2016-2017 Graduate Academic Catalogue 
    
    Mar 28, 2024  
2016-2017 Graduate Academic Catalogue [ARCHIVED CATALOG]

Course Descriptions


 

Graduate Business

  
  • GB 753 - Legal, Ethical, and Global Perspectives of Cyber Security

    (3.00 cr.)

    Introduces the ethical and legal considerations of digital property. Covers the evolution of related statutes and case law, as well as how ethical and legal norms differ. Topics include legal and regulatory policies, evidence procedures, global differences in legal protection, privacy policy, digital property rights, the impact of new technologies, and global cultural norms.

    (Spring only)

  
  • GB 754 - Introduction to Cyber Security Strategy

    (3.00 cr.)

    Surveys the current concepts and trends in cyber security for managers and policy makers. Provides students with the foundation for assessing risk frameworks associated with inter-organizational and external breaches of security, setting up an IT security organization, system development considerations, and technical issues. Uses readings, lectures, discussions, and exercises to promote understanding of securing information in distributed and global environments. Topics include strategy, business continuity, legal issues, risk management, disaster preparedness/recovery, training and awareness, policies and procedures, physical security, public key infrastructure and encryption, industrial espionage, privacy, and software licensure compliance.

    (Spring only)

  
  • GB 757 - Systems Thinking and Risk Assessment

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 751  Corequisite: GB 750 . Introduces the high-level tasks that would be the direct responsibility of a senior C-level executive. Topics include positioning, goals, methodology, architecture framework, metrics for evaluating program effectiveness, and the relationship to other information technology disciplines. Students apply systems thinking while working through a real-world, hands-on project creating a risk assessment and policy document for a business process. (Fall only)
  
  • GB 759 - Special Topics in Management Information Systems

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: Varies with topic. Provides students with the most current readings, discussions, and experiences in the field of information systems management. Group projects, papers, and presentations may be used to share information on the topic. The particular topic will be identified in the course schedule for the semester in which the class is offered. Topics may include human-computer interface, management of the I/S function, total quality management, and IT project management. May be repeated for credit with different topics.
  
  • GB 761 - Financial Accounting Problems II

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 661 . Builds upon areas covered in GB 661 , and deals with problems in accounting for corporate securities, treasury stock, pension plans, leases, revenue recognition issues, income tax allocation, investments, and accounting changes. Students acquire a comprehensive understanding of financial statements. Pronouncements of the AICPA, FASB, SEC, and other authoritative sources are an integral part of the course.
  
  • GB 762 - Cost Accounting

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: All foundation courses or written permission of the instructor. Deals with cost measurement, classification, and recording for external reporting and internal decision making. Topics include an in-depth coverage of cost behavior, cost-volume-profit analysis, cost accounting systems, budgeting, variance analysis, cost allocation, capital budgeting, and relevant cost for decision making. Students learn to identify, classify, and apply cost accounting techniques in business applications.
  
  • GB 764 - Federal Taxation of Business Entities

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 706 . Corequisite: GB 761 . The study of four related aspects of federal entity taxation: the structure of federal income taxation, taxation of business entities, special business topics, and tax consequences of corporate liquidations and reorganizations. Topics covered in theme one include the determination of gross income, business deductions, and business losses and relevant tax planning strategies. Topics covered in theme two include corporate formation, capitalization, operation, and dividend distributions; partnership formation and operation; subchapter S election and operation; and corporate, partnership, and S-corporation tax planning strategies. Topics covered in theme three include multijurisdictional taxation; the corporate alternative minimum tax; taxation of proprietorships; and relevant tax planning strategies. Further topics include a comparative analysis of the various forms of doing business; the basics of corporate liquidations and reorganizations; and an introduction to tax research. The Internal Revenue Code and Regulations are an integral part of this course.
  
  • GB 765 - Auditing

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 761 . Focuses on the basic concepts of auditing in a manual and computer-based accounting system and covers the generally accepted auditing standards and procedures. Students develop the judgment and decision-making skills needed to function as auditors in the complex environment of business and the basic skills to research current issues impacting the audit profession. Major topics include ethical responsibilities, internal control evaluation, evidence gathering, reporting standards, and basic auditing concepts.
  
  • GB 770 - Special Topics in Law and Social Responsibility

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: Varies with topic. Students develop an understanding of alternative perspectives on a specific topic, study this topic in depth, and engage in personal reflection about the topic. Topics may include corporate accountability, leadership, teamwork, law and society, and legal responses to inequality in the workplace. May be repeated for credit with different topics.
  
  • GB 772 - Power, Privilege, and Professional Identity

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: All foundation courses and GB 705 . Today's workforce leadership is still predominantly white and male. The glass ceiling is a metaphor that describes barriers that prevent women and minorities from attaining high level positions in organizations. The barriers-both individual and organizational-that prevent particular employees from shattering the glass ceiling are examined. Readings include articles that describe legal responses to race and gender discrimination in employment; how women and men balance the demands of labor market work and family life; why white Americans are reluctant to acknowledge their privilege; ways in which privileged women oppress less privileged women; and how masculinity shapes leadership styles organizations value. Students are encouraged to develop a professional identity that acknowledges and helps remedy disparities in power and privilege. Closed to students who have taken Glass Ceiling as a topic under GB 770  or GB 797 .
  
  • GB 774 - Business Law: Commercial Transactions

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: All foundation courses. Considers the legal environment of business, including the principal characteristics of the American legal system, the concepts and principles used to determine individual and corporate accountability, and the regulatory system within which businesses operate. Treats aspects of the commercial transaction including contract law, the commercial code (UCC: sale of goods, negotiable instruments, secured transactions, bank collections and deposits), surety, and bankruptcy law. Recommended for students who wish to sit for the CPA exam and should be taken in lieu of GB 612 .
  
  • GB 778 - Employment Law

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: All foundation courses and GB 705 . Covers the basic legal concepts and principles relevant to the employment relationship, including common law, state and federal statutory law, and constitutional law. Explores their relevance for employment policies and practices. Also covers multinational legal considerations relevant to employment.
  
