AA 116Q:
Electric Automobiles and Aircraft
Transportation accounts for nearly one-third of American energy use and greenhouse gas emissions and three-quarters of American oil consumption. It has crucial impacts on climate change, air pollution, resource depletion, and national security. Students wishing to address these issues reconsider how we move, finding sustainable transportation solutions. An introduction to the issue, covering the past and present of transportation and its impacts; examining alternative fuel proposals; and digging deeper into the most promising option: battery electric vehicles. Energy requirements of air, ground, and maritime transportation; design of electric motors, power control systems, drive trains, and batteries; and technologies for generating renewable energy. Two opportunities for hands-on experiences with electric cars. Prerequisites: Introduction to calculus and Physics AP or elementary mechanics.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci, WAY-AQR, WAY-SMA
AA 118N:
How to Design a Space Mission: from Concept to Execution
Space exploration is truly fascinating. From the space race led by governments as an outgrowth of the Cold War to the new era of space commercialization led by private companies and startups, more than 50 years have passed, characterized by great leaps forward and discoveries. We will learn how space missions are designed, from concept to execution, based on the professional experience of the lecturer and numerous examples of spacecraft, including unique hardware demonstrations by startups of the Silicon Valley. We will study the essentials of systems engineering as applicable to a variety of mission types, for communication, navigation, science, commercial, and military applications. We will explore the various elements of a space mission, including the spacecraft, ground, and launch segments with their functionalities. Special emphasis will be given to the design cycle, to understand how spacecraft are born, from the stakeholders' needs, through analysis, synthesis, all the way to their integration and validation. We will compare the current designs with those employed in the early days of the space age, and show the importance of economics in the development of spacecraft. Finally, we will brainstorm startup ideas and apply the concepts learned to a notional space mission design as a team.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-AQR, WAY-SMA
AA 119N:
3D Printed Aerospace Structures
The demand for rapid prototyping of lightweight, complex, and low-cost structures has led the aerospace industry to leverage three-dimensional (3D) printing as a manufacturing technology. For example, the manufacture of aircraft engine components, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) wings, CubeSat parts, and satellite sub-systems have recently been realized with 3D printing and other additive manufacturing techniques. In this freshman seminar, a survey of state-of-the-art 3D printing processes will be reviewed and the process-dependent properties of 3D-printed materials and structures will be analyzed in detail. In addition, the advantages and disadvantages of this manufacturing approach will be debated during class! To give students exposure to 3D printing systems in action, tours of actual 3D printing facilities on campus (Stanford's Product Realization Laboratory), as well as in Silicon Valley (e.g., Made in Space) will be conducted.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-AQR
AA 120Q:
Building Trust in Autonomy
Major advances in both hardware and software have accelerated the development of autonomous systems that have the potential to bring significant benefits to society. Google, Tesla, and a host of other companies are building autonomous vehicles that can improve safety and provide flexible mobility options for those who cannot drive themselves. On the aviation side, the past few years have seen the proliferation of unmanned aircraft that have the potential to deliver medicine and monitor agricultural crops autonomously. In the financial domain, a significant portion of stock trades are performed using automated trading algorithms at a frequency not possible by human traders. How do we build these systems that drive our cars, fly our planes, and invest our money? How do we develop trust in these systems? What is the societal impact on increased levels of autonomy?
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-AQR, WAY-SMA
AA 121Q:
It IS Rocket Science!
It's an exciting time for space exploration. Companies like SpaceX and Blue Origin are launching rockets into space and bringing them back for reuse. NASA is developing the world's most powerful rocket. Startups are deploying constellations of hundreds of cubesats for communications, navigation, and earth monitoring. The human race has recently gotten a close look at Pluto, soft landed on a comet, and orbited two asteroids. The upcoming launch of the James Webb Space Telescope will allow astronomers to look closer to the beginning of time than ever before. The workings of space systems remain mysterious to most people, but in this seminar we'll pull back the curtain for a look at the basics of "rocket science." How does a SpaceX rocket get into space? How do Skybox satellites capture images for Google Earth? How did the New Horizons probe find its way to Pluto? How do we communicate with spacecraft that are so distant? We'll explore these topics and a range of others during the quarter. We'll cover just enough physics and math to determine where to look in the sky for a spacecraft, planet, or star. Then we'll check our math by going outside for an evening pizza party observing these objects in the night sky. We'll also visit a spacecraft production facility or Mission Operations Center to see theory put into practice.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-AQR, WAY-SMA
AA 122N:
Dawn of the Drones: How Will Unmanned Aerial Systems Change Our World?
Unmanned aerial systems (UASs) have exploded on the scene in recent years, igniting a national debate about how to use them, how to regulate them, and how to make them safe. This seminar will dive into the many engineering challenges behind the headlines: in the future, how will we engineer UASs ranging in size from simple RC toys to highly-sophisticated autonomous scientific and military data gathering systems? This seminar will examine the key elements required to conceive, implement, deploy, and operate state-of-the-art of drone systems: What variety of problems can they help us solve? How autonomous are they and how autonomous do they need to be? What are the key technical bottlenecks preventing widespread deployment? How are they different from commercial aircraft? What kinds of companies will serve the market for UAV-related products and services? What business models will be successful and why? We will emphasize aspects of design, autonomy, reliability, navigation, sensing, and perception, as well as coordination/collaboration through a series of case studies drawn from our recent experience. Examples include imaging efforts to map the changing coral reefs in the South Pacific, using and controlling swarms of unmanned systems to perform search and rescue missions over large areas, and package delivery systems over large metropolitan areas. Hands-on experience with Stanford-developed UASs will be part of the seminar.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-AQR, WAY-SMA
AFRICAAM 17N:
Race and Politics: Perspectives on the 2016 Presidential Election (CSRE 17N, SOC 17N)
This course is intended as a seminar-based exploration of the complex ways that race has informed political behavior and attitudes during the 2016 Presidential election. The class is designed to introduce freshman to sociological ways of understanding the social world, and the rigors of college thinking more broadly. As a group we will explore the mechanisms through which race informs political behavior, while also paying close attention to the ways that politics also informs our understanding of race. The course treats ¿race¿ as multifaceted construct, with multiple (and often times conflicting) influences on political behavior. The course stresses thenconstructed nature of both race and politics. The course will be split into 3 parts. In the first partnwe will explore the relationship between racial identity and political behavior at the individualnlevel. The second part of the course will examine how ideas about racial groups shape politicalnattitudes and behaviors, as well as policy outcomes. The third part of the course will explore hownrace is used to mobilize political and economic actors.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
AFRICAAM 48Q:
South Africa: Contested Transitions (HISTORY 48Q)
Preference to sophomores. The inauguration of Nelson Mandela as president in May 1994 marked the end of an era and a way of life for South Africa. The changes have been dramatic, yet the legacies of racism and inequality persist. Focus: overlapping and sharply contested transitions. Who advocates and opposes change? Why? What are their historical and social roots and strategies? How do people reconstruct their society? Historical and current sources, including films, novels, and the Internet.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-GlobalCom, WAY-EDP, WAY-SI, Writing 2
AFRICAAM 52N:
Mixed-Race Politics and Culture (ENGLISH 52N, POLISCI 29N)
Today, almost one-third of Americans identify with a racial/ethnic minority group, and more than 9 million Americans identify with multiple races. What are the implications of such diversity for American politics and culture? In this course, we approach issues of race from an interdisciplinary perspective, employing research in the social sciences and humanities to assess how race shapes perceptions of identity as well as political behavior in 21st century U.S. We will examine issues surrounding the role of multiculturalism, immigration, acculturation, racial representation and racial prejudice in American society. Topics we will explore include the political and social formation of "race"; racial representation in the media, arts, and popular culture; the rise and decline of the "one-drop rule" and its effect on political and cultural attachments; the politicization of Census categories and the rise of the Multiracial Movement.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
AFRICAAM 54N:
African American Women's Lives (AMSTUD 54N, CSRE 54N, FEMGEN 54N, HISTORY 54N)
Preference to freshmen. We will examine the struggles of African American women to define their own lives and improve the social, economic, political and cultural conditions of black communities. Topics will include women¿s enslavement and freedom, kinship and family relations, institution and community building, violence, labor and leisure, changing gender roles, consumer and beauty culture, social activism, and the politics of sexuality.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP
AMSTUD 51Q:
Comparative Fictions of Ethnicity (COMPLIT 51Q, CSRE 51Q)
We may "know" "who" we "are," but we are, after all, social creatures. How does our sense of self interact with those around us? How does literature provide a particular medium for not only self expression, but also for meditations on what goes into the construction of "the Self"? After all, don't we tell stories in response to the question, "who are you"? Besides a list of nouns and names and attributes, we give our lives flesh and blood in telling how we process the world. Our course focuses in particular on this question--Does this universal issue ("who am I") become skewed differently when we add a qualifier before it, like "ethnic"?
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP, Writing 2
AMSTUD 54N:
African American Women's Lives (AFRICAAM 54N, CSRE 54N, FEMGEN 54N, HISTORY 54N)
Preference to freshmen. We will examine the struggles of African American women to define their own lives and improve the social, economic, political and cultural conditions of black communities. Topics will include women¿s enslavement and freedom, kinship and family relations, institution and community building, violence, labor and leisure, changing gender roles, consumer and beauty culture, social activism, and the politics of sexuality.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP
AMSTUD 55N:
Social Movements through Song in Modern America (FEMGEN 55N, HISTORY 55N)
This discussion class will explore a series of social movements in modern America through the songs produced to support efforts to achieve labor unions, civil rights and racial justice, peace, and women's rights. For each class we will read short historical texts to provide contexts for the movements and then concentrate on the role of music within them. We will listening to and discuss several core songs for each topic. Biographical and autobiographical readings on a key set of musicians (including Joe Hill, Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Malvina Reynolds, and Bernice Johnson Reagon) will provide personal accounts of the relationship of songs to social movement . The music we include in class will range from ballads to anthems, from oral traditions to the work of singer-songwriters.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3-4
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
AMSTUD 57Q:
10 American Photographs
Preference to sophomores. ¿The humor, the sadness, the EVERYTHING-ness and American-ness of these pictures!¿ wrote Jack Kerouac of photographer Robert Frank¿s iconic collection, The Americans. This seminar takes Kerouac¿s enthusiasm and applies it to ten American photographs, a new one each week. Examples span the medium¿s history and were taken as art, science, commerce, journalism, or personal mementos. Close study of the photo of the week will address how it looks and why; its history, from initial responses to later reception; and its relationship to the larger American visual and cultural context. Also under discussion: What story does this set of pictures tell about Americanness? What might another set of photos convey?
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
AMSTUD 68N:
Mark Twain and American Culture (ENGLISH 68N)
Preference to freshmen. Mark Twain defined the rhythms of our prose and the contours of our moral map. He recognized our extravagant promise and stunning failures, our comic foibles and tragic flaws. He is viewed as the most American of American authors--and as one of the most universal. How does his work illuminate his society's (and our society's) responses to such issues as race, gender, technology, heredity vs. environment, religion, education, art, imperialism, animal welfare, and what it means to be "American"?
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-AmerCul, WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP
AMSTUD 105Q:
Law and Popular Culture (LAWGEN 105Q)
(Same as AMSTUD 105Q) This seminar focuses on the interface between two important subjects: law and popular culture. Before class, students will see a series of films or television shows relating to law, lawyers, and the legal system. There is also a weekly homework assignment based on materials in the assigned text and the assigned film or TV show. We will discuss the pop culture treatment of subjects such as the adversary system, good and bad lawyers, female and gay lawyers, the work life of lawyers, legal education, ethical issues, the jury system, and criminal and civil justice. The seminar discussions will draw on film theory and film-making technique to deepen understanding of the interrelationship between law and popular culture. The discussions will illuminate the ways in which pop culture products both reflect and change social views about law and lawyers. The assigned text is Michael Asimow & Shannon Mader, "Law & Popular Culture: A Course Book" (Peter Lang, 2d edition, 2013).
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
AMSTUD 109Q:
On the Road: A History of Travel in 20th Century America (HISTORY 69Q)
From Mark Twain's Roughin It to Cheryl Strayed's Wild, this seminar explores epic road trips of the twentieth century. Travel is a cultural practice through which Americans have constructed ideas about the self, society, race, the past, and the future. Engaging historical and literary texts, film, autobiography, photography, and music, we will consider how writers have explored the theme of travel and what the differences in their texts tell us about American writing, American history, and American life.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
AMSTUD 117N:
Losing My Religion: Secularism and Spirituality in American Lives (EDUC 117N, RELIGST 13N)
In this seminar you will explore theory and practice, sociological data, spiritual writing, and case studies in an effort to gain a more nuanced understanding about how religion, spirituality, and secularism attempt to make legible the constellation of concerns, commitments, and behaviors that bridge the moral and the personal, the communal and the national, the sacred, the profane, and the rational. Together we will cultivate critical perspectives on practices and politics, beliefs and belonging that we typically take for granted.
Terms: Aut, Sum
| Units: 2-4
| UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
ANES 70Q:
Critical Illness: Patients, Physicians, and Society
Examines the various factors involved in shaping the critical care illness experience for three groups of people: the clinicians, the patients, and patients' families. Medical issues, economic forces and cost concerns, cultural biases, and communication errors can all influence one's perception. Helps students understand the arc of critical illness, and how various factors contribute to the interactions between those various groups. Includes an immersion experience (students are expected to round with clinicians in the ICU and to attend Schwartz rounds, a debriefing meeting about difficult emotional situation) and a mentoring experience (with critical care fellows), in addition to routine class work.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
ANES 72Q:
The Art of Medical Diagnosis
The Art of Medical Diagnosis: Enhancing Observational Skills through the Study of Art is an interactive, multidisciplinary undergraduate course that explores various ways in which studying art increases critical observational skills vital for aspiring health care providers. Students will be introduced to the concept of `Visual Thinking Strategies¿ through classroom, art creation, and museum based activities. Students will apply these skills to both works of art and medical cases. Significant focus will be on engaging in group discussions where they will collaboratively use visual evidence to generate and defend hypothesis. Drawing and sketching from life will play a critical role in honing observational skills through weekly assignments, workshops, and a final project. The interactive nature of this course pivots students away from a typical lecture based course to a self-directed learning experience.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-CE
ANTHRO 28N:
Secularism and its Critics
Secularism is often taken to be a necessary prerequisite for democracy in the modern world. The separation of religion and politics is often written into constitutions as a fundamental priority. Yet around the world, growing numbers of religious movements have sought to dispute the legitimacy of secularism. Social scientists, including anthropologists, are beginning to research the forms of domination and political violence that have been justified in the name of secularism. This course seeks to make sense of this global debate about secularism. It does so by taking up an anthropological perspective: much as anthropologists might study culture, religion, or kinship, we will interrogate secularism as a comparative social artifact, constituted by historically specific repertoires of signs, identities, everyday practices, and institutional powers. The course focuses on case studies in the United States, Western Europe, the Middle East, and South Asia.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3-5
| UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
ANTHRO 64Q:
These languages were here first: A look at the indigenous languages of California (LINGUIST 64Q, NATIVEAM 64Q)
Stanford was built on land originally inhabited by the Muwekma Ohlone tribe, and Native American students have always held an important place in the university community from the writer and journalist John Milton Oskison (Cherokee) who graduated in 1894 to current enrolments of over three hundred students who represent over fifty tribes. Two hundred years ago, the Muwekma language was one of a hundred languages that made California one of the most linguistically-diverse places on earth. Today, less than half of these languages survive but many California Indian communities are working hard to maintain and revitalize them. This is a familiar pattern globally: languages around the world are dying at such a rapid rate that the next century could see half of the world's 6800 languages and cultures become extinct unless action is taken now. Focusing especially on California, this course seeks to find out how and why languages die; what is lost from a culture when that occurs; and how `sleeping¿ languages might be revitalized. We will take a field trip to a Native American community in northern California to witness first-hand how one community is bringing back its traditional language, songs, dances, and story-telling. We will learn from visiting indigenous leaders and linguistic experts who will share their life, language, and culture with the class. Through weekly readings and discussion, we will investigate how languages can be maintained and revitalized by methods of community- and identity-building, language documentation and description, the use of innovative technologies, writing dictionaries and grammars for different audiences, language planning, and data creation, annotation, preservation, and dissemination. Finally, the course will examine ethical modes of fieldwork within endangered-language communities.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
APPPHYS 77N:
Functional Materials and Devices
Preference to freshmen. Exploration via case studies how functional materials have been developed and incorporated into modern devices. Particular emphasis is on magnetic and dielectric materials and devices. Recommended: high school physics course including electricity and magnetism.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci, WAY-SMA
APPPHYS 79Q:
Energy Options for the 21st Century
Preference to freshmen. Choices for meeting the future energy needs of the U.S. and the world. Basic physics of energy sources, technologies that might be employed, and related public policy issues. Trade-offs and societal impacts of different energy sources. Policy options for making rational choices for a sustainable world energy economy.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci, WAY-SMA
APPPHYS 85N:
Understanding Biology with Numbers
Preference to freshmen. Developing understanding of biological phenomena via quantitative reasoning including framing questions, order of magnitude estimation, and ways of looking at data. Topics span from cellular processes to motion of animals to global carbon cycles.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-AQR, WAY-SMA
ARCHLGY 21Q:
Eight Great Archaeological Sites in Europe (CLASSICS 21Q)
(Formerly CLASSART 21Q.) Preference to sophomores. Focus is on excavation, features and finds, arguments over interpretation, and the place of each site in understanding the archaeological history of Europe. Goal is to introduce the latest archaeological and anthropological thought, and raise key questions about ancient society. The archaeological perspective foregrounds interdisciplinary study: geophysics articulated with art history, source criticism with analytic modeling, statistics interpretation. A web site with resources about each site, including plans, photographs, video, and publications, is the basis for exploring.
Terms: Win, Spr
| Units: 3-5
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, WAY-A-II, Writing 2
ARTHIST 100N:
The Artist in Ancient Greek Society (CLASSICS 18N)
Given the importance of art to all aspects of their lives, the Greeks had reason to respect their artists. Yet potters, painters and even sculptors possessed little social standing. n nWhy did the Greeks value the work of craftsmen but not the men themselves? Why did Herodotus dismiss those who worked with their hands as "mechanics?" What prompted Homer to claim that "there is no greater glory for a man¿ than what he achieves with his own hands," provided that he was throwing a discus and not a vase on a wheel?n nPainted pottery was essential to the religious and secular lives of the Greeks. Libations to the gods and to the dead required vases from which to pour them. Economic prosperity depended on the export of wine and oil in durable clay containers. At home, depictions of gods and heroes on vases reinforced Greek values and helped parents to educate their children. Ceramic sets with scenes of Dionysian excess were reserved for elite symposia from which those who potted and painted them were excluded.n nSculptors were less lowly but even those who carved the Parthenon were still regarded as "mechanics," with soft bodies and soft minds (Xenophon) "indifferent to higher things" (Plutarch).n nThe seminar addresses these issues. Students will read and discuss texts, write response papers and present slide lectures and gallery talks on aspects of the artist's profession.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, WAY-A-II
ARTSINST 11Q:
Art in the Metropolis (TAPS 11Q)
This seminar is offered in conjunction with the annual "Arts Immersion" trip to New York that takes place over the spring break and is organized by the Stanford Arts Institute (SAI). Participation in the trip is a requirement for taking part in the seminar (and vice versa). The trip is designed to provide a group of students with the opportunity to immerse themselves in the cultural life of New York City guided by faculty and the SAI programming director. Students will experience a broad range and variety of art forms (visual arts, theater, opera, dance, etc.) and will meet with prominent arts administrators and practitioners, some of whom are Stanford alumni. For further details and updates about the trip, see http://arts.stanford.edu.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
ARTSINST 180Q:
How to be Governed Otherwise: Art, Activism, and the City (CEE 131Q, URBANST 180Q)
This course will introduce you to contemporary art¿s engagement with political activism. This introduction will focus on the city as, at once, a field and target of activism¿a field of public appearance, artistic intervention, and political action, as well as a target of claims to residence, livelihood, recognition, justice, and collectivity. We will pose activist politics, artistic intervention, and urban space as mutually imbricated, each shaping the possibilities, programs, and histories of the other¿a perspective that offers insights into the spatiality, materiality, and visuality of political identity, agency, and action. Over the quarter, we will study some of the many artistic interventions that are encompassed by urban activism, from informal and everyday practices to protest, resistance, and occupation. Comparative case studies will be drawn from a global context. You will investigate these case studies through both research on urban activism and activist practice; the seminar will therefore invite you to explore the militant possibilities of research, the research possibilities of activism, and the implications of each for the production of art.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
ARTSTUDI 156Q:
Installation Art in Time and Space
This hands on studio based sculpture course focuses on developing concepts, and creating a site-specific installation art project. This class will addresses the impact of material and technique upon form and content; therefore understanding the physical and expressive possibilities of diverse materials. Conceptual and technical considerations will be addressed. Students will learn traditional building techniques as needed (wood shop, metal shop, mold making, found object) as well as anti-object techniques. Students will make 3-4 projects that will culminate in a final site-specific installation. We will look at contemporary artists working in the field of installation art. Group discussions, critiques, readings, video presentations, field trips and visiting artists will augment the class. Installation Art is based on the merger of Space and Time and on a relationship between the artist and the visitor. Utilizing your interests and abilities in a variety of subjects and media, you will create environments that immerse the viewer in a sensory/ intellectual/ emotional experience. The material and methods you use can range from everyday objects, to highly personalized forms, from appropriated sounds to surveillance video, from large wall drawings to interactive switches for the participant to manipulate. The class will consist of demonstrations of art skills particularly useful in installation (sculptural, video, audio, interactive media, etc), presentations by the professor, research and reports and journal entries, and weekly critique. Installation Art is a pervasive, varied, global practice for art-making that acts as a gathering place for expression in all media addressing all subjects in a wide range of styles by broad grouping of artists."
