New Courses, HP Courses, Honors Courses and IDS Courses Descriptions

Please check class schedule for days and times.

New Courses

CMIT 250/PHYS 250/PHYS 350: Scientific Programming in Matlab
Steve Shapiro

This course will (a) introduce students to programming in Matlab and (b) to teach them several computational techniques / algorithms common in scientific computational analysis - which they will program themselves. The course is cross-listed as CMIT 250, PHYS 250, and PHYS 350. The CMIT 250 course counts for the CMIT major and each of the PHYS courses count towards the PHYS major. Students should choose between these listings following the guidelines below. Examples of projects include - depending on student interest and background - numerical differentiation, numerical integration, root finding, statistical description of data, modeling of data (e.g., (weighted) least squares), solution of linear equations (e.g., Gaussian Elimination), interpolation and extrapolation, sorting, visualization, etc.

How to choose between sections:

  • CMIT 250 -- for students primarily interested in scientific programming methods -- with the emphasis on programming. Prerequisites: CMIT 100 or instructor permission.
  • PHYS 250 -- for students interested in both scientific programming techniques and the practical applications in math and science. Prerequisites PHYS 121 or instructor permission.
  • PHYS 350 -- for students who have a strong background in programming and math/phys and wish to explore more challenging problems and in greater depth. MATH/PHYS 320 or instructor permission.

ENG 328: Victorian Masculinity: Manliness in the Age of the Queen
Jim Hood

This course will focus on the concepts of masculinity and manliness developed in Britain, primarily by writers of fiction and poetry, during the reign of Queen Victoria. Concerns about gender were rampant in Victorian Britain, in part because the country was ruled by a woman at a time when two projects that seem very masculine -- the Industrial Revolution and the expansion of the British Empire -- dominated the cultural and literal landscape. We will read a number of writers who participated in the construction of Victorian notions of masculinity, noting that, even though there may have been a dominant, middle-class ideology of manhood, multiple voices spoke in poetry and prose to assert varying ideas that complicated this central one.

Beginning with a pre-Victorian novel, Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility, we will survey texts by male and female writers across the span of the nineteenth century, including Emily Brontë's classic novel about rugged and brooding manhood, Wuthering Heights; Alfred Tennyson's elegy for his college friend, In Memoriam; H. Rider Haggard's African adventure novel, She; Rudyard Kipling's Indian stories about growing up, The Jungle Books; Bram Stoker's famous horror novel, Dracula; and Oscar Wilde's queer classic, The Picture of Dorian Gray. Additional readings in queer and gender theory will supplement these primary texts. Writing assignments will include the usual essays and an extended term project.

FREN 315: French and Francophone Cinema
Maria Park Bobroff

This course will be devoted to the study of French and Francophone cinema. We will seek to define the genre as well as the societal and cultural influences that have shaped its form. We will also situate each director in her/his particular time period and cultural movement, and we will ask why each artist might have chosen film to express her/his ideas. The course will be taught in French, with course readings and assignments completed in French. Specific directors, films, and themes will vary.

GST 101: The Vocational Quest
Frank Massey

"Who am I? "What am I becoming?" "What do I really want to do with my life?" "What major would make me most satisfied?" We will explore tools for engaging in reflection and discernment, examine what it means to enter into deep commitments, ponder what our past experiences can tell us about where we might direct our energies in the future, and share stories about our life journeys and values. Short readings, discussion and journaling will occupy most of our time. Participants should plan to begin the journey of becoming well acquainted with each other through this experience. 1 hour credit; short course (second half of semester)

GST 130: Introduction to Leadership for Social Change Seminar
Judy Harvey

The purpose of this one-credit seminar is to assist students interested in working for social change to assess their skills and interests, explore the possibilities of gifts and vocation, and create an electronic portfolio to serve as a planning and reflection tool for their Guilford experience. Through activities, discussion, and guest speakers, students will define and explore their interest in working for social change. This course is designed for first and second year students who are interdisciplinary majors. Students of other majors may enroll with the instructor's permission. This seminar is the first of 3 seminars required to complete the Interdisciplinary Leadership for Social Change Program. Students may complete one seminar without the intention to complete the program.

GST 200: Leadership Issues in Working for Change
Judy Harvey

The purpose of this one-credit seminar is to help students mine their internship experience for learning about effective leadership in working for change. Using their internship experiences as a focus, students will explore models of effective leadership and issues of change in organizations. Participants will benefit from the opportunity to share insights about issues of working for change with students in a range of internship placements. Students enrolled in this seminar should also be registered for a 2 -- 4 credit internship, or have completed an internship in the preceding semester. Internship supervision and grades will continue to be the responsibility of the faculty sponsor for the internship. This seminar is the second of 3 seminars required to complete the Interdisciplinary Leadership for Social Change Program, a program designed for interdisciplinary majors. Students of other majors may enroll with the instructor's permission. Students may enroll in one seminar without the intention to complete the program.