  • GB 779 - International Study Tour: Corporate Social Responsibility

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 700 . An experiential learning course that focuses on issues of corporate social responsibility and ethics in the international arena. Students, informed by the issues of social responsibility relevant to international industries and the specific corporations visited, consider how leaders of multinational organizations take into consideration the company's local and global impacts on society and the environment. Students consider how issues of legal compliance (both United States and international) interact with principles of ethics and corporate social responsibility to establish acceptable levels of individual and corporate behavior.
  
  • GB 780 - Pricing Strategy

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 707 . Develops tools that can be used to devise wealth-maximizing pricing programs and to integrate pricing with production considerations. Students learn to acquire and analyze data useful in gauging consumers' sensitivity to price; implement a variety of sophisticated pricing tactics; and appreciate the influence of market structure on pricing behavior. Topics include costs and pricing decisions, demand analysis, segmented pricing, competitive advantage, and legal and ethical issues in pricing.
  
  • GB 781 - Monetary Policy Analysis

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 707 . Examines the conduct and strategy of monetary policy. Students study the role of money in the financial system, the institutional structure of the Federal Reserve, as well as the instruments, targets, and transmission mechanism of monetary policy. Special topics include the debate over policy activism, inflation targeting, lessons from Japanese deflation, asset price bubbles, and policy transparency.
  
  • GB 782 - International Economics

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 707 . Covers the main concepts and analytical tools in international economics, as well as some of the major economic events that have attracted the attention of investors and policy makers around the globe. Focus is on the determinants of a country's external accounts (external trade and investment flows), exchange rates, and how these variables simultaneously reflect and affect business and consumer decisions, economic growth, and government policies.
  
  • GB 789 - Special Topics in Business Economics

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 707 . Focuses in depth on the issues and theories in a particular field of business economics. Topics may include industry studies, environmental economics, international trade, labor and managerial economics, health economics, and applied econometrics. May be repeated for credit with different topics.
  
  • GB 791 - Leadership

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 705 .

    Develops self-awareness and insight into the interpersonal skills needed to be an effective leader. Students develop a mastery of the theory and practice of leadership in organizations. Topics include leadership research and theory, characteristics of effective leaders, leadership behaviors and styles, and recent developments in the understanding of effective, responsible, ethical leadership. Methods include team problem-solving exercises, role plays, and cases.

  
  • GB 792 - Human Resources Management

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 705 . Develops student understanding regarding the flow of human resources into and through the organization, including recruitment, selection, training, performance evaluation, outplacement, intrinsic and extrinsic reward systems, teamwork, task analysis and design, and the processes by which employees influence organizational goals and operations. Methods may include lectures, case studies, and team and research projects.
  
  • GB 793 - Leading Organizational Change

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 705 . Develops visionary leadership concepts as key requirements for leading change in organizations. This course also prepares students as strategists, implementers, or recipients of organizational change. Students develop an understanding of the politics of change, the creation of an organizational vision, the skills for leading and implementing change, and a sensitivity to the needs of the recipients of change. Topics include managing teams, analyzing appropriate change strategies, leading and implementing change, and developing ethical perspectives of the change process.
  
  • GB 795 - Special Topics in International Business

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: Varies with topic. Explores the international business environment, management practices, and specific problems facing managers conducting business in more than one cultural context. Readings, discussions, group projects, and presentations may be used to share information on the topic. May be repeated for credit with different topics.
  
  • GB 796 - International Management

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 705 . Focuses on the management of multinational enterprises across different countries and cultures. A cultural framework is initially established at both the national and organizational units of analysis. Subsequently, management issues such as strategic initiatives; international alliances; organization structure and systems; motivation; leadership; global human resources; negotiations; and organizational knowledge and learning capabilities are investigated and compared across organizational and country cultures.
  
  • GB 797 - Special Topics in Management

    (1.50-3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: Varies with topic. Students examine, understand, and develop a mastery of a current management topic. Methods may include research, cases, discussion, and team projects, papers, or presentations. May be repeated for credit with different topics.
  
  • GB 798 - Global Strategy

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 705 . Focuses on the international dimensions of strategy and provides a framework for formulating strategies in an increasingly complex and global world. All aspects of international business are incorporated to enable managers to develop, implement, and evaluate a global strategy for domestic organizations going international for the first time or for the ongoing multinational corporation. Specific industries or regions may be selected for study. Global strategy literature is reviewed. The course consists of lectures, case studies, and team assignments.
  
  • GB 822 - Fixed Income Securities

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 722 . Focuses on the analysis of specific types of fixed income securities including Treasury and municipal bonds, corporate bonds, mortgage securities, and closely related instruments. Students learn how to value the various types of fixed income securities, measure and manage interest rate risk, analyze credit risk, and construct bond portfolios.
  
  • GB 823 - Derivatives and Risk Management

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 722 . Examines derivative securities such as options, futures, forwards, and swaps. Students learn trading strategies, hedging strategies, and how to value derivative securities. Topics include derivatives markets, pricing models, stock options, interest rate derivatives, binomial option pricing, numerical procedures, and exotic options.
  
  • GB 825 - Special Topics in Finance

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: Varies with topic. Addresses issues in a particular field of finance, including investments, portfolio management, derivative securities, international finance, capital markets, corporate finance, and financial institutions. Encompasses critical reviews of selected journal articles, empirical research, guest lectures, student papers and presentations. Seminar format. May be repeated for credit six times with different topics.
  
  • GB 827 - Valuation

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 722 . Teaches students to value equity securities, starting with the top-down approach and industry analysis/forecasting. Students examine valuation theory, models and applications under various circumstances such as initial publics offering, corporate restructurings, leverage buyouts, venture capital situations, and closely-held firms. Topics include the discounted cash flow techniques and valuation using alternative valuation techniques such as market-based multiples. Students learn to apply appropriate financial analysis techniques to valuation problems. Emphasis is placed on obtaining the required information necessary for valuation models from financial statements and other sources.
  
  • GB 828 - Sellinger Applied Portfolio Management

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 722 . Provides students with actual portfolio management experience. Students serve as portfolio and investment managers charged with managing the Sellinger Applied Portfolio Fund in a manner consistent with the core goals and philosophy of the Loyola University Maryland Endowment. Students make use of financial data platforms, the Internet, and other sources of information to create, manage, and monitor this portfolio. Students apply the theoretical concepts and pragmatic aspects of portfolio management, including international aspects, ethics, and social responsibility. Topics include asset valuation, constrained setting asset allocation, asset selection, risk management, and performance evaluation. Closed to students who have taken GB 723 .
  