Terms: Spr
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: WAY-CE
ASNAMST 17Q:
Perspectives in North American Taiko (MUSIC 17Q)
Preference to sophomores. Taiko, or Japanese drum, is a newcomer to the American music scene. Emergence of the first N. American taiko groups coincided with increased Japanese American activism, and to some it is symbolic of Japanese American identity. N. American taiko is associated with Japanese American Buddhism. Musical, cultural, historical, and political perspectives of taiko. Hands-on drumming. Japanese music and Japanese American history, and relations among performance, cultural expression, community, and identity.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-AmerCul, WAY-CE, WAY-EDP
BIO 2N:
Ecology and Evolution of Infectious Disease in a Changing World
This seminar will explore the ways in which anthropogenic change, climate change, habitat destruction, land use change, and species invasions effects the ecology and evolution of infectious diseases. Topics will include infectious diseases of humans, wildlife, livestock, and crops, effects of disease on threatened species, disease spillover, emerging diseases, and the role of disease in natural systems. Course will be taught through a combination of popular and scientific readings, discussion, and lecture. .
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SMA
BIO 3N:
Views of a Changing Sea: Literature & Science
The state of a changing world ocean, particularly in the eastern Pacific, will be examined through historical and contemporary fiction, non-fiction and scientific publications. Issues will include harvest and mariculture fisheries, land-sea interactions and oceanic climate change in both surface and deep waters.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER: DB-NatSci
BIO 5N:
Tipping Point for Planet Earth: How Close Are We to the Edge?
We will explore why the earth is headed toward a tipping point: a change that is so rapid, so extreme, and so unexpected that humanity may not be able to recover. We will cover synergies between people, stuff, storms, hunger, thirst, toxins, disease and war. Students will read chapters from the instructor¿s new book, Tipping Point for Planet Earth, and will participate in class discussions. Each student will produce their own projects based on one of the course themes.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
BIO 7N:
Introduction to Conservation Photography
Introduction to the field of conservation photography and the strategic use of visual communication in addressing issues concerning the environment and conservation. Students will be introduced to basic digital photography, digital image processing, and the theory and application of photographic techniques. Case studies of conservation issues will be examined through photographs and multimedia platforms including images, video, and audio. Lectures, tutorials, demonstrations, and optional field trips will culminate in the production of individual and group projects.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-CE
BIO 8N:
Human Evolution
A survey of the anatomical and behavioral evidence for human evolution and of the increasingly important information from molecular genetics. Emphasis on the split between the human and chimpanzee lines 6-7 million years ago, the appearance of the australopiths by 4.1 million years ago, the emergence of the genus Homo about 2.5 million years ago, the spread of Homo from Africa 1.7-1.6 million years ago, the subsequent divergence of Homo into different species on different continents, and the expansion of fully modern humans (Homo sapiens) from Africa about 50,000 years ago to replace the Neanderthals and other non-modern Eurasians.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-SMA
BIO 12N:
Sensory Ecology of Marine Animals
Animals living in the oceans experience a highly varied range of environmental stimuli. An aquatic lifestyle requires an equally rich range of sensory adaptations, including some that are totally foreign to us. In this course we will examine sensory system in marine animals from both an environmental and behavioral perspective and from the point of view of neuroscience and information systems engineering.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SMA
BIO 24N:
Visions of Paradise: Garden Design
Through literature readings and field trips to local gardens learn the principles and esthetics of classic garden designs: Italian Renaissance, botanical teaching, Japanese, English cottage, and others. Design a personal vision of paradise with details of species, visual and scent impact, water features, and hardscape. Open your eyes to a new appreciation of the world of plants and learn some physiology and genetics that explains the specific properties of individual species.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
BIO 26N:
Maintenance of the Genome
Preference to freshmen. The precious blueprint for life is entrusted to the genomic DNA molecules in all living cells. Multiple strategies have evolved to prevent the deleterious consequences from endogenous DNA alterations and damage from radiation or genotoxic chemicals in the environment. In this seminar you will learn about the remarkable systems that scan cellular DNA for alterations and make repairs to ensure genomic stability. Deficiencies in DNA repair have been implicated in many hereditary diseases involving developmental defects, premature aging, and/or predisposition to cancer. An understanding of DNA repair mechanisms is important for advances in the fields of cancer biology, neurobiology, and gerontology. Background readings, introductory lectures, student presentations, short term paper.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-SMA
BIO 32Q:
Neuroethology: The Neural Control of Behavior (HUMBIO 91Q)
Preference to sophomores. Animal behavior offers insights about evolutionary adaptations and this seminar will discuss the origins of the study of animal behavior and its development to the present. How does the nervous system control behavior and how is it changed by behavior? We will analyze and discuss original research papers about the neural basis of behavior. The use and misuse of parallels between animal and human behavior. Possible field trip to observe animals in their natural habitat.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-SMA
BIO 33N:
Conservation Science and Practice
Preference to freshmen. This course will explore the potential for harmonizing people and nature, for achieving improved outcomes in the well-being of both as a result of conservation investments and interventions. We will consider biophysical, economic, social, and psychological perspectives, examining an array of conservation goals, from protecting endangered species to securing ecosystem services (such as flood control and climate stability) to alleviating poverty and improving mental well-being. We will also study the design and implementation of real conservation and human development efforts worldwide, among the many farmers, ranchers, fishing people, and others managing Earth's lands and waters. Highlights include a field trip to Jasper Ridge Biological Preserve, Stanford¿s very own nature reserve, and guest visits of some impressive conservation leaders internationally.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-SMA
BIOE 32Q:
Bon Appétit, Marie Curie! The Science Behind Haute Cuisine
This seminar is for anyone who loves food, cooking or science! We will focus on the science and biology behind the techniques and the taste buds. Not a single lecture will pass by without a delicious opportunity - each weekly meeting will include not only lecture, but also a lab demonstration and a chance to prepare classic dishes that illustrate that day's scientific concepts.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
BIOE 70Q:
Medical Device Innovation
BIOE 70Q invites students to apply design thinking to the creation of healthcare technologies. Students will learn about the variety of factors that shape healthcare innovation, and through hands-on design projects, invent their own solutions to clinical needs. Guest instructors will include engineers, doctors, entrepreneurs, and others who have helped bring ideas from concept to clinical use.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-CE
CEE 29N:
Managing Natural Disaster Risk
Natural disasters arise from the interaction of natural processes, such as earthquakes or floods, with human development that suffers safety-related and economic losses. We cannot predict exactly when those disasters will occur, or prevent them entirely, but we have a number of engineering and policy options that can reduce the impacts of such events.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-AQR
CEE 31Q:
Accessing Architecture Through Drawing
Preference to sophomores. Drawing architecture provides a deeper understanding of the intricacies and subtleties that characterize contemporary buildings. How to dissect buildings and appreciate the formal elements of a building, including scale, shape, proportion, colors and materials, and the problem solving reflected in the design. Students construct conventional architectural drawings, such as plans, elevations, and perspectives. Limited enrollment.
Terms: Aut, Spr
| Units: 5
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci, WAY-CE
CEE 80N:
Influences on Structural Design
In this seminar, students will be introduced to the history of modern bridges, buildings and other large-scale structures. Classes will include presentations on transformations in structural design inspired by the development of new materials, increased understanding of hazardous overloads and awareness of environmental impacts. Basic principles of structural engineering and how to calculate material efficiency and structural safety of structural forms will be taught using case studies. The course will include a field trip to a Bay Area large-scale structure, hands-on experience building a tower and computational modeling of bridges, and a paper and presentation on a structure or structural form of interest to the student. The goal of this course is for students to develop an understanding and appreciation of modern structures, influences that have led to new forms, and the impact of structural design on society and the environment. Students from all backgrounds are welcome.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-AQR
CEE 131Q:
How to be Governed Otherwise: Art, Activism, and the City (ARTSINST 180Q, URBANST 180Q)
This course will introduce you to contemporary art¿s engagement with political activism. This introduction will focus on the city as, at once, a field and target of activism¿a field of public appearance, artistic intervention, and political action, as well as a target of claims to residence, livelihood, recognition, justice, and collectivity. We will pose activist politics, artistic intervention, and urban space as mutually imbricated, each shaping the possibilities, programs, and histories of the other¿a perspective that offers insights into the spatiality, materiality, and visuality of political identity, agency, and action. Over the quarter, we will study some of the many artistic interventions that are encompassed by urban activism, from informal and everyday practices to protest, resistance, and occupation. Comparative case studies will be drawn from a global context. You will investigate these case studies through both research on urban activism and activist practice; the seminar will therefore invite you to explore the militant possibilities of research, the research possibilities of activism, and the implications of each for the production of art.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
CHEM 25N:
Science in the News
Preference to freshmen. Possible topics include: diseases such as avian flu, HIV, and malaria; environmental issues such as climate change, atmospheric pollution, and human population; energy sources in the future; evolution; stem cell research; nanotechnology; and drug development. Focus is on the scientific basis for these topics as a basis for intelligent discussion of societal and political implications. Sources include the popular media and scientific media for the nonspecialist, especially those available on the web.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SMA
CHEM 26N:
The What, Why, How and wow's of Nanotechnology
Preference to freshmen. Introduction to nanotechnology with discussion of basic science at the nanoscale, its difference from molecular and macroscopic scales, and implications and applications. Developments in nanotechnology in the past two decades, from imaging and moving single atoms on surfaces to killing cancer cells with nanoscale tools and gadgets.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER: DB-NatSci
CHEM 27N:
Light and Life
Preference given to freshman. Light plays a central role in many biological processes and color affects everything in our world. This includes familiar processes such as photosynthesis and vision, but also proton pumps in the organisms that make the Bay purple, green fluorescent protein (GFP), the light from fireflies, the blue and red light receptors responsible for directing how plants grow, the molecules responsible for fall colors, and repair enzymes such as DNA photolyase (this year¿s Nobel prize). Light is also used to interrogate (e.g. super-resolution microscopy, last year¿s Nobel prize) and manipulate (optogenetics) biological systems. Light causes sunburn, but can also be used in combination with special molecules to treat diseases. We will discuss the nature of light, how it is measured, how it is generated in the laboratory, how molecules are excited, and how one measures the fate of this excitation. Chem 31X or 31A preferred, but not required.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
CHEM 28N:
Science Innovation and Communication
Preference to freshmen. The course will explore evolutionary and revolutionary scientific advances; their consequences to society, biotechnology, and the economy; and mechanisms for communicating science to the public. The course will engage academic and industrial thought leaders and provide an opportunity for students to participate in communicating science to the public.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
CHEMENG 31N:
When Chemistry Meets Engineering
Preference to freshmen. Chemistry and engineering are subjects that are ubiquitous around us. But what happens when the two meet? Students will explore this question by diving into experimental problems that scientists and engineers have to face on a daily basis. Many processes that are taken for granted have been developed by understanding science at a very fundamental level and then applying it to large and important industrial processes. In this seminar, students will explore some of the basic concepts that are important to address chemical engineering problems through experimental work. Students will build materials for energy and environmental applications, understand how to separate mixtures into pure compounds, produce fuels, and will learn to look at the chemical properties of molecules that are part of daily life with a different eye.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
CHEMENG 60Q:
Environmental Regulation and Policy
Preference to sophomores. How does government, politics and science affect environmental policy? We examine environmental policy including the precautionary principal, acceptable risks, mathematical models, and cost-effectiveness of regulation. You will learn how data is changing environmental regulation and how different administrations mold environmental policy in real-time. We examine the use of science and engineering, its media presentation and misrepresentation, and the effect of public scientific and technical literacy. You will learn how to participate in the process and effect change.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci, WAY-AQR
CHEMENG 70Q:
Masters of Disaster
Preference to sophomores. For students interested in science, engineering, politics, and the law. Learn from past disasters to avoid future ones. How disasters can be tracked to failures in the design process. The roles of engineers, artisans, politicians, lawyers, and scientists in the design of products. Failure as rooted in oversight in adhering to the design process. Student teams analyze real disasters and design new products presumably free from the potential for disastrous outcomes.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci, WAY-AQR
CHEMENG 80Q:
Art, Chemistry, and Madness: The Science of Art Materials
Preference to sophomores. Chemistry of natural and synthetic pigments in five historical palettes: earth (paleolithic), classical (Egyptian, Greco-Roman), medieval European (Middle Ages), Renaissance (old masters), and synthetic (contemporary). Composite nature of paints using scanning electron microscopy images; analytical techniques used in art conservation, restoration, and determination of provenance; and inherent health hazards. Paintings as mechanical structures. Hands-on laboratory includes stretching canvas, applying gesso grounds, grinding pigments, preparing egg tempera paint, bamboo and quill pens, gilding and illumination, and papermaking.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci, WAY-SMA
CHEMENG 90Q:
Dare to Care: Compassionate Design
Imagine yourself with your abundant creativity, intellect, and passion, but your ability to move or speak is diminished. How would you face the world, how would you thrive at Stanford, how would you relay to people your ideas and creations? How would you share yourself and your ideas with the world? nThere are more than 50 million individuals in America with at least one disability, and in the current world of design, these differences are often overlooked. How do we as designers empower people of diverse physical abilities and provide them with means of self-expression?nnIn Compassionate Design, students from any prospective major are invited to explore the engineering design process by examining the needs of persons with disabilities. Through invited guests, students will have the opportunity to directly engage people with different types of disabilities as a foundation to design products that address problems of motion and mobility, vision, speech and hearing. For example, in class, students will interview people who are deaf, blind, have cerebral palsy, or other disabling conditions. Students will then be asked, using the design tools they have been exposed to as part of the seminar, to create a particular component or device that enhances the quality of life for that user or users with similar limitations.nnPresentation skills are taught and emphasized as students will convey their designs to the class and instructors. Students will complete this seminar with a compassionate view toward design for the disabled, they will acquire a set of design tools that they can use to empower themselves and others in whatever direction they choose to go, and they will have increased confidence and abilities in presenting in front of an audience.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-EDP
CHINA 70N:
Animal Planet and the Romance of the Species (COMPLIT 70N)
Preference to freshmen.This course considers a variety of animal characters in Chinese and Western literatures as potent symbols of cultural values and dynamic sites of ethical reasoning. What does pervasive animal imagery tell us about how we relate to the world and our neighbors? How do animals define the frontiers of humanity and mediate notions of civilization and culture? How do culture, institutions, and political economy shape concepts of human rights and animal welfare? And, above all, what does it mean to be human in the pluralistic and planetary 21st century?
Terms: Win
| Units: 3-4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-GlobalCom, WAY-A-II, WAY-ER
CLASSICS 16N:
Sappho: Erotic Poetess of Lesbos (FEMGEN 24N)
(Formerly CLASSGEN 24N.) Preference to freshmen. Sappho's surviving fragments in English; traditions referring to or fantasizing about her disputed life. How her poetry and legend inspired women authors and male poets such as Swinburne, Baudelaire, and Pound. Paintings inspired by Sappho in ancient and modern times, and composers who put her poetry to music.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4-5
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-CE, WAY-EDP
CLASSICS 18N:
The Artist in Ancient Greek Society (ARTHIST 100N)
Given the importance of art to all aspects of their lives, the Greeks had reason to respect their artists. Yet potters, painters and even sculptors possessed little social standing. n nWhy did the Greeks value the work of craftsmen but not the men themselves? Why did Herodotus dismiss those who worked with their hands as "mechanics?" What prompted Homer to claim that "there is no greater glory for a man¿ than what he achieves with his own hands," provided that he was throwing a discus and not a vase on a wheel?n nPainted pottery was essential to the religious and secular lives of the Greeks. Libations to the gods and to the dead required vases from which to pour them. Economic prosperity depended on the export of wine and oil in durable clay containers. At home, depictions of gods and heroes on vases reinforced Greek values and helped parents to educate their children. Ceramic sets with scenes of Dionysian excess were reserved for elite symposia from which those who potted and painted them were excluded.n nSculptors were less lowly but even those who carved the Parthenon were still regarded as "mechanics," with soft bodies and soft minds (Xenophon) "indifferent to higher things" (Plutarch).n nThe seminar addresses these issues. Students will read and discuss texts, write response papers and present slide lectures and gallery talks on aspects of the artist's profession.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, WAY-A-II
CLASSICS 20N:
Technologies of Civilization: Writing, Number and Money
The technological keys to the growth of civilization that enabled the creation of complex societies and enhanced human cognition. The role of cognition in shaping history and the role of history in shaping cognition. Global perspective, emphasizing the Western tradition and its ancient Greek roots.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3-4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum
CLASSICS 21Q:
Eight Great Archaeological Sites in Europe (ARCHLGY 21Q)
(Formerly CLASSART 21Q.) Preference to sophomores. Focus is on excavation, features and finds, arguments over interpretation, and the place of each site in understanding the archaeological history of Europe. Goal is to introduce the latest archaeological and anthropological thought, and raise key questions about ancient society. The archaeological perspective foregrounds interdisciplinary study: geophysics articulated with art history, source criticism with analytic modeling, statistics interpretation. A web site with resources about each site, including plans, photographs, video, and publications, is the basis for exploring.
Terms: Win, Spr
| Units: 3-5
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, WAY-A-II, Writing 2
CLASSICS 24N:
What is a Map?
Exploration of the nature of maps via an overview of premodern mapping practices, combining theory and history of maps. Hands-on research involving Stanford's rare and historical maps, and chance to create own maps.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
CLASSICS 26N:
The Roman Empire: Its Grandeur and Fall (HISTORY 11N)
(Formerly CLASSHIS 24N.) Preference to freshmen. Explore themes on the Roman Empire and its decline from the 1st through the 5th centuries C.E.. What was the political and military glue that held this diverse, multi-ethnic empire together? What were the bases of wealth and how was it distributed? What were the possibilities and limits of economic growth? How integrated was it in culture and religion? What were the causes and consequences of the conversion to Christianity? Why did the Empire fall in the West? How suitable is the analogy of the U.S. in the 21st century?
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:IHUM-3, WAY-SI
CLASSICS 29Q:
Questioning the Gods: Religious Thought and Literature in Classical Antiquity
Ancient Greek and Roman literature and philosophy dealing with theology and ethics. What is a god, and why should gods care about you or me? Do you have a soul, and if so what might happen to it when you die? Should you try to be a good person, and if so, how? Learn viewing fundamental questions like these through the eyes of ancient Greek and Roman thinkers. We will read tragedies and epic poetry, wrestle with the philosophical arguments, and apply forms scientific reasoning developed more than 2,000 years ago. This course offers highly sophisticated perspectives on religious and ethical issues that are still vitally important today, as well as a firm grasp of the culture of classical antiquity and the means it offers of understanding the world and our place in it.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
CME 20Q:
Computational Modeling for Future Leaders
Preference to sophomores. How can we harness and exploit the power of computational modeling? What responsibilities are there in developing and using computer models? In this course we will analyze fundamental issues inherent to computational modeling such as uncertainty, predictability, error, and resolution. We will furthermore examine the social context of computational modeling including the public perception of computational models, how computer modeling impacts politics and policy, and how politics and policy, in turn, influence computer modeling.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
COMM 130N:
The idea of a free press
Preference to freshmen. An examination of the meaning of freedom of the press, tied to but not bound by various Supreme Court rulings on the scope and purpose of the First Amendment's speech and press clauses. Discussions will include a look at the recent and rapid computerization of communication and what it portends for the future of a free press.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3-4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-SocSci
COMPLIT 10N:
Shakespeare and Performance in a Global Context
Preference to freshmen. The problem of performance including the performance of gender through the plays of Shakespeare. In-class performances by students of scenes from plays. The history of theatrical performance. Sources include filmed versions of plays, and readings on the history of gender, gender performance, and transvestite theater.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-A-II
COMPLIT 11Q:
Shakespeare, Playing, Gender
Preference to sophomores. Focus is on several of the best and lesser known plays of Shakespeare, on theatrical and other kinds of playing, and on ambiguities of both gender and playing gender.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-A-II
COMPLIT 27Q:
You Are Here: Writing in the Age of Environmental Crisis
How have writers on a global scale responded to a growing sense of environmental crisis? How do various literary genres and forms help writers convey a sense of urgency, evoke feelings of loss, or prompt a call to action? Students will encounter recent stories, songs, memoirs, essays, and poems by writers from around the world that engage with the relationship between humans and our precarious environment. Texts such as Cormac McCarthy¿s post-apocalyptic novel The Road, Inger Christensen¿s long poem alphabet, and Arundati Roy¿s fable ¿The Briefing¿ will allow us to see how race, class, and region impact experiences and depictions of a planet in crisis. These texts will also model options for students¿ own creative writing on nature, place, and crisis across genres. Assignments will include observational writing, experiments with genre shifts, and research and writing on the places we call home as members of a global community.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-CE
COMPLIT 37Q:
Zionism and the Novel (JEWISHST 37Q)
At the end of the nineteenth century, Zionism emerged as a political movement to establish a national homeland for the Jews, eventually leading to the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948. This seminar uses novels to explore the changes in Zionism, the roots of the conflict in the Middle East, and the potentials for the future. We will take a close look at novels by Israelis, both Jewish and Arab, in order to understand multiple perspectives, and we will also consider works by authors from the North America and from Europe.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP, Writing 2
COMPLIT 51Q:
Comparative Fictions of Ethnicity (AMSTUD 51Q, CSRE 51Q)
We may "know" "who" we "are," but we are, after all, social creatures. How does our sense of self interact with those around us? How does literature provide a particular medium for not only self expression, but also for meditations on what goes into the construction of "the Self"? After all, don't we tell stories in response to the question, "who are you"? Besides a list of nouns and names and attributes, we give our lives flesh and blood in telling how we process the world. Our course focuses in particular on this question--Does this universal issue ("who am I") become skewed differently when we add a qualifier before it, like "ethnic"?
