Featured Courses

Featured Courses

Explore different courses and continents to globalize your education.

 

Each semester the Keough School offers hundreds of courses for global thinkers like you. These courses span disciplines, cultures, languages, and countries–giving you the knowledge you need to address the global issues you care about. Whether you are considering a major or minor or are simply curious about global affairs, we invite you to explore the diverse courses offered by the Keough School.

Spring 2023

Here is just a sampling of courses offered during the spring 2023 semester. This is not an exhaustive list of courses offered by the Keough School and its global institutes. A full list of courses and descriptions can be viewed online in NOVO or Browse Classes under the advanced college search “Keough School.” Course offerings change every semester. You do not need to be enrolled in a Keough School program to register for these courses.

 


Introduction to Global Politics and Policy

GLAF 20001

Joshua Eisenman

MW 9:30 – 10:45 a.m.

3 credits

Global Policy & Politics helps students gain an understanding of the influences and challenges officials face during the foreign policymaking process.  The course both enhances students’ knowledge of how foreign policy is made and teaches them the reading, writing and oral communications skills they will need to support, and one day become, a policymaker. This includes producing both written and oral policy briefings as well as collaborative experiential policymaking exercises. The ability to find the logical linkages among arguments and synthesize and present their similarities and differences in concise and informative written and spoken briefings is a highly marketable skill. Multinational corporations, governments, think-tanks, NGOs and international organizations are all seeking people who are able to weigh different policy options and communicate complex analytical ideas to both superiors and subordinates.

Credit hours contribute to the:

Global Affairs Major, Keough School of Global Affairs


Foundations of Cultural Analysis and Engagement

KSGA 20000

Julia Kowalski

TR 11:00  a.m.– 12:15 p.m.

3 credits

This course introduces global affairs students to culture as an analytic tool to interpret social differences within and across communities, from local to global. Building on insights from anthropology, sociology, history, and other disciplines, we will examine key themes in global affairs such as “development,” “progress,” and “policy,” in light of what a culturally-informed perspective offers to our understanding of these topics. Over the semester, students will learn to identify and describe the role of cultural difference in shaping global affairs, and to analyze contemporary debates in global affairs in light of culture, power, and inequality. Finally, through independent research, students will develop their own set of critical questions to prepare for their future cultural immersion experiences and scholarship.

Credit hours contribute to the:

Global Affairs Major, Keough School of Global Affairs


Connecting Asia: Pasts, Presents, and Futures

ASIA 30002 / KSGA 30310

Kyle Jaros

TR 12:30–1:45 p.m.

3 credits

“East Asia” has never been a clearly defined place so much as a contested web of spatial and social relationships. What can major cities tell us about the connections that define East Asia and drive its rise? This course focuses on Hong Kong, Singapore, Seoul, and Shanghai to explore how power structures and social forces have connected parts of East Asia and linked it to other parts of the world.

Credit hours contribute to the:

Global Affairs Major, Keough School of Global Affairs

Global Affairs Supplementary Major, Asian Studies concentration; or

Asian Studies Supplementary Major or Asian Studies MinorLiu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies

Photo: Wikipedia Commons


Introduction to International Human Rights

CHR 30715

Zoltán Búzás

MW 11:00 a.m. – 12:15 p.m.

3 credits

Are human rights modern inventions or are they as old as humankind? Are they universal or culturally specific? How much progress, if any, has transnational human rights advocacy achieved? How and to what extent should human rights influence foreign policy? By examining these and similar questions, this course initiates students in the study of international human rights, and features in-class debates on the most pressing human rights problems.

Credit hours contribute to the:

Global Affairs Supplementary Major, Civil and Human Rights Concentration — Keough School of Global Affairs

Minor in Civil and Human Rights — Klau Institute for Civil and Human Rights

Photo: “18th Session of Human Rights Council” by UN Photo


Mobilizing Memory: The Politics of Memory in Modern Europe

EURO 30217

Abby Lewis

TR 12:30 – 1:45 p.m.

3 credits

This class analyzes the politics and cultures of remembrance in Europe from the late nineteenth century to today. Taking examples such as the politicization of Holocaust memory in Europe or the grassroots removal of monuments in Britain as points of departure, students will learn about processes of remembering and forgetting, and how memories of the past—including the World Wars, imperialism and decolonization, the Cold War, and histories of genocide—have shaped European identity and culture. Students will conduct an original research project on a topic of their choosing by exploring a case study of memory work or collective memory in the context of Modern Europe.

Credit hours contribute to the:

Global Affairs Supplementary Major, Transnational Europe Concentration — Keough School of Global Affairs

Minor in European StudiesNanovic Institute for European Studies

Photo: Paul VanDerWerf from Brunswick, Maine, USA, CC BY 2.0.


