Honors

Description for HONORS290:
This course will study some of the many anticolonial and revolutionary movements that intensified in the Third World in the 1960s. We will begin by focusing on the origins, strategies, successes, and failures of anticolonial movements; discuss how discourses of modernization shaped the course of radical movements and governments; and examine the postmodern cultural projects that accompanied and sometimes replaced attempts to restructure Third World economies and societies. Along with memoirs, novels, and essays by Tran Bu Binh, Frantz Fanon, Kwame Nkrumah, Che Guevara, Gabriel García Márquez, and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, we will consider films by Jorge Sanjinés, Gillo Pontecorvo, and Michelangelo Antonioni. Students will write five weekly response papers and complete an 8-10 page final paper or project.

Prerequisite: Requires permission of honors program. For more information, please contact department at 617.287.5520.

Academic Information:
Credits: 3

Fee:
Course Fee: $960
Lab Fee: $0
Total: $960

Description for HONORS290:
Student protest movements, affording a college education (or not), who gets to go and who doesn’t, admission standards and more! These are all issues with a broader social, cultural, historical, political and economic context. Come explore the history of American higher education since WWII and discuss the recent evolution of colleges and universities as well as many current hot topics.

Some specific topics will include a review of major societal changes and their influence on the increased democratization of higher education such as the impact of the GI Bill, the civil rights movement, the women’s movement, student activism, and changes in public policy. Using both primary and secondary sources, we will discuss these topics as well as relevant court rulings, state and federal legislation, and various institutional histories. Additionally, the origins of UMass Boston will be explored within this post-WWII context and students will consider its place within the broader history of the American higher education system. Finally, we will review current trends and debates taking place in higher education including service learning/civic engagement, on-line learning, the role of for-profit higher education institutions, funding of higher education and current public policy proposals.

This seminar type course will emphasize lively intellectual discussion and individually chosen research topics with both individual and group support.

Prerequisite: Requires permission of honors program. For more information, please contact department at 617.287.5520.

Academic Information:
Credits: 3

Fee:
Course Fee: $960
Lab Fee: $0
Total: $960