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP, Writing 2
COMPLIT 55N:
Batman, Hamilton, DÃaz, and Other Wondrous Lives
This seminar concerns the design and analysis of imaginary (or constructed) worlds for narratives and media such as films, comics, and literary texts. The seminar's primary goal is to help participants understand the creation of better imaginary worlds - ultimately all our efforts should serve that higher purpose. Some of the things we will consider when taking on the analysis of a new world include: What are its primary features - spatial, cultural, biological, fantastic, cosmological? What is the world's ethos (the guiding beliefs or ideals that characterize the world)? What are the precise strategies that are used by the artist to convey the world to us and us to the world? How are our characters connected to the world? And how are we - the viewer or reader or player - connected to the world?
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3-5
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP
COMPLIT 70N:
Animal Planet and the Romance of the Species (CHINA 70N)
Preference to freshmen.This course considers a variety of animal characters in Chinese and Western literatures as potent symbols of cultural values and dynamic sites of ethical reasoning. What does pervasive animal imagery tell us about how we relate to the world and our neighbors? How do animals define the frontiers of humanity and mediate notions of civilization and culture? How do culture, institutions, and political economy shape concepts of human rights and animal welfare? And, above all, what does it mean to be human in the pluralistic and planetary 21st century?
Terms: Win
| Units: 3-4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-GlobalCom, WAY-A-II, WAY-ER
COMPMED 80N:
Animal behavior: sex, death, and sometimes food!
Preference to freshman. Behavior is what makes animals special (thirsty plants don't walk to water), but why do animals behave the way they do? What does their behavior tell us about their inner lives, and about ourselves? What do lipstick and cuckoos and fireflies have in common? Why would nobody want to be a penguin? What do mice say to each other in their pee-mail? Learning how to think about questions like these gives us a unique perspective on the natural world. Format: Discussion and criticism of video examples, documentaries, and research papers. Topics: History and approaches to animal behavior; development of behavior, from genetics to learning; mechanisms of behavior, from neurons to motivation; function of behavior, from honest signals to selfish genes; the phylogeny of behavior, from domestication to speciation; and modern applications of behavior, from abnormal behavior, to conservation, to animal welfare, and animal consciousness.
Terms: Aut, Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SMA
COMPMED 81N:
Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of Mammals
Preference to freshmen. Emphasis is on a comparative approach to anatomy and physiology of a wide range of mammals, the unique adaptations of each species in terms of its anatomical, and behavioral characteristics, and how these species interact with human beings and other animals. Dissection required. Class size is limited to 16.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-SMA
COMPMED 84Q:
Globally Emerging Zoonotic Diseases
Preference to sophomores. Infectious diseases impacting veterinary and human health around the world today. Mechanisms of disease, epidemiology, and underlying diagnostic, treatment and control principles associated with these pathogens.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SMA
COMPMED 85N:
Animal Use in Biomedical Research
Preference to freshmen. How and why animals are used in biomedical science. Addresses human and animal disease entities and how animal research has contributed to the treatment and cure of disease. Significantnportions of this course are devoted to documenting the humane care and treatment of laboratory animals in research, including, but not limited to such topics as laws and ethics, animal behavior, animal modeling, and the animal activist movement. Course topics will also include: What advances have been made as a result of the use of animals in research? Who conducts animal research? Predominant animal species used in biomedical research, facts and myths; the regulation of biomedical research; housing and care of laboratory animals; why new drugs must be tested; animal use in stem cell research, cancer research and genetically engineered mice; career choices in biomedical research.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
COMPMED 87Q:
Laboratory Mouse in Biomedical Research
Preference to sophomores. Focus is on the laboratory mouse, a widely used and important research model. Topics include the ethics of animal use in research; the natural history, origin and husbandry of the mouse; characteristics of key mouse strains; its anatomy and physiology; common diseases and their effects on research; coat color genetics relative to human diseases; immunodeficient mouse models; and genetic engineering of mice. The laboratory includes necropsy, handling, introduction to anesthesia and surgery, identification methods, and common research techniques using live and dead mice. Enrollment limited to 14 students.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-SMA
COMPMED 89Q:
Ouch it Hurts! The Comparative Neurobiology of Pain
Preference to sophomores. Focus is on understanding the basic neurobiology of pain pathways. Topics include the physiology, pharmacology, and clinical aspects of effective pain management. In both humans and animals pain is part of the protective mechanisms that prevent further injury to the body. However, if the pain process continues unchecked, it can become extremely detrimental.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
CS 45N:
Computers and Photography: From Capture to Sharing
Preference to freshmen with experience in photography and use of computers. Elements of photography, such as lighting, focus, depth of field, aperture, and composition. How a photographer makes photos available for computer viewing, reliably stores them, organizes them, tags them, searches them, and distributes them online. No programming experience required. Digital SLRs and editing software will be provided to those students who do not wish to use their own.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3-4
| UG Reqs: WAY-CE
CS 54N:
Great Ideas in Computer Science
Stanford Introductory Seminar. Preference to freshmen. Covers the intellectual tradition of computer science emphasizing ideas that reflect the most important milestones in the history of the discipline. No prior experience with programming is assumed. Topics include programming and problem solving; implementing computation in hardware; algorithmic efficiency; the theoretical limits of computation; cryptography and security; and the philosophy behind artificial intelligence.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci
CSRE 17N:
Race and Politics: Perspectives on the 2016 Presidential Election (AFRICAAM 17N, SOC 17N)
This course is intended as a seminar-based exploration of the complex ways that race has informed political behavior and attitudes during the 2016 Presidential election. The class is designed to introduce freshman to sociological ways of understanding the social world, and the rigors of college thinking more broadly. As a group we will explore the mechanisms through which race informs political behavior, while also paying close attention to the ways that politics also informs our understanding of race. The course treats ¿race¿ as multifaceted construct, with multiple (and often times conflicting) influences on political behavior. The course stresses thenconstructed nature of both race and politics. The course will be split into 3 parts. In the first partnwe will explore the relationship between racial identity and political behavior at the individualnlevel. The second part of the course will examine how ideas about racial groups shape politicalnattitudes and behaviors, as well as policy outcomes. The third part of the course will explore hownrace is used to mobilize political and economic actors.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
CSRE 19N:
Everyone Eats: Food, Religion and Culture (JEWISHST 19N, RELIGST 19N)
Food is one of the most essential aspects of the human experience. The decisions and choices we make about food define who we have been, who we are now, and who we want to become. In this seminar we will study how food habits have shaped religious traditions, and vice versa, how religious traditions have shaped food ways. Some traditions are centered around food regiments such as the dietary laws, derived from biblical law that shapes Jewish and Christian tradition very differently. Indeed, many religious and ethical thinkers, as well as anthropologists, have interpreted the meanings of the dietary laws very differently. Further, in many religious traditions the killing of animals and consumption of meat is deeply fraught. We will explore the history of food practices and their contemporary impact; the connections between food, religion, and identity; the meanings that religious thinkers and anthropologists have attributed to food habits; as well as the creative translations of religious traditions into contemporary food ethics by various social movements and groups, predominantly in the U.S..
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
CSRE 45Q:
Understanding Race and Ethnicity in American Society (SOC 45Q)
Preference to sophomores. Historical overview of race in America, race and violence, race and socioeconomic well-being, and the future of race relations in America. Enrollment limited to 16.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-SocSci, GER:EC-AmerCul, WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
CSRE 47Q:
Heartfulness: Mindfulness, Compassion, and Responsibility
We practice mindfulness as a way of enhancing well-being, interacting compassionately with others, and engaging in socially responsible actions as global citizens. Contemplation is integrated with social justice through embodied practice, experiential learning, and creative expression. Class activities and assignments include journaling, mindfulness practices, and expressive arts. We build a sense of community through appreciative intelligence, connected knowing, deep listening and storytelling.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-EDP
CSRE 50Q:
Life and Death of Words (ENGLISH 50Q, FEMGEN 50Q, LINGUIST 50Q, NATIVEAM 50Q)
In this course, we explore the world of words: their creation, evolution, borrowing, change, and death. Words are the key to understanding the culture and ideas of a people, and by tracing the biographies of words we are able to discern how the world was, is, and might be perceived and described. We trace how words are formed, and how they change in pronunciation, spelling, meaning, and usage over time. How does a word get into the dictionary? What do words reveal about status, class, region, and race? How is the language of men and women critiqued differently within our society? How does slang evolve? How do languages become endangered or die, and what is lost when they do? We will visit the Facebook Content Strategy Team and learn more about the role words play in shaping our online experiences. Together, the class will collect Stanford language and redesign the digital dictionary of the future. Trigger Warning: Some of the subject matter of this course is sensitive and may cause offense. Please consider this prior to enrolling in the course.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
CSRE 51Q:
Comparative Fictions of Ethnicity (AMSTUD 51Q, COMPLIT 51Q)
We may "know" "who" we "are," but we are, after all, social creatures. How does our sense of self interact with those around us? How does literature provide a particular medium for not only self expression, but also for meditations on what goes into the construction of "the Self"? After all, don't we tell stories in response to the question, "who are you"? Besides a list of nouns and names and attributes, we give our lives flesh and blood in telling how we process the world. Our course focuses in particular on this question--Does this universal issue ("who am I") become skewed differently when we add a qualifier before it, like "ethnic"?
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP, Writing 2
CSRE 54N:
African American Women's Lives (AFRICAAM 54N, AMSTUD 54N, FEMGEN 54N, HISTORY 54N)
Preference to freshmen. We will examine the struggles of African American women to define their own lives and improve the social, economic, political and cultural conditions of black communities. Topics will include women¿s enslavement and freedom, kinship and family relations, institution and community building, violence, labor and leisure, changing gender roles, consumer and beauty culture, social activism, and the politics of sexuality.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP
CSRE 117Q:
Queer Arts: Remembering and Imagining Social Change (FEMGEN 117Q)
This interdisciplinary fine arts course is designed to examine the nature of artistic imagination, sources of creativity and the way this work helps shape social change. We will consider the relationship among muses, mentors and models for queer artists engaged in such fields as visual art, music, theatre, film, creative writing and dance. Exploring various cultures, lands and times, we will study the relationship between memory and vision in serious art. We will ask questions about the role of the artist in the academy and the broader social responsibility of the artist. We will locate some of the similarities and differences among artists, engage with different disciplines, and discover what we can learn from one another. This seminar requires the strong voices of all participants. To encourage students to take their ideas and questions beyond the classroom, we will be attending art events (performances, exhibits, readings) individually and in groups.nnThe learning goals include a serious exploration of individual students¿ creativity, a more nuanced appreciation of diverse arts and a stronger understanding of the multifaceted nature of gender, race and class. Students will develop their abilities to write well-argued papers. They will stretch their imaginations in the written and oral assignments. And they will grow more confident as public speakers and seminar participants.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4-5
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP, Writing 2
CSRE 188Q:
Imagining Women: Writers in Print and in Person (FEMGEN 188Q)
Gender roles, gender relations and sexual identity explored in contemporary literature and conversation with guest authors. Weekly meetings designated for book discussion and meeting with authors. Interest in writing and a curiosity about diverse women's lives would be helpful to students. Students will use such tools as close reading, research, analysis and imagination. Seminar requires strong voice of all participants. Oral presentations, discussion papers, final projects.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4-5
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP, Writing 2
EARTHSYS 36N:
Life at the Extremes: From the Deep Sea to Deep Space
Preference to freshmen. Microbial life is diverse and resilient on Earth; could it survive elsewhere in our solar system? This seminar will investigate the diversity of microbial life on earth, with an emphasis on extremophiles, and consider the potential for microbial life to exist and persist in extraterrestrial locales. Topics include microbial phylogenetic and physiological diversity, biochemical adaptations of extremophiles, ecology of extreme habitats, and apparent requirements and limits of life. Format includes lectures, discussions, lab-based activities and local field trips. Basics of microbiology, biochemistry, and astrobiology.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
EARTHSYS 41N:
The Global Warming Paradox
Preference to freshman. Focus is on the complex climate challenges posed by the substantial benefits of energy consumption, including the critical tension between the enormous global demand for increased human well-being and the negative climate consequences of large-scale emissions of carbon dioxide. Topics include: Earth¿s energy balance; detection and attribution of climate change; the climate response to enhanced greenhouse forcing; impacts of climate change on natural and human systems; and proposed methods for curbing further climate change. Sources include peer-reviewed scientific papers, current research results, and portrayal of scientific findings by the mass media and social networks.
Terms: Aut, Sum
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SMA
EARTHSYS 44N:
The Invisible Majority: The Microbial World That Sustains Our Planet
Microbes are often viewed through the lens of infectious disease yet they play a much broader and underappreciated role in sustaining our Earth system. From introducing oxygen into the Earth¿s atmosphere over 2 billion years ago to consuming greenhouse gases today, microbial communities have had (and continue to have) a significant impact on our planet. In this seminar, students will learn how microbes transformed the ancient Earth environment into our modern planet, how they currently sustain our Earth¿s ecosystems, and how scientists study them both in the present and in the past. Students will be exposed to the fundamentals of microbiology, biogeochemistry, and Earth history.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
EARTHSYS 46N:
Exploring the Critical Interface between the Land and Monterey Bay: Elkhorn Slough (ESS 46N)
Preference to freshmen. Field trips to sites in the Elkhorn Slough, a small agriculturally impacted estuary that opens into Monterey Bay, a model ecosystem for understanding the complexity of estuaries, and one of California's last remaining coastal wetlands. Readings include Jane Caffrey's "Changes in a California Estuary: A Profile of Elkhorn Slough". Basics of biogeochemistry, microbiology, oceanography, ecology, pollution, and environmental management.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SMA
ECON 11N:
Understanding the Welfare System
Welfare reform passed by the Federal Government in 1996 heralded a dramatic step in how our nation designs and operates its programs that support poor families. The centerpiece of this legislation known as 'devolution' transferred much responsibility for these programs to the states. States had their first opportunity since the 'war on poverty' of the 1960s to undertake radical changes in setting up their public assistance programs. Recently, many of the reforms instituted in the 1990s are being hotly debated and in some aspects reversed. What flexibility did the states receive under welfare reform, and what considerations are relevant in exercising this flexibility? What selections have states made, and how are their programs and those of the federal government likely to evolve in the future? This seminar will address these questions, exploring how reforms changed welfare and who has been affected by these changes. In addition to covering the patchwork of different programs that currently constitute America's social safety net, the seminar will also scrutinize the makeup and trends in government spending and how our nation defines poverty and eligibility for income support. Moreover, the discussion will illustrate the role that economics plays in assessing the effectiveness of anti-poverty programs and the consequences on families' behavior. Students will participate in a project in which they develop their own recommendations for devising a safety net for poor families in America.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
ECON 17N:
Energy, the Environment, and the Economy
Examines the intimate relationship between environmental quality and the production and consumption of energy. Assesses the economics efficiency and political economy implications of a number of current topics in energy and environmental economics. Topics include: the economic theory of exhaustible resources, Greenhouse Gas Emissions (GHG) control (cap and trade mechanisms and carbon fees), GHG emissions offsets, the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), the "smart" transmission grid for electricity, nuclear energy and nuclear waste, the real cost of renewable energy, natural gas and coal-fired electricity production, the global coal and natural gas markets, Corporate Average Fuel Efficiency (CAFE) and Low-Carbon Fuel Standards (LCFS), Energy Efficiency Investments and Demand Response, and Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS). For all topics, there will be reading to explain the economics and engineering behind the topic and class discussion to clarify and elaborate on this interaction.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
ECON 19Q:
Measuring the Performance of Governments in the U.S. (PUBLPOL 19Q)
Spending by federal, state, and local governments accounts for about one-third of U.S. GDP and governments employ more than one-in-seven workers in the U.S. For most U.S. residents, government is represented by a complicated web of federal, state, and local policies. There is an increasingly contentious debate about the proper role of the government and regarding the impact of specific government policies. This debate is rarely grounded in a common set of facts.nIn this seminar, we will explore how each level of government interacts with U.S. residents through government services, public programs, taxes, and regulations. We will examine financial results for different levels of government while considering the net effects of government intervention on the health and economic well-being of individuals and families. Particular attention will be paid to certain sectors (e.g. education, health care, etc.) and to certain groups (e.g. those in poverty, the elderly, etc.). Along the way we will accumulate a set of metrics to assess the performance of each level of government while highlighting the formidable challenges of such an exercise.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
ECON 22N:
Causes and Consequences of the Rise in Inequality
In this class we will discuss the economic and institutional causes of the rise in inequality in the US and other countries over the last 40 years. We will also discuss the consequences of inequality in terms of social justice, economic welfare, aggregate economic performance, intergenerational mobility, and the possible implications of inequality for the recent global financial crisis.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
ECON 23N:
Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy
We will explore the evolution and current performance of capitalist and socialist economies, their interaction with democracy, and the contemporary debate about the appropriate roles of individual vs. collective rights and responsibilities.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
ECON 27N:
The Economics of Gender
This seminar draws on empirical and theoretical insights from multiple fields within economics. The objective is to understand the role of gender in economic decision making, and the changing significance, timing and meaning of work, career and family. We will focus on recent work in experimental economics, and empirical work in the developed world. But at times we will widen the perspective to developing countries and consider historical changes as well.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
ECON 78N:
Economic Policies of the Presidential Candidates (PUBLPOL 78N)
In nearly all polls, American voters rank the economy as one of their most important concerns. In the presidential election, much of the debate for voters will be on questions of economic policy. In this course, we will delve deeply into economic policy issues to understand options for government intervention and possible outcomes. We will combine economic analysis with political science methodology to understand efficient and implementable policy proposals.nnSpecific areas of interest will be taxation, budget, entitlement programs, economic regulation and competition policy, trade, demography, income inequality, and monetary policy. The course will incorporate other timely and salient policy issues as they arise during the course of the campaign. n nStudents will be expected to write a short paper and make an oral presentation to the class. A wide range of topics will be acceptable, including those directly related to campaign issues as well as other long-term economic issues facing the country.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
EDUC 115N:
How to Learn Mathematics
What is going on in mathematics education in the United States? Why do so many people hate and fear math? What contributes to the high levels of innumeracy in the general population? Why do girls and women opt out of math when they get a chance? In this seminar we will consider seminal research on math learning in K-12 classrooms, including a focus on equity. We will spend time investigating cases of teaching and learning, through watching videos and visiting schools. This seminar is for those who are interested in education, and who would like to learn about ways to help students (and maybe yourselves?) learn and enjoy mathematics. If you have had bad math experiences and would like to understand them ¿ and put them behind you ¿ this seminar will be particularly good for you. The final project for this class will involve developing a case of one or more math learners, investigating their journeys in the world of math.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-SocSci, WAY-SI
EDUC 116N:
Howard Zinn and the Quest for Historical Truth (HISTORY 116N)
With more than two million copies in print, Howard Zinn¿s A People's History is a cultural icon. We will use Zinn¿s book to probe how we determine what was true in the past. A People's History will be our point of departure, but our journey will visit a variety of historical trouble spots: debates about whether the US was founded as a Christian nation, Holocaust denial, and the "Birther" controversy of President Obama.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
EDUC 117N:
Losing My Religion: Secularism and Spirituality in American Lives (AMSTUD 117N, RELIGST 13N)
In this seminar you will explore theory and practice, sociological data, spiritual writing, and case studies in an effort to gain a more nuanced understanding about how religion, spirituality, and secularism attempt to make legible the constellation of concerns, commitments, and behaviors that bridge the moral and the personal, the communal and the national, the sacred, the profane, and the rational. Together we will cultivate critical perspectives on practices and politics, beliefs and belonging that we typically take for granted.