  • GB 850 - Global Information Systems

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 704 . Investigates the critical coordination, control, and communication involved with doing business on a global scale and the role of technology. Covers operational issues, technology issues such as IT standards, law, cultural differences affecting use, outsourcing, and politics surrounding data management and telecommunications.
  
  • GB 851 - Strategic Business Intelligence

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 704 . Introduces students to the concepts of managerial decision making through business intelligence (BI) and data mining, as well as data mining software such as SAS Enterprise Miner and SAS Visual Analytics. Students develop an understanding of the strengths and limitations of data mining techniques, and they actively engage in data mining projects applying these techniques. Broad overviews are provided to both descriptive and predictive modeling techniques including association, clustering, and prediction. The concepts of data input, data partitioning, variable selection, transformation, imputation, and model assessment (specifically lift charts and ROC curves) are presented. Students observe and participate in the entire data mining process from data acquisition to final model deployment. Managerial concepts are discussed using cases. A real-world project serves as the culmination of this sequence.
  
  • GB 858 - Information Technology Strategy

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 704 . This course integrates information technology with organizational strategy. Successful organizations adjust strategies to meet new challenges and opportunities presented by rapid increase in the use of information technology in business. A case-based approach is used to explore strategic decision making. Students are taught to analyze and understand the impact of information technology on strategic decision making; recognize business models and internetworking infrastructure; comprehend information technology security; and appreciate the principles of managing diverse information technology infrastructures, outsourcing, and projects.
  
  • GB 867 - Special Topics in Financial Accounting

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: Varies with topic. Investigates and analyzes in detail current topics of interest to the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) and other items of interest in the accounting literature. Uses current pronouncements, exposure drafts, and interpretations of current FASB pronouncements. May be repeated for credit with different topics.
  
  • GB 891 - Family-Owned Business Seminar

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 705 . Develops students' understanding surrounding the dynamics of a family-owned or closely held business, and the unique challenges of being an owner, a family member, and an employee in such a business. Topics include ownership issues, conflict management and resolution, succession planning, strategic planning, closely held firms, and professional business management. Organized as a management seminar and a hands-on laboratory for students, with guest speakers and cases, this course explores family business ideas, beliefs, and opinions. Deliverables include extensive self-directed, reflective, and immediately useful writing assignments. Closed to students who have taken Family Business Seminar as a topic under GB 797 .
  
  • GB 894 - Advanced Topics in International Trade, Finance, and Investment

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 705 . An in-depth exploration of the impact of international trade, finance, and investment on global business; in particular, how firms influence the formation of government policy in the above areas and, in turn, how government policies influence the decisions of global business firms. Closed to students who have taken the course as a topic under GB 795 . Field Trip
    A field trip to the World Bank, IMF, and/or other governmental agencies is included.
  
  • GB 896 - Power and Influence

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 705 . Develops students' understanding of organizations as political entities, where power and influence are key mechanisms for organizational performance. Topics include power and its sources, work relationships, the effective and ethical use of influence, and the nature and use power and influence have over the course of a career.
  
  • GB 897 - Negotiation and Dispute Resolution

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 705 . Provides the opportunity to learn and practice negotiation methods and skills and to learn about the uses of mediation and arbitration as alternative methods of dispute resolution. Students learn to demonstrate an informed understanding of negotiation, mediation, and arbitration, including ethical issues and legal considerations relevant to them; demonstrate and explain their own negotiation and mediation skills; and identify and use relevant sources of information (print, electronic, and practitioner) to research and report on questions pertaining to negotiation, mediation, and arbitration. Negotiation and mediation exercises and invited experts are used along with lectures. Topics include positional bargaining; mutual gains bargaining; preparation for negotiation; negotiating tactics; cross-cultural negotiating; negotiating and gender; ethical and legal issues relevant to negotiating; the mediation process and role of the mediator; the arbitration process; and the use of mediation and arbitration in lieu of litigation.
  
  • GB 898 - New Approaches for Global Competitiveness

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: GB 705 . Examines the determinants of competitiveness and economic development. Beginning with firm-level strategies, the formation of clusters, and national economic strategies, this course explores government policies and the roles of business, universities, and other institutions of competitiveness in developing and advanced countries. Theory, policy, and organizational structures ideal for improvement in competitiveness are explored as well. Closed to students who have taken the course as a topic under GB 795 .

Kodály Music Education

  
  • KM 590 - Solfa Fundamentals

    (2.00 cr.)

    Restricted to Kodály music program students. Focuses on the development of musical skills for the teacher: sight singing, ear training, inner hearing, dictation, musical memory, transposition, improvisation, part work, and form. Participants learn a variety of activities and strategies to develop these skills in the areas of rhythm, melody, and harmony. The movable-do system of solfa, a German system for absolute note name singing, and a rhythm language are used. Skills are presented in a sequence compatible with Kodály methodology in order to prepare teachers to develop music literacy skills in their students. Credits do not count toward the graduate degree.
  
  • KM 852 - Kodály Methodology, Level I

    (1-3.00 cr.)

    Restricted to Kodály music program students. A sequential, child-developmental approach to vocal music pedagogy for American children in preschool through grade two is presented. Participants are introduced to the philosophy and practices inspired by Zoltan Kodály, as well as the principles of music learning theory developed through the research of Dr. Edwin Gordon. They learn to plan and teach a curriculum, based largely on the use of American folk songs, that leads children to musicianship and musical literacy. Teachers learn techniques for developing in their students music readiness, good vocal production, in-tune singing, aural discrimination, rhythm skills (via movement), beginning skills in the use of solfa and rhythm syllables, and the foundations of music notation and reading.
  
  • KM 853 - Kodály Materials, Level I

    (1-3.00 cr.)

    Restricted to Kodály music program students. Participants research, collect, and learn American rhymes, folk songs, and singing games that support Kodály methodology for preschool through grade two. They learn the principles of folk song analysis and create a retrieval system to organize their materials for the sequential teaching of tonal, rhythmic, and formal skills. They also learn basic principles of accompanying children's singing with folk instruments, with an emphasis on playing the Appalachian dulcimer.
  
