This course is designed to help first year students develop skills and habits for college success. It is also an introduction to anthropology, particularly biological anthropology- the study of human evolution, human biology, and primates. Students will learn about campus resources, share their experiences adjusting to independent college life, and explore key questions in biological anthropology, such as: What are the origins of humanity? Who are our closest living relatives? What are the implications of our biological nature?

In this class you'll explore comics, animation and other visual and arts-based approaches of communicating scholarly work with diverse publics. You'll read what others have said about these topics and also spend time learning to create your own comics and animations. Drawing skills are not required! You will not be graded on your drawing skills! Many of the methods we explore don't rely on any form of drawing, others involve simple stick figure sketching. In our hyper-visual culture, presenting information or research in a visually engaging way can have a powerful impact.

The conditions that we find ourselves in - extreme social inequalities, dislocations, and violence as part of increasingly unstable ecologies - implore us to rethink the very nature of our economies and ourselves. Yet, even as our economic activity pushes towards runaway climate change, there is a cynical sense of inevitability; the very foundations of our dominant economy are largely taken for granted and often explained away as the result of human nature.

This course will critically examine issues of race, representation and the sexual politics of hip- hop culture. We will trace the historical implications of race and gender in U. S. culture from slavery onwards and connect how past images of African Americans continue to influence contemporary notions of Black identity. We will trace the early historical moments of the hip- hop movement in order to understand how the culture became synonymous with male dominated spaces and silent women.

Not available at this time

The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 was a seismic event that took the world by storm. It gave rise to dizzy optimism and hope for a new, post-ideological age and greater global unity, within and beyond Europe. Twenty years on, these hopes have not been realized. Cold War hostilities are alive and well and although the EU has expanded, Europe is, arguably, more divided than ever. This course explores the implications of the Wall and its passing for Europe, focusing on anthropological accounts of the (former) East bloc.

Interest in forensics has exploded thanks to programs like CSI as well as Fox's Bones, A&E's Cold Case Files, and Court TV's Forensic Files. But TV shows do not accurately portray the way forensic science is used to solve crimes. In Hollywood portrayals science is most often a gimmick--a technological toy that the hero uses to find evidence the criminal surely hoped was undetectable. In this class, we will critique the methods used in various episodes of these shows and compare them to the actual science of forensics.

This course will analyze dragon myths as metaphors of socio-political power dynamics in their specific historical, ecological contexts. Dragon myths exist globally as creation myths, guardian myths and generally ways for people to understand the world around them including shifts in religious orientation, natural disasters, and military conflicts. Students will read a selection of myths each week, starting with the African continent and continuing around the globe.

The history of Native North Americans from their arrival on this continent, sometime between 80,000 and 12,000 years ago, up until their initial contact with Europeans. Archaeology as a source for the telling of history sensitive to voices often excluded from the written record. (Gen.Ed. HS, DU)

Not available at this time