HIST 250: Popular Art & Amusement in 19th Century America
Josh Guthman

During the nineteenth century, Americans consistently identified the rise of the country's various popular arts and entertainments with America's unique democratic culture. This course examines selected popular arts and entertainments from the nineteenth century by placing them in both their historical and critical contexts. Some of the key issues we will address include:

  1. the construction of -- and relationship between -- different categories of art, such as high art, commercial entertainment, and folk art;
  2. the relationship between popular arts and various forms of cultural authority, such as racial and gender stereotypes; and
  3. the vexed intersection between American popular entertainment and participatory democracy.

HIST 350: Moving Europe Immigration in Modern Europe
Philip Slaby

The history of Europe is the history of people on the move. From the nineteenth century to the twenty-first, the lure of riches and work, the cataclysm of war, the dictates of power politics and of conscience have set the populations of modern Europe in motion. This class analyzes migration and immigration in Europe as both a cause and consequence of wider historical change from the Industrial Revolution in the early 1800s, through the upheaval of the World Wars, to the recent ethnic clashes of the early 21st century. It will examine the engines of migration: the pull of employment, the push of poverty, the demands and terror of war, the will of governments, and the choices of individuals. Further, it will consider how ethnicity, regionalism, nationalism, class, race, and gender shaped the ability of immigrants to integrate and assimilate into their new homes. Additionally, it will assess how the influx of new peoples reshaped the localities, regions, and nations in which they arrived.

MUS 250: Rock History
Parke Puterbaugh

This course will survey the music of the rock & roll era, from 1954 to the present. We will explore the evolution and development of rock and related forms of popular music, including rhythm & blues, soul, reggae, psychedelia, punk-rock, New Wave, indie-rock, rap and grunge. We will look for linkages, influences and continuity - as well as moments of innovation and radical departure - across the past half-century. While the focus will be primarily musical, we will also examine the ways in which popular music has impacted history, from civil rights to the Vietnam War. The course will consist of lectures, musical examples, and class discussion. Students will acquire tools for researching and critiquing popular music, and be asked to write music reviews and a biographical paper. Upon completion, they will have a broader understanding of popular music from its roots to its latest flowerings. The instructor is a former senior editor for Rolling Stone magazine and has worked with the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame since its inception. Course satisfies the Arts and the Diversity in the US liberal arts requirements.

The course may also be counted as part of the Communications Concentration.

PSCI 350: Politics of Gender (WRT Course)
Maria Rosales

This upper-level writing-intensive course provides an opportunity to critically examine the role of gender in politics. Until relatively recently, the political sphere was considered to be the realm of men. Many still consider politics to be a gender-divided world. We will use works from political history, political theory, and political psychology to investigate what gender is. We will then discuss the ways that people use gendered categories to make political decisions, as well as the ways that gender intersects with other major political categories such as race, class, and sexuality.

PSCI 350: Race, Ethnicity, and Politics
Maria Rosales

This upper-level course examines several theories about race and ethnicity. Among these theories are ideas about how race and ethnicity are constructed to shape our political identities, including the ways in which images of race and ethnicity are employed in the struggle over issues of equality, freedom, and solidarity. The goal of the course is to use a variety of theories and methodologies in order to develop a critical understanding of the complexities of race and ethnicity, with an emphasis on race and ethnicity in the United States.

PSY 350: Boys into Men
Kathy Adams and David Hildreth

"Boys will be boys..." Such a frequently made statement implies that the speaker and listener have a particular meaning in mind. In the past, masculinity has been viewed by males and females as a unidimensional, monolithic concept which defined and accurately reflected the behavior and expectations of all boys and men. Yet many males find that their own behavior or characteristics do not fit the traditional image of masculinity and that the "rewards" of such masculinity elude them. We will explore the concept of masculinity in detail, examining factors that influence the definition of masculinity and the way in which boys and men live out their lives. We will consider also the benefits and problems associated with "masculinity" and the male gender. Finally, we will examine the gamut of male relationships and how they are affected by society's concept of masculinity. Course readings will include a course pack of articles from professional journals and popular magazines and at least one novel and one biography. Films will be used to illustrate various models of masculinity and male experiences. Students will complete a final project exploring a related topic of their choice. Counts toward Psychology and Women's Studies. Prerequisite: Psy 100, 224, OR 232.

