Course Descriptions Spring 2023

WRC 1104.101 Investigations Global: The Lives of Animals 

  • Gen Ed Designation: Liberal Studies Experience.  
  • Instructor: Dr. Michael Dale 
  • Time: MW 2:00 pm -3:15 pm & TR 11:00 am to 1:45 pm 

As Martha Nussbaum reminds us, we homo sapiens do not live alone on the planet. We share the world and its resources with a wonderful variety of flora and fauna, including other intelligent and emotional creatures. The nature of communal living requires that we be attentive to the moral questions and issues that relationships between living beings demands. What should be the nature of our human relationships with the non-human animals with which we share this world? Should non-human animals be seen as part of the community of human beings? What, if any, are the moral demands that non-human animals make upon us if they are seen as a part of our community? What does it mean to be a human being in a moral relationship with other living, non-human beings? Drawing upon novels, short stories, essays, and narrative works of non-fiction we will be attentive to and engaged with questions and issues of our humanly intimate and complex relations to, and at times callous disregard for and cruelty towards the lives and deaths of non-human animals.

*Honors students interested in this course should register for WRC 1104.410

WRC 1104.102 INVESTIGATIONS GLOBAL: Great Big Books, Large Family Dramas

  • Gen Ed Designation: Investigations: Global and Liberal Studies Experience
  • Instructor:  Dr. Clark Maddux
  • Time: TR 11:00 am - 1:45 pm & TR 2:00 pm - 3:15 pm

In this class, we will read 3 works that should be known by every literate person: George Eliot's (Mary Ann Evans's) Middlemarch, Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, and Ford Madox Ford's The Good Soldier. Demonstrated knowledge of these is a marker of one's educational attainment, but these books also have something to say to us about the many ways that families can be embroiled in tragedy, farce, and dysfunction, as well as how they can thrive and create loving and nurturing homes. The key to this class, in my mind, is reading and thoughtful conversation. I will ask you as a class to create a contract among yourselves and with me about the ways in which you will primarily demonstrate those aspects of your education. Along the way, we'll develop your research and writing skills, but those are supplements to the work of entering into the imaginative world of these fictional families, each of which is rich with life and longing. Come for the challenge of reading great big books; stay for the stories.

*Honors students interested in this course should register for WRC 1104.411

WRC 1104.103 INVESTIGATIONS GLOBAL: Entering the World: Global Literature & Film

  • Gen Ed Designation: Investigations: Global and Liberal Studies Experience
  • Instructor: Dr. Jessica Martell
  • Time: TR 11:00 am - 1:45 pm & TR 2:00 pm - 3:15 pm

Dreams and disappointment, struggles and self-knowledge—these themes are central to the bildungsroman, the "coming-of-age" novel of education, growth, and development. Its path is familiar: a young hero undertakes a quest of self-discovery, navigating hostile social forces along the way. But how does the genre change over time as more heroes reflect the diverse experiences of women, immigrants, and other minority groups? How do writers from different parts of the world reinvent the genre as they tell global stories of longing, alienation, and triumph? We will investigate these and other important cultural questions.

This course is perfect for students who love to explore different cultures and countries by reading novels and watching films. Possible texts include works from Iran, India, Germany, Zimbabwe, Mexico, Ghana, & the US; and they will be accompanied by concepts from feminist, postcolonial, and LGBTQ+ areas of study. Students will be encouraged to write creatively, research effectively, and build a strong learning community through discussions, group work, and presentations.

*Honors students interested in this course should register for WRC 1104.413 

WRC 1104.104 INVESTIGATIONS GLOBAL: Mapping Monsters

  • Gen Ed Designation: Investigations: Global and Liberal Studies Experience
  • Instructor: Dr. Audrey Fessler
  • Time: TR 11:00 am - 1:45 pm & MW 2:00 pm - 3:15 pm

This course will range across many eras and cultures to explore diverse monsters and their psychological and social functions. Andrew J. Hoffman, in his anthology Monsters, posits that "Monsters are not merely entertainment. The study of monsters is the study of what it means to be human in a world that provides much to fear and avoid. Since time immemorial, people have had to deal with fear: fear of the wild, fear of the unknown, even fear of each other. Monsters may be a repository for much that is negative in human experience. In this way, monsters provide us with the opportunity to connect to important issues of society, psychology, science, medicine, art, and religion" (3). Analyses by scholars from many fields—including classical studies, critical studies, cultural anthropology, history, monster theory (yes!), sociology, philosophy, psychology, religion, and urban theory—will inform our responses to primary sources of monster lore. Course work will include weekly reading reflections, frequent quizzes, occasional leadership of portions of class discussion, and two research projects with accompanying research presentations.

