This course will provide an overview of the theories, tensions, and debates within the study of media literacy/media education as they apply to K-12 classrooms and community endeavors. Current research studies in this area will be examined, and students will have the opportunity to design their own media literacy curricula.

This course aims to inspire the development of a critical vocabulary for analysis of the formal
conventions of film, especially as they bear on literary discourse. In addition, this course will focus on cinematic and literary works that articulate or express specific notions of American identity in terms of race, class, and gender. This class will look specifically at how the film industry negotiates specific literary narratives about identity within American society as a means of adapting the texts to the big screen. Satisfies the Integrative Experience requirement for BA-Comm majors.

An exploration of the counter-cultural movements of the 1960s and 70s and later, hosted by someone who was there and lived to tell the tale. Through the medium of documentary and fiction films, we will delve into the musical, sexual, artistic, political and spiritual upheavals that rocked America and Europe back then and that continue to reverberate today.

Over the years, the family has gradually given up many of its functions and much of its authority to outside institutions. Schools, religious institutions, peer groups, and various community organizations now perform basic tasks of socialization, education, work, and recreation that were previously the domain of the family.

This course will explore media justice work through a feminist lens and engage with communication strategies and media tools to subvert media misrepresentation and marginalization. Through community-based research/ community service learning projects, students will develop action-research media analysis, work with community partners on digital media empowerment, and promote media advocacy for policy change.

This course explores research on the influence of mass media on audiences. The course examines the effects of television (and some other media) on thoughts, attitudes, and behaviors. Topics include politics and the media, the influence of news, public service campaigns and advertising, and media influence on health. Students will take three in-class exams and will do in-class writing in each class session.

This course examines three typologies of health literacy: functional, interactive and critical. The course will focus on social political and cultural determinants of health discourse that distinguish health literacy from a traditional health education definition to any empowerment tool that is positioned to improve health outcomes and reduce inequalities in health delivery.

Scholarly literature on interpersonal communication, including historical development and conceptualization, survey of current research and theoretical development and critique of methodologies. Emphasis on reciprocal causal relationships between communication patterns and the social order, and implications of this relationship for individual action and cultural change. Required of students specializing in this area.

This course introduces analytical and theoretical tools used to make sense of visual culture. Topics include the relationship between real-life vision and looking at images, persuasive images, images as evidence.

As forms of communication contribute to the growing integration of the planet, the planet itself is threatened by unprecedented environmental and economic crises. This course will examine ecology and sustainability through the mediating logic of communication technologies, institutions and texts, as well as insights drawn from fields like Anthropology, Geography, Biology, Physics, and Spirituality. Students will develop an interdisciplinary framework to examine conflicts over nature and the social construction of nature and ecology.