SPST 250: Teaching Educational Games
Lavon Williams

Are dodgeball, duck, duck goose and kickball, educationally appropriate games for elementary-aged school children? Do teachers need to consider skill progression, or is it better to have students play games like soccer, T-ball and basketball? Is recess as developmentally valuable as teacher-structured physical activity? The answers to these questions and many others are discussed in SPST 250: Educational Games. This course focuses on the performance and analysis of elementary physical game skills and instructional strategies for teaching children physical games. Specific attention will be given to skill progression, game modification, lesson planning, organization and evaluation of teaching educational games. This course is appropriate for persons pursing careers as physical education teachers, youth physical activity specialists, elementary school teachers, and anyone interested in learning how to create environments that provide young children with physical activity opportunities that will positively contribute to the their fitness, health and overall well-being.

SOAN 250: Culture & Sexuality in Africa
Edwins Gwako

This course will explore relations between culture and sexual practices, identities, and roles in African societies. It will use case studies and films of culture, sexuality, and gender to critically examine and enhance informed understandings of these areas of human experience within and across multiple African cultures. While this course does not specifically focus on queer issues, we will also look at the growing body of literature on lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, transgender (LGBT)/ "queer" practices in African societies. The course will also critically examine implications and meanings of sexuality in African contexts and stimulate thinking of sexual practices from the local points of view. Course readings will stimulate critical analyses of how culture and sexuality practices in African societies influence reproductive performance, the spread of HIV/AIDS, teenage pregnancies, sexual exploitation of both male and female children, and domestic violence. The rationale is to ensure social justice and guarantee the dignity of all people and enjoyment of sexual rights, safe and sexually fulfilling lives, and reproductive health. Students will enhance their ability to critically analyze, interpret, and understand the social justice implications of the struggles and inequalities associated with the cultural construction of sexuality in African societies. Fulfills Intercultural and Social Justice Requirements

SOAN 250: Social Stratification
Bennett Judkins

All societies wrestle with the question of how to distribute wealth, power, and privilege. Some are relatively egalitarian and others are significantly unequal. How this process becomes institutionalized into a system of structured inequality and opportunity is the sociological study of social stratification. Although some attention will be given to global stratification, the main focus of this course will be on the United States. It will be organized around five broad questions: How has inequality emerged historically in society and how has this influenced the current structures that perpetuate social stratification? What are the basic sociological explanations for why inequality exists?

What are the methodological issues involved in measuring inequality and especially the formation of social classes in society? What are their strengths and weaknesses? How are class, prestige and power distributed in contemporary society, and how are these related to other forms of inequality based on race, ethnicity, gender, age, religion, disability and sexual orientation? What social policies, and other efforts at social change, are likely to be most effective at addressing the growing inequality in society?

Equality of opportunity is at the heart of what Gunner Myrdal referred in his classic study of racial inequality in the middle of the twentieth century as "the American Creed" - the ideals of the essential dignity of the individual human being, of the fundamental equality of all people, and of certain unalienable rights to freedom, justice and fair opportunity. Unfortunately, the United States has not always lived up to this creed. Internal colonization of Native Americans, African Americans, and Mexican Americans established patterns of institutionalized discrimination that still make upward mobility difficult for these populations, as well as established a framework for institutional domination of other emerging minorities as well. For women, the opportunity for full participation in educational, economic and political institutions has evolved only recently. The industrial revolution and capitalism created great opportunities for the expansion of wealth and material goods, but their distribution across classes has grown, especially in the last two or three decades. The nation's economy has continued to concentrate, along with an intensification of political power of the upper classes and a corresponding weakening of the lower classes, a process often facilitated by education and the government.

Following an historical overview of the development of social stratification, the course will review various explanations for inequality from the classic works of Marx and Weber, contemporary functionalist perspectives of Parsons and Davis and Moore, neo-functionalist like Giddens, and the conflict perspectives of French sociologist Bourdieu, among others. Contemporary analysis will focus on empirical research documenting the extent of inequality in general and among various demographic groups. The course will conclude by looking at traditional and contemporary efforts to address inequality and encouraging students to use Principled Problem Solving to craft other innovative approaches.

