Category Archives: Liberal Arts & Sciences – Core

All Liberal Arts Core Courses: Cultures & Contexts, Texts & Ideas

Modern Italy (ITAL-UA 9868)

Credits: 4
Duration: 14 Weeks
Dates: Thu

This course introduces contemporary Italy in all its complexity and fascination. Reviewing politics, economics, society, and culture over the past two centuries, the course has a primary goal — to consider how developments since the 1800s have influenced the lives and formed the outlook of today’s Italians. In other words, we are engaged in the historical search for something quite elusive: Italian “identity”. Topics will include the unification of the country, national identity in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the First World War, and Italian fascism, World War Two and the resistance, the post-war Italian Republic, the economic “miracle”, the South, the Mafia, terrorism, popular culture, and the most recent political and social developments, including Italy and the European Union. Lectures combine with readings and films (taking advantage of Italy’s magnificent post-war cinema).

Italian (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 14 Weeks

Cultures and Contexts Fall 2025 Liberal Arts & Sciences - Electives Spring 2026 Undergraduate
Fall 2021

First-Year Interdisciplinary Seminar: Science and Literature (FIRST-UG 85)

In a 1959 lecture titled “The Two Cultures,” C. P. Snow famously declared, “the intellectual life of the whole of western society is increasingly being split into two polar groups,” with “literary intellectuals at one pole—at the other scientists.” Snow asserted that the two are separated by “a gulf of mutual incomprehension,” even “hostility and dislike.” Snow’s view of a fundamental antagonism between science and literature has its roots in the nineteenth-century; his concept of “two cultures” remains influential today. But was he right? This course addresses that question, seeking to deepen our understanding of the relationship between science and literature. Our readings will pair literary and scientific texts: we may consider Ted Chiang’s short fiction and the laws of thermodynamics; Michael Frayn’s play Copenhagen and quantum physics; Amitav Ghosh’s novel The Calcutta Chromosome and sociological theories of scientific knowledge; and the poetry of ecologist Madhur Anand; and Robin Wall Kimmerer’s interdisciplinary meditations on the environment in Braiding Sweetgrass. The class is a discussion-based seminar; assignments will include short response papers, brief contributions to a class blog, and formal essays.

First Year program (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks

Texts and Ideas Undergraduate

A History of London (HIST-UA 9127)

Credits: 4
Duration: 14 Weeks
Dates: Mon
Credits: 4
Duration: 14 Weeks
Dates: Mon,Mon,Wed

This course examines the growth and importance of London from the Roman invasion of 43 AD to the present day. Students will learn about London’s changing economic and political role, and will understand how London grew to dominate the commerce, industry and culture of England. They will find out how London became the biggest city the world had ever known, and how it coped (or failed to cope) with the social and environmental problems created by its enormous size. The classroom sessions will be divided between a lecture and a class discussion. From week two onwards the class will begin with a discussion of the topic or period covered in the previous week‚s lecture, in which students will be expected to use knowledge and ideas gathered from lectures and from their weekly reading. There will also be four walking tours of parts of London which relate to the period we are studying at a particular time.

History (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 14 Weeks

Cultures and Contexts Fall 2025 Spring 2026 Undergraduate

English Novel in The 19th Century (ENGL-UA 9530)

Credits: 4
Duration: 14 Weeks
Dates: Wed

The nineteenth century was the great age of the English novel. This course charts the evolution of the form during this period, exploring texts by major authors including Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, George Eliot and Thomas Hardy. Close attention to narrative, questions of mimesis and publishing practices will combine with the exploration of a range of significant contemporary discourses relating to shifting conceptions of gender, sexuality, religion, science, class, and race. These varied contexts will help us to consider formal, stylistic and thematic continuities as well as discontinuities and innovations. Taking advantage of our local surroundings, we will also explore changing representations of London and trace the enduring legacy of this period in the twenty-first-century city.

English (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 14 Weeks

Fall 2025 Liberal Arts & Sciences - Electives Spring 2026 Texts and Ideas Undergraduate

Intro to Buddhism (EAST-UA 832)

An introduction to this complex religion, emphasizing its history, teachings, and practices. Discusses its doctrinal development in India, then emphasizes certain local practices: Buddhism and the family in China; Buddhism, language, and hierarchy in Japan; the politics of Buddhist Tibet; and Buddhist art. Finally the course touches on Buddhism in the United States.

East Asian Studies (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks

Cultures and Contexts Liberal Arts & Sciences - Electives Spring 2025 Undergraduate
Fall 2021 Fall 2024

The Literature of Children & Adolescents (CAMS-UA 191)

Considers children’s and adolescents’ literature as a rich, untapped source of insight into child development for students of psychology, child development, and related disciplines. Over the last century, a vibrant, many-faceted literature for young people has grown in tandem with our understanding of child and adolescent psychology to pre-sent young readers with an increasingly finely calibrated perspective on such basic developmental issues as the formation of trust, the emergence of a sense of autonomy, and the complexities of family and peer relationships. Students explore these and other topics as they read and discuss a wide range of picture books, longer fiction, and relevant professional literature.