  • KM 856 - Choral Studies for the Music Educator, Level I

    (1-3.00 cr.)

    Restricted to Kodály music program students. Music educators begin the process of preparing to be effective teachers and conductors in a choral setting. Participants develop their choral singing skills and receive instruction and practice in score study, conducting gestures, and rehearsal techniques as they lead portions of the rehearsals. A performance of the works rehearsed is given during the concluding concert of the course.
  
  • KM 860 - Solfa: Sight Singing and Ear Training, Level I

    (1-3.00 cr.)

    Restricted to Kodály music program students. The Kodály philosophy requires that every music teacher be the best musician he or she can be. To that end, this course focuses on the development of musical skills for the teacher-ear training, sight singing, improvisation, dictation, musical memory, transposition, part singing, and form. Students learn a variety of activities and strategies to develop these skills in the areas of rhythm, melody, and harmony. The movabledo system of solfa, a German system for absolute note name singing, and a rhythm language are used.
  
  • KM 952 - Kodály Methodology, Level II

    (1-3.00 cr.)

    Restricted to Kodály music program students. A sequential, child-developmental approach to vocal music pedagogy for American children in grades three to four is presented. Participants explore the philosophy and practices inspired by Zoltan Kodály, as well as the principles of music learning theory developed through the research of Dr. Edwin Gordon, as applied to students on the intermediate level. They learn to plan and teach a curriculum, based largely on the use of American folk songs, that leads children to musicianship and musical literacy. Teachers learn techniques for developing in their students good vocal production, in-tune singing, aural discrimination, intermediate level skills in rhythm (via movement), use of solfa and rhythm syllables, form, music notation and reading, and part-singing.
  
  • KM 953 - Kodály Materials, Level II

    (1-3.00 cr.)

    Restricted to Kodály music program students. Participants research, collect, and learn American rhymes, folk songs, and singing games that support Kodály methodology for grades three to four. They apply the principles of folk song analysis to expand their retrieval systems to include repertoire for the intermediate grades and organize their materials for the sequential teaching of vocal, melodic, rhythmic, formal, and part-singing skills. They also learn basic principles of accompanying children's singing with folk instruments, with an emphasis on playing the folk guitar.
  
  • KM 956 - Choral Studies for the Music Educator, Level II

    (1-3.00 cr.)

    Restricted to Kodály music program students. Music educators continue the process of preparing to be effective teachers and conductors in a choral setting. Participants develop their choral singing skills and receive instruction and practice in score study, conducting gestures, and rehearsal techniques as they lead portions of the rehearsals. A performance of the works rehearsed is given during the concluding concert of the course.
  
  • KM 957 - Conducting I

    (1-3.00 cr.)

    Restricted to Kodály music program students. Participants begin the process of acquiring the knowledge and skills that will enable them to be effective teachers and conductors in a choral setting. Participants study and practice basic score analysis/preparation and conducting techniques, with an emphasis on selection, study, preparation, teaching, and conducting of music especially appropriate for children's choirs at the elementary school level.
  
  • KM 960 - Solfa: Sight Singing and Ear Training, Level II

    (1-3.00 cr.)

    Restricted to Kodály music program students. The Kodály philosophy requires that every music teacher be the best musician he or she can be. To that end, this course focuses on the development of musical skills for the teacher-ear training, sight singing, improvisation, dictation, musical memory, transposition, part singing, and form. Students learn a variety of activities and strategies to develop these skills in the areas of rhythm, melody, and harmony. The movable-do system of solfa, a German system for absolute note name singing, and a rhythm language are used.
  
  • KM 992 - Choral Studies for the Music Educator, Level III

    (2.00 cr.)

    Restricted to Kodály music program students. Participants continue beyond the work done in Levels I and II in the development of their personal choral singing skills and mastery of the knowledge and skills required to be effective teachers and conductors in a choral setting. During the choir segment, participants continue the study and practice of vocal production, principles of choral singing, interpretation, musical style, and application of solfege in learning music. The choral literature studied is performed for an audience during the concluding concert of the program. During the conducting segment, participants study and practice advanced level score analysis/preparation and conducting techniques, including such topics as the International Phonetic Alphabet, teaching strategies for presenting new choral music to children, the rehearsal flow chart, and rehearsal techniques. Opportunity is given to practice advanced conducting techniques, with an emphasis on selection, study, preparation, teaching, and conducting of music especially appropriate for children's choirs at the high school level.
  
  • KM 993 - Kodály Materials, Level III

    (3.00 cr.)

    Restricted to Kodály music program students. Participants collect and learn American folk songs and singing games that support Kodály methodology for grades five and six. They continue the study begun in Levels I and II of the principles of folk song analysis and add upper level materials to the retrieval systems they created to organize their materials for the teaching of vocal, expressive, rhythmic, melodic, formal, and harmonic skills. They also learn basic principles of accompanying children's singing with folk instruments, with an emphasis on five-string banjo. Participants prepare songs to sing and play on the banjo for a group demonstration/performance at the end of the course. This course also reviews and expands upon the singing game, play party, and folk dance skills mastered in Levels I and II, adding new repertoire suitable for grades five and six.
  
  • KM 994 - Kodály Methodology, Level III

    (2.00 cr.)

    Restricted to Kodály music program students. A sequential, child-developmental approach to vocal music pedagogy for American children in grades five and six is presented. Participants continue the study begun in Levels I and II of the philosophy and practices inspired by Zoltan Kodály, as well as the principles of music learning theory developed through the research of Dr. Edwin Gordon, as applied to students on the intermediate level. They learn to plan and teach a curriculum, based largely on the use of American folk songs, which leads children to musicianship and musical literacy. Teachers learn techniques for continuing the development in their upper grade students of good vocal production, in-tune singing, expressive performance, aural discrimination, rhythm skills, skills in the use of solfa and rhythm syllables, part-singing skills, skills in analysis and labeling of various musical forms, and intermediate skills in music notation and reading.
  
  • KM 995 - Solfa: Sight Singing and Ear Training, Level III

    (2.00 cr.)