Terms: Aut, Sum
| Units: 2-4
| UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
EE 14N:
Things about Stuff
Preference to freshmen. The stories behind disruptive inventions such as the telegraph, telephone, wireless, television, transistor, and chip are as important as the inventions themselves, for they elucidate broadly applicable scientific principles. Focus is on studying consumer devices; projects include building batteries, energy conversion devices and semiconductors from pocket change. Students may propose topics and projects of interest to them. The trajectory of the course is determined in large part by the students themselves.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci
EE 15N:
The Art and Science of Engineering Design
The goal of this seminar is to introduce freshmen to the design process associated with an engineering project. The seminar will consist of a series of lectures. The first part of each lecture will focus on the different design aspects of an engineering project, including formation of the design team, developing a project statement, generating design ideas and specifications, finalizing the design, and reporting the outcome. Students will form teams to follow these procedures in designing a term project of their choice over the quarter. The second part of each lecture will consist of outside speakers, including founders of some of the most exciting companies in Silicon Valley, who will share their experiences about engineering design. On-site visits to Silicon Valley companies to showcase their design processes will also be part of the course. The seminar serves three purposes: (1) it introduces students to the design process of turning an idea into a final design, (2) it presents the different functions that people play in a project, and (3) it gives students a chance to consider what role in a project would be best suited to their interests and skills.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci
EE 21N:
What is Nanotechnology?
Nanotechnology is an often used word and it means many things to different people. Scientists and Engineers have some notion of what nanotechnology is, societal perception may be entirely different. In this course, we start with the classic paper by Richard Feynman ("There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom"), which laid down the challenge to the nanotechnologists. Then we discuss two classic books that offer a glimpse of what nanotechnology is: Engines of Creation: The Coming Era of Nanotechnology by Eric Drexler, and Prey by Michael Crichton. Drexler's thesis sparked the imagination of what nano machinery might do, whereas Crichton's popular novel channeled the public's attention to this subject by portraying a disastrous scenario of a technology gone astray. We will use the scientific knowledge to analyze the assumptions and predictions of these classic works. We will draw upon the latest research advances to illustrate the possibilities and impossibilities of nanotechnology.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci, WAY-SMA
EE 23N:
Imaging: From the Atom to the Universe
Preference to freshmen. Forms of imaging including human and animal vision systems, atomic force microscope, microscope, digital camera, holography and three-dimensional imaging, telescope, synthetic aperture radar imaging, nuclear magnetic imaging, sonar and gravitational wave imaging, and the Hubble Space telescope. Physical principles and exposure to real imaging devices and systems.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci
EE 60N:
Man versus Nature: Coping with Disasters Using Space Technology (GEOPHYS 60N)
Preference to freshman. Natural hazards, earthquakes, volcanoes, floods, hurricanes, and fires, and how they affect people and society; great disasters such as asteroid impacts that periodically obliterate many species of life. Scientific issues, political and social consequences, costs of disaster mitigation, and how scientific knowledge affects policy. How spaceborne imaging technology makes it possible to respond quickly and mitigate consequences; how it is applied to natural disasters; and remote sensing data manipulation and analysis. GER:DB-EngrAppSci
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci, WAY-SMA
ENGLISH 40N:
Theatrical Wonders from Shakespeare to Mozart
What is the secret of theatrical illusion? How does the theater move us to wonder, sympathetic identification, and reflection? How do the changing stories that theater tells reveal our values? We will ask these questions through a close examination--on the page and on the stage--of dramatic masterpieces by Shakespeare, Calderón, and Mozart. We will attend a live performance of The Magic Flute. No prior knowledge of music is required.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
ENGLISH 50Q:
Life and Death of Words (CSRE 50Q, FEMGEN 50Q, LINGUIST 50Q, NATIVEAM 50Q)
In this course, we explore the world of words: their creation, evolution, borrowing, change, and death. Words are the key to understanding the culture and ideas of a people, and by tracing the biographies of words we are able to discern how the world was, is, and might be perceived and described. We trace how words are formed, and how they change in pronunciation, spelling, meaning, and usage over time. How does a word get into the dictionary? What do words reveal about status, class, region, and race? How is the language of men and women critiqued differently within our society? How does slang evolve? How do languages become endangered or die, and what is lost when they do? We will visit the Facebook Content Strategy Team and learn more about the role words play in shaping our online experiences. Together, the class will collect Stanford language and redesign the digital dictionary of the future. Trigger Warning: Some of the subject matter of this course is sensitive and may cause offense. Please consider this prior to enrolling in the course.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
ENGLISH 52N:
Mixed-Race Politics and Culture (AFRICAAM 52N, POLISCI 29N)
Today, almost one-third of Americans identify with a racial/ethnic minority group, and more than 9 million Americans identify with multiple races. What are the implications of such diversity for American politics and culture? In this course, we approach issues of race from an interdisciplinary perspective, employing research in the social sciences and humanities to assess how race shapes perceptions of identity as well as political behavior in 21st century U.S. We will examine issues surrounding the role of multiculturalism, immigration, acculturation, racial representation and racial prejudice in American society. Topics we will explore include the political and social formation of "race"; racial representation in the media, arts, and popular culture; the rise and decline of the "one-drop rule" and its effect on political and cultural attachments; the politicization of Census categories and the rise of the Multiracial Movement.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
ENGLISH 63N:
Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human
Harold Bloom has argued that Shakespeare is the first literary writer to invent three-dimensional fictional human beings: characters who, in hearing themselves think, develop. With that premise in mind, we will explore two key dimensions of Shakespeare's originality: his poetic language and his genius for unfolding character. Above all, we will examine the extremities of the human condition-villainy, monstrosity, betrayal, seduction-in selected "problem plays" and tragedies.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
ENGLISH 68N:
Mark Twain and American Culture (AMSTUD 68N)
Preference to freshmen. Mark Twain defined the rhythms of our prose and the contours of our moral map. He recognized our extravagant promise and stunning failures, our comic foibles and tragic flaws. He is viewed as the most American of American authors--and as one of the most universal. How does his work illuminate his society's (and our society's) responses to such issues as race, gender, technology, heredity vs. environment, religion, education, art, imperialism, animal welfare, and what it means to be "American"?
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-AmerCul, WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP
ENGLISH 79N:
The Renaissance: Culture as Conflict
Focus is on the Renaissance not as a cultural rebirth but as a scene of cultural conflict. Course materials are selected from Renaissance art, history, philosophy, politics, religion, and travel writing; authors include More, Luther, Erasmus, Machiavelli, Michelangelo, Montaigne, Shakespeare. Among the conflicts we will explore are: old (world)/new (world), wealth/poverty, individual/collectivity, manuscript/print, religion/secularism, Catholicism/Protestantism, monarchism/republicanism, femininity/masculinity, heterosexuality/homosexuality.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
ENGLISH 82N:
Thinking about Photographs
The course will begin with a short history of photography since the 19th century; followed by both a hands-on exploration of different types of photographs (possibly using the Cantor Collection) and then a more theoretical discussion of some of the acknowledged classics of photographic writing (Susan Sontag's On Photography, Roland Barthes' Camera lucida, Linfield's The Cruel Radiance.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
ENGLISH 85N:
Financial Markets in Fiction and Film
The financial markets have been an enormously fruitful subject for fiction writers and filmmakers since the 17th century--but the financial crisis of 2008 has energized this interest again. We will study the literature (film, fiction, journalism) of the financial markets, and talk in great detail about moral, social, economic and political issues that such literature raises.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
ENGLISH 90Q:
Sports Writing
Study and practice of the unique narratives, tropes, images and arguments that creative writers develop when they write about popular sport. From regional fandom to individualist adventuring, boxing and baseball to mascot dancing and table tennis, exceptional creative writers mine from a diversity of leisure activity a rich vein of ¿sports writing¿ in the creative nonfiction genre. In doing so, they demonstrate the creative and formal adaptability required to write with excellence about any subject matter, and under the circumstances of any subjectivity. Discussion of the ways in which writers have framed, and even critiqued, our interest in athletic events, spectatorship, and athletic beauty. Writers include Joyce Carol Oates, Roland Barthes, David James Duncan, Arnold Rampersad, John Updike, Maxine Kumin, Susan Sterling, Ernest Hemingway, Norman Mailer, Dervla Murphy, Haruki Murakami, Don DeLillo, Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Annie Dillard, John McPhee, and Laura Hillenbrand. Close readings of essays on form and sport, as well as book excerpts. Students will engage in class discussions and write short weekly papers, leading to a more comprehensive project at the end of the quarter.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-CE
ENGLISH 93Q:
The American Road Trip
From Whitman to Kerouac, Alec Soth to Georgia O¿Keeffe, the lure of travel has inspired many American artists to pack up their bags and hit the open road. In this course we will be exploring the art and literature of the great American road trip. We will be reading and writing in a variety of genres, workshopping our own personal projects, and considering a wide breadth of narrative approaches. Assignments will range from reading Cormac McCarthy¿s novel, The Road, to listening to Bob Dylan¿s album, ¿Highway 61 Revisited.¿ We will be looking at films like Badlands and Thelma and Louise,¿acquainting ourselves with contemporary photographers, going on a number of campus-wide field trips, and finishing the quarter with an actual road trip down the California coast. Anyone with a sense of adventure is welcome!
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-CE
ENGR 159Q:
Japanese Companies and Japanese Society (MATSCI 159Q)
Preference to sophomores. The structure of a Japanese company from the point of view of Japanese society. Visiting researchers from Japanese companies give presentations on their research enterprise. The Japanese research ethic. The home campus equivalent of a Kyoto SCTI course.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-SocSci
ESS 46N:
Exploring the Critical Interface between the Land and Monterey Bay: Elkhorn Slough (EARTHSYS 46N)
Preference to freshmen. Field trips to sites in the Elkhorn Slough, a small agriculturally impacted estuary that opens into Monterey Bay, a model ecosystem for understanding the complexity of estuaries, and one of California's last remaining coastal wetlands. Readings include Jane Caffrey's "Changes in a California Estuary: A Profile of Elkhorn Slough". Basics of biogeochemistry, microbiology, oceanography, ecology, pollution, and environmental management.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SMA
ETHICSOC 21N:
Ethics of Sports (PHIL 21N)
This seminar will be focused on the ethical challenges that are encountered in sport. We will focus on the moral and political issues that affect the world of sport and which athletes, coaches, sports commentators and fans are faced with. For instance, we will ask questions such as: what is a fair game (the ethics of effort, merit, success)? Is it ethical to train people to use violence (the ethics of martial arts)? Are divisions by gender categories justified and what should we think of gender testing? Is the use of animals in sport ever justified? Which forms of performance enhancements are acceptable in sport (the ethics of drug use and enhancements through technologies)? Should we ban sports that damage the players¿ health? Does society owe social support to people who hurt themselves while practicing extreme sports? nnThe class will be structured around small group discussions and exercises as well as brief lectures to introduce key moral and political concepts (such as fairness, equality, freedom, justice, exploitation, etc.). I will also bring guests speakers who are involved in a sport activity at Stanford or who have worked on sports as part of their academic careers. By the end of the seminar, students will have a good understanding of the various ethical challenges that surround the world of sport. They will be able to critically discuss sport activities, norms, modes of assessments and policies (on campus and beyond). They will also be prepared to apply the critical ethical thinking that they will have deployed onto other topics than sports. They will have been introduced to the normative approach to social issues, which consists in asking how things should be rather than describing how things are. They will be prepared to take more advanced classes in ethics, political theory, as well as moral and political philosophy.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-ER
FEMGEN 24N:
Sappho: Erotic Poetess of Lesbos (CLASSICS 16N)
(Formerly CLASSGEN 24N.) Preference to freshmen. Sappho's surviving fragments in English; traditions referring to or fantasizing about her disputed life. How her poetry and legend inspired women authors and male poets such as Swinburne, Baudelaire, and Pound. Paintings inspired by Sappho in ancient and modern times, and composers who put her poetry to music.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4-5
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-CE, WAY-EDP
FEMGEN 36N:
Gay Autobiography (HISTORY 36N)
Preference to freshmen. Gender, identity, and solidarity as represented in nine autobiographies: Isherwood, Ackerley, Duberman, Monette, Louganis, Barbin, Cammermeyer, Gingrich, and Lorde. To what degree do these writers view sexual orientation as a defining feature of their selves? Is there a difference between the way men and women view identity? What politics follow from these writers' experiences?
Terms: Spr
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-EDP
FEMGEN 44Q:
Gendered Innovations in Science, Medicine, Engineering, and Environment (HISTORY 44Q)
Section 1 focuses on the history of women in science, medicine, and engineering. Section 2 looks at transforming research institutions so that both men and women can flourish. Section 3 explores how sex and gender analysis can enhance creativity. We discuss concrete examples of how taking gender into account has yielded new research results. Stanford University currently has a multiple year collaboration with the European Commission for Gendered Innovations, and this class will be part of that project. This course fulfills the second level Writing and Rhetoric Requirement (WRITE 2) and will emphasize oral and multimedia presentation.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4-5
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-EDP, WAY-SI, Writing 2
FEMGEN 50Q:
Life and Death of Words (CSRE 50Q, ENGLISH 50Q, LINGUIST 50Q, NATIVEAM 50Q)
In this course, we explore the world of words: their creation, evolution, borrowing, change, and death. Words are the key to understanding the culture and ideas of a people, and by tracing the biographies of words we are able to discern how the world was, is, and might be perceived and described. We trace how words are formed, and how they change in pronunciation, spelling, meaning, and usage over time. How does a word get into the dictionary? What do words reveal about status, class, region, and race? How is the language of men and women critiqued differently within our society? How does slang evolve? How do languages become endangered or die, and what is lost when they do? We will visit the Facebook Content Strategy Team and learn more about the role words play in shaping our online experiences. Together, the class will collect Stanford language and redesign the digital dictionary of the future. Trigger Warning: Some of the subject matter of this course is sensitive and may cause offense. Please consider this prior to enrolling in the course.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
FEMGEN 52N:
Spoken Sexuality: Language and the Social Construction of Sexuality (LINGUIST 52N)
The many ways language is used in the construction of sexuality and sexual identity. How language is used as a resource for performing and perceiving sexual identity. Drawing on linguistic analyses of pronunciation, word choice, and grammar, questions such as: Is there a gay accent? Why isn't there a lesbian accent? How do transgendered people modify their linguistic behavior when transitioning? How are unmarked (heterosexual) identities linguistically constructed? Sexuality as an issue of identity, as well as of desire. Iconic relations between elements of language such as breathy voice quality and high pitch, and aspects of desire such as arousal and excitement. How language encodes ideologies about sexuality; how language is used to talk about sexuality in public discourses about gay marriage and bullying, as well as in personal narratives of coming out. How language encodes dominant ideologies about sexuality, evident in labels for sexual minorities as well as terminology for sex acts. Discussions of readings, explorations of how sexuality is portrayed in popular media, and analyses of primary data. Final research paper on a topic of student choice.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
FEMGEN 54N:
African American Women's Lives (AFRICAAM 54N, AMSTUD 54N, CSRE 54N, HISTORY 54N)
Preference to freshmen. We will examine the struggles of African American women to define their own lives and improve the social, economic, political and cultural conditions of black communities. Topics will include women¿s enslavement and freedom, kinship and family relations, institution and community building, violence, labor and leisure, changing gender roles, consumer and beauty culture, social activism, and the politics of sexuality.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP
FEMGEN 55N:
Social Movements through Song in Modern America (AMSTUD 55N, HISTORY 55N)
This discussion class will explore a series of social movements in modern America through the songs produced to support efforts to achieve labor unions, civil rights and racial justice, peace, and women's rights. For each class we will read short historical texts to provide contexts for the movements and then concentrate on the role of music within them. We will listening to and discuss several core songs for each topic. Biographical and autobiographical readings on a key set of musicians (including Joe Hill, Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Malvina Reynolds, and Bernice Johnson Reagon) will provide personal accounts of the relationship of songs to social movement . The music we include in class will range from ballads to anthems, from oral traditions to the work of singer-songwriters.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3-4
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
FEMGEN 86Q:
Love as a Force for Social Justice (HUMBIO 86Q)
Preference to sophomores. Biological, psychological, religious, social and cultural perspectives on the concept of agape love. How love is conceptualized across cultures; agape love as the basis of many religions; different kinds of love; the biology of love; love in action for social justice; the languages of love, including art, literature, music, and poetry. Emphasis is on blog writing, participation, and oral presentation.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
FEMGEN 117Q:
Queer Arts: Remembering and Imagining Social Change (CSRE 117Q)
This interdisciplinary fine arts course is designed to examine the nature of artistic imagination, sources of creativity and the way this work helps shape social change. We will consider the relationship among muses, mentors and models for queer artists engaged in such fields as visual art, music, theatre, film, creative writing and dance. Exploring various cultures, lands and times, we will study the relationship between memory and vision in serious art. We will ask questions about the role of the artist in the academy and the broader social responsibility of the artist. We will locate some of the similarities and differences among artists, engage with different disciplines, and discover what we can learn from one another. This seminar requires the strong voices of all participants. To encourage students to take their ideas and questions beyond the classroom, we will be attending art events (performances, exhibits, readings) individually and in groups.nnThe learning goals include a serious exploration of individual students¿ creativity, a more nuanced appreciation of diverse arts and a stronger understanding of the multifaceted nature of gender, race and class. Students will develop their abilities to write well-argued papers. They will stretch their imaginations in the written and oral assignments. And they will grow more confident as public speakers and seminar participants.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4-5
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP, Writing 2
FEMGEN 188Q:
Imagining Women: Writers in Print and in Person (CSRE 188Q)
Gender roles, gender relations and sexual identity explored in contemporary literature and conversation with guest authors. Weekly meetings designated for book discussion and meeting with authors. Interest in writing and a curiosity about diverse women's lives would be helpful to students. Students will use such tools as close reading, research, analysis and imagination. Seminar requires strong voice of all participants. Oral presentations, discussion papers, final projects.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4-5
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP, Writing 2
FRENCH 75N:
Narrative Medicine and Near-Death Experiences (ITALIAN 75N)
Even if many of us don't fully believe in an afterlife, we remain fascinated by visions of it. This course focuses on Near-Death Experiences and the stories around them, investigating them from the many perspectives pertinent to the growing field of narrative medicine: medical, neurological, cognitive, psychological, sociological, literary, and filmic. The goal is not to understand whether the stories are veridical but what they do for us, as individuals, and as a culture, and in particular how they seek to reshape the patient-doctor relationship. Materials will span the 20th century and come into the present. Taught in English.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-SI
GENE 104Q:
Law and the Biosciences
Preference to sophomores. Focus is on human genetics; also assisted reproduction and neuroscience. Topics include forensic use of DNA, genetic testing, genetic discrimination, eugenics, cloning, pre-implantation genetic diagnosis, neuroscientific methods of lie detection, and genetic or neuroscience enhancement. Student presentations on research paper conclusions.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-ER, Writing 2
GEOPHYS 60N:
Man versus Nature: Coping with Disasters Using Space Technology (EE 60N)
Preference to freshman. Natural hazards, earthquakes, volcanoes, floods, hurricanes, and fires, and how they affect people and society; great disasters such as asteroid impacts that periodically obliterate many species of life. Scientific issues, political and social consequences, costs of disaster mitigation, and how scientific knowledge affects policy. How spaceborne imaging technology makes it possible to respond quickly and mitigate consequences; how it is applied to natural disasters; and remote sensing data manipulation and analysis. GER:DB-EngrAppSci
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci, WAY-SMA
GERMAN 130N:
Nobel Prize Winners in German Literature
Readings from some of the best German-language authors, including Thomas Mann, Hermann Hesse, Heinrich Boll and Herta Muller. How imaginative literature engages with history, and how great authors address the major questions in politics and philosophy in modern Germany. Taught in German. German language equivalent to high school AP.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
GS 42N:
Landscapes and Tectonics of the San Francisco Bay Area
Active faulting and erosion in the Bay Area, and its effects upon landscapes. Earth science concepts and skills through investigation of the valley, mountain, and coastal areas around Stanford. Faulting associated with the San Andreas Fault, coastal processes along the San Mateo coast, uplift of the mountains by plate tectonic processes, and landsliding in urban and mountainous areas. Field excursions; student projects.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: WAY-AQR, WAY-SMA
GS 43Q:
Environmental Problems
Preference to sophomores. Components of multidisciplinary environmental problems and ethical questions associated with decision making in the regulatory arena. Students lead discussions on environmental issues such as groundwater contamination from point and nonpoint sources, cumulative watershed effects related to timber and mining practices, acid rain, and subsurface disposal of nuclear waste.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER: DB-NatSci
GS 55Q:
The California Gold Rush: Geologic Background and Environmental Impact
Preference to sophomores. Topics include: geologic processes that led to the concentration of gold in the river gravels and rocks of the Mother Lode region of California; and environmental impact of the Gold Rush due to population increase, mining operations, and high concentrations of arsenic and mercury in sediments from hard rock mining and milling operations. Recommended: introductory geology.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-SMA, Writing 2
GS 59N:
Earthquake 9.0: The Heritage of Fukushima Daiichi 6 Years Later
We will consider the case for nuclear power as an energy source through the lens of the Fukushima disaster. Specific topics will include the cause of the earthquake and tsunami, the causes for the nuclear power plant failure, the mechanisms for the release of radioactivity at the time of the accident and today, and the ongoing human impact of this tragedy. In addition to the details of the accident and the release of radioactivity, class discussions and readings will explore the health and economic impacts of nuclear power and examine how the accident has affected the future prospects of nuclear power in Japan, the U.S., and around the world.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
GSBGEN 112Q:
Leading Out Loud: an Exploration of Leadership Communication through an LGBT Lens
Students of all sexual orientations are invited to apply for this unique new seminar looking at the distinct challenge LGBT leaders have faced in communicating effectively. Through the years, many individuals have led the struggle for gay rights and inclusion through a variety of different communication strategies and tactics; some were successful while others were not. This seminar course will explore some of the key leaders in the LGBT community and how they chose to communicate. Together we will search through a variety of film clips, transcripts, news reports, and other historical elements to see how the message, media, and moments work together. A number of guest speakers will also share their perspective on what it means to "Lead Out Loud." Heterosexual identified students as well as LGBT students are encouraged to apply; in fact, we seek to have a true diversity of opinions in the room as we explore this topic. All students will benefit from this exploration of how to communicate about controversial, sensitive, and personal subjects with greater strength and purpose.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:EC-Gender
HISTORY 7N:
Humanitarianism and Its Histories
This seminar will explore when and under what circumstances humanitarian sensibilities, including the idea of human rights, became powerful components of modern politics and ethical thinking. Far from being a straightforward ideology, humanitarianism has been invoked in myriad ways ¿ both idealistically and cynically ¿ in the course of modern history, in debates over phenomena as varied as slavery, colonialism, world war, genocide, famine, and immigration. As a result, contemporary ethical motivations for assisting those in need remain deeply shaded by humanitarianism¿s long engagement with political categories, ideologies, and practices of the past, including Christianity, race, liberalism, capitalism, and imperialism. We will examine the shifting narratives and media strategies that activists, NGOs, and governments have employed to draw widespread attention to crises and abuses from the late eighteenth century to the present.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
HISTORY 9N:
How to Start Your Own Country: Sovereignty and State-Formation in Modern History
What does it mean to start a country, or to acquire and possess sovereignty over a territory? This course will examine the historical evolution of fundamental concepts in our international system: state formation, statehood, and sovereignty. Each week will spotlight a case-study in which sovereignty and statehood have appeared greatly confused and hotly contested. These include: the UK-China lease for control of Hong Kong; the US Naval Station in Guantanamo Bay; the corporate state of the legendary British East India Company; and Disney World.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
HISTORY 10N:
Thinking About War
This course examines classic approaches to war as an intellectual problem, looking at how a matter of such great physical violence and passions can be subjected to understanding and used in philosophy, political theory, and art. Questions to be examined include the definition of war, its causes, its moral value, the nature of its participants, its use in the self-definition of individuals and societies, its relation to political authority, warfare and gender, and the problem of civil war.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
HISTORY 11N:
The Roman Empire: Its Grandeur and Fall (CLASSICS 26N)
(Formerly CLASSHIS 24N.) Preference to freshmen. Explore themes on the Roman Empire and its decline from the 1st through the 5th centuries C.E.. What was the political and military glue that held this diverse, multi-ethnic empire together? What were the bases of wealth and how was it distributed? What were the possibilities and limits of economic growth? How integrated was it in culture and religion? What were the causes and consequences of the conversion to Christianity? Why did the Empire fall in the West? How suitable is the analogy of the U.S. in the 21st century?