One of the challenges to teaching social stratification is that students of privilege often believe that equality of opportunity and fairness generally exist in society and its institutions. If there are differences in economic standing, for example, they generally attribute these to individual traits rather than social forces. They find it difficult to go beyond an individualistic explanation to a structural analysis of social stratification. To address this, this course will use an active learning collaborative problem solving approach to social stratification. Students will undertake field research related to a contemporary problem related to stratification in the local community. Through a literature review, analysis of local and national quantitative data, along with qualitative interviews with persons in the community, students will experience social research and put a local problem into a larger context. In the process, they will enhance their critical thinking skills and their sociological imagination, as they see first hand that the private troubles that individuals face are related to the public dimensions of structured inequality. Fulfills Sociology and Anthropology Major and Sociology Concentration Requirements

SOAN 450: Native Peoples of North America
Tom Guthrie


This course introduces students to the complexity and diversity of native North American societies from an anthropological perspective. Students will learn about traditional Native American cultures, but the course emphasizes contemporary Indian communities (both on and off reservations) and the theme of cultural continuity and change. One of our principal concerns will therefore be to investigate how Indian nations have survived five hundred years of Euro-American domination. In order to make an enormous field of study more manageable, we will focus on groups living in the present-day United States, and special attention will be paid to the unique relationship between Indians and the federal government. Through ethnographic readings, students will become familiar with selected groups and their particular historical, environmental, economic, cultural, and political circumstances. Yet the course will encourage students to think critically about the idea of bounded tribal cultures and “culture areas” and about the practice of anthropology itself. We will discuss the construction of Indianness, interactions between Indians and non-Indians, urban Indian populations, and pan-Indianism. In this sense, the study of native North America provides a fine opportunity for learning more about some of the political, ethical, and epistemological issues that run through twenty-first-century anthropology. Classes will be conducted in a seminar format, with discussion supplemented by short lectures and occasional films.

As this is a 400-level course, our focus will be a critical exploration of anthropological theory, methods, research, and writing through the study of Native Americans. Students are expected to have a strong background in social analysis and theory, but are not necessarily expected to know a great deal about Native American cultures and histories. So while the content of the course may be new, you should be able to engage with it in a sophisticated critical manner. Prerequisites: Completion of SOAN 342 and SOAN 337. Enrollment limited to senior SOAN majors, others by permission of instructor. Fulfills the capstone seminar requirement for SOAN majors who meet the prerequisites; others can take for elective credit. Interested students who may not meet the prerequisites are encouraged to come to class on the first day!

 

Historical Perspective Courses

ENGL 151: HP Black Women's History and Literature
Carolyn Beard Whitlow

In this course we will read/hear/view/discuss/write about the historical conditions in the United States affecting the empowerment of black women from the 17th through the early 20th centuries. We will look at black women in a variety of roles, from freedom fighter to passive resistor, from servant to orator, from singer to poet, from newspaper reporter to novelist. For two days each week, large and small group discussions will center on three major time periods sequentially:

  1. Resistance -- to slavery, from its beginning to its end;
  2. Reconstruction -- from the end of the Civil War through the turn of the century; and
  3. The Great Migration of southern blacks to the north and west.

Course materials include a standard history text, a documentary history with pictures, films, audio taped interviews, slave narratives, autobiography, and historical and period novels. The third class meeting each week will concentrate on sharpening both analytical writing and research skills, and learning how to write essay exams.

English 151: HP Classics Revisited
Carol Hoppe

The fearless monster-slayer of the Anglo-Saxon epic Beowulf becomes a swaggering fool when the story is told from the monster's point of view by a modern American novelist. The noble King Lear, who withstands the storm on the heath in Shakespeare's tragedy, is transformed into a dirty old man by Jane Smiley in her novel, A Thousand Acres. How the mighty have fallen in these modern re-workings of literary classics! One might well ask how the transformations have taken place -- what values of the past are being put aside by these 20th c. American writers, and what currents of modern life make those values seem quaint, if not laughable. Those are some of the questions that will guide our study in this Historical Perspectives course, which looks at two literary masterpieces and the historical forces behind their modern revisions.

One of the signs of a classic is its staying power. Though it recreates the life and culture of its author's time and place, it also speaks to later periods, other nationalities. Thus, it is a mark of greatness to be "revisited" by other readers and writers across the centuries. It means that the work's themes, form and language have established a standard against which later works will be measured, even when those later texts change the "message," as in the examples above. Those students who are interested in studying great works of the past, discussing human values, and learning about the recent decades of U.S. history that have helped shape modern literature (as well as their own lives) will be best suited for this course.

Participants should expect to do a fair amount of reading -- the works mentioned above plus U.S. history from the dropping of the atomic bomb to the women's liberation movement and Vietnam. You will also write three papers and present the revision of a "classic" that you discover on your own.

ENG 151: HP Educating for Equality
Cynthia Nearman

Educating for Equality: Racism and Education in the US (1954-2001) invites students to examine multiple and conflicting arguments about schools' role in responding to persistent racial inequality. We will study the period of American history between two significant pieces of legislation -- Brown vs. Board of Education (1954) and No Child Left Behind (2001) -- and analyze developments in educational ideals, commitments, and practices. Because the civil rights movement provided both a model and a stimulus to several groups interested in improving educational and socioeconomic opportunities, we will focus on questions of gender, class, ability, and immigration in light of our sustained inquiry into racism and American education. Students will use competing historical interpretations and a variety of primary sources from the period to explore how identity, social location, and experiences shape individuals' ideas about the what, how, and why of public education.