*Honors students interested in this course should register for WRC 1104.415

WRC 2001.101 28607: DAYS IN THE LIFE

  • Gen Ed Designation: Gen Ed Second Year Writing
  • Instructor: TBA
  • Time: TR 9:30 am - 10:45 am

WRC 2001.102 28607: DAYS IN THE LIFE

  • Gen Ed Designation: Gen Ed Second Year Writing
  • Instructor: Professor Katy Abrams
  • Time: T 2:00 pm - 4:45 pm

Science fiction dazzles its readers with alien invaders, comet collisions, futuristic technologies, and dystopian landscapes. Why are such works so captivating, and what can they show us about the societies that produce them? In this second-year writing course, we will delve into major works of British, U.S., and Indigenous science fiction. We'll begin in the late-nineteenth century, when the genre arguably emerged, and journey through the twentieth century, encountering the "Pulp Era" of the 1920s-30s, the so-called "Golden Age" of the 1950s, and the "New Wave" that began in the late 1960s. We will then spend substantial time on twenty-first century science fiction, including iterations in new mediums such as podcast, digital art, and web series. As we move through this historical progression, we'll analyze common themes such the fraught role of technology and science, the question of what makes someone "human," the use of extrapolation to predict the future, and more. Because science fiction cannot be separated from its social and historical contexts, gender, race, settler colonialism, sexuality, and class will be central to our explorations. Expect to encounter well-known writers like H.G. Wells, Isaac Asimov, Ursula Le Guin, and Octavia Butler, as well as lesser-known and emerging authors and creators.

WRC 2100.101 THE LIVES OF ANIMALS

  • Gen Ed Designation: ILE-Human-Animal Bond
  • Instructor: Dr. Michael Dale
  • Time: TR 2:00 pm - 3:15 pm

As Martha Nussbaum reminds us, we homo sapiens do not live alone on the planet. We share the world and its resources with a wonderful variety of flora and fauna, including other intelligent and emotional creatures. The nature of communal living requires that we be attentive to the moral questions and issues that relationships between living beings demands. What should be the nature of our human relationships with the non-human animals with which we share this world? Should non-human animals be seen as part of the community of human beings? What, if any, are the moral demands that non-human animals make upon us if they are seen as a part of our community? What does it mean to be a human being in a moral relationship with other living, non-human beings?

*Honors students interested in this course should register for WRC 2100.410

WRC 2201.101 HEARING VOICES. INQUIRY IN LITERATURE: God-Haunted: Appalachia and Southern Gothic

  • Gen Ed Designation: Lit Studies and ILE-Experiencing Inquiry and Honors
  • Instructor: Dr. Clark Maddux
  • Time: TR 3:30 pm - 4:45 pm

Flannery O’Connor once remarked that “while the South is hardly Christ-centered, it is most certainly Christ-haunted.”  In this course, we’ll examine depictions of religion in greater Appalachia through some of the literature produced here.  Much of this writing reflects a literary tradition of what has come to be called “Southern Gothic,” a genre characterized by a relentless sense of unspeakable horror and pervasive evil lurking in the next room, or just around a corner.  We’ll read and write about three works that take as their subject the often-perverse application of religion and religious belief, and explore how these texts relate to economic, social, cultural, and historical circumstance:  Flannery O’Connor’s Wise Blood, Cormac McCarthy’s Child of God, and Donald Ray Pollock’s “Hillbilly Gothic” novel, The Devil All the Time.

