Introductory Special Topics (190’s and 290’s) (Fall 2022)

GHS 290 00, Anthropology of Food
Abbreviated Title: Anth of Food
Professor Runestad
Credits: 4
An examination of food and foodways from an anthropological perspective. With attention to the interplay between biology, culture, and power, students explore the myriad of ways in which food-related behaviors influence human health. Core principles for the course are food safety, security, sovereignty, sustainability, and sociality. Using those lenses, students explore foods as medicines or poisons, the relationship between differential access to resources and health, the importance of the power and representation in making changes to food systems to support community health, tensions between maintaining worker health and the food supply, and the ways in which relationships and identities are forged and maintained through ritual and shared cuisines. This course will fill an elective requirement in Cultures and Society for GHS majors and minors. for GHS majors and minors in Cultures and Society.

LS 290, Introduction to Medicine
Professor Peterson
Credits: 2
A study of the preparation for a medical career and the characteristics required of a health care provider. Students read from various texts about the challenges presented by a medical career. Students explore aspects of medicine through the lens of the competencies currently used to evaluate medical school candidates. Topics include health disparities, the social determinants of health, and current issues in health care.
This will be taught as a seven-week Module B course.
Must be taken Credit/No Credit
Designed for sophomores or above

PHIL 290 00, Whiteness and the Concepttualization of Race
Abbreviated Title: Whiteness and Concept of Race
Professors Bywater and Yancy
Credits: 4
A critical study of race as a structure of society. The racial binary of black and white is explored through the lenses of African American philosophy, feminist theory, literature and pedagogy.  The course considers contemporary understandings of privilege, “purity,” vulnerability, “innocence,” and complicity as these relate to whiteness as explored through critical phenomenological literature, post-colonial literature, the genre of autobiography, Black fiction, and Black essayists. 

PSYCH 190 00, Drugs and Human Behavior
Professor Frambes
Credits: 4
A basic overview of physiological and neurochemical aspects of drug use with a focus on the properties of specific psychoactive drugs, how these drugs work in the body, and how the body responds to and eliminates these drugs. Special topics will include the relationship between method of drug use and drug effect, the neurological bases of substance dependency, and treatment of addiction.