Honors Courses

If you receive a cohort error when registering for an Honors course, email marmuster@weber.edu for an override to register for an Honors course.
Please include the CRN and your W number.

A student may repeat a course number for up to 6 credits if the course name, course syllabus, and faculty/instructor teaching the course is different.

Email professors by clicking on their names

If you have any questions or concerns about registration or the course, please contact Mar Muster at marmuster@weber.edu

Fall 2021

Introductory College Writing

HNRS ENGL 1010: Introductory College Writing
CRN 26683

How does one write in the digital age? This course not only introduces students to the habits and practices necessary for writing well at the college level but also provides them opportunities to write in a variety of styles and genres, including blogs and digital documentaries.

Face-to-Face
Elizabeth Hall (EH) 205
1:30-2:45pm T, TH
Jose Otero (English)


HNRS + ENG

Construction of Knowledge

HNRS 1110 HU Introduction to Honors
CRN 26458

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. Traditionally these areas are kept separate on campus, but this class brings them together. This alignment opens possibilities for better understanding our lives in the contemporary moment, a time laden with tensions about information and truth, interpretation and meaning.

Face-to-Face
Library (LI) 325
9:00-10:15 AM T,Th
Christy Call (English)
Dan Bedford (Geography)

HNRS + HU Credit

ArtsBridge: Murals

HNRS 1530 CA/CEL Perspectives in the Creative Arts
CRN 26463

How does public art integrate environment, community engagement, purpose, and message? ArtsBridge: Murals is a course that provides students with an experiential learning opportunity to create and implement a community engaged learning project—designed through the lens of an art form—with a community organization. Students will learn about murals and public art in the community, work with professional mural artists in hands-on workshops, and create an original art installation in Ogden.


Face-to-Face
WSU Community Education Center (2605 Monroe Blvd), Room 106
4:30pm-7:10pm W
Tamara Goldbogen (Arts Learning)
Erinne Roundy (Arts Learning)

HNRS + CA + CEL Credit

Prescriptions for Empathy

HNRS 1540 HU Perspectives in the Humanities
CRN 26501

The course uses literature about healthcare and medicine to talk about the importance of and definition for empathy in culture and personal relationships.

Virtual
12:30-1:20pm M,W,F
Sally Shigley (English)

HNRS + HU Credit

Tree of Life

HNRS 2040 LS SUS Exploring Key Concepts: Life Sciences
CRN 26536

This course focuses on human relationships with trees through the lenses of science, storytelling, and metaphor. We will read the epic novel, The Overstory, by Richard Powers. As we are introduced to the human characters, we will also learn the underlying biology of forest communities. We will explore themes of human relationships with the natural world, environmentalism, activism, and the roles of science and technology.

Face-to-Face
Library (LI) 325
10:30-11:20am M,W,F
Heather Root (Botany and Plant Ecology)
Kyra Hudson (English)

SUS + HNRS + LS Credit

TV - Media History

HNRS 2050 SS Exploring Key Concepts: Social Sciences
CRN 26537

TV-Media History will look at the development of television as a factor in reinforcing and influencing social trends. The business side of the broadcast industry will be discussed, but the programming angle will be more heavily studied. Issues will include minorities, gender issues, and politics as they influenced social transition.

Face-to-Face
Library (LI) 246
9:30-10:20am M,W,F
Tracey Smith (History)

HNRS + SS Credit

Politics and Film

HNRS 2050 SS Exploring Key Concepts: Social Sciences
CRN 26538

This course seeks to make students sensitive to and articulate about the ways in which politics and American values are portrayed in film and television. It is the contention of your professors that these depictions say something about what our real, and espoused, values are. Topics to be covered include the tensions between ethics and politics, the current debate in the academic community on social capital and what citizens owe to one another and the balancing of rights and how creative artists choose to narrate those tensions, an introduction to various moral theories that figure in contemporary policy debates depicted in film and TV and a consideration of the principal values that animate American politics including issues and dilemmas in professional agencies. This course is quite multidisciplinary in its approach and materials, emphasizes multiculturalism and devotes considerable attention to the comparative and normative aspects of American government and free speech. The central theme will be citizenship: that is, to prepare students for their roles in a pluralist democracy in an increasingly media narrated world.