READER ADVISORY: These narratives are soaked in blood and boiled in bigotry.  They use language that is reprehensible and now even taboo, and they unflinchingly examine the most brutal elements of who we are as human beings.  Reading these novels, and discussing them, will not be easy.  Encountering any of these can feel like being forced into an abattoir.  There is a reason for this nightmarish quality, but you should not come into this class expecting that it will begin or end in sweetness and light.

*Honors students interested in this course should register for WRC 2201.410

WRC 2201.102 HEARING VOICES. INQUIRY IN LITERATURE: Mountains Speak

  • Gen Ed Designation:  Lit Studies and ILE-Experiencing Inquiry 
  • Instructor: Cary Curlee
  • Time: MW 3:30 pm - 4:45 pm

This course explores an eclectic collection of literature about living, loving, and surviving in high places. Students will locate, analyze, and compare voices discovered throughout course readings.

WRC 2202.101 WHAT IF? ASKING HIST QUESTIONS: British Baby Boomers

  • Gen Ed Designation:  His Studies and ILE-Experiencing Inquiry
  • Instructor: Dr. Marjon Ames
  • Time: MWF 11:00 am - 11:50 am

How do we know what we think we know? What informs our understanding of the past? In this course, students watch the "Up Series" documentary series and read 20th century British fiction to better understand the experiences of a cross-section of British society in the postwar era. Students examine different storytelling techniques employed, question the quality of the portrayal of the historical backdrop, and observe how different approaches in narrative can result in different stories.

WRC 3000.101 INTERROGATING POPULAR CULTURE: What's Trending?: Popular Culture in a Platform Society.

  • Gen Ed Designation: Social Sci  and ILE-Experiencing Inquiry
  • Instructor: Dr. Mark Nunes
  • Time: TR 2:00 pm - 3:15 pm

This is the class where you get to scroll through TikTok and call it homework. Spoiler alert: we will also do a lot of reading! We will discuss where this idea of "popular culture" comes from, and why we study it. We will then look at what happens to popular culture when it goes online. We will also explore the great and powerful Algorithm and start to examine who or what is behind the curtain (bonus points if you got that pop culture reference!) After taking this course, you will be able to casually slip phrases like "platform society" and "data colonialism" into conversations with your friends while you're watching videos of people running with jugs of milk to the sound of Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire."

WRC 3203.101 WHY ART? WAYS OF RESPONDING TO THE WORLD AROUND US

  • Gen Ed Designation: Fine Arts and Aesthetic-Creat Exp of Culture and ILE-Experiencing Inquiry
  • Instructor: TBA
  • Time: W 5:00 pm - 7:30 pm

An interdisciplinary exploration of creative responses to the natural world and constructed environments. Artistic forms studied may include visual art, dance, drama, poetry, music, puppetry, or film.

WRC 3401.101 MYTH AND MEANING

  • Gen Ed Designation: Lit Studies  and Liberal Studies Experience
  • Instructor: Dr. Laura Ammon
  • Time: MW 2:00 pm - 3:15 pm

WRC 3401 Myths are the stories we tell about the world, exploring and explaining humanity's place in the past, the present and the future offering insights on what it means to be human. This course will explore various expressions of myth, from the real world examples such as the Aztecs to contemporary mythic tales like Spirited Away and Black Panther. We will explore how these myths construct meaningful imaginative worlds within specific historical, cultural, and literary contexts. We will cover an assortment of myths, rituals, symbols that construct the worldviews of various communities, investigating conflict, syncretism, and hybridity in differing global encounters, and how that conflict impacts the stories humans tell about their place in the world. This investigation is necessarily an interpretive journey involving theoretical approaches to the role of mythology in human cultures and religions.

*Honors students interested in this course should register for WRC 3401.410

WRC 4001.101 SEM EXPERIEN INTEGR LEARNING

  • Instructor: Dr. Laura Ammon
  • Time: TR 3:30 pm - 4:45 pm

WRC 4001 What does it mean to create and sustain a residential college such as Watauga? This class will explore WRC's past, present, and future, working on creative ways to take integrative, experiential education into the future through appreciation of its past. We will talk with former directors, faculty and alumni as well as connect with other residential colleges.