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:IHUM-3, WAY-SI
HISTORY 20N:
Russia in the Early Modern European Imagination
Preference to freshmen. The contrast between the early modern image of Europe as free, civilized, democratic, rational, and clean against the notion of New World Indians, Turks, and Chinese as savage. The more difficult, contemporary problem regarding E. Europe and Russia which seemed both European and exotic. Readings concerning E. Europe and Russia from the Renaissance to the Enlightenment; how they construct a positive image of Europe and conversely a negative stereotype of E. Europe. Prerequisite: PWR 1.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-GlobalCom, WAY-SI, Writing 2
HISTORY 36N:
Gay Autobiography (FEMGEN 36N)
Preference to freshmen. Gender, identity, and solidarity as represented in nine autobiographies: Isherwood, Ackerley, Duberman, Monette, Louganis, Barbin, Cammermeyer, Gingrich, and Lorde. To what degree do these writers view sexual orientation as a defining feature of their selves? Is there a difference between the way men and women view identity? What politics follow from these writers' experiences?
Terms: Spr
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-EDP
HISTORY 41Q:
Madwomen: The History of Women and Mental Illness in the U.S.
Explores how gender and historical context have shaped the experience and treatment of mental illness in U.S. history. Why have women been the witches and hysterics of the past, and why have there historically been more women than men among the mentally ill? Topics include the relationship between historical ideas of femininity and insanity, the ways that notions of gender influence the definition and treatment of mental disorder, and the understanding of the historically embedded nature of medical ideas, diagnoses, and treatments.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-SocSci, WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
HISTORY 44Q:
Gendered Innovations in Science, Medicine, Engineering, and Environment (FEMGEN 44Q)
Section 1 focuses on the history of women in science, medicine, and engineering. Section 2 looks at transforming research institutions so that both men and women can flourish. Section 3 explores how sex and gender analysis can enhance creativity. We discuss concrete examples of how taking gender into account has yielded new research results. Stanford University currently has a multiple year collaboration with the European Commission for Gendered Innovations, and this class will be part of that project. This course fulfills the second level Writing and Rhetoric Requirement (WRITE 2) and will emphasize oral and multimedia presentation.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4-5
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-EDP, WAY-SI, Writing 2
HISTORY 48Q:
South Africa: Contested Transitions (AFRICAAM 48Q)
Preference to sophomores. The inauguration of Nelson Mandela as president in May 1994 marked the end of an era and a way of life for South Africa. The changes have been dramatic, yet the legacies of racism and inequality persist. Focus: overlapping and sharply contested transitions. Who advocates and opposes change? Why? What are their historical and social roots and strategies? How do people reconstruct their society? Historical and current sources, including films, novels, and the Internet.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-GlobalCom, WAY-EDP, WAY-SI, Writing 2
HISTORY 50N:
Who Killed Jane Stanford... The Podcast
In 1905 Jane Stanford died of strychnine poisoning. Who may have killed her remains unknown. For this seminar, you will become collaborative historians and journalists to research the case and create investigative audio podcast much like WBEZ Serial. Building on research by a previous freshman seminary, you will together you will examine suspects, circumstances, and the often odd actions of central figures and then build an audio story out of interviews, archival materials, and sound recordings. In your (application?) explain your interest, and any experience with, podcasting.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: WAY-CE, WAY-SI
HISTORY 54N:
African American Women's Lives (AFRICAAM 54N, AMSTUD 54N, CSRE 54N, FEMGEN 54N)
Preference to freshmen. We will examine the struggles of African American women to define their own lives and improve the social, economic, political and cultural conditions of black communities. Topics will include women¿s enslavement and freedom, kinship and family relations, institution and community building, violence, labor and leisure, changing gender roles, consumer and beauty culture, social activism, and the politics of sexuality.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-Gender, WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP
HISTORY 55N:
Social Movements through Song in Modern America (AMSTUD 55N, FEMGEN 55N)
This discussion class will explore a series of social movements in modern America through the songs produced to support efforts to achieve labor unions, civil rights and racial justice, peace, and women's rights. For each class we will read short historical texts to provide contexts for the movements and then concentrate on the role of music within them. We will listening to and discuss several core songs for each topic. Biographical and autobiographical readings on a key set of musicians (including Joe Hill, Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Malvina Reynolds, and Bernice Johnson Reagon) will provide personal accounts of the relationship of songs to social movement . The music we include in class will range from ballads to anthems, from oral traditions to the work of singer-songwriters.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3-4
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
HISTORY 61N:
The Worlds of Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson assumed many roles during his life¿Founding Father, revolutionary, and author of the Declaration of Independence; natural scientist, inventor, and political theorist; slaveholder, founder of a major political party, and President of the United States. This introductory seminar explores these many worlds of Jefferson, both to understand the multifaceted character of the man and the broader historical contexts that he inhabited and did so much to shape.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
HISTORY 69Q:
On the Road: A History of Travel in 20th Century America (AMSTUD 109Q)
From Mark Twain's Roughin It to Cheryl Strayed's Wild, this seminar explores epic road trips of the twentieth century. Travel is a cultural practice through which Americans have constructed ideas about the self, society, race, the past, and the future. Engaging historical and literary texts, film, autobiography, photography, and music, we will consider how writers have explored the theme of travel and what the differences in their texts tell us about American writing, American history, and American life.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
HISTORY 84N:
The American Empire in the Middle East
What have been the traditional objectives of U.S. policy in the Middle East since the end of World War II? What forces shape U.S. policy towards the Middle East? Did those interests and the means employed to pursue them change substantially after the demise of the Soviet Union? What has been the impact of U.S. policy on the region itself? The three principal cases to be examined are Afghanistan, Iraq and Israel/Palestine.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-SocSci, GER:EC-GlobalCom, WAY-SI
HISTORY 95N:
Maps in the Modern World
Preference to freshmen. Focus is on cutting-edge research. Topics: the challenge of grasping the globe as a whole; geography's roots in empire; maps as propaganda and as commodities; the cultural production of scale; and the cartography of imaginery worlds.Sources include resources in the Green Library Special Collections and in the Stanford Spatial History Lab.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4-5
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-SocSci, WAY-SI
HISTORY 116N:
Howard Zinn and the Quest for Historical Truth (EDUC 116N)
With more than two million copies in print, Howard Zinn¿s A People's History is a cultural icon. We will use Zinn¿s book to probe how we determine what was true in the past. A People's History will be our point of departure, but our journey will visit a variety of historical trouble spots: debates about whether the US was founded as a Christian nation, Holocaust denial, and the "Birther" controversy of President Obama.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
HRP 89Q:
Introduction to Cross Cultural Issues in Medicine
Preference to sophomores. Introduction to social factors that impact health care delivery, such as ethnicity, immigration, language barriers, and patient service expectations. Focus is on developing a framework to understand culturally unique and non-English speaking populations in the health care system.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:EC-AmerCul
HUMBIO 79Q:
Sexuality and Society
This course will explore how sexual identity, attitudes, and behaviors are shaped by the messages sent by the various agents of society such as schools, family, peers, media, and religious, medical, and political institutions. The interaction of biology, psychology, and socio-cultural factors, such as gender roles and sexual/relationship scripts will be discussed, as will the intersection of sexuality and notions of love, romance, and commitment. Critical developmental periods, such as adolescence and emerging adulthood will be examined in depth. Students will explore their own values and feelings about sexuality and come to an understanding of how their beliefs were formed. We will discuss how information about sexuality is disseminated in our society and what we can do to help ensure that such information is used in a way that promotes healthy self-conceptions, behavior, and relationships.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:EC-Gender, WAY-SI
HUMBIO 86Q:
Love as a Force for Social Justice (FEMGEN 86Q)
Preference to sophomores. Biological, psychological, religious, social and cultural perspectives on the concept of agape love. How love is conceptualized across cultures; agape love as the basis of many religions; different kinds of love; the biology of love; love in action for social justice; the languages of love, including art, literature, music, and poetry. Emphasis is on blog writing, participation, and oral presentation.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
HUMBIO 91Q:
Neuroethology: The Neural Control of Behavior (BIO 32Q)
Preference to sophomores. Animal behavior offers insights about evolutionary adaptations and this seminar will discuss the origins of the study of animal behavior and its development to the present. How does the nervous system control behavior and how is it changed by behavior? We will analyze and discuss original research papers about the neural basis of behavior. The use and misuse of parallels between animal and human behavior. Possible field trip to observe animals in their natural habitat.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-SMA
HUMBIO 96Q:
Injustice, Advocacy and Courage: The Path of Everyday Heroes
This course will study the paradigms of people of courage, action and energy who have fought against injustice by advocating for causes against great odds and at personal risk. The focus will be on everyday people who have taken action, often at great personal risk, not for ambition, but because of their convictions and steadfast commitment to their beliefs.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
HUMBIO 97Q:
Sport, Exercise, and Health: Exploring Sports Medicine (ORTHO 97Q)
Preference to sophomores. Sports medicine is the practice of clinical medicine at the interface between health and performance, competition and well-being. While sports medicine had its origins in providing care to athletes, medical advances developed in care of athletes exerted a great effect on the nature and quality of care to the broader community. Topics include sports injuries, medical conditions associated with sport and exercise, ethics, coaching, women's issues, fitness and health, and sports science. Case studies.
Terms: Aut, Win, Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: Writing 2
ILAC 110N:
Brazil: Musical Culture and Films
An audiovisual introduction to Brazilian cultural and regional diversities. Films and Music from Samba to Bossa Nova to Tropicália to Hip-Hop. Rhythms and Spirituals of Capoeira and Candomblé. Amerindian songs. Dances and Rituals. Final visual-sonorous exhibition and performance by students. Taught in English.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3-5
ILAC 117Q:
The Short Story in Latin America
What is a short story? How is it different from a nouvelle or a short novel? What represents the greatest achievement in its practice? How is the social function and literary standing of cuentos different in the region from elsewhere in the world? Read and think about short stories while cultivating core critical skills: close-reading, aesthetic appreciation, and good Spanish expository prose. Taught in Spanish.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3-5
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
INTNLREL 60Q:
United Nations Peacekeeping
Focus is on an examination of United Nations peacekeeping, from its inception in 1956 in the wake of the Suez Crisis, to its increasingly important role as an enforcer of political stability in sub-Saharan Africa. Examines the practice of "classic" peacekeeping as it developed during the Cold War, the rise and fall of "second-generation" peacekeeping, and the reemergence of a muscular form of peacekeeping in sub-Saharan Africa more recently. Topics include the basic history of the United Nations since 1945, he fundamentals of the United Nations Charter, and the historical trajectory of U.N. peaeckeeping and the evolving arguments of its proponents and critics over the years.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-EDP
INTNLREL 62Q:
MASS ATROCITIES AND RECONCILIATION
This seminar considers the theory and practice of transitional justice as exemplified by diverse case studies, such as Germany, South Africa, Bosnia, and Rwanda. We will ask ourselves throughout the term whether and to what extent mass atrocities and grave human rights violations can be ameliorated and healed, and what legal, institutional, and political arrangements may be most conducive to such attempts. We will study war crimes tribunals and truth commissions, and we will ask about their effectiveness, especially in regards to their potential of fostering reconciliation in a given society. In every case we will encounter and evaluate specific shortcomings and obstacles, which will provide us with a more nuanced understanding of the complex process of coming to terms with the past.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-ER, WAY-SI
ITALIAN 41N:
Imagining Italy
Images of Italy. To the English and American literary imagination, Italy has long been a source of fascination. During the past hundred years, writers from Nathaniel Hawthorne to Frances Mayes have explored the broad range of contradictory resonances of the Italian setting, in fiction, travel essays, and memoirs. While some writers have celebrated the sensuality of Italian culture and landscape, others have imagined Italy as a more dangerous place -- as dangerous as the erotic love with which it is often identified. In this course we will examine the range of literary responses to Italy by writers in English during the past hundred years, and explore the ways in which our culture has continued to construct myths of Italy. We will also see how these myths have been transformed into commodities in today's consumer culture, making "Italy" one of the most profitable fictions in the marketplace.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, WAY-A-II
ITALIAN 75N:
Narrative Medicine and Near-Death Experiences (FRENCH 75N)
Even if many of us don't fully believe in an afterlife, we remain fascinated by visions of it. This course focuses on Near-Death Experiences and the stories around them, investigating them from the many perspectives pertinent to the growing field of narrative medicine: medical, neurological, cognitive, psychological, sociological, literary, and filmic. The goal is not to understand whether the stories are veridical but what they do for us, as individuals, and as a culture, and in particular how they seek to reshape the patient-doctor relationship. Materials will span the 20th century and come into the present. Taught in English.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-SI
JEWISHST 19N:
Everyone Eats: Food, Religion and Culture (CSRE 19N, RELIGST 19N)
Food is one of the most essential aspects of the human experience. The decisions and choices we make about food define who we have been, who we are now, and who we want to become. In this seminar we will study how food habits have shaped religious traditions, and vice versa, how religious traditions have shaped food ways. Some traditions are centered around food regiments such as the dietary laws, derived from biblical law that shapes Jewish and Christian tradition very differently. Indeed, many religious and ethical thinkers, as well as anthropologists, have interpreted the meanings of the dietary laws very differently. Further, in many religious traditions the killing of animals and consumption of meat is deeply fraught. We will explore the history of food practices and their contemporary impact; the connections between food, religion, and identity; the meanings that religious thinkers and anthropologists have attributed to food habits; as well as the creative translations of religious traditions into contemporary food ethics by various social movements and groups, predominantly in the U.S..
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
JEWISHST 37Q:
Zionism and the Novel (COMPLIT 37Q)
At the end of the nineteenth century, Zionism emerged as a political movement to establish a national homeland for the Jews, eventually leading to the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948. This seminar uses novels to explore the changes in Zionism, the roots of the conflict in the Middle East, and the potentials for the future. We will take a close look at novels by Israelis, both Jewish and Arab, in order to understand multiple perspectives, and we will also consider works by authors from the North America and from Europe.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP, Writing 2
LAWGEN 105Q:
Law and Popular Culture (AMSTUD 105Q)
(Same as AMSTUD 105Q) This seminar focuses on the interface between two important subjects: law and popular culture. Before class, students will see a series of films or television shows relating to law, lawyers, and the legal system. There is also a weekly homework assignment based on materials in the assigned text and the assigned film or TV show. We will discuss the pop culture treatment of subjects such as the adversary system, good and bad lawyers, female and gay lawyers, the work life of lawyers, legal education, ethical issues, the jury system, and criminal and civil justice. The seminar discussions will draw on film theory and film-making technique to deepen understanding of the interrelationship between law and popular culture. The discussions will illuminate the ways in which pop culture products both reflect and change social views about law and lawyers. The assigned text is Michael Asimow & Shannon Mader, "Law & Popular Culture: A Course Book" (Peter Lang, 2d edition, 2013).