This course fulfills the Historical Perspectives requirement and is designed to train students in the conventions of academic research and writing, using historical methods. Students can expect to read between 50 and 100 pages per week, including scholarly overviews of the era and primary documents that offer multiple perspectives on specific issues or concern to those who helped shape it. Students can expect to write -- and revise -- between 15 and 20 pages, and to polish their final projects for public audiences.

Honors Courses

BUS 215-001 (Banner Code 30796): Business Law
Betty Kane

This course provides a survey of the U.S. legal concepts relevant to the operations of the business system, including such topics as: contracts, agency, sales, products liability, secured transactions, bankruptcy, real property, and corporate and administrative law. Honors program students will have occasional out-of-class meetings with the instructor. (Meets the Business and Policy Studies requirement, the Social Justice/Environmental Responsibility requirement, and the Honors Co-disciplinary requirement)

FYE 101-012 (Banner Code 30694): The Greeks in Love and War
Carol Hoppe

It is a commonly held notion that ancient Greece provided the foundation of the Western world. We give the Greeks credit for our political democracy, athletic contests, judicial system, philosophy, art and science. Their plays and treatises are part of our literary and philosophical canon, and we find countless references to their gods and heroes in literature and music. Despite this cultural debt, many aspects of the Greek way of life look strange to modern eyes. We know, for example, that the cradle of democracy excluded women and foreigners from full citizenship, that athletes performed in the nude to honor the gods, that homosexuality was honored and promoted, and that actors wore masks to avoid offending the gods by showing their own faces on stage. Who were these strange people who helped shape our world?

We will study them this semester through the double lens of their religion (mythology) and literature. The stories people tell about themselves reveal a great deal about their values and the everyday pattern of their lives. Like visual art and philosophy (which we will also look at briefly), Greek stories paint pictures and outline questions that preoccupied the leaders of that culture -- questions with which we still struggle today. Who, or what, created the world? What is a good citizen? Are men and women equal? When is war (and revenge) justified? Is there life after death? Are we free or controlled by fate? We will examine their answers to these and other questions in texts that deal particularly with love and war (the Trojan War, in this case): Homer's Iliad, Aeschylus' and Euripides' tragedies, Sappho's lyric poetry, and Plato's Symposium. In the process, we will discover more about the beliefs and values of our own time.

Though this is an Honors course, non-Honors students with some background and a strong interest in the subject are encouraged to contact the instructor for permission to enroll. You can contact her by e-mail at choppe@guilford.edu and by phone at (336) 605-9706.

Enrollment limited to Honors Program students or instructor permission.

FYE 101-024 (Banner Code 30695): Medicine For A Living World
Becky Gibson

"Heal", "health", "whole", "holy" -- These words have the same Indo-European root, as Wendell Berry reminds us in his essay "Health Is Membership." If we think about health and healing at all, we probably think first of our bodies. The ankle breaks- we call the orthopedic surgeon. The surgeon repairs the fracture by pinning it or by simply bracing it until it heals on its own. We may consider the break, though painful, simply our material selves, not really us. The real self is psyche (soul) which lives in a realm apart from our fragile limbs. Even before Plato, Western consciousness has tended to separate mind and body, privileging all that we associate with the "higher" mind (thought, reason, spirit) over that which we associate with the "lower" body (sensation, emotion, matter). In fact, we have inherited an entire set of dualisms that dog our thinking to this day: mind/body;God/nature;immortality/death;male/female.

Members of this class will seek to understand this split and how we may begin to repair it. Such a course must be interdisciplinary;no field or discipline has a monopoly on Truth. By its very nature, truth must be fragmentary;each of us holds only a slender strand of it. We will read philosophy, theology, and literature. We will practice embodied thinking. If you sign up for this course, be prepared to read, write, and move with concentrated attention.

Readings include Plato's Symposium; Carol Christ's She Who Changes: Re-imagining the Divine in the World; Leslie Marmon Silko's novel Ceremony; essays, poems, stories, and teachings by Native American poets Linda Hogan and Louise Erdrich, physicians Richard Selzer and Susan Onthank Mates, and several Zen Masters. Sessions are planned for Tai Chi, yoga, and meditation. If you can handle the challenge of reading and re-reading, thinking and re-thinking, writing and re-writing, then you should thrive in this

Though this is an Honors course, non-Honors students with a strong interest in the subject are encouraged to contact the instructor for permission to enroll. You can contact her by e-mail at rgibson@guilford.edu and by phone at (336) 316-2289.

