Spring 2025 Course Offerings

Here is a list of Honors cross listed course titles for the Spring semester.

HONR 81 AI FICTION

HONR 83 SOCIAL CONTEXT OF URBAN SCHOOLS

HONR 95 ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE ETHICS

HONR 100 PATHS TO KNOWLEDGE - EDUCATION & SCHOOLING: WHY BOTHER?

HONR 105 PHILOSOPHY OF ART

HONR 111 INTERNATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL TRAVEL SEMINAR (JTERM)

HONR 113 PHILOSOPHY OF ART

HONR 125 PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION

HONR 126 THE PHILOSOPHY OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

HONR 129 PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE

HONR 137 MEDICAL ANTHROPOLOGY

HONR 151 ALT-RIGHT RELIGION

HONR 161 AFRICA/AFRICANS/ATLANT/SLAVERY

HONR 177 MUSIC AND POLITICS

HONR 178 DEATH AND SOCIETY

HONR 181 WOMEN & HEBREW SCRIP

Sample Course Descriptions 

HONR 129 - Philosophy of Science
The course will examine the major topics and issues of contemporary philosophy of science, including (but not limited to) the demarcation criteria of science, the rationality and objectivity of scientific theories, the verification and falsification of scientific theories, and the claims and merits of realism, pragmatism, empiricism, and constructivism. The course will also consider the ways in which various contexts of scientific activity (technological, social, historical, economic, political, personal) affects the practice and aims of science.

HONR 137 - Medical Anthropology
Medical anthropology examines affliction and healing in a cross-cultural perspective. It emphasizes the understanding of how health and healing are shaped by cultural and biological processes. It also analyzes the relations among health, illness, social institutions, power, and cultural representations. Medical anthropologists examine the ways in which global processes—health policies, epidemics, war and violence, inequalities—affect the life of individuals and communities.

HONR 125 PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION
The philosophy of religion, broadly defined, is the philosophical examination of religious reasoning. As practiced, however, the philosophy of religion usually gets narrowly focused on either the rationality of modern-western religion or the religiosity of modern-western philosophy. This course ventures a new approach in the philosophy of religion, one that is religiously diverse and historically grounded. As such, it seeks first to survey several different instances of reason-giving in several different religions of the world. It will then formally compare these instances of reason-giving in an effort to detect important and interesting similarities and differences between them. Finally, it will ask whether and how these instances and patterns can be critically evaluated with respect to their truth and value. Since this is a philosophy of religion course, particular emphasis will be placed on this third and final step: can one inquire into the truth and value of religious reasons and ideas? If so, how? If not, why not? Note that this class is designed to accompany Drake University's public program in comparative religion, The Comparison Project (http://comparisonproject.wordpress.drake.edu).

HONR 161 - Africa/Africans/Atlantic/Slavery
The immense growth of slavery and slave trade research in the last quarter century has made examinations of unfree labor a major issue for world research. Studies of Atlantic slavery have generated the bulk of that research, and as a result have challenged many traditional perceptions of that trade and its associated system of slavery. However, despite the unquestioned value of these recent analyses, most of these studies have looked at Atlantic slavery from the American side of the ocean. Consequently, the African nature of Atlantic slavery has often lacked close scrutiny. This course has two goals: 1) to root Atlantic slavery and its trade in its African context, and 2) to help incorporate recent research findings into popular understandings of the Atlantic trade. The major argument of this course is that one cannot know why the Atlantic trade happened as it did nor how Atlantic slavery developed as it did without understanding the context which produced the people who were sold into slavery. Therefore, the course looks at the influence political, social, economic, and cultural factors in Africa had on the making of slavery and the slave trade both in Africa and the Americas. In doing so, the course will challenge students to rethink their own notions of Atlantic slavery as they analyze and critique the ideas encountered in this course.

HONR 191  WOMEN AND HEBREW SCRIPTURES
The basics of the course include reading Biblical accounts involving women and various commentaries on those Biblical accounts with a critical eye. These accounts will include "Genesis", "The Red Tent", and "The Five Books of Miriam". The goal is to come to an understanding of how the Jewish Bible deals with issues involving women and how such an understanding can help us understand issues today.