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
LAWGEN 112N:
Law and Inequality
Most Americans know that discrimination on the basis of race, sex, and religion is unlawful. Seems simple enough. But advertisements in the back of newspapers still announce: "Single White Female Seeks Single White Male?" Isn't that discrimination on the basis of race and sex? Most businesses don't consider men for women's locker room or bathroom attendant. And why aren't those men and women's bathrooms and locker rooms illegal segregation? After all we know what would happened if some business set up separate bathrooms for blacks and whites. Isn't it discrimination for an employer to insist that men wear a jacket and tie and women wear nylons and a skirt? Why are some forms of discrimination unlawful and others not? Why is discrimination against short people, overweight people, or people with annoying personalities not against the law? We will answer these and many other questions by looking at court cases, legal theory, and philosophy. We may also have conversations with guest lecturers who work in civil rights enforcement, and the seminar may include a field trip to visit the offices of civil rights lawyers (lawyers tend to be busy people so these opportunities will depend on their schedules). Class participation and a short final paper are required, but here are no prerequisites other than an open mind and a willingness to delve into unfamiliar material.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
LAWGEN 115N:
Human Rights Advocacy
What are the origins of the human rights movement and where is it headed? What does it mean to be a human rights activist? What are the main challenges and dilemmas facing those engaged in human rights advocacy? In the space of 60 years, human rights advocates have transformed a marginal utopian ideal into a central element of global discussion, if not practice. In this seminar we will examine the actors and organizations behind this remarkable development as well as the vast challenges faced by advocates in the recent past and today. Together, we will learn to be critical of, as well as to think, and act, like human rights advocates. This seminar will introduce you to some the main debates and dilemmas within the human rights movement. We will consider and understand the differing agendas of western international nongovernmental organizations (INGOs) and their counterparts in the frequently non-western) developing world, as well as tensions between and among rights advocates along other important dimensions (civil and political vs. economic, social and cultural rights; rights promotion through engagement of powerful actors vs. challenging structures of power, etc.). The seminar seeks to develop your ability: 1) to understand human rights and social justice issues as contested political, legal and cultural phenomena; 2) to review advocacy texts, videos and other interventions critically; 3) to appreciate the political dimensions of efforts to promote human rights; 4) to understand how recent history constrains and structures options and possibilities for social intervention to promote rights and justice. During the course of the quarter you will be required to submit several short reflection papers and develop a human rights advocacy campaign.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
LINGUIST 21N:
Linguistic Diversity and Universals: The Principles of Language Structure
The human capacity for language is able to support a staggering diversity of languages. But is anything possible in a human language, and is there anything that is common to all languages? Looking past the vast surface differences, linguists have discovered deep commonalities among the languages of the world as well as strict limits on the observed variation and on what a possible human language is. In this seminar, we will seek to uncover the building blocks of language and the laws that govern their interactions. Our goal will be to reach an understanding of the ways in which languages are systematically alike and different, as well as of the nature of language in general. We will investigate a variety of topics, including crosslinguistic differences and similarities with respect to word order, the grammatical structure of questions, and how languages mark subjects and objects. We will explore the structure of both sentences and words, identifying and studying their fundamental properties. In this pursuit, we will rely on data from a range of languages, such as English, Navajo, Zulu, and many others. This seminar will teach you how to view language as an object of scientific study, introducing you to central concepts and methods of linguistics (with a particular emphasis on syntax) along the way. It will give you the tools to describe and analyze even unfamiliar languages, and will teach you to construct explicit hypotheses about how language works and to test them empirically. There are no prerequisites for this course and no experience with linguistics will be assumed; the course is Socratically taught and there will be no textbook.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
LINGUIST 47N:
Languages, Dialects, Speakers
Preference to freshmen. Variation and change in languages from around the world; language and thought; variation in sound patterns and grammatical structures; linguistic and social structures of variation; how languages differ from one another and how issues in linguistics connect to other social and cultural issues; the systematic study of language.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-SocSci
LINGUIST 50Q:
Life and Death of Words (CSRE 50Q, ENGLISH 50Q, FEMGEN 50Q, NATIVEAM 50Q)
In this course, we explore the world of words: their creation, evolution, borrowing, change, and death. Words are the key to understanding the culture and ideas of a people, and by tracing the biographies of words we are able to discern how the world was, is, and might be perceived and described. We trace how words are formed, and how they change in pronunciation, spelling, meaning, and usage over time. How does a word get into the dictionary? What do words reveal about status, class, region, and race? How is the language of men and women critiqued differently within our society? How does slang evolve? How do languages become endangered or die, and what is lost when they do? We will visit the Facebook Content Strategy Team and learn more about the role words play in shaping our online experiences. Together, the class will collect Stanford language and redesign the digital dictionary of the future. Trigger Warning: Some of the subject matter of this course is sensitive and may cause offense. Please consider this prior to enrolling in the course.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
LINGUIST 52N:
Spoken Sexuality: Language and the Social Construction of Sexuality (FEMGEN 52N)
The many ways language is used in the construction of sexuality and sexual identity. How language is used as a resource for performing and perceiving sexual identity. Drawing on linguistic analyses of pronunciation, word choice, and grammar, questions such as: Is there a gay accent? Why isn't there a lesbian accent? How do transgendered people modify their linguistic behavior when transitioning? How are unmarked (heterosexual) identities linguistically constructed? Sexuality as an issue of identity, as well as of desire. Iconic relations between elements of language such as breathy voice quality and high pitch, and aspects of desire such as arousal and excitement. How language encodes ideologies about sexuality; how language is used to talk about sexuality in public discourses about gay marriage and bullying, as well as in personal narratives of coming out. How language encodes dominant ideologies about sexuality, evident in labels for sexual minorities as well as terminology for sex acts. Discussions of readings, explorations of how sexuality is portrayed in popular media, and analyses of primary data. Final research paper on a topic of student choice.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
LINGUIST 64Q:
These languages were here first: A look at the indigenous languages of California (ANTHRO 64Q, NATIVEAM 64Q)
Stanford was built on land originally inhabited by the Muwekma Ohlone tribe, and Native American students have always held an important place in the university community from the writer and journalist John Milton Oskison (Cherokee) who graduated in 1894 to current enrolments of over three hundred students who represent over fifty tribes. Two hundred years ago, the Muwekma language was one of a hundred languages that made California one of the most linguistically-diverse places on earth. Today, less than half of these languages survive but many California Indian communities are working hard to maintain and revitalize them. This is a familiar pattern globally: languages around the world are dying at such a rapid rate that the next century could see half of the world's 6800 languages and cultures become extinct unless action is taken now. Focusing especially on California, this course seeks to find out how and why languages die; what is lost from a culture when that occurs; and how `sleeping¿ languages might be revitalized. We will take a field trip to a Native American community in northern California to witness first-hand how one community is bringing back its traditional language, songs, dances, and story-telling. We will learn from visiting indigenous leaders and linguistic experts who will share their life, language, and culture with the class. Through weekly readings and discussion, we will investigate how languages can be maintained and revitalized by methods of community- and identity-building, language documentation and description, the use of innovative technologies, writing dictionaries and grammars for different audiences, language planning, and data creation, annotation, preservation, and dissemination. Finally, the course will examine ethical modes of fieldwork within endangered-language communities.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
LINGUIST 83N:
Translation
Preference to Freshman. What is a translation? The increased need for translations in the modern world due to factors such as tourism and terrorism, localization and globalization, diplomacy and treaties, law and religion, and literature and science. How to meet this need; different kinds of translation for different purposes; what makes one translation better than another; why some texts are more difficult to translate than others. Can some of this work be done by machines? Are there things that cannot be said in some languages?
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-SocSci
MATH 80Q:
Capillary Surfaces: Explored and Unexplored Territory
Preference to sophomores. Capillary surfaces: the interfaces between fluids that are adjacent to each other and do not mix. Recently discovered phenomena, predicted mathematically and subsequently confirmed by experiments, some done in space shuttles. Interested students may participate in ongoing investigations with affinity between mathematics and physics.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-FR, WAY-SMA
MATH 87Q:
Mathematics of Knots, Braids, Links, and Tangles
Preference to sophomores. Types of knots and how knots can be distinguished from one another by means of numerical or polynomial invariants. The geometry and algebra of braids, including their relationships to knots. Topology of surfaces. Brief summary of applications to biology, chemistry, and physics.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-FR
MATSCI 81N:
Bioengineering Materials to Heal the Body
Preference to freshmen. Real-world examples of materials developed for tissue engineering and regenerative medicine therapies. How scientists and engineers design new materials for surgeons to use in replacing body parts such as damaged heart or spinal cord tissue. How cells interact with implanted materials. Students identify a clinically important disease or injury that requires a better material, proposed research approaches to the problem, and debate possible engineering solutions.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci
MATSCI 82N:
Science of the Impossible
Imagine a world where cancer is cured with light, objects can be made invisible, and teleportation is allowed through space and time. The future once envisioned by science fiction writers is now becoming a reality, thanks to advances in materials science and engineering. This seminar will explore 'impossible' technologies - those that have shaped our past and those that promise to revolutionize the future. Attention will be given to both the science and the societal impact of these technologies. We will begin by investigating breakthroughs from the 20th century that seemed impossible in the early 1900s, such as the invention of integrated circuits and the discovery of chemotherapy. We will then discuss the scientific breakthroughs that enabled modern 'impossible' science, such as photodynamic cancer therapeutics, invisibility, and psychokinesis through advanced mind-machine interfaces. Lastly, we will explore technologies currently perceived as completely impossible and brainstorm the breakthroughs needed to make such science fiction a reality. The course will include introductory lectures and in-depth conversations based on readings. Students will also be given the opportunity to lead class discussions on a relevant 'impossible science' topic of their choosing.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
MATSCI 83N:
Great Inventions That Matter
This introductory seminar starts by illuminating on the general aspects of creativity, invention, and patenting in engineering and medicine, and how Stanford University is one of the world's foremost engines of innovation. We then take a deep dive into some great technological inventions which are still playing an essential role in our everyday lives, such as fiber amplifier, digital compass, computer memory, HIV detector, personal genome machine, cancer cell sorting, brain imaging, and mind reading. The stories and underlying materials and technologies behind each invention, including a few examples by Stanford faculty and student inventors, are highlighted and discussed. A special lecture focuses on the public policy on intellectual properties (IP) and the resources at Stanford Office of Technology Licensing (OTL). Each student will have an opportunity to present on a great invention from Stanford (or elsewhere), or to write a (mock) patent disclosure of his/her own ideas.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SMA
MATSCI 84N:
Re-engineering the energy landscape
Why hasn't electricity from solar panels, wind turbines, and other environmentally friendly resources taken over our energy landscape? Why is a hybrid car or an all-electric vehicle so expansive? In this seminar we will explore energy technologies and focus on how development in materials science enables a greener future. This seminar takes a hands-on approach; we will make solar cells and batteries and generate our own electricity. We will also include field trips to companies running large-scale energy production and green energy for transportation. Lastly we will explore advanced energy materials research at Stanford and find what still needs to be done in order to achieve a sustainable energy landscape.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
MATSCI 159Q:
Japanese Companies and Japanese Society (ENGR 159Q)
Preference to sophomores. The structure of a Japanese company from the point of view of Japanese society. Visiting researchers from Japanese companies give presentations on their research enterprise. The Japanese research ethic. The home campus equivalent of a Kyoto SCTI course.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-SocSci
ME 12N:
The Jet Engine
Preference to freshmen. This seminar describes how a jet engine works with examples given from modern commercial and military engines. We then explore the technologies and sciences required to understand them including thermodynamics, turbomachinery, combustion, advanced materials, cooling technologies, and testing methods. Visits to research laboratories, examination of a partially disassembled engine, and probable operation of a small jet engine. Prerequisites: high school physics and preferably calculus.
Terms: Sum
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci
ME 13N:
The Great Principle of Similitude
Basic rules of dimensional analysis were proposed by Sir Isaac Newton. Lord Rayleigh called the method ¿The Great Principle of Similitude.¿ On its surface, it is a look at the relationships between physical quantities which uses their basic ¿units¿. In fact, it is a powerful and formalized method to analyze complex physical phenomena, including those for which we cannot pose, much less solve, governing equations. The method is also valuable to engineers and scientist as it helps perform back-of-the-envelope estimates and derive scaling laws for the design of machines and processes. The principle has been applied successfully to the study of complex phenomena in biology, aerodynamics, chemistry, sports, astrophysics, and forensics, among other areas. In this course, the students will be provided with the basic tools to perform such flexible and powerful analyses. We will then review particular example analyses. These will include estimating the running speed of a hungry tyrannosaurus rex, a comparison of the flights of mosquitos and jet airliners, the cost of submarines, and the energy released by an atomic weapon. We will then work together as a class to identify problems in everyday life and/or current world events to analyze with this powerful tool.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
ME 18Q:
Teamology: Creative Teams and Individual Development
Preference to sophomores. Roles on a problem solving team that best suit individual creative characteristics. Two teams are formed for teaching experientially how to develop less conscious abilities from teammates creative in those roles. Reinforcement teams have members with similar personalities; problem solving teams are composed of people with maximally different personalities.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
ME 22N:
Smart Robots in our Mix: Collaborating in High Tech Environments of Tomorrow
This course invites students to explore rules of engagement in a global digitally interconnected world they will create with the robots in their society. The material will be taught in the context of ubiquitous integrated technology that will be part of their future reality. Human-robot interactions will be an integral part of future diverse teams. Students will explore what form will this interaction take as an emerging element of tomorrow's society, be it medical implanted technology or the implications of military use of robots and social media in future society. Students will learn to foster their creative confidence to explore collaboration by differences for social innovation in a digitally networked world.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
MED 50N:
Translating Science to Disease Treatment
Investigates how scientific research informs how physicians take care of patients and how clinical research informs how scientific experiments are conducted. Topics include how these two processes have improved health and have resulted in innovation and scientic progress; specific human disease areas in allergy and immunology that affect all ages of patients globally, including food allergy; scientific concepts of research that helped in discovery of novel diagnostics and treatment of disease; ethical roles of physicians and scientists in conducting translational research in human disease.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SMA
MED 50Q:
Respiration
Preference to sophomores. Topics include: the biological basis for use of oxygen for aerobic metabolism in animals, human lung physiology and pathophysiology, comparative physiology of respiration in fish, birds and mammals, new insights into mammalian lung development, current challenges in human respiratory health including air pollution and lung cancer. Student presentations on specific topics based on literature research developed in consultation with the instructor. Application required.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
MED 51Q:
Palliative Medicine, Hospice and End of Life Care for Diverse Americans
Introduces students to changing demographics of the aging and dying population in the United States. Topics include current issues in palliative medicine, hospice and end-of-life care for an increasingly diverse population. Includes simulated video case studies, real patient case discussions and collaborative field project. Application required.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
MED 71N:
Hormones in a Performance-Enhanced Society
(Formerly 117Q) Prefersnce to freshmen. Explores how the availability of hormone therapy has affected various aspects of daily lives. Topics include the controversies concerning menopause and its treatment; use of hormones in athletics; cosmetic use of hormones to enhance growth, strength, and libido; use of hormones as anti-aging drugs; and how the hormone system has influenced our notions of gender. Includes the biochemistry and physiology of the human endocrine system; how hormones influence behavior, and how to read a scientific paper.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SMA
MED 73N:
Scientific Method and Bias
Offers an introduction to the scientific method and common biases in science. Examines theoretical considerations and practical examples where biases have led to erroneous conclusions, as well as scientific practices that can help identify, correct or prevent such biases. Additionally focuses on appropriate methods to interweave inductive and deductive approaches. Topics covered include: Popper¿s falsification and Kuhn¿s paradigm shift, revolution vs. evolution; determinism and uncertainty; probability, hypothesis testing, and Bayesian approaches; agnostic testing and big data; team science; peer review; replication; correlation and causation; bias in design, analysis, reporting and sponsorship of research; bias in the public perception of science, mass media and research; and bias in human history and everyday life. Provides students an understanding of how scientific knowledge has been and will be generated; the causes of bias in experimental design and in analytical approaches; and the interactions between deductive and inductive approaches in the generation of knowledge.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SMA
MED 88Q:
Dilemmas in Current Medical Practice
Preference to sophomores. Social, political, scientific, and economic forces influencing medical practice. Spiraling costs, impaired access to health care, and disillusionment toward the health care system. Attempts by government and medical insurers to control costs through managed care and health maintenance organizations. Medical education and how it has affected the practice of medicine. Alternative health care, preventive medicine, and the doctor-patient relationship. The paradox of health in America: why do so many people who are healthy feel unhealthy? Mandatory observation of instructors in their medical practices.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
MED 108Q:
Human Rights and Health
Preference to sophomores. History of human-rights law. International conventions and treaties on human rights as background for social and political changes that could improve the health of groups and individuals. Topics such as: regional conflict and health, the health status of refugees and internally displaced persons; child labor; trafficking in women and children; HIV/AIDS; torture; poverty, the environment and health; access to clean water; domestic violence and sexual assault; and international availability of drugs. Possible optional opportunities to observe at community sites where human rights and health are issues. Guest speakers from national and international NGOs including Doctors Without Borders; McMaster University Institute for Peace Studies; UC Berkeley Human Rights Center; Kiva. PowerPoint presentation on topic of choice required.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
MED 120N:
Cardiovascular Physiology in Normal and Disease States
Preference to freshmen. Introduces students to the anatomy, physiology, pathology and clinical aspects that comprise the discipline of cardiovascular medicine. Topics will include explanations of such pathologic states as heart attack, stroke, congestive heart failure, cardiac rhythm disturbances, and sudden cardiac death. Introduction to the underlying principles of diagnosis and treatment of heart disease are included in the syllabus.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
MI 70Q:
Photographing Nature
Utilizes the idiom of photography to learn about nature, enhance observation, and explore scientific concepts. Builds upon the pioneering photographic work of Eadweard J. Muybridge on human and animal locomotion. A secondary goal is to learn the grammar, syntax, composition, and style of nature photography to enhance the use of this medium as a form of scientific communication and also to explore the themes of change across time and space. Scientific themes to be explored include: taxonomy, habitat preservation, climate change; species diversity; survival and reproductive strategies; ecological niches and coevolution, carrying capacity and sustainability, population densities, predation, and predator-prey relationships, open-space management, the physics of photography. Extensive use of field trips and class critque.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
MS&E 92Q:
International Environmental Policy
Preference to sophomores. Science, economics, and politics of international environmental policy. Current negotiations on global climate change, including actors and potential solutions. Sources include briefing materials used in international negotiations and the U.S. Congress.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
MS&E 93Q:
Nuclear Weapons, Energy, Proliferation, and Terrorism
Preference to sophomores. At least 20 countries have built or considered building nuclear weapons. However, the paths these countries took in realizing their nuclear ambitions vary immensely. Why is this the case? How do the histories, cultures, national identities, and leadership of these countries affect the trajectory and success of their nuclear programs? This seminar will address these and other questions about nuclear weapons and their proliferation. Students will learn the fundamentals of nuclear technology, including nuclear weapons and nuclear energy, and be expected to use this knowledge in individual research projects on the nuclear weapons programs of individual countries. Case studies will include France, UK, China, India, Israel, Pakistan, North Korea, South Africa, Libya, Iraq, and Iran, among others. Please note any language skills in your application. Recommended: 193 or 293.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-EngrAppSci
MUSIC 17N:
The Operas of Mozart
Preference to freshmen. Four of Mozart's mature operas, the earliest works in the operatic repertoire never to go out of fashion. What accounts for this extraordinary staying power? Focus on the history of their composition, performance, and reception, and their changing significance from Mozart's time to the present.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, WAY-A-II
MUSIC 17Q:
Perspectives in North American Taiko (ASNAMST 17Q)
Preference to sophomores. Taiko, or Japanese drum, is a newcomer to the American music scene. Emergence of the first N. American taiko groups coincided with increased Japanese American activism, and to some it is symbolic of Japanese American identity. N. American taiko is associated with Japanese American Buddhism. Musical, cultural, historical, and political perspectives of taiko. Hands-on drumming. Japanese music and Japanese American history, and relations among performance, cultural expression, community, and identity.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-AmerCul, WAY-CE, WAY-EDP
MUSIC 26N:
Japanese Arts: a Creative Exploration
The striking originality of Japanese contemporary culture seems to defy unifying pressures of globalization. What are the sources of this originality? Can it be traced to the unique and sophisticated art forms like rock gardens, haiku, tea ceremony, martial arts, ikebana and Noh Theater or to the illusive aesthetic notions of wabi, sabi, yûgen, ma or jo-ha-kyû? Exploration of Japanese arts through comparative examination and direct engagement. Creative projects and workshops in traditional Japanese arts.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-CE
MUSIC 27N:
The British Invasion
Examination of three generations of British popular music in the `60s and `70s: the Beatles (and the Rolling Stones, the Kinks, the Who); progressive rock (art rock) as embodied in Pink Floyd, Yes, King Crimson, Genesis, and Emerson, Lake, and Palmer; the emergence of punk in its revolutionary (the Clash) and nihilistic (the Sex Pistols) forms. Among other issues, the manner in which marginal American culture (particularly African-American blues) is neglected by Americans and venerated by foreigners and the subsequent mainstream consumption of a transformed and repackaged American minority culture is discussed.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, WAY-A-II
MUSIC 34N:
Performing America: The Broadway Musical
Musical theater as a site for the construction of American identity in the twentieth century to the present. Issues of class, race, gender, and sexuality; intersections with jazz, rock, and pop; roles of lyricist, composer, director, choreographer, producer, performers. Individual shows (Showboat, Oklahoma, South Pacific, Guys and Dolls, West Side Story, Wicked, Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, Book of Mormon), show tunes in jazz performance, film musicals, and television. Opportunities for performance and attendance at local productions.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, WAY-A-II, WAY-CE
MUSIC 37N:
Ki ho'alu: The New Renaissance of a Hawaiian Musical Tradition
Preference to freshman. Developed in the Hawaiian Islands during the 1830s, ki ho'alu, or Hawaiian slack key guitar, is an art form experiencing newfound popularity coinciding with the growth of political activism in Hawaiian culture. The musical, cultural, historical, and political perspectives of Hawaiian music and ki ho'alu, through hands-on experience, readings, discussion, and workshops. Hawaiian music and history and relationships among performance, cultural expression, community, and identity.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-AmerCul, WAY-A-II, WAY-CE
NATIVEAM 50Q:
Life and Death of Words (CSRE 50Q, ENGLISH 50Q, FEMGEN 50Q, LINGUIST 50Q)
In this course, we explore the world of words: their creation, evolution, borrowing, change, and death. Words are the key to understanding the culture and ideas of a people, and by tracing the biographies of words we are able to discern how the world was, is, and might be perceived and described. We trace how words are formed, and how they change in pronunciation, spelling, meaning, and usage over time. How does a word get into the dictionary? What do words reveal about status, class, region, and race? How is the language of men and women critiqued differently within our society? How does slang evolve? How do languages become endangered or die, and what is lost when they do? We will visit the Facebook Content Strategy Team and learn more about the role words play in shaping our online experiences. Together, the class will collect Stanford language and redesign the digital dictionary of the future. Trigger Warning: Some of the subject matter of this course is sensitive and may cause offense. Please consider this prior to enrolling in the course.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
NATIVEAM 64Q:
These languages were here first: A look at the indigenous languages of California (ANTHRO 64Q, LINGUIST 64Q)
Stanford was built on land originally inhabited by the Muwekma Ohlone tribe, and Native American students have always held an important place in the university community from the writer and journalist John Milton Oskison (Cherokee) who graduated in 1894 to current enrolments of over three hundred students who represent over fifty tribes. Two hundred years ago, the Muwekma language was one of a hundred languages that made California one of the most linguistically-diverse places on earth. Today, less than half of these languages survive but many California Indian communities are working hard to maintain and revitalize them. This is a familiar pattern globally: languages around the world are dying at such a rapid rate that the next century could see half of the world's 6800 languages and cultures become extinct unless action is taken now. Focusing especially on California, this course seeks to find out how and why languages die; what is lost from a culture when that occurs; and how `sleeping¿ languages might be revitalized. We will take a field trip to a Native American community in northern California to witness first-hand how one community is bringing back its traditional language, songs, dances, and story-telling. We will learn from visiting indigenous leaders and linguistic experts who will share their life, language, and culture with the class. Through weekly readings and discussion, we will investigate how languages can be maintained and revitalized by methods of community- and identity-building, language documentation and description, the use of innovative technologies, writing dictionaries and grammars for different audiences, language planning, and data creation, annotation, preservation, and dissemination. Finally, the course will examine ethical modes of fieldwork within endangered-language communities.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
NENS 67N:
Intracellular Trafficking and Neurodegeneration
Preference to freshmen. Cell structures and functions, the intracellular trafficking system that maintains exchanges of materials and information inside cells, and clinical features and pathologies of neurodegenerative diseases. Techniques for examining cellular and subcellular structures, especially cytoskeletons; functional insights generated from structural explorations. Prerequisite: high school biology.
