2026 Summer Courses

Credits: 3
Instructor: Ann Stebner Steele
Modality: Asynchronous Online
Honors College Attributes: Upper-Division Elective
USP attributes: (H) Human Culture
A&S attributes: none
Concurrent Major Honors Interdisciplinary Inquiry Concentration Designations(s):
Environment, Ethics, and Humankind

Course Description:
Hunting plays a prominent role in the culture and traditions of many people in the American West and across the globe. However, nationally the number of hunters has declined in recent years, and many people believe hunting is unethical. How can we explain these two realities? What makes hunting such a powerful and defining tradition for some while others find it alien or even appalling? Is hunting a viable means for procuring food? Does it offer value, economically or culturally, to our communities? How does the practice of hunting play into questions of sustainability, conservation, and land use?  Together in this class, we will create an open, supportive community that allows us to explore these questions through lenses of personal experiences and various academic disciplines (e.g., philosophy, economics, ecology, rangeland management, anthropology, and narrative writing and storytelling).

Instructor: Adrian Molina
Modality: Asynchronous Online
Honors College Attributes: Upper-division elective
USP attributes: (H) Human Culture
A&S attributes: none
Concurrent Major Honors Interdisciplinary Inquiry Concentration Designations(s):
Technology, Society, and the Future
Creativity, Justice, and our World

Course Description:
This course explores the most central and critical issues of our times: Humanity, Technology, and Ecology. In this course, the student is the main "Text," meaning that each student will engage in contemplative education practices. Students will examine their own lives in relationship to technology, mass media, social media. We will explore how the cyborg-ification of our lives affects our physical, mental, and emotional health, as well as our relationships with other humans. 

Additionally, this is a topics course that may explore any of the following: the development of collective consciousness; functions of mass media; the functions of corporate media vs independent media; how mass media affects public opinion; journalism and ethical considerations; pop culture's relationship to American values and standards; the nature of news coverage and news filters; access to media and social justice concerns; functions of art and entertainment; critiques of mass media and pop culture; alternative forms of media; futurist perspectives on human consciousness; and real-time developments in technology including artificial intelligence. 

Credits: 3
Instructor: Adrian Molina
Modality: Asynchronous Online
Honors College attributes: Upper-Division Elective
USP attributes: H (Human Culture)
A&S attributes: D (Diversity)
Concurrent Major Honors Interdisciplinary Inquiry Concentration Designations(s):
Technology, Society, and the Future
Creativity, Justice, and our World
Course Description: 
This course is an inter- and multi-disciplinary course inspired by human culture.  This course explores a culture and form of music that hundreds of millions of people throughout the world identify with.  Hip-Hop was born in the South Bronx, NY in the early 1970s, where African-American, Latino, and immigrant populations were essentially cast off as a result of the construction of the Cross Bronx Expressway, white flight into the suburbs, and the politics of abandonment.  Hip-Hop music and culture has now spread throughout the world, and regardless of whether the discussion is about mainstream gangster rap or socially and political conscious Hip-Hop, this emerging field of study has broad, cultural, social, political, and economic implications.  Students will research, explore, discuss and write about American historical music influences, the history and development of hip-hop, the various artistic elements of hip-hop, hip-hop as a culture,  hip-hop journalism, and hip-hop’s influence on American society.  Using hip-hop as an academic tool, students will also explore the following issues: race relations, racism, sexism and misogyny, class struggle, urbanization, pan-ethnicity and ethnic/cultural diasporas, civil rights era activism, post-civil rights Black and Latina/o community leadership, activism through art, globalization, the commodification of art and culture in corporate America, the perpetuation of racism and sexism through mass media, alternative forms of cultural media, the poetics of hip-hop, and communication through musical form.