MATH 123: Accelerated Calculus
Elwood Parker

The topics to be covered are those of the traditional Calculus I and II, which include differentiation and integration of single variable algebraic, exponential, and logarithmic, and trigonometric functions. Applications to physics and various geometrical situations, and an introduction to series will be included. It will be assumed that students already know the basic techniques of differentiation and integration (or can quickly gain them) so that class times can be devoted to working on substantial and interesting problems, and to understanding the basic theory of calculus. Students will be encouraged to work on problems in groups, to invent their own problems for investigation, to write about their approaches to difficult problems, and to use available technology where appropriate and useful. The course will emphasize "doing" and "understanding" mathematics rather than "memorizing" it. All test and exams will be "open book" and will allow the use of calculators.

Meets the Quantitative Literacy requirement.

MUS 110-002 (Banner Code 30793): Jazz Appreciation
Craig Whittaker

Jazz Appreciation explores the many facets of jazz as a musical art form with respect to ethnicity, cultural, historical and musical evolution. Special emphasis is placed on intentional music listening. Students are required to write intelligently about the music and musicians of jazz, and to make appropriate connections between the music and human nature. NOTE: Attendance at live performances is required for this class. (Meets the Arts requirement)

PHIL 200 (Banner Code 30471): Informal Logic
Vance Ricks

What makes an argument "good", and how do we recognize good arguments when we hear or see them? What makes an argument "bad", and how do we tell? How can we fix our (and others') bad arguments? What is an "argument", anyway? Logic addresses those questions, among many others. Logic is a part of the systematic study of reasoning. Logic focuses on arguments: their standards, creation, interpretation, and critique. Informal logic is a relatively recent sub-field of logic, and its boundaries are not yet well defined or agreed upon. Thus, a precise definition is difficult to give, but here are two preliminary descriptions:

  1. Informal logic studies the construction and evaluation of argumentation in everyday contexts (as opposed to artificial and/or strictly formal contexts), including business, news, entertainment media, and politics.
  2. Informal logic studies general aspects of argumentation and reasoning, including inference, arguments, and evidence.

This course is designed to make you a better and more reflective reasoner, which could also make you a better thinker, friend, and citizen.

PHYS 121 (Banner Code 30172): Classical and Modern Physics
Don Smith

This course is designed for Physics majors AND for others interested in physics. This course is not a survey, but rather, an introduction to the thinking and analysis processes of physics, with classroom and laboratory topics chosen from modern and classical physics to emphasize the skills needed to think like a physicist. To prepare for Physics 122, students should plan to take Math 121 (Calculus I) concurrently with this course. (Meets the Natural Sciences and Mathematics requirement)

PSYCHOLOGY 232 (Banner Code 30549): Introduction To Personality
Richie Zweigenhaft

What is personality? This is not a simple question. As we will see, defining personality is based in part upon one's theoretical assumptions, and theoretical assumptions, whether overt or implicit, are related to one's view of the world and one's place in the social order of a society. Over the past 90 years, four or five major "theories," "paradigms," or "approaches" have evolved in the study of personality. Psychologists differ about whether there are four, or five, or six, and what exactly to call them. We'll examine these various approaches over the course of the semester, and see how they suggest different conceptions of personality. For now, we'll draw on the definition used by Mark Leary, the first author in our book of readings: "Personality can be defined as the system of enduring, inner characteristics of individuals that contributes to consistency in their thoughts, feelings, and behavior" (p. 3).

We will begin, as our textbook does, by looking at six basic issues in the field of personality: 1) the scientific study of personality, 2) personality measurement; 3) genetic and environmental influences; 4) biological perspectives; 5) personality development; and 6) motives. We will then look at a series of specific "hot" topics in the field of personality research. In this honors section, small groups of students will design and carry out research projects on certain of these "hot" topics in personality. (Meets the Social Science requirement)

SPORT STUDIES 232 (Banner Code 30794): Sociology Of Sport And Exercise
Lavon Williams

This course is an introduction to basic sociological theories as they apply to sport and other forms of physical activity. Students learn to think more critically about sports as a part of social life. A seminar approach is used to explore issues in making sports more democratic and sport participation accessible to all people. (Meets the Business and Policy Studies and the Honors co-disciplinary requirement)

ID 400 Courses

IDS 402: Business Ethics
Staff

This course is designed as a seminar course, which entails class discussion and requires your active participation. The main objective is for each of you to discover for yourselves the core of our moral and ethical basis for decision-making in the workplace. The course will utilize the case study approach to assist you in applying the principles discussed in class so that you will have a firm foundation for handling ethical problems when they arise (and they always do).