    Restricted to Kodály music program students. Focuses on the development of musical skills for the teacher on a more challenging level than that of Levels I and II in the areas of sight singing, ear training, inner hearing, dictation, musical memory, transposition, improvisation, part work, and form. Participants learn a variety of activities and strategies to develop these skills in the areas of rhythm, melody, and harmony. The movable-do system of solfa, a German system for absolute note name singing, and a rhythm language are used.

Liberal Studies

  
  • LS 600 - Self and World: Fundamental Issues in Human Existence

    (3.00 cr.)

    What does it mean to be a human being in the world? This course undertakes to define the human self, the world, and the manner in which the two relate through examination of the fundamental conditions and experiences of human existence. Themes considered may include faith, exile, solidarity, and death. Must be taken in the first semester of enrollment. Students beyond their first semester of enrollment must obtain written permission of the instructor.
  
  • LS 617 - Voters, Campaigns, and Elections in the United States

    (3.00 cr.)

    Focuses on the upcoming U.S. Presidential election and its context using academic scholarship, political rhetoric, historical documents, and current news analysis. U.S. politics and elections in historical context, the evolution of upcoming elections, and the American electorate itself are considered. Finally, the possible implications of the new President, his or her policies, and the political environment in which he or she will govern are discussed.
  
  • LS 641 - Human, Animal, Machine: Nature in Technological Society

    (3.00 cr.)

    Utilizes contemporary, largely American authors, as they reconsider our imperiled relation with the natural world. Bill McKibben compares twenty-four hours spent on an Adirondack mountain with twenty-four hours of programming on every single local cable television station. Anthony Weston explores the rich intelligence of animals, including our own pets. Students will be invited to investigate their own complex relationship with nature and technology.
  
  • LS 679 - Literary Biography

    (3.00 cr.)

    Looks at biography as a literary art form, while examining the role biography plays not only in understanding the significant accomplishments of certain individuals, but in illuminating the times in which they lived. Has biography changed over the decades? Are biographies ever entirely unbiased? Are popular biographies invariably less accurate than academic ones? What privacy rights do public figures retain? These are some of the questions this seminar addresses as it looks at biographical writings about such figures as Madame Curie, Thomas Jefferson, Ulysses Grant, Mohandas Gandhi and Coco Chanel. Students are also asked to write a biographical essay about a public, artistic or historical figure of their own choice.
  
  • LS 798 - Special Topics in Liberal Studies

    (3.00 cr.)

    An opportunity for students to pursue research on a specific topic with a faculty mentor. The student is responsible for securing permission, prior to registration, from the faculty member who will direct the project. The student must submit a completed specialized study form with registration.
  
  • LS 799 - Capstone Project in Liberal Studies

    (3.00 cr.)

    Prerequisite: Completion of 10 courses (30 credit hours) toward the Master of Arts (M.A.) in Liberal Studies.  This independent project builds on the work of one or more graduate courses in liberal studies, developing the concept, method, or approach of that course in greater depth and intellectual subtlety. The course may develop methodology from any of the three course categories (historical, thematic, or creative), but it may not in itself fulfill the curricular requirement to take at least one course from each group. The course aim is the production of a publishable paper or an art product worthy of exhibition. A public presentation to an audience of current and former liberal studies students and faculty is required. Those interested in enrolling should discuss their plans with the director at least a semester in advance. Written or electronic permission of the instructor and the director.

Liberal Studies: Creative Process

  
  • LS 671 - Surrealism and Cinema

    (3.00 cr.)

    Participants learn about surrealists, European artists of the 1920s, and their fascination with the magical medium of film. Old surrealist films are screened, such as Andalusian Dog by Salvador Dali and Luis Buñuel, as well as more modern films with surrealist themes, such as Altered States by Ken Russell and Naked Lunch by David Cronenberg. Through these screenings, text readings, papers, and class discussion, participants learn how to interpret surrealist symbols that appear in many films. (Seminar format)
  
  • LS 673 - Minding Metaphors

    (3.00 cr.)

    Through workshops, lecture, and discussion, students explore the crafting of contemporary poetry. Readings encompass theory and a wide range of poets. Writing assignments consist exclusively of poems; students will enjoy broad latitude in subject and approach. No previous experience or expertise in writing poetry is required.
  
  • LS 675 - The Critical Eye: Looking at Art

    (3.00 cr.)

    A course in the methods and practices of scholarly research and the writing of a research paper in the field of art history. Participants indulge themselves in the "forensic" methods of art history and practice the formal discipline of writing a research paper: competent expository writing; research techniques and library skills; the proper citation of sources; and the care, nurture, and notation of a good bibliography. The different ways art historians "read" a work of art are examined. The various textures of meaning that contribute to our fascination with works of art are the focus of our reading, writing, and looking.
  
  • LS 677 - Understanding Comics: The World of Graphic Literature

    (3.00 cr.)

    Comics, narratives which juxtapose words and images in sequential panels, have been with us as long as written language itself. Graphic literature today is challenging, vibrant, promiscuous, forthrightly multicultural, and often aggressively independent. In this course, students experience a wide array of graphic literature, explore the inherently interdisciplinary nature of the medium, and try to take the full measure of its sophistication.
  
  • LS 680 - Critical Methodologies: Humor Studies

    (3.00 cr.)

    This course, of potential interest to anyone who laughs, proposes that humor serves as one of the best ways to understand literature and culture. From Archilochus to Rushdie, parody and the playful are productive: they illuminate serious forms, as well as generating their own discourse and conventions. Writers use humor to reveal the local and the universal, to speak truth in multiple voices, to refashion art and expectation.
  
  • LS 681 - Living Theatre

    (3.00 cr.)

    Students experience firsthand many important aspects of modern theatre production while working as actors, directors, playwrights, designers, and critics. Because the course is taught in McManus Theatre, it is a hands-on experience of the modern theatre culminating in a class production of an original theatre piece.
  
  • LS 684 - All is Fair in Love and War: A Survey of Women's Texts from 900 to 2012

    (3.00 cr.)

    The adage "all is fair in love and war" connotes a strategic iciness in two of humanity's most commonly held experiences; it also betrays a disconcerting equation of humanity's capacities for love and violence. This class focuses on texts, mostly by women from Europe and America, broadly related to the ideas and experiences of love and war, as well as issues of race, history, and political activism. Canonical and non-traditional texts are discussed, among them novels, poems, short stories, memoirs, academic articles/works, journalism, films, and music. This course emphasizes how these texts represent gender, how literature contributes to identity-formation, and how women have used the written word to change their social and imaginative conditions. Taught from a feminist perspective.
  
