Global Arc

This course studies the sources of expected returns in financial markets and why predictable return patterns persist. Using empirical evidence, the course studies returns across asset classes, common factors, and hedge fund strategies, including value, momentum, carry, low-risk, and arbitrage, and covers the distinction between risk premia, alpha, and luck. The course integrates asset pricing, behavioral finance, and market frictions to cover the portfolio construction and evaluation of investment strategies under real-world constraints, including leverage, liquidity, and market stress.

Junior Independent Work Foundations (ECO 396) is an introductory course leading directly to writing the Junior Paper. During the fall term, students attend weekly lectures, group meetings, and workshops as they begin to learn the basics of conducting research. They do this by investigating an individualized topic of their choosing and writing a Prospectus by the end of the fall term. Junior independent work is designed to prepare students to complete their senior thesis. ECO 396: Junior Independent Work Foundations begins this process as the Junior Paper (JP) due at the end of the spring term (ECO 398) is built upon the Fall term Prospectus.

In early modern Europe, mythology provided the stimulus for a host of performances in theaters, palaces, and different media involving song, stone, gardens, and even water. This course will consider the performance of mythology in early modern Europe. What are the gendered implications of the myths in which women turn into plants, trees, flowers, and animals, and how were they presented in media? How is the trope of the abandoned transformed into song and painting? We'll explore the interactions between artists, poets, and musicians and the ways in which opera - a brand new medium in the early 17th century -brought the ancient world to life.

The myth of Don Juan, the irresistible male seducer, has a long history that spans four centuries and many countries. From Spain to Austria and from England to Latin America, the story of the cunning charmer has been told and retold in literature, painting, theater, opera, and film. This seminar will explore the major works focusing on the character of Don Juan by authors such as Tirso de Molina, Mozart, Molière, Lord Byron, and Pasolini. What makes Don Juan irresistible? What makes him a timeless figure, one that continues to fascinate in our time? We will discuss readings by critics from Freud to Jordan Peterson.

This course invites students to explore the intersection of design, imagination, and future thinking. It provides an in-depth look at various design practices and their associated methodologies that are used to envision and shape potential futures. The first half of the course lays the foundation for understanding long-term thinking and introduces students to various design practices that help envision potential futures. The second half of the course focuses on the application of strategic foresight against an uncertain future.

This course explores the emerging phenomenon of "digital public infrastructures" (DPIs). These efforts -- which typically consist of technologies for identity management, payments, and data exchanges -- have been heralded as critical infrastructure for the twenty-first century economy. DPIs have the potential to spur innovation and economic development and to change the relationship between citizens and the state. The course will examine India's digital stack, which is among the most prominent and well-developed, but will take a global and comparative approach, discussing similar emerging systems in China, the EU and USA.

The ability to connect knowledge, methods, and people across the arts and sciences is a critical 21st-century skill needed to tackle complex challenges. However, education and knowledge production largely occurs within domains, departments, and disciplines. Specialization is valuable in the pursuit of deeper understanding, but is also limited. We have and continue to accrue more and more specialized data and knowledge. Yet we struggle to make sense of it and to use it. This course is about developing the urgent skills of connecting, systems thinking, and designing innovations informed by a broad understanding of human experiences.

Join Tiger Challenge, a team-based course aimed at equipping participants with the capacity to design equitable and joyful societies. Through design thinking and social entrepreneurship, we tackle complex societal problems in education, health, equity, sustainability, and civic life. Learn to create innovative, resilient solutions while gaining practical skills and tools to address wicked challenges. With support from mentors and partners, you'll engage in hands-on projects, impact evaluations, and collaborative community engagement.

Students learn how to apply critical thinking and analytical skills to creating sustainable value-producing systems, organizations, and enterprises that are valued and supported by existing well-defined communities or groups. This class is for student entrepreneurs who feel deeply about a project they are already working on and want to figure out how to make the product or design valuable on an ongoing basis to a group or community. By the end of this class sequence students will have designed and created smooth functioning products, services, systems, or actions that actual groups or communities want and are willing to fund going forward.

Join Tiger Challenge, a team-based course aimed at equipping participants with the capacity to design equitable and joyful societies. Through design thinking and social entrepreneurship, we tackle complex societal problems in education, health, equity, sustainability, and civic life. Learn to create innovative, resilient solutions while gaining practical skills and tools to address wicked challenges. With support from mentors and partners, you'll engage in hands-on projects, impact evaluations, and collaborative community engagement.