IDS 405: Quakers, Community and Commitment
Max Carter

"Quakers, Community and Commitment" is an exploration of the impulse of some in society to live a life in subordination to a community or to commit themselves to a set of principled beliefs. The Quaker testimony of community forms a basis for this study, and historical attempts at living out values of integrity, peace, simplicity and equality in Quaker community are looked at. Quakerism is not a primary focus of the course, however, and a variety of historical and contemporary intentional communities and committed individuals is included: psycho-social, economic, religious, political and environmental communities as well as such individuals as Dorothy Day and Clarence Jordan. A major unit is devoted to the classic intentional communities of the Shakers, Oneida, Amana, and Ephrata and another to the current dynamic of Amish community. Field trips to an Amish community and a permaculture community are included.

IDS 422: The Harlem Renaissance
Carolyn Beard Whitlow

Sometimes treated as an appendage to the larger American literary movement of the 1920s and 30s, the Harlem Renaissance actually marked a critical juncture in the cultural expression of a racial experience. This critical thinking based discussion course will introduce students to the "Jazz Age" from an Afro-centric perspective and will explore the significance of the era to the development of the African American literary and historical traditions. We will consider issues of race, gender and class and question notions of aesthetic standards. Jazz and blues musicians, orators, entrepreneurs, photographers, sculptors, actors and actresses, writers and thinkers will all get airtime. Although the course will mine the works of the Harlem Renaissance luminaries, Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen and Claude McKay, the course consciously seeks to spotlight the creative verve of the women of the Renaissance who were kept in the shadows. All of the required texts are primary sources from the era. Selected additional primary and secondary readings in all genres will be examined as we clarify the social problems and historical milieu that influenced artistic expression.

IDS 426: Legal Decisions
Staff

This course provides an upper-division introduction to the interdisciplinary study of legal decision-making. As American citizens, we understand in a general way that we have greater individual rights than citizens of most other nations. This course will explore the nature and scope of several important aspects of our rights as citizens and some of the legal principles and procedures that limit and guide interactions in the American legal system. The emphasis will be on legal decision-making but the course is not intended to be a comprehensive survey of the discipline of law. The hierarchy and relationship between levels of law will be addressed (international, federal and state legal systems). In the first part of the semester we will study the attributes, structure and broad cultural, social and historical foundations of the laws, which are a part of the landscape of justice and injustice in contemporary American society. In the second part of the course we will delve on the historical roots of common law and the different origins of the diverse rules of law. The third and final part of the semester will be spent on the analysis of the political and corporate alliance in manufacturing and enforcing the laws of our country. We will use, throughout the semester, historical and contemporary sociological analysis, videos and newspaper articles in order to gain a broad perspective on the subject by putting our daily live into context.

IDS 435: Understanding Poverty
Edwins Gwako

Examines the underlying multiple causes, and compares anthropological, sociological, political, ecological, and economic theories, of poverty. Explores methodological issues in the measurement of poverty and institutional approaches to its alleviation. Since poverty (i.e., income and quality-of-life disparities) is the main reason for national and international development strategies, this course provides a comprehensive understanding of the rationale for such development through discussions of the key aspects of poverty. The course is structured to stimulate critical inquiry into the ways in which poverty manifests itself (within and outside families, nations, and regions), to examine possible factors implicated in exacerbating poverty levels, and to evaluate the effectiveness of redressive measures to eradicate poverty. It provides challenging opportunities for engaging in critical thinking about how to apply accumulated knowledge to address poverty.

IDS 442: International Development
Deena Burris

This course offers a comparative look at development in Ghana and Malaysia (with some references to Indonesian development for additional contrast). It will address how history, politics, economics, geography, and religion impact the development process. The main question to be posed by this class is, "Why do some countries, given relatively the same resources, experience economic growth and development faster than other countries?"

This is a transitions course in the sense that it will enable you to draw on your liberal arts experience at Guilford by integrating your experiences in other courses into a coherent, comprehensive 'picture of the world' and, hopefully, yourself in that world. The course will have a theory component and an application or case study component designed to encourage integrative thinking skills for real world problems and challenges.

IDS 443: Leadership: East and West
George Guo

This course will examine and critically analyze historical and contemporary theories, concepts, and issues associated with leadership throughout the perspectives of Eastern and Western cultures. By using cross-cultural approaches, it examines how culture, religion, philosophy, and political ideology cause different understandings of power, legitimacy, and justice and therefore shape different styles of leadership. It will explore the virtues, functions, and ethics of leaders in social and political philosophy and how changing conceptions of morality, politics, and even epistemology affects changes in the conception of leadership.

