Global Arc

We know that we must cease using fossil fuels with all due haste if the planet is to avert a climate catastrophe, and yet the odds of making this transition seem long. This is due not only to the political clout of Big Oil, but also to the ways in which oil saturates every aspect of life, from the clothes we wear to the food we eat. Yet neither the dazzling benefits nor the dramatic damages of this ubiquitous petroculture are evenly distributed. Surveying literature, film, music and the visual arts, this course renders the material and social circuits of petroculture visible that they might be better challenged and transformed.

This course explores religions within the horizon of interdependent life and the cosmos. It investigates the symbolic and lived expressions of this interconnection in religious texts and practices. The course draws on science for understanding the dynamic processes of the universe, Earth, life, and ecosystems. In part I, we explore ecological perspectives from Indigenous traditions, Christianity, and Confucianism. In part II we survey environmental ethics. Finally, we examine the scientific story of the unfolding universe as a cosmological narrative orienting human-Earth relations.

Field Seminar in Regional Environmental Politics will provide students the opportunity for experiential learning and regional engagement with a range of important environmental topics by pairing intensive topical readings from the environmental social sciences, humanities, and sciences with field-based pedagogy. ENV 347 will proceed in three thematic modules, each of which will be anchored by a field trip to a relevant site in the region (Eg. New Jersey, Philadelphia, and New York City). The intensive seminar enhances ENV's goals of broad-based, interdisciplinary approach to environmental topics through locally engaged research and practice.

This course explores the history of the environmental imagination from the Age of Exploration of early modern Europe to the global environmental politics of today. We will trace the ways in which people have imagined themselves and nature have shifted over time, and how these changes have helped shape science and politics in the modern world. The course also examines more recent efforts in the arts and sciences to re-imagine humans and nature in order to grapple with the rapidly changing world of contemporary global environmental politics, with a particular focus on the challenges of urbanization, biodiversity loss, and climate change.

This course provides the chemical background to understand many of today's most important environmental issues. Topics include atmospheric pollution, the ozone hole, ocean acidification, acid mine drainage, and coastal dead zones. Overall, the course focuses on a quantitative understanding of the chemistry of the atmosphere and natural waters. Students will use the chemical equilibrium model Minteq to study specific examples related to water quality issues.

This course focuses on the relationship between climate and weather events: each weather event is unique and not predictable more than a few days in advance, large-scale factors constrain the statistics of weather events, those statistics are climate. Various climatic aspects will be explored, such as the geographic constraints, energy and water cycling, and oceanic and atmospheric circulation, solar heating, the El Niño phenomenon, ice ages, and greenhouse gases. These climate features will be used to interpret the statistics of a number of weather events, including heat waves, tropical cyclones (hurricanes and typhoons) and floods.

This course explores the current fascination with animals in film, photography and popular culture, engaging central issues in animal and environmental studies. Why has looking become our main way of interacting with animals? How does rethinking animals inspire us to rethink being human? How can we transform our relations with other species and the planet? Course themes include: wilderness, national parks and zoos; the cult of the pet; vampires, werewolves and zombies; animal speech, animal emotions and rights; nature, sexuality and race. Exploring planetary crises such as extinction and climate change, and positive strategies for change.

This workshop will expose participants to some of the most dynamic, adventurous environmental nonfiction writers while also giving students the opportunity to develop their own voices as environmental writers. We'll be looking at the environmental essay, the memoir, opinion writing, and investigative journalism. In the process we'll discuss the imaginative strategies deployed by leading environmental writers and seek to adapt some of those strategies in our own writing. Readings will engage urgent concerns of our time, like climate change, extinction, race, gender and the environment, and relations between humans and other life forms.

This course is an introduction to earth system modeling for students interested in global environmental issues. Students will use a "compact" or "reduced" earth system model, including the ocean, the land and the atmosphere, to examine how the system responds to human activities and natural climate variations. In small groups, they will design mitigation and geo-engineering scenarii (reforestation, carbon capture, emission limitation etc.), test their impact using the model and analyze and discuss their results. This course is designed to give students a critical thinking about climate models, their strengths and their limitations.

This course in the environmental arts and humanities will explore the vital transformative role that narrative and image can play in shifting our imaginative, ethical, and political horizons. Students will have the chance to engage with cutting edge creativity by environmental filmmakers, writers, sculptors and digital artists. Our perspective will be international and interdisciplinary as we consider experimental strategies to change the force fields of environmental perception and thereby impact the emotional life of the body politic. For, as novelist Ruth Ozeki puts it, "The very act of storytelling is itself a form of hope."