Courses in this cluster will explore climate change using different disciplinary insights from literary studies, mathematics, and environmental studies.

Associated Course Pairings:

Course Descriptions

CC101: Climate Literature

Instructor: Sylvan Goldberg
Learning Across the Liberal Arts Designation: Analysis & Interpretation of Meaning
CRN# 18250
Block: 1

How can literary representation help us better understand climate change—both the threats it poses to the natural and social worlds, and our responses to these potential changes? In this course, we’ll investigate literature’s fascination with humankind’s detrimental environmental impact by focusing our critical attention on literature about climate and climate change. Does global catastrophic climate change mean humans are now at the whim of a threatening natural world, or is this the ultimate expression of human control over their environment? We’ll read a mix of genres (poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and drama) to consider the following: the divide between nature and culture; environmental justice; toxicity and pollution; and the Anthropocene, a proposed new geological epoch in which the human species can now be considered a geological force. Our own writing for the class will include literary analysis, considerations of the literary analysis of other scholars, as well as a brief piece of creative climate fiction, which we’ll share in our final class meeting. As a CC100 course, we’ll discuss the broader implications of approaching these questions through the lens of literary and cultural studies.

There will be at least one, and possibly two, film screenings. Time/location/dates TBD.

CC120: Reading Fiction: How Stories Make Meaning

Instructor: George Butte
CRN# 18330
Block: 2

This CC120 asks you to think about stories, writing, and language. “Reading Fiction” means we will look at how narrative organizes time, our lives, and the way we make meaning of them. The basic argument is that there is no self, no family, no community, without narrative. We will look at specifics about how narrative constructs meaning, with specific examples, including memoir (self-writing, a complex form of creating meaning). Language is an important topic too, in narrative form, and in your writing. We will spend considerable time on assumptions and protocols of your writing, with one assignment in which you will rewrite a paper after a tutorial. You will have choices in grading track, based on cultural assumptions about writing (what is “good” English?). We will discuss these options in detail.

CC103: Mathematics for Sustainability

Instructor: Mike Siddoway
Learning Across the Liberal Arts Designation: Formal Reasoning & Logic
CRN# 18282
Block: 1

“Mathematics for Sustainability” will cover topics connected to resource assessment including measurement, estimation, equilibrium and flows. We will also study energy stocks and ecological systems/networks; in particular energy flows in the climate system. Various models for growth will be discussed. Exponential and logarithm functions will be used as first approximations of growth (decay) behavior, and logistic models will be studied when considering environmental limits to change. Systems, connections and feedbacks will be focused on in specific case studies selected from (depending on the interests of students) control of wildfires, recycling, population growth and questions of control, genetic engineering and the future of food, nuclear power, efficient use of electricity at home, solar energy, the ecological impacts of electric vehicles, and federal predator controls in the service of the livestock industry. Basic statistics and probability theory will be used to understand and measure risk, payoffs, and when possible, to make careful predictions. Students will complete an individual research project presented at the end of the course that will make use of mathematical tools to better understand a topic in sustainability.

CC120: Science Writing and Narratives in Cell and Molecular Biology

Instructors: Sara Hanson, Olivia Hatton
CRN# 18332
Block: 2

Stories in science are told between scientists through peer-reviewed journal articles and between scientists and the rest of the world through narrative writing. These stories both reflect and shape the larger society in which science is performed. In this course, students will critically engage with technical scientific writing and with narrative scientific writing, with emphasis on stories told in the history of the fields of cell and molecular biology. Students will carry out and report on an experiment using the techniques of each style of writing.

CC105: Introduction to Climate Change

Instructor: Daniel Hueholt
Learning Across the Liberal Arts Designation: Scientific Analysis
CRN# 18254
Block: 1

Introduction to the contemporary Earth climate system that focuses on the roles of the atmosphere, oceans, cryosphere, and land surface, and an overview of how this system has changed in the past and is predicted to change in the future. Includes the use of mathematical models to describe complex systems and the role of policy, economics, and ethics in mitigating human impact.

The class likely will have 2-3 afternoon lab and discussion sessions 1-3 p.m. The class will likely go to visit NCAR (National Climate and Atmospheric Research Center) in Boulder in week 2.

CC120: Environment & Society

Instructor: Mike Angstadt
CRN# 18300
Block: 2

Introduction to humanistic and social science perspectives on global environmental change, engaging with a wide variety of explanatory frameworks and disciplinary lenses. Students will examine the socioeconomic, political, cultural, historical, and philosophical drivers of current environmental conditions. Includes perspectives emphasizing potential responses to climate change and other environmental challenges.

One second week field trip that should return by 3 pm.