  • LS 685 - Religion and Popular Culture

    (3.00 cr.)

    An introduction to critical issues in and approaches to the study of religion and popular culture. The course considers how religious themes and images are portrayed, critiqued, and manipulated in books, films, music and other media forms. An important part of the class is a discussion of what "religion" is and what we mean when we make distinctions between "high" and "low" culture.
  
  • LS 687 - A Sensory Approach to Creative and Practical Nonfiction Writing

    (3.00 cr.)

    Unlock the subliminal and powerful secrets of your own creativity and productivity. This course teaches the tried and true--but little known and used--techniques of some of the most accomplished writers. Learn how to get beyond "writer's block" and under-confidence to a successful "writer's wellspring" through a variety of sensory-based activities and readings from a number of literary genres. Using the universal magic of our own senses (and there are more than five), this course helps conjure successful texts like a master. This workshop-based exploration of quality creative non-fiction changes how you write forever.
  
  • LS 689 - American Film Classics

    (3.00 cr.)

    Students are encouraged to examine and reflect upon traditional American values as portrayed in a set of eight vintage films. The central focus of the films chosen varies but could include foundational myths like the self-made man, the cowboy and the Wild West, the pioneer spirit, or individual freedom. May be repeated for credit.
  
  • LS 690 - The 1970s: Ideas Have Consequences

    (3.00 cr.)

    Examines writings and films produced during the decade in which our current culture, for better or worse, took clear shape. Most aspects of the cultural revolution of the 1960s were absorbed into mainstream culture during the 1970s, even as a conservative counter- cultural revolution began to emerge that would reach full bloom in the 1980s. Students study works that are either interesting in their own right, or that shed light on the ideas and debates that prevailed during a curious and tumultuous time associated with the rise of postmodernism, feminism, libertarianism, mass narcissism, and much more. They also consider why film historians regard the 1970s as a particularly rich decade that brought forth both the American New Wave, and the rise of the summer blockbuster-Hollywood's standard for success for years to come. Readings include Tom Wolfe's The Me Decade and Christopher Lasch's The Culture of Narcissism.
  
  • LS 691 - Writing a Life: Architecture of the Memoir

    (3.00 cr.)

    The popularity of life-writing genres has grown extensively in the past half century. Creative nonfiction, including the memoir, has supplanted some of the literary territory previously reserved for novels and other thinly-veiled fiction. Of all nonfiction, the memoir offers perhaps the most daunting research and exploration. The process of mining one's own life for material offers an emotional challenge but also a substantial reward: a chance at fresh self-invention and self-interpretation. The memoir also offers a vision of how one's life appears in the context of a creative work. Because of the proliferation of memoir genre, much theory has been developed to assess it. Students explore these concepts while examining diverse examples of strong memoirs from the past century, along with the writing of peers. The principal written work of the course is the production of three formal sections of a personal memoir.
  
  • LS 695 - Books in Context: The American Best Seller, 1960-1990

    (3.00 cr.)

    This seminar examines a series of popular American books published during a time of rapid and continuing change. It seeks to discover how these works reflected values and attitudes that prevailed when they were published, and how they may have contributed to the mass culture we live in today. Students are asked to participate in seminar-style discussions and research-based activities that help to illuminate the mental atmosphere in which these works appeared, while also showing how these works influenced continuing intellectual, artistic, and social trends. Along the way, the phenomenon of the best seller is discussed, assisted by appropriate readings from social critics and literary historians. Titles include William Lederer's A Nation of Sheep (1960), John Updike's Couples (1968), Mario Puzo's The Godfather (1969), Germaine Greer's The Female Eunuch (1970), Charles Reich's The Greening of America (1970), and Allan Bloom's The Closing of the American Mind (1988).
  
  • LS 697 - Reading Television

    (3.00 cr.)

    This course contends that, while television is primarily a visual and oral medium, anything like an adequate appreciation of its pervasive contributions to American culture requires something much more akin to mastering a unique and comprehensive literacy. Students learn how to "read" television by viewing a handful of exceptional seasons of highly successful television series and placing them in social, historical, generic, aesthetic, and theoretical contexts. Possible series include: All in the Family, M*A*S*H, Dallas, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The West Wing, 24, Star Trek: The Next Generation, The Simpsons, The Sopranos, and Deadwood.
  
  • LS 760 - Women on the Verge: Adventures in the Transgressive Feminine

    (3.00 cr.)

    Who dares do all that may become a woman...and then some? What happens when the lives, loves, and accomplishments of women exceed the horizon of expectations placed upon them? From shrews to witches, sirens to saints, and madcap heiresses to femme fatales, this course explores the transgressive feminine in literature, film, and theory.
  
  • LS 766 - The Art of the Modern Essay

    (3.00 cr.)

    The essay today is alive and thriving, accommodating a wide range of voices and styles. Students start with Montaigne, then consider works by many more contemporary practitioners, Americans and Europeans alike. In addition to a critical essay, students submit two other carefully revised essays on topics (and in a style) of their own choosing.
  
  • LS 770 - Relationships Between Men and Women in Literature

    (3.00 cr.)

    In literature, trouble is interesting, and relationships between men and women certainly provide plenty of opportunity for trouble. Students examine a variety of stories, poems, and plays that deal with those relationships. Readings include texts by authors such as Chopin, Hemingway, Faulkner, Lawrence, Oates, O'Connor, Glaspell, Bishop, and Plath.
  
  • LS 772 - The Sagas of the Seventies

    (3.00 cr.)

    What most of us think of as the sixties happened in the early 1970s. The films, books, and pop culture of the era reflected a deepening questioning and cynicism that began with the previous decade. By the decade's end, the President would declare a "national malaise." Then again, he wouldn't be president much longer. This course examines the inquiries into order, coherence, form, and values that grew out of the cultural redefinitions underway as the 1960s drew to a semi-apocalyptic close. Texts include six novels, five films, and three television series that defined and interpreted that decade of excess.
  
  • LS 773 - American Film and Society, 1955-1975

    (3.00 cr.)

