Fall 2021 Course Offerings

Honors 1110: Honors Interdisciplinary Seminar
A Good Life
Dr. Paul Baumgardner, Dr. Charmion Gustke, Dr. Mary Ellen Pethel and Dr. Bonnie Smith Whitehouse

What does it mean to live a good life? What does it mean to be good, to do good, to embrace and interrogate the nature of goodness? In this class, which was tailor-made for students new to the Honors Program, we will consider happiness, virtue, ambition, wisdom, struggle, doubt, and dreams from philosophical, theological, literary, political, historical, and scientific perspectives. We will become an Honors community together as we interrogate these issues and questions.

Honors introduction to the fundamentals of speech communication including how to research, organize, prepare and deliver effective oral presentations in a one-to-many communication setting. Key Belmont goals are that students become excellent thinkers, writers and speakers. In HON 1130, students exercise these skills through both written and oral communication. Students will practice communicating for impact by crafting thoughtful messages that matter to the audience, by demonstrating mastery of subject matter and by delivering polished presentations designed to achieve a clearly stated purpose (e.g. to inform, to persuade, to entertain, to motivate or inspire, etc.).

Honors 1140: Honors Social Science Seminar

In this course we'll think about the ways people imagined the American city from the dawn of last century to the present day, especially in books, photographs, and film. We'll consider how cities were and are: 1) meeting spaces for diverse people and cultures across time; 2) places where dark, disturbing, or dystopian ideas of society have lived; or 3) imaginaries where people think about the future or about utopias. After considering a few cities in historical context, we'll take a close look at our own city of Nashville, considering where it is now, and imagining what it might be in the future.

Honors 1140: Honors Social Science Seminar
Talkin' Bout a Revolution
Dr. Mary Ellen Pethel

In 1988, singer songwriter Tracy Chapman released the now classic song “Talkin’ Bout a Revolution.” From paradigmatic shifts in science to socio-political uprisings to major economic and industrial developments to issues we confront today—we will be talking about not just one but many revolutions. This class will explore the causes, elements, and consequences of revolutions over the last 500 years. Some revolutions are sudden, others build slowly. Some involve violence and vitriol; others engage new theories and technologies—but all revolutions represent intersectional moments that mark substantial change to the ways in which we live. Are we living through a revolution, or multiple, now? If so, what does it mean for humanity? How did we get here and where do we go now? The answers to these questions lie in the past and our ability to connect to the present. Using a variety of primary and secondary sources that span the interdisciplinary spectrum, we will learn with and from one another to create a new understanding of revolutions. And, to be sure, we will be talkin’. 

Honors 1140: Honors Social Science Seminar
Radicalism and American Democracy
Dr. Paul Baumgardner

This seminar delves into the rich tradition of radical politics in the United States. Moving from the Radical Republicans of the nineteenth century to Bernie Sanders's 2020 presidential campaign, we will explore the possibilities and limitations of the electoral process in the United States. Through an examination of a range of radical currents on the political right and left, we will consider (1) the nature of American democracy, (2) the heterodox movements that have shaped our current political system, and (3) the different forms of political action that exist outside of national elections.

Honors 1140: Honors Social Science Seminar
Economics, War & Society
Dr. Leif Torkelsen

This course will encourage students to explore the complex interaction of economics, business and military power on different societies throughout time. In modern times, armed conflict has often been considered an aberration – one that otherwise interrupts the normal course of human affairs. However, using economics as the primary mode of analysis, this course will explore to what extent business, war, and society exist in a more symbiotic relationship. Considering case studies from around the globe, students in this course will gain a greater understanding of one of the most powerful and dangerous dynamics in world history.

Honors 1150: Honors Wellness Seminar
Daily Practices: A Guide for Healthy and Holistic Living
Dr. Holly Huddleston, Dr. Nick Bacon

This course will focus on living in a way that integrates daily practices of well-being from multiple dimensions of wellness. We will learn to identify the interrelated dimensions of wellness in ourselves and our communities, recognize disparities among populations, modify environments to enhance behaviors, and evaluate local and global practices of well being. In addition, we will learn to lead others in a way that reflects daily healthy choices.

Honors 2120: Honors Humanities Seminar
Writing, Community and Leadership
Dr. Amy Hodges-Hamilton

Writing, Community, and Leadership is an interdisciplinary writing seminar where students will “jump hurdles, leap fences, and penetrate walls” in order to explore a range of communities and their place within them—from their individual communities to Nashville communities like Rest Stop Ministries, Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital, At-Risk Youth Centers, and Morningside Assisted Living, as well as global communities like the Nashville International Center for Empowerment (NICE).  We will also study our place and displacement within communities and consider how stories can make us stronger and more effective leaders in our professional lives.

Honors 2120: Honors Humanities Seminar

This writing-intensive course will draw from non-fictional narratives, young adult fiction, music, and films that explore the theme of coming of age within the last century to present day. What does it mean to come of age? How does the meaning differ based on gender, culture, and/or era? How do we document this human experience? In addition to studying critical theory, students will give voice to their own narratives on the subject, in the form of personal essays, literary journalism, story treatments, and poetry.

