ESS Course Offerings for Spring Semester 2010
Environmental Science (ESS 30 & Biol 30) [BNS, BI]
– Professor Sara Webb Environmental Studies and Sustainability Capstone Seminar (ESS 185)– Professor Tammy Windfelder
Elective Courses
Plant Morphology and Identification (Biology 171) [BNS]- Professor Sara Webb [BNS]
Tropical Marine Ecology (Biology 183) -Professor Jennifer Fox
This year's Tropical Marine Ecology course will take place in Belize. See the Course Catalog for more information. [BNS]
International Environmental Politics. (PoliSci 119 & ESS 191, sec.4) - Professor Phil Mundo
Environmental issues extend beyond international borders. Because of that, finding effecting, enduring solutions to environmental problems requires engaging the international political arena. Nations enter into global, regional, and bilateral agreements to address environmental problems they confront. While negotiating the international political system is important, not much can happen at this level without the consent of participating nations. Thus, domestic politics plays an important role in international environmental agreements. With this basic dynamic in mind, this course examines the development of international environmental policies, their effectiveness, their shortcomings, and prospects for the future.
Archaeology and Sustainability (Anth 114) - Prof. Maria Masucci
Environmental Aesthetics (ESS 144 = Philosophy 144) [BI, BH] - Professor Erik Anderson
Sustainable Harvests: Food Justice & 20th Century U.S. Literature (ESS 191, sec. 1/English 118) -Prof. Sarah Wald
What should you eat? How did your dinner get to your plate? This class examines contemporary politics around food, including hunger, health, and agriculture. We will ask how to make food production and consumption sustainable. Yet we will also examine a longer culture of concern for what we eat and how we farm. This class uses Food Justice as a window into 20th Century U.S. literature. We will read Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle (1906) alongside Ruth Ozeki’s My Year of Meats (1999). We will read John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath (1939) alongside Cherrie Moraga’s Heroes and Saints (1994) and Willa Cather’s O Pioneers (1913) alongside Wendell Berry’s “Mad Farmer Liberation Front” (1999). Our readings will include poems, novels, essays, and one play as we examine 20th Century U.S. literature through debates around farming, food, and land. [BI, BH]
Environmental Justice (Anth 135 and ESS 191/sec.2) - Professor Joslyn Cassady
Over the last twenty years, there has been a ground swell of national and international attention to environmental justice and protection. These movements, however, have not resulted in dramatic changes in public policy or corporate accountability toward the socially marginalized and poor. Incidents of state and corporate-sponsored environmental degradation and environmental racism continue to cripple the lives of an ever-increasing number of people nationally and internationally today. In this class, we will learn about, and confront, this disheartening reality head on. Through case studies of mountain top removal in Appalachia, toxic waste in the Arctic, and the Dow chemical disaster in Bhopal, India, we will develop anthropologically-informed understandings of environmental justice, environmental racism, and cultural survival. We will also learn about the struggles for environmental justice in New Jersey through field trips and guest lectures by local activists and leaders. [BI, BSS]
Economics of Climate Change and Peak Oil (Econ 130/ESS 191, sec. 3) - Professor Fred Curtis
Climate change and the burning of fossil fuels that contribute to it is not the only energy challenge to our economy, environment and society. The other is peak oil or oil depletion which will lead to increasing energy costs over time. This course examines climate change and peak oil as inter-connected issues that must be understood and solved together. Proposed solutions to peak oil include turning coal into liquid fuels, an option that increases greenhouse gas emissions. This course considers both problems together as well as technological and policy alternatives, with a focus on their impacts on the economy and society. We will also discuss the impact of both on globalization and consumption and relocalization solutions. The course is open to all students having sophomore or higher standing. [BI, BSS]
