Undergraduate Programs

Global Studies Certificate and Academic Credentials

• recognize the ongoing impact and effects of neoliberal globalization 
• make analytical connections between the local and the global in ways that enrich both 
• appreciate the value of  cultural, racial, regional, sexual, religious, class) difference on both a local and global scale 
• articulate an interdisciplinary approach to problem-based learning that encourages an intersectional, transnational, transhistorical outlook 
• critique different discourses of the global and globalization (e.g. cultural, policy, anthropological, medical) and communicate effectively about these issues orally and in writing to an interdisciplinary audience.  

Globally Themed Certificate Requirements: 

PS 0550 Introduction to Global Studies
15 credits of coursework in one global concentration
4 semesters of language study or demonstrated language proficiency
Completion and approval of digital portfolio

Global Concentrations

Cultural Dynamics explores the diverse ways people understand, evaluate, and feel about the world around them and how these shape and reflect people’s involvement in complex new forms of social interaction related to globalization.  Students might study the processes producing increasing cultural sameness and growing cultural difference, identity formation and challenges of intercultural communication and understanding, or people’s engagement with these processes through the arts, film, literature, performance, and other forms of creative expression.

Critical World Ecologies - How do humans shape nature, and how does it shape us? Critical World Ecologies explores the broad transnational and historical processes that affect how humans think about and exploit nature as well as the contemporary social, cultural, economic, and political relations through which “nature” and “the environment” are continually reproduced. Students might study how colonialism, migration, and globalization shape and reshape the dynamic interrelationship between humans and (the rest of) nature, or they might focus on how these interactions affect differently situated people, highlighting (e.g.) slow violence, environmental intersectionality, environmental (in)justice, and the efforts of people acting collectively to ensure that democracy, human rights, and social justice prevail in ecological struggles about our present and future. They will also encounter debates about “The Anthropocene” and alternative ways of thinking about contemporary human ecological impacts. Unlike sustainability, which focuses on enhancing efficiency, conserving resources, and preserving existing social structures, Critical World Ecologies questions how humans came to understand nature as an object of scientific knowledge, a repository of resources, and a support system for human life and how we came to think of ourselves as distinct from (or distinctive within) nature.

Health and Well-Being explores the relationship between global health, social suffering, and the processes that connect and divide people around the world.  Students might study how globalization affects people’s susceptibility to physical and mental illnesses, their access to appropriate kinds of care and, more broadly, their well-being (enjoyment of a healthy, secure, and satisfying life) and capacity for “living well” (belonging to a community in which people live harmoniously with one another and with nature).

Peace, Conflict, and (In)Security addresses contemporary challenges of conflict and (in)security and the prospects for peace and social justice by examining how major conflicts and emergencies arise, are addressed, and are sometimes averted. Students might study the relationship between state sovereignty, international law, and armed intervention; the meanings of human rights and (human) security in a diverse and conflictual world; terrorism and counterterrorism, global and domestic; the roots of insecurity in in racism, patriarchy, ethno-nationalism, climate change, hunger, poverty, and other sources; processes of peace building, peace keeping, and reconciliation, including through social movements and at local levels; and, the work of the UN, NGOs, and other non-state actors, including as it relates to the work of social movements and local actors. 

Politics and Economy focuses on the organization and workings of power.  It highlights the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services and how these processes relate to one another in producing global connections and divisions; it also highlights how states and other actors interact as they attempt to manage these processes.  Students might study changes in the character and reach of capitalism, models of sustainable development, interactions among states, empires, social movements, and other political entities, or systems of inequality organized geopolitically and by factors such as class, race, gender, and sexuality.

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Undergraduate Global Health Certificate

Global Health Certificate Requirements: