Italy and Ireland with Dr. Cynthia White
June 5th-July 6th, 2023
This Honors first-year summer course entitled “Rome in Ireland” explores the reception of art, architecture, literature, and culture of the Roman Empire on the “emerald isle of saints and scholars.” In three weeks in Rome and one in Dublin, we will experience the pivotal transformation from Roman Republic to Roman Empire, and then explore the theme in reverse, when the Republic of Ireland declares its independence from the British Empire.
The curriculum for these courses reimagines the power of the ancient Roman empire in novels (e.g., A Star Called Henry by Roddy Doyle), films (Belfast, Ben Hur), and several experiential activities.
Examples of assignments include sketching ancient monuments, writing poems, performing a play or musical composition, creating (satiric) cartoons, developing a blog/vlog, engaging in formal debates, and participating in scavenger hunts and photo contests. The Spring 2023 7W2 HNRS 195 seminar associated with the trip will be devoted to reading and writing assignments in preparation for experiencing the cities as text!
Courses for Summer 2023
All students will earn 6 units of general education credit by participating in this program in the following:
HNRS 218 – HNRS 218 - Wording Pictures: Writing and Art (3-units)
The visual and verbal arts enjoy a long history of creative and intellectual affinity. Wording Pictures is an interdisciplinary creative writing studio that explores interconnections between the arts of text and image. Students will examine artistic representation across media. Drawing visual inspiration from course readings and viewings, museums, special collections, and community arts settings, students will develop creative, critical, and researched writings in both traditional and innovative forms. Each student's original writing culminates in a final manuscript that aligns perception, process, reason, research, and reflection.
HNRS 150B2 - Exploring Electronic Presence: From the Telegraph to Twitter and Beyond (3-units)
This course examines communication technologies and the history of electronic communication, and their relationship to the social sphere. We will examine the social impact of these technologies, especially how they disrupted established social relations, unsettling customary ways of dividing the private person and family from the more public setting of the community. At the same time, we will focus on the persistent cultural beliefs that have been linked with communications technologies. Throughout the study abroad experience we will be comparing and contrasting our contemporary experience of ubiquitous communication and computing with how electronic presence has been experienced and imagined in the past.
