Small-scale agriculture fed the world until the middle of the 20th century, and the majority of the world's population farmed small plots in rural areas until the last decade. What role will family farms play in the world we are creating? We examine how small scale agriculture has changed over the past 200 years in East and West Africa, the Andes, China, India, and in the United States, and consider its future. Using recent and classic scholarship, autobiographies, memoirs, archives, and oral histories, we will develop skills in analysis, critical reading, and academic writing.

Food is essential for Italian family and society,;and the food industry is an important part of the;Italian economy. Starting with Carlo Petrini's;Italian Slow Food revolution, we will explore and;analyze the strong relationship between food,;culture and business in modern Italian society. ;We will read and discuss literary and historical;texts, films, and, of course, cookbooks. Taught;in English.

Drawing on archival records and other documents, including Dickinson's letters and poems, students in this seminar will explore what Dickinson's year at Mary Lyon's Mount Holyoke might have meant to her as student and poet. We will also examine Lyon's vision of women's education, as well as contrasting visions of education in 'Old New England' from such writers and thinkers as Emerson, Thoreau, and Stowe.

For several decades now, journalists, artists, and scholars have attempted to articulate the ways the Internet and digital culture has transformed how we live and think. Examining novels, movies, blogs, and other digital media, we will consider how the digital age shapes our understandings of gender and sexuality and how notions of femininity might help us define 'being digital.' As we develop reading and writing skills, we will also experiment in groups with new digital tools such as distant reading, advanced searching, and media remixing.

The twentieth century started with the downfall;of the Chinese monarchy, numerous humiliations at;the hands of Western countries, and the;establishment of the Republic of China in 1911.;In the spirit of reform and renaissance, a group;of young writers, educated in both China and the;West, spearheaded a new direction in Chinese;literature.

From Shakespeare's plays within plays to;Rowling's diary of Tom Riddle, from;Velázquez to;Escher, writers and artists have consistently;embedded moments of self-referentiality within;their;works to raise representational questions such as;the relationships between illusion and reality,;between truth and fiction, between past, present;and future time, between words and worlds,;and so on. We will explore these and other;paradoxes by examining a variety of artistic;forms;including poetry, stories, plays, painting, and;film.

What is love? What are its causes? What kinds of love do we value? This interdisciplinary seminar explores different kinds of love (romantic, familial, divine, etc.) from diverse perspectives, including those of select philosophers, psychologists, neuroscientists, religious thinkers, and social justice activists.

Students are expected to complete a supervised field experience full-time every day during January Intersession in an inclusive classroom in a school setting. Placements can be located within or outside of the Five College area. In addition to the field experience component, students attend three course meetings (detailed below).

This class will expose students to programming;techniques used in computer-based interactive art;including real-time graphics, data visualization,;human-computer interaction, sensor networks,;computer vision, and physical computing through;analysis of existing computational art and;synthesis of original works. The course will;place particular emphasis on embodied interation;-- interaction that uses sensors to react to the;whole body. Weekly assignments and reading will;serve to reinforce concepts from lectures, build;technical skills, and develop a personal;aesthetic.

This seminar provides an introduction to natural;language processing, the discipline of getting;computers to understand human language. We will;cover core ideas and algorithms relevant to both;speech processing and text processing, with;emphasis on applications in human-computer;natural language interaction. Students will;design and complete an open-ended final project.