Hybrid
Library (LI) 325
11:30am- 12:20pm M,W,F
Gary Johnson (Political Science)
Scott Rogers (English)

 HNRS + SS Credit

The Meaning of Life

HNRS 2110(A) HU Great Ideas of the West/Classical and Medieval Eras
CRN 26548

Ever wondered about the meaning of life? So have a lot of other people! Explore and examine with us the various answers that Western societies, religions, philosophers and thinkers have proffered to this timeless question from the dawn of civilization to the Black Death.

Virtual
12:00-1:15pm T,Th
Marc Nelson (Philosophy)
Katie Nelson (History)

 HNRS + HU Credit

Bored, Lonely, Angry, Stupid: Changing Feelings about Technology, from the Telegraph to Twitter

HNRS 2120(B) SS Great Ideas of the West/Modern Era
CRN 26565

How has technology changed our emotions, attention span, and our notions of what it means to be human? This course will examine the effects of technologies, from the telegraph to Twitter, from the camera to the selfie-stick, in order to understand how our tools reshape our selves and our societies. 

Virtual
10:30-11:45am T,Th
Susan Matt (History)
Luke Fernandez (School of Computing)

 HNRS + SS Credit

 

Diagnosing Disease in the Past and Present

HNRS 3900 Honors Colloquium
CRN 26409

“Diagnosing Disease in the Past and Present” will take a medical humanities interdisciplinary approach to the study of nine specific diseases. Drawing on the expertise of a historian and a pathologist, we have a unique opportunity to attract students from across the disciplines. We will present historical and social science methodologies and modern medical diagnostic approaches in order to provide the students with sufficient training to apply these skills to case studies both drawn from history as well as diseases that continue to plague the modern era. The World Health Organization has set a challenge to alleviate human suffering by learning to successful diagnose, treat, and ultimately prevent disease.

Virtual
1:30-2:20pm M,W,F
Scott Moore (Medical Labratory Sciences)
Matthew Romaniello (History)

  3 Credits

Antiracism: An Exploration of American History, Systems, Culture

HNRS 4900 Honors Colloquium
CRN 26582

Antiracism: An Exploration of American History, Systems, & Culture will explore racism and antiracism in our nation, in order to better understand the context for the present. We must work towards dismantling individual, societal, and systemic racism in order to create a more equitable, just, and antiracist future. This exploration will include the differences between race and ethnicity, cultural considerations regarding each, and intersectionality present between race, and class, space, gender, and sexuality.

Virtual
1:30-2:45pm T,Th
Kathleen Cadman (Nursing)

   3 Credits

R.E.A.L Projects

HNRS 4920: Short Courses, Workshops, Institutes, and Special Program
CRN 26583
CRN 26584

Real Experience Applied Learning Projects (R.E.A.L. Projects) Employers are looking more at experiential learning to determine the best candidates for today's jobs. "R.E.A.L. Projects" gives students real-world experience, working as part of an interdisciplinary team on a real project for an employer. The course will teach project management, communication, and leadership skills, helping to set you apart from other potential candidates in the job market.

Virtual
9:00-10:15am T,Th
Robert Ameling (Career Services)
Katie Swainston (Career Services)

3 Credits

Stuck: How Vaccine Rumors Start -- and Why They Don't Go Away by Heidi Larson

HNRS 2830 Book Discussion Class
CRN 26642

Vaccine reluctance and refusal are no longer limited to the margins of society. Debates around vaccines' necessity -- along with questions around their side effects -- have gone mainstream, blending with geopolitical conflicts, political campaigns, celebrity causes, and "natural" lifestyles to win a growing number of hearts and minds. Today's anti-vaccine positions find audiences where they've never existed previously.
Stuck examines how the issues surrounding vaccine hesitancy are, more than anything, about people feeling left out of the conversation. A new dialogue is long overdue, one that addresses the many types of vaccine hesitancy and the social factors that perpetuate them. To do this, Stuck provides a clear-eyed examination of the social vectors that transmit vaccine rumors, their manifestations around the globe, and how these individual threads are all connected.