    From 1955 to 1975, the American film industry released many films focusing directly on social problems and political themes. Often considered "controversial," these movies represent the high point of twentieth-century American liberalism: they assumed that artful presentations of issues such as racism, materialism, and militarism would help prompt discussions that would eventually lead to a more perfect society and a more peaceful world. Students examine several popular, if rather didactic, films. With the help of selected critical readings, students consider how the values and attitudes of these films, with all their sociological trimmings, contributed to the cultural environment students inhabit today.
  
  • LS 776 - Thinking through Genre

    (3.00 cr.)

    This course considers what it means to create, experience, and analyze through the lens of genre. How does understanding a work of art or popular culture as a kind or type, and subsequently interpreting it with and against such expectations, affect how we order and make sense of the world? How does genre both constrict and enable? Students read theorists of the concept of genre, as well as critics writing about specific genres, and apply what they learn to two of the following four genres (as chosen by students): the western, romantic comedy, film-noir, and horror.
  
  • LS 777 - Short Story Writing

    (3.00 cr.)

    Students closely examine the short story as a distinctive art form, paying particular attention to its development over the twentieth century and the various shapes it now takes. A variety of story types (including the mini-novel, the Checkhovian tale, and the cryptic story) by a strong assortment of masters of the genre are read and discussed. Students also write and revise a story of their own.

Liberal Studies: Historical Approaches

  
  • LS 601 - Guilt and Innocence: America in the Twentieth Century

    (3.00 cr.)

    Traditionally, Americans have tended to see themselves as new Adams in a Garden of Eden. In the twentieth century, however, a debate emerged concerning America's guilt or innocence. This debate is viewed as it appears in fiction, popular essays, philosophy, politics, science, and the arts. Readings include Dewey, Fromm, Updike, Mary Gordon, Stephen Jay Gould, and others.
  
  • LS 604 - Modern Hispanic-American Fiction

    (3.00 cr.)

    In the great melting pot of the United States, Hispanics are one of the fastest growing ethnic groups. The writing they produce is diverse, highly creative, and passionate. This course examines three types of Latino authors: those who have emigrated to the United States, those who were born in the United States, and those who live in Latin America but are influential in the United States. Representative of these three groups are Isabel Allende (Chile), Rudolfo Anaya (New Mexico), and Gabriel García Márquez (Colombia). Other traditions are also represented.  All works will be read in English translation.
  
  • LS 608 - Latino Perspectives on the United States

    (3.00 cr.)

    Traces the development of Hispanic or Latino culture in the United States, beginning with the first Spanish who explored North America, continuing with nineteenth-century Hispanic realities in California and New York, and concluding with Chicano persistence and the Cuban, Puerto-Rican, and Central American Diasporas.
  
  • LS 610 - The Existential Imagination

    (3.00 cr.)

    Nietzsche, that enigmatic nineteenth-century German thinker, spoke of doing philosophy "with a hammer." Often times this image is taken as indicative of the brutal, destructive power of Nietzsche's thought, the wielding of a philosophical sledge hammer. But the metaphor might be better grasped in terms of the cautious, skillful tapping of a sounding hammer, probing and testing the shiny veneer of ideas and values beneath which might lie a hollowness of spirit, a soft and frightful emptiness of purpose. This sounding hammer has been put to practice by a variety of artists, authors, and thinkers during the past century or so, in many guises and forms, one of which might be termed the "existential imagination."
  
  • LS 613 - The American Ethos

    (3.00 cr.)

    Ethos refers to the characteristic spirit of a culture, era, or people as manifested in its beliefs and aspirations. Questions about the nature of the American "character" in this broader sense often permeate the national dialogue. No matter what the topic of debate, everyone seems to have a firm idea of what being an American means. Yet invariably individual definitions of the American identity differ widely. This course probes a broad spectrum of material, from belletristic literature and academic studies to icons of popular culture and time-honored symbols of the United States, to come to a better understanding of those enduring, if sometimes contested, American values.
  
  • LS 614 - Working in Baltimore: Local and Global Perspectives

    (3.00 cr.)

    From steel, the port, and drug wars to technology and globalization, this course considers a range of political and economic issues in Baltimore and postindustrial America in a changing world. It considers historical and modern developments, from the individual and local experience to the national and global contexts. This course relies in part on David Simon's HBO series, "The Wire." Service-learning option available.
  
  • LS 620 - Power and Money: Understanding a Global Economy in Flux

    (3.00 cr.)

    Why don't countries with McDonald's go to war with each other? What are the real costs (and benefits) of American energy dependence? What has been the most effective poverty alleviation scheme of the last century (hint: not the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund)? How can people turn trees into HDTVs? Will today's young people ever be able to retire? This course approaches these and other political economy enigmas with lively and erudite discussions of the classics, the controversial, and current events.
  
  • LS 621 - Reading the Nobel Prize Winners

    (3.00 cr.)

    From DNA to the expanding universe, from Marie Curie to arms control, from The Jungle Book to the Arab Spring: the scientists, economists, writers, and peacemakers of the last one hundred years have made essential contributions to improving our world and our understanding of it. Selected writings are examined from a wide range of those whom Alfred Nobel hoped would have "conferred the greatest benefit on mankind." Students explore common and competing themes, their cumulative impact toward improving the human condition, and how we mortals can stand on the shoulders of these giants. No particular background in mathematics or the sciences is required.
  
  • LS 623 - Another America, Central America

    (3.00 cr.)

    This course focuses on and compares contemporary Guatemala, Nicaragua, and El Salvador. Topics for discussion include the continuing Spanish conquest and indigenous resistance to it; military dictatorships and genocide; U.S. interventions; social revolutions; and the rise of gang violence. Readings range from fiction and poetry to personal testimony and social science statistical research.
  
  • LS 625 - The American Civil Rights Movement, 1954-1976

    (3.00 cr.)

    An investigation of the growth and decline of the struggle for African American civil rights in the United States from 1954 to 1976. This study addresses major personalities and institutions which influenced the direction of the civil rights movement from the Supreme Court decision of Brown versus the Board of Education to the nation's Bicentennial Celebration just a few decades later. It also analyzes the overall impact of the movement on the lives of African Americans in the United States in the late twentieth century.
  
