INDIVIDUAL SENIOR PROJECTS

Prerequisites: Meets senior requirement. Instructor permission required. The instructor will supervise the writing of long papers involving some form of sociological research and analysis.

• Department: Sociology @Barnard
• Instructor: Randa B Serhan
  CULPA: 2 Info
• 4 points

Senior Research Seminar: Inquiry

SENIOR RESEARCH SEMINAR I

This is the second semester of a year-long senior capstone experience for Educational Studies majors. Over the course of the year, you will design and carry-out an inquiry project, and you will report on this project through an appropriate medium, for a specific purpose and audience.

• Department: Education @Barnard
• T 4:10 p.m.-6 p.m.
• Instructor: Thea R Abu El-Haj
  Info
• 4 points

Confined Bodies

Used as punishment since antiquity for the political and social dissidents, exile, penal colonies, concentration camps, and prisons have been produced as conceptual and concrete spaces where constructions of the body politic have been contested. How does the experience of the spatialized body produce social and political subjectivities, especially with the employment of discourses of inclusion and exclusion, of grafting and excising onto and from the body politic? In this seminar we will explore these questions especially as they pertain to the instrumentalities that seek to erect rhetorics and narratives of utopias within the enclosures of specific dystopic spaces: prisons, refugee and concentration camps, schools and other morphing institutions of re-formation.

• Department: Classics
• R 6:10 p.m.-8 p.m.
• Instructor: Neni K Panourgia
  CULPA: 27 Info
• 3 points

ARTEMIS RISING SHORT COURSE IN FILMMAKIN

ARTEMIS COURSE IN FILMMAK

The Artemis Rising Short Course in Filmmaking is a two to four-week course offered each semester on a special topic of filmmaking presented by an Artemis Rising Foundation Filmmaker Fellow (ARFF). This series was endowed by the Artemis Rising Foundation to bring world-class filmmakers with hands-on experience and fresh perspectives to Barnard to connect with students interested in filmmaking as a vocation and media literacy.

It can only be taken for pass/fail for 1 point.
Students must attend all four class sessions and write a final paper in order to receive credit for this course. 
To see the dates/times that the Artemis Rising Short Course will meet this semester, the current course description, and the biography of the visiting filmmaker, please visit the ARFF website:
https://athenacenter.barnard.edu/arff
.

• Department: Film @Barnard
• W 11 a.m.-12:50 p.m.
• Instructor: Alice A Reagan
  CULPA: 1 Wikipedia Info
• 1 points

ARTEMIS RISING SHORT COURSE IN FILM PROD

ARTEMIS COURSE:FILM PRODU

The Artemis Rising Short Course in Film Production is a one-point credit short workshop presented by an Artemis Rising Foundation Filmmaker Fellow (ARFF).  It consists of four workshops on a special aspect of film production and one final project. This series was endowed by the Artemis Rising Foundation to bring world-class filmmakers with hands-on experience and fresh perspectives to Barnard to connect with students interested in filmmaking as a vocation and media literacy.

It can only be taken for pass/fail for 1 point. 
Students must attend all four class workshops and produce one final project in order to receive credit for this course. 
To see the dates/times that the Artemis Rising Short Course will meet this semester, the current course description, and the biography of the visiting filmmaker, please visit the ARFF website:
https://athenacenter.barnard.edu/arff
.

• Department: Film @Barnard
• W 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: Alice A Reagan
  CULPA: 1 Wikipedia Info
• 1 points

SENIOR THESIS

French majors will write their senior thesis under the supervision of the instructor.

• Department: French @Barnard
• T 6:10 p.m.-7:25 p.m.
• Instructor: Brian D O'Keeffe
  CULPA: 28 Info
• 4 points

More than Real: Dreams, Imagination, and

More Than Real

This course is thematic, though a loose history of dreaming, imaginative praxis, and virtual reality environments across South Asia will emerge through the networked conversations across texts. The advantage of a thematic course allows us to cover various genres such as: ritual manuals; epic; poetry; philosophical argument; biographical accounts; prophecies; conversion stories; and medical textbooks to name a handful. At the end of the course, we will see how the texts encountered in the first part have been repurposed to speak to social justice movements around caste - both within South Asia and the diaspora population in the U.S. The thematic of dreaming and imagination also provides flexibility in method: because students will have the opportunity to study conversations between different historical actors across religious traditions about dreams, they will also have the opportunity to revise problematic accounts of religious pluralism and communalism in South Asia. Students will read primary texts from Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist, Zoroastrian, and Sikh traditions to name a handful. Students can look forward to reading about worlds within rocks; falling asleep and waking up as another person only to die in the dream world, wake up and then realize your dream-life family is somehow real and looking for you; how to finally interpret those pesky dreams about teeth falling out; dismembered bodies generating the universe; daydreaming about a cloud that thinks mountain peaks look like nipples; how to build a mind-temple that Shiva prefers to the physical one with fancy rock; and much more!

