Humanities Center Seminar (HUMC 294)
What can studying the environment teach us about the nature of action and the ethics of care and responsibility? How can individuals and societies shape, repair or harm ecosystems through intentional or unintentional action? How can we create and participate in ways that promote a more just, sustainable and healthy world?
In this summer class, faculty members introduce incoming first-year students to the different ways that academic disciplines help us develop critical intellectual skills so that we can make a sustained positive impact in the world. Taught remotely, this course will be highly participatory and introduce students to the interdisciplinary nature of a USD liberal arts education.
Week 1
Environmental Responsibility: Faith, Discovery and Adaptation
- Speakers
- Readings
- Michael Lovette-Colyer, PhD | Mission Integration
Caring for our Common Home: The Legacy of Pope Francis and the Contribution of the Catholic Intellectual Tradition - Nicole Danos, PhD | Biology
Natural History of Vertebrates: The Joy of Discovery - Sophie Taddeo, PhD | Environmental and Ocean Sciences
Ecosystem Resilience: Adapting to Climate Change and Landscape Transformation
Week 2
Environmental Justice in North America
- Speakers
- Readings
- Matt Ford, MFA | History
Environmental Colonialism in the U.S.: History, Policy and Indigenous Resistance - Amanda Petersen, PhD | Languages, Cultures and Literatures
Erased Landscapes: Environmental Impact and Historical Memory in US–Mexico Borderlands - Nilmini Silva-Send, PhD | School of Law
Law, Justice and Ecology in the San Diego–Tijuana Region
Week 3
Broadening and Empowering Climate Advocacy
- Speakers
- Readings
- Julia Cantzler, PhD | Sociology
Youth Climate Advocacy - Drew Talley, PhD | Environmental and Ocean Sciences
Women, Development and the Climate Crisis: Rethinking Environmental Innovation - Ibrahim Al-Marashi, PhD | Political Science and International Relations
Climate Resiliency and Action in the Middle East
Week 4
Rethinking Human Systems for Environmental Action
- Speakers
- Readings
- Jenny Prairie, PhD | Environmental and Ocean Sciences
Communicating Climate Science: From Data to Action - Julia Medina, PhD | Languages, Cultures and Literatures
Decentering the Human: Origin Stories and Environmental Thought Across the Americas - Nichole Wissman, PhD | Knauss School of Business
Business & Systems Thinking: Rethinking Growth for a Safe and Just Future
Week 5
Stories as a Call to Environmental Action
- Speakers
- Readings
- Sara Hasselbach, PhD | English
Nature and Humanity in E.M. Forster’s The Machine Stops - Brittany Asaro, PhD | Languages, Cultures and Literatures
“The World is a Circle”: Environmental Action in a Contemporary Italian Children’s Novel - Darby Vickers, PhD | Philosophy
The Atlantis Myth as a Cautionary Tale for Environmental Collapse