How well do you know the planet on which we live? In this course we will explore Earth from its core to its surface, from the mountains to the deep ocean basins, from the past and present to the future. The  earth is an evolving and dynamic system, changing on time scales that range from seconds, to millennia, to eons: volcanos erupt, earthquakes vibrate the globe, continents separate and collide, and mountains rise only to be worn away and rise again. What physical processes drive this dynamism? How does the restless nature of Earth impact our residency?

The global ocean is one of the defining features of our planet’s surface. It regulates weather patterns, sculpts the coasts of the continents, and contains records of the past 200 million years of earth's climate in sediment on the seafloor. In this course we will develop an understanding of the global marine system through study of its interconnected geological, chemical, physical, and biological processes. These fundamental principles include seafloor spreading, the transport of heat from the equator to the poles, and cycling of nutrients and organic matter by plankton.

North America is a dynamic, at times cataclysmic, continent with a deep geologic past. Iconic and dramatically diverse landscapes characterize the western United States, including snow-capped mountain ranges, deep canyons, volcanoes, monuments of stone, geyser fields, and vast lava-capped plateaus - in marked contrast to the more

A single course.

Fall semester. The Department.

How to handle overenrollment: null

Students who enroll in this course will likely encounter and be expected to engage in the following intellectual skills, modes of learning, and assessment: Emphasis on written work; readings; independent research; textual analysis.

Independent reading course. Full course.

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

How to handle overenrollment: null

Students who enroll in this course will likely encounter and be expected to engage in the following intellectual skills, modes of learning, and assessment: Readings; independent research; textual analysis.

Through analyses of both the visual and sonic dimensions of the films studied, this class will investigate the status of racialization and colonialism in cinema from the francophone world––in particular from Black France, Haïti, and Senegal. What were the historical impositions on film from the cultures hors France or from marginalized communities within France? When it comes to articulating such notions as race and belonging, what can visual media achieve that literature cannot?

This course explores the concept of repression and its psychological corollaries as a means of illuminating a range of key twentieth-century and contemporary novels and films in French. For Freud, “the essence of repression lies simply in turning something away, and keeping it at a distance, from the conscious.” Examining repression in both its personal and social dimensions in these works, we will ask ourselves just what it is that comes to be unbearable to the conscious, to what effect it is repressed, and whether it may (be made to) return.

In matters of conquest, political alliance, or arts and letters, France’s interactions with Italy during the sixteenth century have left a significant imprint on its history, its language and literature, and even its national identity. With the Italian Renaissance preceding the French, French rulers, thinkers, and artists alike looked across the Alps for inspiration and innovation, and voyages to Italy almost became an obligatory rite of passage for the educated Frenchman.

We will study the social, philosophical, poetic and institutional currents that contribute to the emergence of allegorical texts in the period between the twelfth and the late-fourteenth centuries. Readings include the Quest for the Holy Grail and works by Chrétien de Troyes, Guillaume de Lorris, Jean de Meung, Dante Alighieri, and Marie de France. All readings will be done in English translation. Conducted in English. Fall semester: Professor Rockwell.

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From folktales and plays to comic books and news, this course invites students to engage with different uses and users of the French language across various media in order to examine how stories are told and why. In this course, students reflect on elements such as perspective and audience, contexts and motivations, as well as questions of relevance, adaptation, and endurance in the creation and transmission of particular narratives.