An overview of the dominant sedimentologic processes operating in both modern and ancient depositional environments. Students will learn how to examine and interpret features of sedimentary rocks and how to assess temporal or spatial patterns in sequences of sedimentary rocks. Students will then use these observations to expand their understanding of Earth history. Three hours of lecture and three hours of laboratory each week.

Requisite: GEOL 111. Recommended requisite: GEOL 121. Spring semester. Visiting Assistant Professor Carroll.

For at least 3.5 billion years, the Earth’s surface environment has supported some form of life. What geologic processes first created and now maintain this environment? To what extent has life modified this environment over geologic time? What conditions are necessary for a planet to be conducive to life? What are the natural processes that operate at the Earth’s surface? This course looks at the environment from a geologist’s perspective.

As the science that considers the origin and evolution of the earth, Geology provides students with an understanding of what is known about the earth and how we know it, how the earth “works” and why we think it behaves as it does. In particular this course focuses upon the earth as an evolving and dynamic system where change is driven by energy generated within the earth.

Independent reading course. Full course.

Admission with consent of the instructor required. Fall and spring semesters. The Department.

Entirely devoted to the works of Senegalese writer and filmmaker Ousmane Sembene, this course will explore the defining moments of his life, his participation in European leftist organizations, and the dominant features of his works and their significance within African cultural discourse.