IDS 445: Culture, Conflict, Negotiation
Vernie Davis

The increase in global political, economic, and cultural interdependence requires awareness of the effect of cultural diversity on the creation, escalation, and resolution of conflicts. This course focuses on the role of culture in conflict and negotiation. It will address different cultural approaches to conflict and the various methods of dispute resolution, particularly the different styles of negotiation applied by different cultures; it will look at issues of communication styles, mores, values, and norms from a cross-cultural perspective; it will draw on theoretical models and concepts from different disciplinary perspectives to analyze conflict, communication, and negotiation; and it will explore the implications of this analysis for conflict and negotiation in an intercultural context. In order to learn methods and skills of dealing with intercultural conflicts, students will be encouraged to apply class material and readings to their immediate personal and professional environment.

Students taking this course for IDS 445 credit must be seniors and must be a major or concentrator in Peace and Conflict Studies and/or have worked with the Conflict Resolution Resource Center; or permission of instructor. Students taking this course for SOAN 445 credit must have taken research methods and theory in either sociology or anthropology or have permission of instructor.

IDS 444: Promoting Health via Physical Activity: Making a Difference in Your Community
Lavon Williams

Promoting Health via Physical Activity: Making a Difference in Your Community examines the role of physical activity in the promotion of healthful living. We will examine personal and social concerns relative to sedentary lifestyles and develop workable approaches to encourage and motivate people to be more physically active for health and well-being. Working collaboratively with one other person and using knowledge of exercise psychology, exercise sociology, behavioral change principles, health promotion, and advocacy, students will (a) develop and defend a community-based behavior change program designed to promote healthful living through physical activity, (b) develop a method for evaluating the feasibility and effectiveness of their plan, and (c) devise a plan for advocating their program to community leaders. Develop of this project is extensive and success requires collaboration. Thus, students are required to develop this project with one other person. This requires significant personal contact with your group, and individual level of successful in this course is dependent on group success.

IDS 455: Human Sexuality
Kathy Tritschler

This course is an interdisciplinary study of human sexuality that draws most prominently from the academic disciplines of biology, psychology, sociology, and health education. Course content includes male and female sexual biology, birth control, pregnancy and childbirth, sexually transmitted diseases, cancers of sexual organs, sexual orientation, and gender relationships. The course objectives include learning goals in both the cognitive (knowledge) and affective (values, feelings, and attitudes) domains. The course is designed to help you...

  1. Increase your knowledge of human sexuality - for greater understanding of self and partner, and to assist you in making practical decisions about sexual practices.
  2. Increase your comfort in thinking and talking about sexual matters.
  3. Examine your own beliefs and attitudes regarding sexual behaviors - and, possibly, to broaden what you assume to be "normal" human sexuality, and/or to increase your appreciation of alternative perspectives regarding controversial issues.
  4. Become a better "consumer" of (sexual) products and information.

IDS 464: Gender Violence
Kathryn Schmidt

This course focuses on the construction and understanding of gender violence, broadly including violence based on gender categories and violence shaped by gendered relationships. The course draws on methods of describing and analyzing gender violence from the multiple perspectives of sociology, psychology, women's studies, and literary analysis. In a major research project, each student explores an example of gender violence to discover theoretical and practical methods of reducing its occurrence. Students should have a thorough understanding of the social construction of gender and of gendered social processes for most effective participation in this class.

IDS 465: Jazz and Spirituality
Craig Whittaker

This course will examine the uniquely American musical art form known as jazz and the close relationship jazz music has held with spirituality and the church. The focus will be toward examining spirituality and how jazz compositions and performers forge a spiritual connection with each other and the listener through music. Specific attention will be directed toward examining how humans express spirituality, the ways that jazz engages the listener and how the jazz artist explores their spiritual side. Students will be asked to explore their personal definitions of spirituality and will be asked to consider how jazz can enhance their own spiritual experiences.

IDS 471: Defining America: Cultural Nationalism in the Early Republic
Adam Golub

What makes American culture "American"?  Do Americans share a national culture?  Is it desirable or even possible to have a "national" culture in a multicultural society?  IDS 471 explores these questions from a historical perspective, focusing on American cultural life in the years between the Revolution and the Civil War. We will examine the emergence of literature, art, music, folklore, schoolbooks, museums, religious movements, and public rituals that attempted to define the "spirit" of America. At the same time, we will interrogate the ways in which these expressions of cultural nationalism marginalized or excluded certain groups of people who resided in the newly independent United States. At its core, this course raises questions about the efficacy of cultural nationalism as an ideological practice that seeks to unify members of a nation-state.