Honors Courses

HNRS 1530 CA: Words & Wares

What is your Story? How might you tell your story?

Writing employee symbols on a page to evoke thoughts and feelings—imparting meaning to the reader. Art can function as text as well—imparting meaning to the viewer.

This course will explore the ways in which writing and art both work to tell a story and how sharing your story through writing and art can move others to action.

Monica Linford | 5:30 - 8:10 pm | Wednesdays | KA 307
This course fulfills a Creative Arts general education requirement.

HNRS 2020 CA: Children's Literature: Building a Book with Art & Science

This course will provide students with an immersive, cross-disciplinary learning experience.

Students will explore and engage in the creative process as they are guided through the creation of an original children’s book.

The content for the children’s book will focus on water and connect to science and sustainability.

Tamara Goldbogen & Erinne Roundy | 4:30 - 7:10 pm | Wednesdays | LI 325
This course fulfills a Creative Arts general education requirement.

HNRS 1110 HU: The Construction of Knowledge

This course examines how knowledge is produced, what it is used for, and what it means.

We look at knowledge in the general sense but also in the specific way it is advanced by literature and science, bringing together two topics of study to broaden our understanding of life in the contemporary moment.

Christy Call & Dan Bedford | 10:30 - 11:45 am | Tuesdays & Thursdays | LI 325
This course fulfills a Humanities general education requirement.

HNRS 1540 HU: Hiking for Mind, Body and Soul

This course combines academic learning with local hiking and meditation.

You will enrich your mind, body and soul; commune with nature; explore local trails; study philosophy; taste wild berries; find greater peace and relaxation; learn about how hiking and nature affect the brain and experience their effects on your whole self.

Marc Nelson | 1:30 - 4:10 pm | Wednesdays | LI 325 (but mostly out on a trail!)
This course fulfills a Humanities general education requirement.

HNRS 2010 HU: Conflict Journalism

This class will explore the motivations, dangers, and costs to journalists and relief workers who choose to head into harm’s way.

It will explore how truth-telling can create its own form of danger. It will conclude with practical strategies for risk assessment and to protect personal safety in hazardous conditions.

Jean Norman | 11:30 am - 12:20 pm | Monday, Wednesday, Fridays | LP 201
This course fulfills a Humanities general education requirement.

HNRS 1520 SS: Psychoanalysis & Culture

What exactly is psychoanalysis? What makes it unique among other approaches to human psychology and other methods of interpretation?

This course will provide answers to these questions and more by surveying psychoanalysis through its history, theories, and applications.

The course will culminate with a consideration of the ways in which scholars have put psychoanalytic ideas to use.

Brady Brower & Alex Collopy | 10:30 - 11:45 am | Tuesdays & Thursdays | LI 322
This course fulfills a Social Science general education requirement.

HNRS 2050 SS: Youth in Revolt

What is the category of youth? How has it shifted historically? What are the problems facing young people?

This course focuses on the identities, social positions, and experiences of youth, as they come together as activists, goths, gamers, and other active transformers of society.

Pepper Glass | 12:30 - 1:20 pm | Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays | LH 206
This course fulfills a Social Science general education requirement.

HNRS 2120 B SS: The Meaning of Life

Ever wondered about the meaning of life?

Explore and examine the various answers that Western philosophers, thinkers, writers and historians have proffered to this timeless question since the Scientific Revolution through today.

Marc & Katie Nelson | 9:00 - 10:15 am | Tuesdays & Thursdays | LH 114
This course fulfills a Social Science general education requirement.

HNRS 2830: Young Adult Queer Literature & Television (1-credit discussion course)

This 1 credit-hour class will read a couple of the best titles in queer YA literature: Last Night at the Telegraph Club and Like a Love Story, in addition to watching queer stories on television.

This class will investigate ways in which the genre has developed.

Richard Price | 3 - 4 pm | Tuesdays | LI 325

HNRS 2920: Vietnam in Film & Fiction - Viet Thanh Nguyen (1-credit discussion course)

This 1 credit-hour class will examine the acclaimed contemporary novel, The Sympathizer, along with the classic film Apocalypse Now.

Michael Wutz | 12:30 - 1:30 pm | Wednesdays | LI 325

HNRS 3900: Monsters & Markets

This course will explore the link between monsters and markets.

By connecting monsters and markets, this course will be an exploration of basic economic theories, capitalism, market socialism, creation, consumption, and transfer of wealth through the pop cultural lens of vampires, werewolves, zombies and other monsters.

Valentinas Rudys & Cynthia Jones | 12 - 1:15 pm | Tuesdays & Thursdays | LI 325

HNRS 4900: Meditation & Mindfulness

A quiet mind and inner peace are infrequently experienced, especially among college students.

In this course, students will not only discover the possibility of inner peace and a quiet mind but experience their reality.

Students will learn how meditation and mindfulness are two of our most powerful tools to reduce anxiety and stress and regain inner peace.

Michael Olpin | 12 - 2:45 pm | Tuesdays | SW 225