  • LS 626 - Music and Technology, 1700 to the Present

    (3.00 cr.)

    Music in the Western world undergoes continual evolution, and technology contributes to such evolution in a major way. For example, the invention of the microphone eliminated the need for vocalists to project to the audience in a large hall. The valve in brass instruments made it possible for music to change keys more frequently and rapidly. The audio recording has afforded unparalleled access to alien musical cultures but, paradoxically, may have retarded tonal progress. Students explore the influence of technology on music from 1700 to the present. Musicians and works considered range from Beethoven and Wagner to Frank Zappa, Brian Eno, and beyond. Students also have the opportunity to explore others via their own projects.
  
  • LS 628 - Scientists and Psychics

    (3.00 cr.)

    By the end of the nineteenth century, a strange confluence of events had allowed some of the leading chemists, biologists, and psychologists of the day to investigate seances, hypnotic trances, precognition, clairvoyance, and telekinesis. This examination of late Victorian science explores the assumptions upon which physicists and psychics based their research, as well as the cultural milieu that provided such a fertile ground for both sets of investigations. The discoveries of Sir William Crookes, Sir Oliver Lodge, and Dr. Anna Kingsford serve as the focus for a detailed study of the "mutability" of facts within the context of science in fin-de-siècle Britain.
  
  • LS 630 - The Philosophy of Faith

    (3.00 cr.)

    This course considers religious belief and its place in human existence. It examines factors that foster religious conviction(s) and their possible consequences for the individual believer, while asking whether the possibility of a meaningful existence must (or can) be predicated upon belief in a religious "absolute." Ultimately, students attempt to determine what constitutes faith, what can stand as a legitimate object of faith, and why (or whether) faith is significant for human existence.
  
  • LS 632 - Tradition and Revolt in Literature: Twentieth-Century Modernism(s)

    (3.00 cr.)

    This course explores the complexities of the literary movement known as modernism and examines the shift in scholarly understanding from a single "modernism" to multiple "modernisms." For much of the twentieth century, the term modernism described the works of a limited number of writers, usually T. S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, W. B. Yeats, William Faulkner, James Joyce, and Virginia Woolf. In an age dominated by accelerated industrialization, urbanization, the first global war, and new technologies which transformed daily life, these writers redefined the nature of literary expression, developing literary forms such as stream-of-consciousness narrative, free verse, the long poem, and imagism to express their twentieth-century experience. Yet there were many other authors, African American writers, working class writers, feminist writers, and popular writers writing at the same time whose poems, novels, stories, and plays were excluded from the conventional scholarly definition of modernism. Nonetheless their works illuminate new angles of vision and express sometimes startling perspectives on early twentieth-century modernity. By pairing canonical and marginal texts, the course attempts to determine what makes a text modern.
  
  • LS 635 - Genealogy of Race

    (3.00 cr.)

    Explores the modern European 'scientific' invention of the concept of race as a way of categorizing human difference in the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century writings of intellectuals such as Voltaire, Kant, Forster, Blumenbach, as well as Gobineau and Galton. This course then turns to exploring the persistence of the category of race in scientific writing throughout the twentieth century, and into the twenty-first. The course concludes with a critical analysis of statements that debunk race as a scientific category.
  
  • LS 636 - Deconstructing Postmodernism: Literary Theory in a Postmodern, Postcolonial World

    (3.00 cr.)

    This course looks at the ways artists of the twentieth and the twenty-first century view their world and recreate it in their works. Students study modern literature from around the world and reflect on the various ways in which different cultural traditions have confronted the questions of individual and collective identity. This course provides students with a working knowledge of the most important contemporary trends and figures from a wide range of literary traditions while examining the historical and social context in which each writer's work develops. All works will be read in English.
  
  • LS 702 - Scientists or Psychics: Victorian Era Science, Empiricism, and Belief

    (3.00 cr.)

    The prelude to modern science in the work of English, American, and European scientists of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries: the assumptions upon which both scientists and psychics based their research, as well as the cultural milieu that inspired and supported investigations of both types. Special attention is given to theories of Charles Darwin and Francis Galton as well as other scientists who revolutionized scientific theory and investigated paranormal phenomena.
  
  • LS 705 - Underground Film

    (3.00 cr.)

    A survey of American independent filmmakers who have influenced mainstream cinema, including Stan Brakhage, Jonas Mekas, Michael Snow, Jordan Belson, John Whitney, Stan VanDerBeek, Nam June Paik, and Andy Warhol. Forgoing commercial careers, these artists went "underground" to retain artistic freedom in their choice of subjects and techniques. Students draw upon readings, lecture, and screenings to critique underground films in class discussions and papers.
  
  • LS 706 - Liberation Thinking

    (3.00 cr.)

    Examines the foundations of liberation thinking during the Renaissance. This course compares European and Latin American paradigms developed during the European conquest of the Americas, and checks in on them again during the seventeenth, nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Some themes studied are mortality; justice/charity; God/Church; spiritual/temporal power; spirituality/sovereignty; immanence/transcendence; the nature of the soul; virtue; theology and history; the Gospels; the evangelization of Native Americans; the doctrine of non-violence; the Counter-Reformation; Utopian visions; and revolutionary appropriations of Christ (liberation theology).
  
  • LS 709 - The Moral and Political Ideas of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings

    (3.00 cr.)

    One of the most popular literary works of all time, The Lord of the Rings is filled with moral, political, philosophical, and religious ideas. Exploring Tolkien's great themes of friendship, war, mercy, treachery, possession, land, and totalitarianism, students take a close look at Tolkien's writings, the film trilogy, and philosophical works upon which he likely relied.
  
  • LS 710 - Fiction and Film of the 1980s

    (3.00 cr.)

    Students examine how today's contentious society took shape in the 1980s; how, for example, conservatism in politics and religion gathered steam in the late seventies and eighties, even as "postmodernism" (in its many guises) triumphed in the academy and the arts. The course undertakes a study of the two trends which defined American culture in the 1980s, with effects that still linger today. The first was the assimilation, into the mass media and elsewhere, of values and attitudes associated with the counterculture of the sixties and seventies. The second was the rise, also widely celebrated in the commercial culture, of money-making as a preeminent social goal.
 

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