Terms: Win, Sum
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SMA
NSUR 70Q:
Experimental Stroke
Preference to sophomores. How stroke is studied in the laboratory; advances in stroke research over the last two decades; and future directions. Topics include: cellular and molecular mechanisms of neuronal death and survival in the brain after stroke, including necrosis, apoptosis, inflammation, and cell signaling pathways; experimental tools for stroke treatment, such as gene therapy, cell therapy, hypothermia, preconditioning, postconditioning, and other pharmacological treatments; the gap and barrier between laboratory research and clinical translation.
Terms: Win
| Units: 2
OB 110N:
Savvy: Learning How to Communicate with Purpose
Our seminar is designed for students interested in improving their communication skills. Right now, you probably don¿t spend much time thinking about the way you communicate, nor are you likely, in the academic setting, to get much feedback on the messages you send. Yet the quality of your communication will have a large impact on your overall effectiveness in building relationships and getting things done, both in the university setting and later in your career. Each of the sessions in our seminar will help you appreciate the nature and complexity of communication and provide guidelines for both improving your communication style and recognizing the unique styles of others. nnIn each class session, we¿ll consider a number of well-studied forms of interpersonal communication. And, we¿ll rely heavily on experiential learning to bring the concepts to life. For example, to better understand the dynamics of unstructured, spontaneous communication, we will participate in an improvisational theatre workshop, taught by one of the artists-in-residence at the Groundlings Theater in Los Angeles. To better understand persuasive communication tactics, we¿ll participate in role-play exercises, competitive games, and negotiation simulations. For each tactic, we¿ll talk about why it works, when it works best, and what its limitations might be. We¿ll discuss how you can put these approaches to work in order to support your goals. nnAfter taking this course, you will be better able to: (1) identify strategies for crafting effective communication in the form of everyday conversation, written work, and public presentations, (2) develop techniques for building strong, long-term relationships with your peers, and (3) become more persuasive in advancing an agenda, acquiring resources, or gaining support from others. These skills will be invaluable to you as you grow and develop here at Stanford and beyond.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
OBGYN 81Q:
Perspectives on the Abortion Experience in Western Fiction
Explores the role of media in delivering abortion-related messages as well as the broader questions of how abortion and related issues are fundamentally integrated into the social fabric of US and global societies. Abortion remains one of the most controversial and polarizing challenges of our time. Yet, it has been a clinical, social, political, and cultural fact in a broad swath of societies for centuries. As is common for such lightning rod issues, the topic of abortion has featured prominently in novels and films. Each treatment provides a unique perspective on at least one aspect of abortion, whether it be clinical, social, political or cultural. How abortion is portrayed in novels and films provides the student of history, anthropology, and biology with insights into the author's or director's perspectives, and into societal attitudes and mores.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
ORTHO 97Q:
Sport, Exercise, and Health: Exploring Sports Medicine (HUMBIO 97Q)
Preference to sophomores. Sports medicine is the practice of clinical medicine at the interface between health and performance, competition and well-being. While sports medicine had its origins in providing care to athletes, medical advances developed in care of athletes exerted a great effect on the nature and quality of care to the broader community. Topics include sports injuries, medical conditions associated with sport and exercise, ethics, coaching, women's issues, fitness and health, and sports science. Case studies.
Terms: Aut, Win, Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: Writing 2
PEDS 65N:
Understanding Children's Health Disparities
The social and economic factors that affect children and their health status. The principal sources of disparities in the health of children in the U.S. are not biologic, but social and economic. Topics include ethnic, cultural, and behavioral factors that affect children's health, both directly and indirectly; lack of health insurance; and current proposals for health care reform, focusing specifically on how they will impact existing health disparities among children.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-SocSci, GER:EC-AmerCul, WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
PHIL 4N:
Knowing Nothing
Our beliefs are subject to multiple sources of error: a traveler's perception of an oasis in the desert may turn out to be a mirage; the key witness in a trial criminal may turn out to be lying; or a fluke in the data may mislead a research team into believing a false hypothesis; or a miscalculating math student may end up with the wrong answer. Philosophers often characterize knowledge as belief that is safe from error--but is knowledge possible? This course uses the philosophical arguments and thought experiments to assess the question of how much we can hope to know.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
PHIL 11N:
Skepticism
Preference to freshmen. Historical and contemporary philosophical perspectives on the limits of human knowledge of a mind-independent world and causal laws of nature. The nature and possibility of a priori knowledge. Skepticism regarding religious beliefs..
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum
PHIL 12N:
Paradoxes
In this course, we will use paradoxes like these as foci for discussions of some of the deepest issues in philosophy and mathematics. No prior knowledge of logic, philosophy or mathematics will be assumed and there will be minimal use of symbolism.nStudents will be expected to complete problem sheets, and to write a very short final paper. The seminars will be discussion-based.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
PHIL 21N:
Ethics of Sports (ETHICSOC 21N)
This seminar will be focused on the ethical challenges that are encountered in sport. We will focus on the moral and political issues that affect the world of sport and which athletes, coaches, sports commentators and fans are faced with. For instance, we will ask questions such as: what is a fair game (the ethics of effort, merit, success)? Is it ethical to train people to use violence (the ethics of martial arts)? Are divisions by gender categories justified and what should we think of gender testing? Is the use of animals in sport ever justified? Which forms of performance enhancements are acceptable in sport (the ethics of drug use and enhancements through technologies)? Should we ban sports that damage the players¿ health? Does society owe social support to people who hurt themselves while practicing extreme sports? nnThe class will be structured around small group discussions and exercises as well as brief lectures to introduce key moral and political concepts (such as fairness, equality, freedom, justice, exploitation, etc.). I will also bring guests speakers who are involved in a sport activity at Stanford or who have worked on sports as part of their academic careers. By the end of the seminar, students will have a good understanding of the various ethical challenges that surround the world of sport. They will be able to critically discuss sport activities, norms, modes of assessments and policies (on campus and beyond). They will also be prepared to apply the critical ethical thinking that they will have deployed onto other topics than sports. They will have been introduced to the normative approach to social issues, which consists in asking how things should be rather than describing how things are. They will be prepared to take more advanced classes in ethics, political theory, as well as moral and political philosophy.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-ER
PHYSICS 14N:
Quantum Information: Visions and Emerging Technologies
What sets quantum information apart from its classical counterpart is that it can be encoded non-locally, woven into correlations among multiple qubits in a phenomenon known as ¿entanglement.¿ Will discuss paradigms for harnessing entanglement to solve hitherto intractable computational problems or to push the precision of sensors to their fundamental quantum mechanical limits. Will also examine challenges that physicists and engineers are tackling in the laboratory today to enable the quantum technologies of the future.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-FR, WAY-SMA
PHYSICS 18N:
Frontiers in Theoretical Physics and Cosmology
Preference to freshmen. The course will begin with a description of the current standard models of gravitation, cosmology, and elementary particle physics. We will then focus on frontiers of current understanding including investigations of very early universe cosmology, string theory, and the physics of black holes.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-SMA
PHYSICS 45N:
Topics in Light and Heat
Preference to freshmen. Explores the quantum and classical properties of light from stars, lasers and other sources. Includes modern applications ranging from gravity wave interferometers to x-ray lasers.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 1
PHYSICS 81N:
Science on the Back of the Envelope
Understanding the complex world around us quantitatively, using order of magnitude estimates and dimensional analysis. Starting from a handful of fundamental constants of Nature, one can estimate complex quantities such as cosmological length and time scales, size of the atom, height of Mount Everest, speed of tsunami, energy density of fuels and climate effects. Through these examples students learn the art of deductive thinking, fundamental principles of science and the beautiful unity of nature.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
PHYSICS 83N:
Physics in the 21st Century
Preference to freshmen. Current topics at the frontier of modern physics. This course provides an in-depth examination of two of the biggest physics discoveries of the 21st century: that of the Higgs boson and Dark Energy. Through studying these discoveries we will explore the big questions driving modern particle physics, the study of nature's most fundamental pieces, and cosmology, the study of the evolution and nature of the universe. Questions such as: What is the universe made of? What are the most fundamental particles and how do they interact with each other? What can we learn about the history of the universe and what does it tell us about it's future? We will learn about the tools scientists use to study these questions such as the Large Hadron Collider and the Hubble Space Telescope. We will also learn to convey these complex topics in engaging and diverse terms to the general public through writing and reading assignments, oral presentations, and multimedia projects. The syllabus includes a tour of SLAC, the site of many major 20th century particle discoveries, and a virtual visit of the control room of the ATLAS experiment at CERN amongst other activities. No prior knowledge of physics is necessary; all voices are welcome to contribute to the discussion about these big ideas. Learning Goals: By the end of the quarter you will be able to explain the major questions that drive particle physics and cosmology to your friends and peers. You will understand how scientists study the impossibly small and impossibly large and be able to convey this knowledge in clear and concise terms.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-SMA
PHYSICS 95Q:
The Philosophies of Three Great Physicists
Richard Feynman has famously said, Philosophy of science is about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds. A closer look at key moments in the history of physics, however, reveals a different picture. Contrary to the misconception that philosophy has nothing to offer to science in general, and physics in particular, watershed moments in the development of physics were inspired and motivated by deeply held philosophical principles. Similarly, important developments in physics have generated important and difficult philosophical questions. In this sophomore seminar we will explore three significant moments in the development of physics surrounding the works of Newton, Einstein, and Bohr. We will analyze the relationship between the prevailing philosophical views they espoused and the physics they produced. How did Newton come to the view of absolute and fixed space and time? What led Einstein to reject the notion of a fixed space and time and propose a relativistic, and even dynamic space-time? What is Bohr's influential doctrine of complementary, and why did several generations of physicists believe it to be an adequate philosophical response to quantum mechanics? We will see that the relationship between philosophy and physics is more similar to the relationship between mathematics and physics where progress in one area is often preceded and followed by progress in the second.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SMA
POLISCI 23Q:
Analyzing the 2016 Elections
the seminar will normally meet for two hours, but after three seminars there will be lab sessions to acquaint students with basic quantitative methods and major social science databases. After every election the commentariat promulgates a story line to explain the results. Typically later analysis shows the media story line to be wrong (eg. "values voters" in 2004). Participants in this seminar will analyze the results of the 2016 elections. The seminar is about ANALYSIS, not ideology. Some familiarity with quantitative methods is a prerequisite.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
POLISCI 24Q:
Law and Order
Preference to sophomores. The role of law in promoting social order. What is the rule of law? How does it differ from the rule of men? What institutions best support the rule of law? Is a state needed to ensure that laws are enforced? Should victims be allowed to avenge wrongs? What is the relationship between justice and mercy?
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-SocSci
POLISCI 29N:
Mixed-Race Politics and Culture (AFRICAAM 52N, ENGLISH 52N)
Today, almost one-third of Americans identify with a racial/ethnic minority group, and more than 9 million Americans identify with multiple races. What are the implications of such diversity for American politics and culture? In this course, we approach issues of race from an interdisciplinary perspective, employing research in the social sciences and humanities to assess how race shapes perceptions of identity as well as political behavior in 21st century U.S. We will examine issues surrounding the role of multiculturalism, immigration, acculturation, racial representation and racial prejudice in American society. Topics we will explore include the political and social formation of "race"; racial representation in the media, arts, and popular culture; the rise and decline of the "one-drop rule" and its effect on political and cultural attachments; the politicization of Census categories and the rise of the Multiracial Movement.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
POLISCI 31N:
Political Freedom: Rights, Justice, and Democracy in the Western Tradition
Freedom is one of our core values. Most people can agree that freedom is a good thing. Yet there is far less agreement about how to understand the concept itself and what kinds of political arrangements are best suited to protect and enhance freedom. Is freedom about being left alone? Undertaking action with others? Participating in governance? Does freedom require a limited state? An active and interventionist government? A robustly participatory political system? How is freedom connected to other political values, like justice and equality? This seminar will consider and evaluate some of the most controversial and challenging answers that have been given to these questions by both historical and contemporary political thinkers from Europe and North America. Thinkers covered will include: Plato, Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, Alexis de Tocqueville, John Stuart Mill, Karl Marx, Robert Putnam, and Jeremy Waldron.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
POLISCI 31Q:
Justice and the City
Cities have most often been where struggles for social justice happen, where injustice is most glaring and where new or renewed visions of just communities are developed and tested. What makes a city just or unjust? How have people tried to make cities more just? Why have these efforts succeeded or failed? Each of our sessions will focus on questions like these and include a case study of a particular city, largely with a focus on the United States, including very local cases like San Francisco, Palo Alto and East Palo Alto. The central goal of this class is for you to gain an understanding of the roles of urban design and urban policies in making cities just or unjust places. You will critically engage with some of the debates on cities and justice and gain experience connecting theoretical debates about justice and democracy to empirical data and contemporary work on city design, planning, and policies through readings, our class discussions, and a sustained research project looking a particular city in depth.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
POLISCI 43Q:
Immigration Crisis? Policy Dilemmas in the US and Europe
Immigration is a hotly contested social, economic, and political phenomenon in countries throughout the world. People migrate for many reasons, including the desire to start careers, reunite families, and escape oppression. While each story of migration is unique, migration in the modern world has certain commonalities, and these patterns often manifest as political conflict. Labor migration promises economic productivity and efficiency but may threaten existing labor protections and social welfare guarantees to natives. Facilitating migration from failed nation-states may protect the human rights of migrants but introduce security concerns. In the 21st century, the world has witnessed political violence¿by natives and migrants, both first and second generations¿including the September 11th attacks, the London bombings, the mass killings in Norway, and the Paris attacks. How can policymakers harness the promises of immigration without succumbing to its pitfalls? Why do some countries respond so differently than others in similar circumstances? When does the meaning of citizenship evolve and when does it stay the same? What lessons do other countries have for the United States as it considers immigration reform? n n This course is designed to provide students with an overview of immigration law and politics in the United States and other countries, particularly in the European Union. Students will develop the necessary tools to critically analyze immigration policies, starting with the historical evolution of immigration policy in the United States. We will visit Angel Island and discuss the legacy of the Chinese Exclusion Act as well as contemporary immigration politics in San Francisco, a so-called ¿sanctuary city¿ for undocumented immigrants. There will also be a screening on La Haine (Hate), an acclaimed French film which chronicles the challenges of immigrant integration. Students will study the economics of immigration and the politics of refugees in the context of post-9/11 security dilemmas. Students will design a concrete immigration policy proposal.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
PSYC 51Q:
Culture, Psychology, and Mental Health Treatment
Focuses on a critical analysis of Western approach to psychology and psychiatric terms of understanding mental illness, psychiatric phenomena, and treatment of mental health disorders. Includes an orientation to and critique of western clinical psychology/psychiatry and an inquity as to its relevance outside Western settings. Includes guest speakers representing cross-cultural providers of mental health services as well as medical anthropologists and critics of the Western generalizations in psychiatry. Special attention place on cross-cultural psychiatry and international mental health efforts.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 2
PSYC 53Q:
Your Secret Mind: Getting to Know and Living with your Unconscious
Focuses on the motivational unconscious. Topics include the science of the unconscious mind and the techniques used to gain conscious access to these psychological process, as well as methods of exploring students' own unconscious for creative purposes and to understand personal habits, reactions, motives, emotions and thoughts. Case-based, problem-oriented format utilized to develop foundational understanding of the science of the unconscious mind. Emphasis on student study of self and own unconscious as case for the class. Student privacy will be protected.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
PSYC 54N:
Genes, Memes and Behavior
Examines how natural selection operates to shape successful genes in the gene pool, how cultural selection operates to shape successful "memes" in the pool of cultural ideas, and how selection by consequences operates to shape successful behaviors in our repertoires. Topics include cases in which selection produces undesirable consequences (e.g. genetic mutations, cultural problems, and aberrant behaviors in children). Emphasis on understanding the role of modern natural science in complex behaviors and why study of human life from an interdisciplinary perspective is important.