Intro to International Development Studies

IDS 20500

Suan Ostermann

MW 2:00-3:15 p.m.

3 credits

This course serves as an introduction to the field of international development. Students will examine debates on the meaning and measurement of development; alternative approaches to, and methods in, the study of development; and attempts to address some of the main development challenges facing the world today. There will be a central focus on understanding “what works” in development. Working together in teams, students will conceptualize and design an international development project using “real world” constraints.

Credit hours contribute to the:

Global Affairs Supplementary Major, International Development Studies concentration

Minor in International Development StudiesKellogg Institute for International Studies 


Engaging Religions: An Introduction to Religion and Global Affairs

KGSA 30600 / ASIA 30600 / IIPS 30434

Alexander Hsu

MW 2:00 – 3:15 p.m.

3 credits

In a religiously diverse and vastly troubled world, how do religious traditions motivate believers to work toward the common good? “Engaging Religions,” the course title, refers to three things we will examine. First, it describes how religions are intrinsically engaging: they draw in adherents by fulfilling their material, intellectual, and spiritual needs. Second, it specifies what various secular institutions like governments and development organizations must do in pursuing the common good across our planet—most of whose inhabitants are religious. Finally, it characterizes our work in this class: exploring how various religious traditions conceptualize and work toward the common good in a global context. We will engage how religious traditions from the East and West—from Asian and Abrahamic “world” religions, to a variety of indigenous “local” religions—complicate or complement modern Catholicism’s emphasis on Integral Human Development.

Credit hours contribute to the:

Global Affairs Major — Keough School of Global Affairs

Peace Studies Supplementary Major or Peace Studies MinorKroc Institute for International Peace Studies

Asian Studies Supplementary Major or Asian Studies MinorLiu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies


Marketing Social Issues, Causes and Ventures

SEI 40834

Michael Morris

TR 3:30–4:45 p.m.

3 credits

This class explores the use of marketing principles and concepts to support initiatives, causes, and ventures that are social in nature. Attention is devoted to the marketing and communication challenges involved when attempting to do good, and how these issues can be overcome without spending large amounts of money. Sample topics include identifying and understanding target markets for social initiatives, constructing a value proposition, developing positioning approaches, designing communication programs, use of guerrilla techniques, the roles of price and place, and how to set goals and measure performance.

Credit hours contribute to the:

Social Entrepreneurship and Innovation Minor (SEI Minor)Pulte Institute for Global Development and McKenna Center for Human Development and Global Business


The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict through Films

IIPS 40416 01

Atalia Omer

MW 9:30 – 10:45 a.m.

3 credits

What is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict about? How did it start? How might it be resolved? Some interpretations rely on claims of ancient hatreds. Others invoke sacred and biblical narratives as their authority for claims to a land deemed holy by many different religions. Still others underscore the ills and legacies of settler colonialism and indigenous accounts of historical presence. Some invoke international law and human rights to make their claims. This course will explore these arguments surrounding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through screening and discussion of cinematic representation, narrative argument, and documentary films.

Credit hours contribute to the:

Global Affairs Major — Keough School of Global Affairs

Peace Studies Supplementary Major or Peace Studies MinorKroc Institute for International Peace Studies

Photo: Children playing with barbed wire by Jakob Rubner from Unsplash


Information to register for classes:

 

Current students can view a full list of Keough School courses and descriptions online in NOVO or PATH Class Search. Click on Browse Classes, then Advanced Search and perform a College search by selecting “Keough School” from the drop-down menu. Courses with the subject code “KSGA” contribute to the Keough School’s Supplementary Major in Global Affairs. Courses offered by the Keough School institutes, including courses that contribute to some of the global affairs concentrations, are identified by their respective subject codes (Liu/Asian studies: ASIA, Kellogg/International development studies: IDS, Keough-Naughton/Irish studies: IRST, Kroc/Peace studies: IIPS, Klau/Civil and human rights: CHR, Nanovic/European studies: EURO, and Pulte/McKenna/Social Entrepreneurship and Innovation: SEI).

Global Affairs Major

Courses that contribute to the new global affairs major can be found by searching within Coursicle or NOVO or PATH under the subject code “GLAF.” Courses that count towards school level requirements for primary majors or towards the supplementary major in global affairs can be found by using the subject code “KSGA.”

Courses that fulfill the supplementary major’s global cultures and global politics requirements can be found under the subject code KSGA with the course attribute “GLBC” (global cultures) or “GLBP” (global politics).

 

 

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