Ik besliste het leerzaam zou kunnen zijn om een ogenblik te nemen om over de weg te spreken die ik kies. Spoedig, zal ik een andere post verklaart die schrijven hoe deze cursussen mijn vrij tijd/leven/geluk meer in detail beïnvloeden, maar voor nu I dacht het goed enkel zou zijn om te beschrijven wat ik op mijn afschrift heb. In geen bepaalde orde…

EPE 440, Jonathan Schell: Dit seminarie is een geavanceerde inleiding aan eigentijdse politiek-filosofische debatten over het concept geweld en zijn rol in politiek. We will focus, in particular but not exclusively, on the existentialist, post-structuralist, neo-Marxist, and “critical-rationalist� approaches to violence. We will examine their ability to penetrate into the nature of violence, describe the forms it assumes and functions it fulfills within different political settings as well as elucidate its conjunction with (or antagonism to) liberty, law, history and rationality. There is, however, a basic problem that underlies most of the theories discussed in this seminar, albeit dealt with differently by them: violence is inseparable from politics and yet it has to be tamed or “transcended� by politics lest the latter should collapse into the “banality of evil�, to use Arendt’s trope. We will have to judge whether this problem is solvable at all. [From Syllabus]

My Description: This course can be pretty intense intellectually at times, with some very tough concepts and readings. However, it proves incredibly enjoyable even if it does make my brain hurt fort a while afterwards some classes (it is a once weekly, 2 hour seminar). The professor is super amazing, brilliant and friendly and very knowledgeable. It takes a lot of skill to make the material come alive as he does! Because it’s hard to encapsulate exactly what this course is about in an intelligible way, I’ve just added above the description from the course syllabus. But this course, and others taught by him, are just really fantastic. Boris Kapustin is a forever-visiting EP&E professor, and I hope he keeps coming back, because he’s really, really, great. I took a course with him last term called Moral Values in Civil Society.

SOCY 015, Hannah Brückner: Social Relations and Society

Course Description: A study of how social roles and social status are constituted by social relations in everyday life; how boundaries between groups of people are constructed and maintained; and how group membership structures the opportunities and well-being of individuals. Consideration of the conditions under which individuals and groups engage in collective action and the resulting characteristics of contemporary societies.

My Description: This course can be a little slow in class, in part perhaps because it is at 9:25 on a Thursday morning for two hours. Our class shrank from a start of near 20 students to now something like 6 in the final weeks, as people realized it was either more work (for a WR credit, among other things) or less exciting than they had first imagined. The readings here are FANTASTIC: a really exciting collection of amazing journal articles and other sources. In class, things can be less exciting when we go over the material. Professor is the Director of Undergraduate Studies for Sociology.

EVST 245, Benjamin Cashore: International Environmental Policy and Governance Course Description: The emergence of global-scale environmental challenges, environmental diplomacy, and global environmental governance. Particular attention to the linked issues of climate change, deforestation, biodiversity loss, and desertification, and to the interplay of science and politics in framing policy responses to these issues.

My Description: EVST 245 is a fun course which the professor describes as first “very depressing” as we learn about all the problems and then “very optimistic!” as we learn about ways that we might work to solve them. Interestingly covering things from the prof’s political science background, the team of Cashore and Graeme Auld, our excellent T.A., makes for a lot of fun. It’s a very intimate lecture and it is very interactive, if sometimes a little bit off-subject. Still, an interesting introduction to useful international governance models and international regime theories and history, and a really fun course with a friendly and good-humored professor-TA duo. More on this course later, actually–I have a post in mind.

FR 139, Diane Charney: Advanced Language Practice II (L5)

Course Description: An advanced language course intended to improve students? comprehension of spoken and written French as well as their speaking and writing skills. Modern fiction and nonfiction texts familiarize students with idiomatic French. Emphasis on oral practice through debates and presentations on current events.

My Description: This course is in an uncomfortable spot: It’s the last “review-type” course in French before you get to things like FR150, “Conversational Practice” or other pure French literature courses. This course has a mix of films, short stories, and literature (all of it very sad, depressing, and French) but on top of that it also has tons and tons of grammar for review which is tested regularly. This, combined with a 3-times-a-week schedule (even if only for 50 minutes) can make it pretty grueling at times. This is somewhat made up for by our really, really nice professor, who is charming and fun and a delight to have. Sadly, this course only gives 1 credit, though it takes a lot of time to do all of the work. It’s especially tough for me because I haven’t done French in 2 years, so I know what I want to say but don’t quite realize that I don’t now know exactly how to say it. Thus, I tend to make a lot of small errors and mistake which completely ruin my work (and grades). C’est triste.