Terms: Aut, Sum
| Units: 3
PSYC 60N:
The Psychology of Stoked
Examines the biological, psychological and social aspects of what it means to live a positive, life-affirming existence. Drawing from a wide range of sources, from psychiatry and psychology, to spirituality and philosophy, seminar informs on the latest thinking about the psychology of happiness, and questions assumptions about personal happiness. Explores the new field of positive psychology and pulls from a multidisciplinary literature, examining life satisfaction and happiness from many perspectives, and the psychiatry of stimulation including substance, human sexuality, and healthy methods of attaining happiness. Includes guest speakers from many different backgrounds and perspectives. Examines what it means to be truly mindful.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
PSYC 71N:
Eight Ages of Man
Ways in which a psychologcially-minded attitude can add to the appreciation of literature; how literature can be used to understand issues and themes of the developing personality. Using the well-known essay by psychoanalyst Erik Erikson, "The Eight Ages of Man," as a foundation, works reflecting elements of an age or ages are read. "Wisdom of the Ego" by Dr. George Valliant serves as a resouce to better understand this model, as well as offering a more contemporary theory of personality development.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
PSYC 78N:
Mental Health in Collegiate Athletes
Developmental, psychological, social, and performance issues in collegiate sports. Topics include transition to Stanford, time management, optimizing mental fitness, coping with injuries.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
PSYC 83Q:
The Physiology of Addiction in the Modern World
Addiction is a powerful neurological and psychiatric condition that interferes with many lives. As technology advances, many new types of addiction are emerging. This class will discuss the physiology and psychology of addiction in the modern world, including: drugs, spending, and internet addictions. We cover the neuroscience of addiction in these categories, in addition to the psychological implications for the addict and his/her companions. Students will be engaged in thought-provoking discussions surrounding this topic to stimulate critical thinking at the interface between psychology and neuroscience in the modern world. nnEach student will lead one discussion section throughout the quarter, and will write a 4-page final paper based on their preparation for the discussion and will include information yielded from the class discussion itself. Final grades will based on four components, each graded equally (25% each): 1) Class Participation both during the lectures and discussions; 2) Performance as Discussion leader; 3) Participation in the activities, each of which the students will write a one page paper summarizing their experience with the activity; and 4) the Final 4-page paper. The primary goal ofnthis seminar is to engage the students in interactive, critical thinking didactics, activities and discussions that shape their understanding of the complexity inherent to the issues surrounding societal issues such as addiction. The aim is to improve their critical thinking abilities surrounding such issues in a manner that will not only increase their understanding of addictions, from genes through behavior to societal implications, but which will increase the students¿ ability to more critically assimilate and interrogate information on any topic.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI, WAY-SMA
PSYC 111Q:
Madness and the Womb: Medical and Artistic Approaches to Mental Illness in Women Through the Ages
Historical and current concepts of mental illness in women. Premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMS), postpartum depression, menopausal mood disorders, and eating disorders. Historical biopsychosocial approach. Readings include women's diaries and advice books, physicians' casebooks, and 19th- and 20th-century medical texts. Guest speakers from art and literature departments. Literary and artistic images, and the social and cultural contexts of these disorders during the last 300 years.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
PSYCH 7N:
Learn to Intervene, Wisely
Do you ever look around and see ways that the world could be a better place, especially if people behaved a little differently? Do you wonder what prevents better outcomes? nnIn this seminar, we will examine social-psychological processes that lie behind diverse social problems, especially how people make sense of themselves, other people, or important situations, sometimes in pejorative ways that undermine outcomes. Then we will examine interventions that address critical processes to promote human flourishing. You¿ll have the opportunity to read and discuss classic and contemporary ¿wise¿ psychological interventions such as: how a change in the sign on a hospital soap dispenser can increase soap use; how a change in survey items can raise voter turnout; how a change in a single question can improve dating relationships; and how reading-and-writing exercises that address students¿ beliefs about intelligence and belonging in school can improve achievement years into the future. In learning about this research, you will discover more about psychological processes, how basic research helps clarify these processes, how they contribute in complex field settings to social problems, and how they can be altered.nnAs you learn from past research, you¿ll have the opportunity to design your very own ¿wise intervention¿ and to workshop others¿ efforts. You will identify a social problem on campus of interest to you, say: How can you reduce waste in the cafeteria? How can you get more people to take the stairs? How can you get people to hold more inclusive attitudes? Then you will identify a psychological process you think contributes to this problem, implement an intervention in the field and track the results. nnWhen you have completed this seminar, you will more fully understand the psychological aspect of social problems and how this can be addressed through rigorous research.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
PSYCH 9N:
Reading the Brain: the Scientific, Ethical, and Legal Implications of Brain Imaging
It's hard to pick up a newspaper without seeing a story that involves brain imaging, from research on psychological disorders to its use for lie detection or "neuromarketing". The methods are indeed very powerful, but many of the claims seen in the press are results of overly strong interpretations. In this course, you will learn to evaluate claims based on brain imaging research. We will also explore the deeper ethical and philosophical issues that arise from our ability to peer into our own brains in action. The course will start by discussing how to understand and interpret the findings of brain imaging research. We will discuss how new statistical methods provide the ability to accurately predict thoughts and behaviors from brain images. We will explore how this research has the potential to change our concepts of the self, personal responsibility and free will. We will also discuss the ethics of brain imaging, such as how the ability to detect thoughts relates to personal privacy and mental illness. Finally, we will discuss the legal implications of these techniques, such as their use in lie detection or as evidence against legal culpability.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-ER, WAY-SMA
PSYCH 12N:
Self Theories
Preference to freshmen. The impact of people's belief in a growing versus fixed self on their motivation and performance in school, business, sports, and relationships. How such theories develop and can be changed.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-SocSci, WAY-SI
PSYCH 20N:
How Beliefs Create Reality
This seminar will take an interdisciplinary approach to exploring how subjective aspects of the mind (e.g., thoughts, beliefs, and expectations) can fundamentally change objective reality. Over the course of the semester, students will be challenged to think critically about research from psychology, sociology, and medicine, which suggests that what we think, believe and expect plays a significant role in determining our physical health, performance and well-being. Students will explore research on how mindsets about nutrition, exercise, and stress can alter the body¿s response to those phenomena. Students will also uncover how social interactions with friends, family, colleagues and the media influence the perceived quality and impact of cultural products such as art, music, and fashion. And students will learn about the neurological and physiological underpinnings of the placebo effect, a powerful demonstration of expectation that produces real, healing changes in the body. Finally, students will have the opportunity to consider real world applications in disciplines including policy, business, medicine, academics, athletics and public health and consider the ethical implications of those applications. Throughout the class active participation and an open mind will be critical to success. The final weeks of class will be dedicated to student designed studies or interventions aimed to further explore the power of self-fulfilling prophecies, placebo effects, and the social-psychological creation of reality.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
PUBLPOL 19Q:
Measuring the Performance of Governments in the U.S. (ECON 19Q)
Spending by federal, state, and local governments accounts for about one-third of U.S. GDP and governments employ more than one-in-seven workers in the U.S. For most U.S. residents, government is represented by a complicated web of federal, state, and local policies. There is an increasingly contentious debate about the proper role of the government and regarding the impact of specific government policies. This debate is rarely grounded in a common set of facts.nIn this seminar, we will explore how each level of government interacts with U.S. residents through government services, public programs, taxes, and regulations. We will examine financial results for different levels of government while considering the net effects of government intervention on the health and economic well-being of individuals and families. Particular attention will be paid to certain sectors (e.g. education, health care, etc.) and to certain groups (e.g. those in poverty, the elderly, etc.). Along the way we will accumulate a set of metrics to assess the performance of each level of government while highlighting the formidable challenges of such an exercise.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
PUBLPOL 78N:
Economic Policies of the Presidential Candidates (ECON 78N)
In nearly all polls, American voters rank the economy as one of their most important concerns. In the presidential election, much of the debate for voters will be on questions of economic policy. In this course, we will delve deeply into economic policy issues to understand options for government intervention and possible outcomes. We will combine economic analysis with political science methodology to understand efficient and implementable policy proposals.nnSpecific areas of interest will be taxation, budget, entitlement programs, economic regulation and competition policy, trade, demography, income inequality, and monetary policy. The course will incorporate other timely and salient policy issues as they arise during the course of the campaign. n nStudents will be expected to write a short paper and make an oral presentation to the class. A wide range of topics will be acceptable, including those directly related to campaign issues as well as other long-term economic issues facing the country.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI
RELIGST 2N:
Religion in Anime and Manga
Religious themes and topoi are ubiquitous in Japanese anime and manga. In this course, we will examine how religions are represented in these new media and study the role of religions in contemporary Japan. By doing this, students will also learn fundamental concepts of Buddhism and Shint¿.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP
RELIGST 11N:
The Meaning of Life: Philosophical, Aesthetic, and Religious Perspectives
Raise ultimate questions about life. Yes, the unexamined life is not worth living, but also the unlived life is not worth examining. Students and professor examine their own lives in the light of questions that the readings and lectures bring up: 1. The big picture: Is there such a thing as "the" meaning of life? 2. What is entailed in making personal-existential sense of one's own life? 3. What constitutes the good life, lived in society? 4. How can a university education bear upon the search for a meaningful life? 5. What "methods" for or approches to life can one learn from studies in the humanities? After introductory lectures, the seminar studies a series of artworks, poems, diverse texts, and a film, all of which bear on the questions mentioned above -- works such: 1. Plato's Allegory of the Cave, from "The Republic" 2. Manet's "A bar at the Folies Bergere" 3. A comparison/contrast of Monet's early (1862) "Still Life" and van Gogh's late (1889) "Irises" 4. Lyric poetry T.S. Eliot: "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," "The Waste Land," and "East Coker"; Edwin Muir: "The Heart Could Never Speak"; Philip Larkin: "Days" 5. Martin Heidegger's "What Is Metaphysics?" 6. Jean-Paul Sartre's novel "Nausea" 7. Marx's Paris Manuscripts of 1844 8. Bergman's "The Seventh Seal"
Terms: Aut
| Units: 5
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum
RELIGST 12N:
Perspectives on the Good Life
The question is how to approach and evaluate different perspectives on the good life, especially when those perspectives are beautifully, and elusively, presented to us as texts. We will consider both classic and modern writers, from the West and from China; some are explicitly religious, some explicitly secular; some literary, some philosophical. Most of the class will revolve around our talk with each other, interpreting and questioning relatively short texts. The works we will read - by Dante, Dickenson, Zhuangzi, Shklar, and others - are not intended to be representative of traditions, of eras, or of disciplines. They do, however, present a range of viewpoint and of style that will help frame and re-frame our views on the good life. They will illustrate and question the role that great texts can play in a modern 'art of living.' Perhaps most important, they will develop and reward the skills of careful reading, attentive listening, and thoughtful discussion. (Note: preparation and participation in discussion are the primary course requirement. Enrollment at 3 units requires a short final paper; a more substantial paper is required for the 4-unit option.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3-4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum
RELIGST 13N:
Losing My Religion: Secularism and Spirituality in American Lives (AMSTUD 117N, EDUC 117N)
In this seminar you will explore theory and practice, sociological data, spiritual writing, and case studies in an effort to gain a more nuanced understanding about how religion, spirituality, and secularism attempt to make legible the constellation of concerns, commitments, and behaviors that bridge the moral and the personal, the communal and the national, the sacred, the profane, and the rational. Together we will cultivate critical perspectives on practices and politics, beliefs and belonging that we typically take for granted.
Terms: Sum
| Units: 2-4
| UG Reqs: WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
RELIGST 19N:
Everyone Eats: Food, Religion and Culture (CSRE 19N, JEWISHST 19N)
Food is one of the most essential aspects of the human experience. The decisions and choices we make about food define who we have been, who we are now, and who we want to become. In this seminar we will study how food habits have shaped religious traditions, and vice versa, how religious traditions have shaped food ways. Some traditions are centered around food regiments such as the dietary laws, derived from biblical law that shapes Jewish and Christian tradition very differently. Indeed, many religious and ethical thinkers, as well as anthropologists, have interpreted the meanings of the dietary laws very differently. Further, in many religious traditions the killing of animals and consumption of meat is deeply fraught. We will explore the history of food practices and their contemporary impact; the connections between food, religion, and identity; the meanings that religious thinkers and anthropologists have attributed to food habits; as well as the creative translations of religious traditions into contemporary food ethics by various social movements and groups, predominantly in the U.S..
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
SLAVIC 77Q:
Russia's Weird Classic: Nikolai Gogol
This seminar investigates the work and life of Nikolai Gogol, the most eccentric of Russian authors, the founder of what was dubbed Fantastic (or Magic) Realism. Our investigation will be based on close reading of the works written in various genres and created in various stages of Gogol's literary career. This study provides a perspective on the relationship between Romanticism and Realism in Russian literature (the so-called "Natural School" of the 1830-1840s), and between the popular Ukrainian culture and "high" Russian and West European traditions in Gogol's oeuvre. The seminar traces Gogol's influences on subsequent Russian literature (Dostoevsky in particular) and investigates the impact of his work on XX century modernist literature, theatre, music, and painting (Vladimir Nabokov, literature of the absurd, Dmitry Shostakovich, Marc Chagall). The seminar is intended for students interested in literature and literary studies.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3-4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, WAY-A-II
SLAVIC 88N:
UKRAINE AT A CROSSROADS
Literally meaning "borderland," Ukraine has embodied in-betweeness in all possible ways. In the course, we will consider the historical permeability of its territorial, linguistic, and ethnic borders as an opportunity to explore the multiple dimensions of Ukraine's relations its neighbors. The reading materials for the course include the earliest records of Herodotus about the prehistoric Ukrainian civilizations, the cultural legacy of Kyivan Rus¿ and baroque, as well as artistic works created during romanticism, realism, modernism, and postmodernism. In addition to learning how to interpret literary texts, we will examine the works of visual and performative arts which shape modern Ukraine and create several cartographic projects with the use of GIS tools. All required texts are in English. No knowledge of Ukrainian is required.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3-4
SLAVIC 118N:
Other People's Words: Folklore and Literature
What happens when you collect and use other people's words? This class considers folklore and literature based on it, focusing on the theme of objects that come to life and threaten their makers or owners (including Russian fairy tales and Nikolai Gogol's stories, the Golem legend and Michael Chabon's Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, and Ovid's and Shaw's Pygmalion). We read essays by Jacob Grimm, Sigmund Freud, Roman Jakobson, and others, to understand what folklore can mean and how the oral and the written can interact. Students collect living folklore from a group of their choosing. This course fulfills the second-level Writing and Rhetoric Requirement (Write-2) and emphasizes oral and multimedia presentation.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, Writing 2
SOC 14N:
Inequality in American Society
An overview of the major forms of inequality in American society, their causes and consequences. Special attention will devoted to to public policy associated with inequality.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4
SOC 17N:
Race and Politics: Perspectives on the 2016 Presidential Election (AFRICAAM 17N, CSRE 17N)
This course is intended as a seminar-based exploration of the complex ways that race has informed political behavior and attitudes during the 2016 Presidential election. The class is designed to introduce freshman to sociological ways of understanding the social world, and the rigors of college thinking more broadly. As a group we will explore the mechanisms through which race informs political behavior, while also paying close attention to the ways that politics also informs our understanding of race. The course treats ¿race¿ as multifaceted construct, with multiple (and often times conflicting) influences on political behavior. The course stresses thenconstructed nature of both race and politics. The course will be split into 3 parts. In the first partnwe will explore the relationship between racial identity and political behavior at the individualnlevel. The second part of the course will examine how ideas about racial groups shape politicalnattitudes and behaviors, as well as policy outcomes. The third part of the course will explore hownrace is used to mobilize political and economic actors.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
SOC 31N:
Social Networks
This Introductory Seminar reviews the history of social network studies, investigates how networks have changed over the past hundred years and asks how new technologies will impact them. We will draw from scholarly publications, popular culture and personal experience as ways to approach this central aspect of the human experience.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
SOC 45Q:
Understanding Race and Ethnicity in American Society (CSRE 45Q)
Preference to sophomores. Historical overview of race in America, race and violence, race and socioeconomic well-being, and the future of race relations in America. Enrollment limited to 16.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-SocSci, GER:EC-AmerCul, WAY-EDP, WAY-SI
SPECLANG 198Q:
Modern Greece in Film and Literature
Preference to sophomores. Cultural and literary highlights. Filmmakers include Kakoyannis, Dassen, Boulmetis, Angelopoulos, and Scorsese; readings from Eugenides, Gage, Kavafis, Kazantzakis, Samarakis, Seferis, and Elytis.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3-5
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-GlobalCom
STATS 48N:
Riding the Data Wave
Imagine collecting a bit of your saliva and sending it in to one of the personalized genomics company: for very little money you will get back information about hundreds of thousands of variable sites in your genome. Records of exposure to a variety of chemicals in the areas you have lived are only a few clicks away on the web; as are thousands of studies and informal reports on the effects of different diets, to which you can compare your own. What does this all mean for you? Never before in history humans have recorded so much information about themselves and the world that surrounds them. Nor has this data been so readily available to the lay person. Expression as "data deluge'' are used to describe such wealth as well as the loss of proper bearings that it often generates. How to summarize all this information in a useful way? How to boil down millions of numbers to just a meaningful few? How to convey the gist of the story in a picture without misleading oversimplifications? To answer these questions we need to consider the use of the data, appreciate the diversity that they represent, and understand how people instinctively interpret numbers and pictures. During each week, we will consider a different data set to be summarized with a different goal. We will review analysis of similar problems carried out in the past and explore if and how the same tools can be useful today. We will pay attention to contemporary media (newspapers, blogs, etc.) to identify settings similar to the ones we are examining and critique the displays and summaries there documented. Taking an experimental approach, we will evaluate the effectiveness of different data summaries in conveying the desired information by testing them on subsets of the enrolled students.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-AQR, WAY-FR
STRAMGT 110Q:
Making Sense of Strategy
Get the strategy right, and the chance for success is great. Nowhere is this more evident than in today's world of major challenges. Strategy is at the heart of problem solving and achieving objectives, yet few people can define strategy, much less understand how to conceptualize, design, and execute effective strategies that yield the best outcomes. This course will meet once a week to focus on interesting and engaging case studies, each of which illustrates a key ingredient of strategy. Some are well-known historical events, while others are less obvious, but all have a strategic lesson to share. They are quite diverse, from the planning of a high-risk rescue in the Colorado Rockies, to a product crisis in a Fortune 50 company, to a little-known failed military mission of WWII, to a commercial airline disaster. The ability to think through challenging and varied scenarios is both instructive and mind-stretching. There will be some pre-reading on each case study and there may be a field trip for students to put their lessons into practice. The course is designed to be highly interactive; all to enable students to unravel the mystery and power of strategic thinking. Students will also have the opportunity to select and analyze a case reflecting interests of their own. This course can help students not only prepare for a career in a range of fields, but also as they meet the challenges of their current coursework. Problem-solving skills are central in every walk of life; this seminar can help students build a stronger foundation for sound decision-making.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
SURG 70Q:
Surgical Anatomy of the Hand: From Rodin to Reconstruction
The surgical anatomy of the hand is extremely complex in terms of structure and function. Exploration of the anatomy of the hand in different contexts: its representation in art forms, the historical development of the study of hand anatomy, current operative techniques for reconstruction, advances in tissue engineering, and the future of hand transplantation.
Terms: Win
| Units: 2
SURG 72Q:
Anatomy in Society
Preference to sophomores. The influence of human anatomy on the design of commercial products and performance (such as headphone and ear bud design, automobile interior design, table music performance and handicap devices design). How societal advancements have evolved to increasingly accommodate human form and function. Guest speakers are experts in the fields of audiology, design and music. Exposure to human anatomy via cadaver material, 3D digital images, the 3D dissection table and models.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| Repeatable
2 times
(up to 6 units total)
TAPS 11N:
Dramatic Tensions: Theater and the Marketplace
Preference to freshmen. The current state of the American theater and its artists. Conventional wisdom says that theater is a dying art, and a lost cause, especially in an age of multi-media entertainment. But there are more young playwrights, actors, and directors entering the field today than at any other time in American history. Focus is on the work of today's theater artists, with an emphasis on an emerging generation of playwrights. Students read a cross-section of plays from writers currently working in the US and UK, covering a spectrum of subjects and styles from serious to comic, from the musical to the straight play. Hits and misses from recent seasons of the New York and London stages and some of the differences of artistic taste across the Atlantic. Hands-on exploration of the arts and skills necessary to make a play succeed. Students develop their own areas of interest, in guided projects in design, direction or performance. Conversations with playwrights, designers ,and directors. Labs and master classes to solve problems posed in areas of creative production. Class meets literary managers and producers who are on the frontlines of underwriting new talent. Class trips include two plays at major Bay Area Stages.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, WAY-A-II
TAPS 11Q:
Art in the Metropolis (ARTSINST 11Q)
This seminar is offered in conjunction with the annual "Arts Immersion" trip to New York that takes place over the spring break and is organized by the Stanford Arts Institute (SAI). Participation in the trip is a requirement for taking part in the seminar (and vice versa). The trip is designed to provide a group of students with the opportunity to immerse themselves in the cultural life of New York City guided by faculty and the SAI programming director. Students will experience a broad range and variety of art forms (visual arts, theater, opera, dance, etc.) and will meet with prominent arts administrators and practitioners, some of whom are Stanford alumni. For further details and updates about the trip, see http://arts.stanford.edu.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
TAPS 17N:
Acting for Activists
Acting for Activists is designed for students who are interested in combining acting with activism, performance with politics. We will work with theatre that responds to specific political events and crisis such as hate crimes or war through the performance of activist texts. We will also explore works that challenge inequalities of income, race, gender and sexual orientation. By the end of the course students will cultivate a critical vocabulary for discussing and critiquing work within acting/activist contexts and develop new strategies for creating theatre in relation to issues they are passionate about. Acting for Activists encourages students to think about what they want to say and helps them craft how they want to say it.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-CE
TAPS 19N:
Perform, Record, Create: American Theater in the Age of Video
From Electronovision, a clunky combination of television and film used to record Broadway shows in the sixties, to slick 360º videos of theater performances that Google Cultural Institute brings to your iPhone, video technologies have profoundly altered the ways in which we see and understand live performance. If video recording started as an effort to preserve live performances, it ended up transforming the way we make theater. In short, it went from documentation to creation. In this class, students will watch landmark recordings of theater performances, comment on them, and, following the historical trajectory of the encounter between these two media, create their own videos of live shows. No previous experience in video or theater is necessary.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
TAPS 20N:
Prisons and Performance
Preference to Freshmen. This seminar starts with the unlikely question of what can the performing arts ¿ particularly dance and theater ¿ illuminate about the situation of mass incarceration in America. Part seminar, part immersive context building, students will read and view a cross-section of dance and theater works where the subject, performers, choreographers or authors, belong to part of the 2.4 million people currently behind bars in US prisons. Class includes conversations with formerly incarcerated youth, prison staff, juvenile justice lawyers and artists working in juvenile and adult prisons as well as those who are part of the 7.3 million people currently on parole or probation. Using performance as our lens we will investigate the unique kinds of understanding the arts make possible as well as the growing use of theater and dance to affect social change and personal transformation among prison inmates. Class trips will include visits to locked facilities and meetings with artists and inmates working behind bars.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-EDP
TAPS 21N:
The Idea of Virtual Reality
What is virtual reality and where is it heading? Was there VR before digital technology? What is the value of the real in a virtual culture? How, where, and when do we draw the line between the virtual and the real, the live and the mediated today? Concentrating on three aspects of VR simulation, immersion, and interactivity this course will examine recent experiments alongside a long history of virtual performance, from Plato's Cave to contemporary CAVEs, from baroque theatre design to Oculus Rift.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
URBANST 27Q:
Sophomore Seminar: Three Detectives, Three Cities
This seminar will analyze the social reality of three historic cities (London in the 1880s and 90s, San Francisco in the 1920s and 30s, and contemporary Shanghai) through the prism of popular crime fiction featuring three great literary detectives (Arthur Conan Doyle¿s Sherlock Holmes, Dashiell Hammett¿s Sam Spade, and Qiu Xiaolong¿s Chief Inspector Chen). As a student in this course, you will explore why crime fiction is so popular, why the fear of crime is so much a part of modern urban culture, and why the police detective and the private investigator have become iconic code heroes of pulp fiction, movies, TV shows, and even video games. If you take this class, you will have the opportunity to write a paper and present your research on one of the classic literary detectives or on one of today¿s related manifestations of the same impulse in mass-market tales of superheroes, vampires, and the zombie apocalypse.
Terms: Win
| Units: 3
URBANST 180Q:
How to be Governed Otherwise: Art, Activism, and the City (ARTSINST 180Q, CEE 131Q)
This course will introduce you to contemporary art¿s engagement with political activism. This introduction will focus on the city as, at once, a field and target of activism¿a field of public appearance, artistic intervention, and political action, as well as a target of claims to residence, livelihood, recognition, justice, and collectivity. We will pose activist politics, artistic intervention, and urban space as mutually imbricated, each shaping the possibilities, programs, and histories of the other¿a perspective that offers insights into the spatiality, materiality, and visuality of political identity, agency, and action. Over the quarter, we will study some of the many artistic interventions that are encompassed by urban activism, from informal and everyday practices to protest, resistance, and occupation. Comparative case studies will be drawn from a global context. You will investigate these case studies through both research on urban activism and activist practice; the seminar will therefore invite you to explore the militant possibilities of research, the research possibilities of activism, and the implications of each for the production of art.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4
| UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