Child/Adoles Mental Hlth Stds (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 14 Weeks

Liberal Arts & Sciences - Electives Texts and Ideas Undergraduate
Fall 2022

Cultures & Contexts: Russia Since 1917 (CORE-UA 528)

Major periods, developments, and interpretative issues in Russian politics, history, and society, from the 1917 revolution to the present. The emphasis is on the Soviet experience, though the Tsarist past and post-Soviet developments are also considered. Special attention is given to the role of historical traditions, leadership, ideology, ramifying events, and socioeconomic factors.

College Core Curriculum (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks

Sections (Fall 2022)

CORE-UA 528-000 (19720)09/01/2022 – 12/14/2022 Tue,Thu9:00 AM – 10:00 AM (Morning)at Washington SquareInstructed by O’Donnell, Anne

CORE-UA 528-000 (19721)09/01/2022 – 12/14/2022 Wed8:00 AM – 9:00 AM (Morning)at Washington SquareInstructed by

CORE-UA 528-000 (19722)09/01/2022 – 12/14/2022 Wed9:00 AM – 10:00 AM (Morning)at Washington SquareInstructed by

CORE-UA 528-000 (19723)09/01/2022 – 12/14/2022 Wed8:00 AM – 9:00 AM (Morning)at Washington SquareInstructed by

CORE-UA 528-000 (19724)09/01/2022 – 12/14/2022 Wed9:00 AM – 10:00 AM (Morning)at Washington SquareInstructed by

CORE-UA 528-000 (19725)09/01/2022 – 12/14/2022 Wed3:00 PM – 4:00 PM (Late afternoon)at Washington SquareInstructed by

CORE-UA 528-000 (19726)09/01/2022 – 12/14/2022 Wed4:00 PM – 6:00 PM (Late afternoon)at Washington SquareInstructed by

Cultures and Contexts Undergraduate
Fall 2022

Cities on the Move: Migration and Urban Landscapes (SASEM-UG 9104)

The rapid expansion of urban areas is the major driving force of global environmental change. As most urban landscapes expand in number and size, their inhabitants place increasing demands on resources and energy. These demands pose great challenges for ensuring human welfare and protecting biodiversity. Urban land use change has always been a question for urban planners and researchers, but understanding contemporary competition for urban land and associated resources is perhaps more urgent than ever. The inflow of large numbers of migrants, not only from the rural counterparts of larger cities but also from all over the world, poses new challenges to environmental processes and the functioning of urban systems. A critical question emerges: how can we sustainably integrate new migrants into large urban areas without compromising the environmental wellbeing and livelihood of existing local populations? Urban development concepts like smart growth, eco-cities and sponge cities have previously grappled with this question; through them, researchers, urban planners, architects, and other professionals have imagined new forms and functions for buildings, material infrastructure, and open or vegetated spaces. The central challenge is to improve the resilience capacity of urban landscapes. Here, the notion that cities themselves may be reinvented in more ecologically vital ways portends to offer solutions to the dire environmental stresses that climate change, natural resource scarcity, and geopolitical instability promise. There is an important interdisciplinary dimension to this challenge: different stakeholders speak different scientific and functional languages. This course emphasizes inter- and trans-disciplinary approaches in an effort to highlight the multiple and distinct knowledge forms and data types relevant to understanding linkages between landscape structure, landscape function, and urban socio-natural transformation.

Study Away Seminar (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks

Sections (Fall 2022)

SASEM-UG 9104-000 (18839)at NYU Berlin (Global)Instructed by

Cultures and Contexts Undergraduate

Place-Building-Time:The Architecture of Berlin (ARTH-UA 9651)

Credits: 4
Duration: 14 Weeks
Dates: Mon

Berlin is a unique modern Metropolis. Its alternating history with often drastic changes offers a comprehensive background to explore and investigate the nature of architecture in correlation to the various developmental processes of urban life and culture. Architecture is embedded in the urban fabric in which place and time serve as the main threads, constantly changing their multifaceted and layered relationships. This urban fabric provides the fertile soil for urban life and culture, which literally takes place in various scales between the public and the private realm, two further threads intertwined in the urban fabric. Experiencing the city through walking is essential for learning how to observe, see and read “Place, Building and Time” in Berlin. Tours will alternate with classroom discussions and workshops.

Art History (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 14 Weeks

Cultures and Contexts Fall 2025 Spring 2026 Undergraduate
Spring 2022

Tibetan Buddhism (RELST-UA 835)

Identical to EAST-UA 833. Offered periodically. 4 points. An introduction to Tibetan Buddhism doctrine and practice. Approaches the subject from historical and thematic perspectives, beginning with a close study of one of the classic Tibetan guides to Tibetan Buddhism for a solid foundation in the principles of the tradition. Proceeds along a historical track, beginning with the seventh-century arrival of Buddhism in Tibet to the present-day encounter with Western devotees of exiled Tibetan lamas. Topics include doctrinal innovation, ritual, myth, art, sacred geography, revelation, and the role of Buddhism in Tibet’s relationship with its neighbors. Readings consist of primary texts in translation and secondary literature on the study of religion and Tibetan Buddhism.