Virtual
6:00-7:15pm Th
Sally Cantwell (Nursing)


1 Credit

Data and Goliath, by Bruce Shneier; Spam Nation, by Brian Krebs

HNRS 2830 Book Discussion Class
CRN 26641

Data and Goliath
Your cell phone provider tracks your location and knows who’s with you. Your online and in-store purchasing patterns are recorded, and reveal if you're unemployed, sick, or pregnant. Your e-mails and texts expose your intimate and casual friends. Google knows what you’re thinking because it saves your private searches. Facebook can determine your sexual orientation without you ever mentioning it.

The powers that surveil us do more than simply store this information. Corporations use surveillance to manipulate not only the news articles and advertisements we each see, but also the prices we’re offered. Governments use surveillance to discriminate, censor, chill free speech, and put people in danger worldwide. And both sides share this information with each other or, even worse, lose it to cybercriminals in huge data breaches.

Much of this is voluntary: we cooperate with corporate surveillance because it promises us convenience, and we submit to government surveillance because it promises us protection. The result is a mass surveillance society of our own making. But have we given up more than we’ve gained? In Data and Goliath, security expert Bruce Schneier offers another path, one that values both security and privacy. He brings his bestseller up-to-date with a new preface covering the latest developments, and then shows us exactly what we can do to reform government surveillance programs, shake up surveillance-based business models, and protect our individual privacy. You'll never look at your phone, your computer, your credit cards, or even your car in the same way again.

Spam Nation
In Spam Nation, investigative journalist and cybersecurity expert Brian Krebs unmasks the criminal masterminds driving some of the biggest spam and hacker operations targeting Americans and their bank accounts. Tracing the rise, fall, and alarming resurrection of the digital mafia behind the two largest spam pharmacies - and countless viruses, phishing, and spyware attacks - he delivers the first definitive narrative of the global spam problem and its threat to consumers everywhere.

Virtual
9:30-10:20am F
Matt Paulson (School of Computing)


1 Credit

Podcast: Revisionist History by Malcom Gladwell

HNRS 2830 Book Discussion Class
CRN 26640

Because sometimes the past deserves a second chance.
Welcome to Revisionist History, a podcast from Malcolm Gladwell and Pushkin Industries. Each week for 10 weeks, Revisionist History will go back and reinterpret something from the past: an event, a person, an idea. Something overlooked. Something misunderstood.
 

Face-to-Face
Library (LI) 325
12:30-1:20pm M
Leah Murray (Walker Institute)


1 Credit

How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi

HNRS 2830 Book Discussion Class
CRN 29332

Antiracism is a transformative concept that reorients and reenergizes the conversation about racism—and, even more fundamentally, points us toward liberating new ways of thinking about ourselves and each other. At its core, racism is a powerful system that creates false hierarchies of human value; its warped logic extends beyond race, from the way we regard people of different ethnicities or skin colors to the way we treat people of different sexes, gender identities, and body types. Racism intersects with class and culture and geography and even changes the way we see and value ourselves. In How to Be an Antiracist, Kendi takes readers through a widening circle of antiracist ideas—from the most basic concepts to visionary possibilities—that will help readers see all forms of racism clearly, understand their poisonous consequences, and work to oppose them in our systems and in ourselves.

Kendi weaves an electrifying combination of ethics, history, law, and science with his own personal story of awakening to antiracism. This is an essential work for anyone who wants to go beyond the awareness of racism to the next step: contributing to the formation of a just and equitable society.

Face-to-Face
Library (LI) 325
4:00-4:50pm M
Brad Mortensen (WSU President)
Adrienne Andrews (
Chief Diversity Officer)


1 Credit

Summer 2021

Soundtrack for the Revolution

HNRS 2050 Exploring Key Concepts in the Disciplines: Social Sciences
CRN 11870

Soundtrack of the Revolution will explore the role that music across multiple genres, has played in shaping society and challenging establishments throughout history. Specifically, students will consider how music has been used as a platform to empower women, people of color, LGBT+ individuals, the working class, and others who have been marginalized or oppressed by political forces and governments around the world.

Online-First Block
Kathleen Cadman (Nursing)
Carey Campbell (Performing Arts)


HNRS + SS

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