Honors 2120: Honors Humanities Seminar

In this course, we will read from a variety of disciplines that explore aspects of the following question: “How shall we live now?” This is the primary question Daniel Quinn asks in his novel Ishmael: An Adventure of the Mind and Spirit. Specifically, this course will consider how we preserve our humanity, connect meaningfully with one another, reflect on our choices and their implications, and stay grounded on the earth while living in our fast-paced age of technology, progress, and over-consumption. Although philosophical in its questioning, this course will also be quite pragmatic: We will examine applications of these ideas, noting how specific choices have affected people, communities, and society.

Honors 2120: Honors Humanities Seminar
The Healing Power of Creativity
Professor Stewart Lewis

From disciplinary perspectives in history, the social sciences, and popular culture, this course explores how creativity can enrich and heal our lives. Particularly in the contexts of music, art, writing, and ideation, we will examine the ways in which acts of creativity can impact our intellectual, behavioral, and spiritual growth. Not only will we consider the myriad of ways in which creativity has healed different cultures throughout history to present day, but imagine the arc of how it may change our future.

Not everyone is born to be creative. Even so, there are practices that can enhance our lives even if we don’t harbor inherent talent sets. For example, in some cultures, singing and dancing is a way of life, a community experience that exists not as a competition or employment, but simply to bring joy. There are children who benefit from art therapy, elderly dementia patients that have improved their memory through music, people whose stories, whether or not read by millions, are cathartic for them to write. Through completing our own creative exercises, in class and out of class, we will gather hands on experience in addition to empirical knowledge, and take part in self-reflective discussions as well as critical thinking.

This seminar is designed to take us together on a journey through philosophical, psychological, social, and cultural sources, and allow you to explore a research interest that will serve you beyond this course. The final term paper will give you the freedom—and responsibility—to research a perspective or angle that not only intersects this seminar’s topic, but one you can build upon for future research, employment, and living.

Honors 2120: Honors Humanities Seminar
Developing Cultural Intelligence: Encountering Asian Cultures
Dr. Ronnie Littlejohn, Professor of Philosophy and Director of Asian Studies

As our world becomes increasingly globalized, the interaction between peoples of different cultures is cutting across all levels of life including business, politics, religions, music, art, family and personal lifestyles.  It’s no wonder that Cultural Intelligence has been called “The Essential Intelligence for the 21^st Century.” Using a broad swath of the range of encounters between East Asian cultures and the U.S., this course provides an opportunity to develop one’s cultural intelligence.  Topics studied include what is culture/what is cultural? How do cultures vary? How do they change? What’s the difference between cultural relativism and cultural pluralism? Does a practice being cultural also make it moral? How does Asia matter for the U.S.?  How do values compare between the U.S. and Asia?  Who was God’s Chinese son and what was his Heavenly Peace Kingdom?  What was/is “the Yellow Peril”? How are China and the U.S. “joined at the hip” in the global marketplace? Why were Japanese imprisoned in the U.S. and Chinese excluded from immigration? What does it mean to speak of Buddhism without beliefs as the coming new global religious worldview?  What are the social and pop cultural impacts of K-pop, J-pop, and C-pop?  What has the West learned about Japanese culture from anime?….and is Hello Kitty as sweet and benign as you think???

Honors 2130: Honors Fine Arts Seminar
The Crisis of Truth in Art and Culture
Professor Thomas Williams

This course will address the significance of the post-truth moment for contemporary art and culture. We live in a time when conspiracy theories and “alternative facts” define our public conversations, and journalists and politicians often seem more like performance artists than truthtellers. We appear to have moved from the Enlightenment to post-truth in one short decade. In the face of all this, this course will attempt to address the following questions: What is the role of artists when reality seems more unreal than fantasy or fiction? Does contemporary visual culture offer us some certainties, or is it just a fountain of misinformation and doubt? As we consider these questions, we will consider the following topics, among others: the histories and theories of the post-truth condition; the dangers this condition represents for democracy and the public sphere; the role of contemporary artists as truthtellers and documentarians; the role of artists and activists as fabulists and pranksters; the history of hucksterism, paranoia, and epistemological skepticism that has preceded our own post-truth moment; and the responsibilities of artists and citizens in responding to this new age of disinformation and doubt.

Honors 2130: Honors Fine Arts Seminar
Art in the Age of Mass Incarceration
Robin Paris, Professor of Practice

This course makes a case for the role of art in the debate about mass incarceration today. As many critics have noted, the United States now incarcerates more people than any other country on earth, and those individuals are disproportionately people of color. In recent years, mass incarceration or the prison-industrial complex has become a topic of intense debate and frequent calls for reform; visual art has played a crucial role in this conversation. Exhibitions of works by prisoners and about prison have made vital contributions to the public understanding of life in prison and the humanity of incarcerated people, and a number of artists have made critical work that addresses the prison system today. This course will address the literature on mass incarceration and the role of artists and filmmakers in the public debate around its reform. We will look at writings by authors such as Bryan Stevenson, Michelle Alexander, and Nicole Fleetwood, and we will discuss works of art by prisoners and artists such as Nigel Poor, Ashley Hunt, Deborah Luster, Titus Kaphar, Laurie Jo Renyolds, and others. If circumstances permit, we may engage in artistic collaborations with prisoners in the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville through the mail (though no experience in artmaking is required).