Religious Studies (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks

Cultures and Contexts Undergraduate
Spring 2022

Major Texts in Critical Theory (ENGL-UA 712)

Major texts in critical theory from Plato to Derrida, considered in relation to literary practice. The first half of the course focuses on four major types of critical theory: mimetic, ethical, expressive, and formalist. The second half turns to 20th-century critical schools, such as Russian and American formalism, archetypal criticism, structuralism, psychoanalytic criticism, feminism, reader theory, deconstruction, and historicism.

English (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks

Liberal Arts & Sciences - Electives Texts and Ideas Undergraduate
Spring 2022

Creating a Good Society: Christian and Jewish Perspectives (HBRJD-UA 428)

This course explores Greek, Christian and Jewish responses to the problem: How does one create a good society? Central questions to be explored include: What is the best form of government? What economic system is ideal? Should the government actively promote a vision of the good life or leave it to individual to decide the good for themselves? Should the government prioritize the freedom, equality, or happiness of its inhabitants? What role should religion and nationhood play in society? What models of education should the government promote? How does gender inform these considerations? The course will focus on careful analysis of primary texts. Thinkers to be studied include: Plato, Maimonides, Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Wollstonecraft, Mendelssohn, Marx, Hess. Having first taken the course: Living a Good Life: Greek and Jewish Perspectives is highly desirable.

Hebrew & Judaic Studies (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks

Sections (Spring 2022)

HBRJD-UA 428-000 (10015)01/24/2022 – 05/09/2022 Wed11:00 AM – 1:00 PM (Morning)at Washington SquareInstructed by Gottlieb, Michah

Texts and Ideas Undergraduate
Fall 2021

Human Evolution (ANTH-UA 2)

Investigates the evolutionary origins of humans. The study of human evolution is a multidisciplinary endeavor involving a synthesis of concepts, techniques, and research findings from a variety of different scientific fields, including evolutionary biology, paleontology, primatology, comparative anatomy, genetics, molecular biology, geology, and archaeology. Explores the different contributions that scientists have made toward understanding human origins and provides a detailed survey of the evidence used to reconstruct the evolutionary history of our own species.

Anthropology (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks

Sections (Fall 2021)

ANTH-UA 2-000 (7767)09/02/2021 – 12/14/2021 Mon,Wed12:00 AM – 1:00 PM (Early afternoon)at Washington SquareInstructed by Higham, James

ANTH-UA 2-000 (7775)09/02/2021 – 12/14/2021 Mon3:00 PM – 4:00 PM (Late afternoon)at Washington SquareInstructed by Gunson, Jessica

ANTH-UA 2-000 (7768)09/02/2021 – 12/14/2021 Mon4:00 PM – 6:00 PM (Late afternoon)at Washington SquareInstructed by Gunson, Jessica

ANTH-UA 2-000 (7769)09/02/2021 – 12/14/2021 Tue8:00 AM – 9:00 AM (Morning)at Washington SquareInstructed by Galway-Witham, Julia

ANTH-UA 2-000 (7770)09/02/2021 – 12/14/2021 Tue9:00 AM – 10:00 AM (Morning)at Washington SquareInstructed by Galway-Witham, Julia

ANTH-UA 2-000 (7771)09/02/2021 – 12/14/2021 Tue12:00 AM – 1:00 PM (Early afternoon)at Washington SquareInstructed by Wang, Xue

ANTH-UA 2-000 (7772)09/02/2021 – 12/14/2021 Tue6:00 PM – 7:00 PM (Evening)at Washington SquareInstructed by Dudas, Madelynne

ANTH-UA 2-000 (7773)09/02/2021 – 12/14/2021 Tue4:00 PM – 6:00 PM (Late afternoon)at Washington SquareInstructed by Dudas, Madelynne

ANTH-UA 2-000 (7774)09/02/2021 – 12/14/2021 Wed2:00 PM – 3:00 PM (Early afternoon)at Washington SquareInstructed by Wang, Xue

ANTH-UA 2-000 (26376)09/02/2021 – 12/14/2021 Wed3:00 PM – 4:00 PM (Late afternoon)at Washington SquareInstructed by Guerra, Jordan

Liberal Arts & Sciences - Core Liberal Arts & Sciences - Electives Physical Science OR Life Science Societies & the Social Sciences Undergraduate
Fall 2021

Introduction to Ancient Indian Literature (RELST-UA 335)

An introductory course designed to acquaint students with the great works of the ancient Indian literary tradition, a major part of which was written in Sanskrit. The earliest form of that language, called Vedic Sanskrit, is the language of the Vedic hymns, especially those of the Rig Veda. Sanskrit has had an unbroken literary tradition for over 3,000 years. This rich and vast literary, religious, and philosophical heritage is introduced in this course. In addition, students work with excerpts from the Jain and Buddhist canons written in Prakrits and examples of Tamil poetry. Selections from the Vedic literature, classical drama, epics, story literature, and lyric poetry are studied in English translation.

Religious Studies (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks

Cultures and Contexts Liberal Arts & Sciences - Core Liberal Arts & Sciences - Electives Societies & the Social Sciences Texts and Ideas Undergraduate