War shape international political and economic institutions? How did advances in science and technology help fuel a global arms race? How did the Cold War condition society and culture? What traces of the Cold War continue to influence world politics in the early 21st century? This course is taught in a seminar format.
3 credits
FLC Seminar II
Cross-listed with POLS 445

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