• Department: Religion @Barnard
• R 10:10 a.m.-noon
• Instructor: Meghan E Hartman
  Info
• 4 points

SUPERVISED INDEPENDENT RES

Prerequisites: the instructors permission for entrance, and the departmental representatives permission for aggregate points in excess of 12 or less than 4. This course may be repeated for credit (see major and concentration requirements). Individual research under the supervision of a member of the staff. Research areas include organic, physical, inorganic, analytical, and biological chemistry. Please note that CHEM UN3098 is offered in the fall and spring semesters.

• Department: Chemistry
• Instructor: Vesna Gasperov
  CULPA: 1 h-index: 4 Info
• 4 points

GUIDED RESEARCH IN ECONOMICS

Prerequisites: Instructors permission Provides students with the experience of participating in the research process by matching them to a faculty mentor who will put them to work on one of his or her current research projects.

• Department: Economics @Barnard
• Instructor: Ashley Wong
  Info
• Instructor: Randall Reback
  CULPA: 17 h-index: 14 Info
• Instructor: Sarah M Gertler
  Info
• Instructor: Kurt Semm
  Info
• 1-2 points

INDEPENDENT STUDY

Independent study

• Department: Film @Barnard
• Instructor: Alice A Reagan
  CULPA: 1 Wikipedia Info
• 1-4 points

INDEPENDENT STUDY

• Department: French @Barnard
• Instructor: Brian D O'Keeffe
  CULPA: 28 Info
• 1-4 points

INDEPENDENT STUDY

This course can be worth 1 to 4 credits (each credit is equivalent to approximately three hours of work per week) and requires a Barnard faculty as a mentor who has to provide written approval. The course entails a scholarly component; for this, a research report is required by the end of the term. The research report can take the form that best suits the nature of the project. The course will be taken for a letter grade, regardless of whether the student chooses 1, 2, 3, or 4 credits.

• Department: Neuroscience & Behavior @Barnard
• Instructor: Peter D Balsam
  CULPA: 25 Info
• Instructor: Elizabeth P Bauer
  CULPA: 3 h-index: 21 Info
• Instructor: Bj Casey
  Info
• Instructor: John Glendinning
  CULPA: 23 h-index: 39 Info
• Instructor: Gabrielle J Gutierrez
  Info
• Instructor: E'Mett McCaskill
  CULPA: 38 Info
• Instructor: Kara Pham
  CULPA: 9 Info
• Instructor: Russell D Romeo
  CULPA: 9 Info
• Instructor: Rae Silver
  Wikipedia h-index: 69 Info
• Instructor: Alex White
  h-index: 13 Info
• Instructor: Alexis S Hill
  Info
• Instructor: Kevin G Bath
  Info
• 1-4 points

HAMLET

In this course, we will spend a semester reading, thinking about, seeing, and writing about one play, Shakespeare’s 
Hamlet. 
We will begin by reading 
Hamlet 
slowly, using various critical perspectives to attend to some of the historical and contemporary problematics of the play. In addition to glancing at sources (Saxo Grammaticus’ narrative of Amleth’s revenge in 
Historia Danica
) and contemporaries (Thomas Kyd, 
The Spanish Tragedy
), we’ll consider the relationship between the two media of 
Hamlet
’s production, the book and the stage, taking the opportunity to consider what the three texts of 
Hamlet
s—the 1603 quarto, the 1604 quarto, and the folio version—have to say to us about our preconceptions of theatre and print. Then we will turn to two problems. The first is 
Hamlet 
as a conceptual challenge, focusing on Hamlet in modernism, notably as framed by Mallarmé, Eliot, Freud, and Joyce; as part of this consideration  we’ll take up some modern dramatic encounters with 
Hamlet, 
notably Tom Stoppard’s 
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dea 
(1966),
 
Heiner Müller’s 
Hamletmachine 
(1977) and Magda Romanska’s 
Opheliamachine 
(2013)
, 
Samuel Beckett’s 
Endgame 
(1957)
. 
We will conclude the semester by thinking about mediated performance, beginning with Laurence Olivier’s controversial (and award-winning) 1948 film, and tracing through Michael Almereyda’s 2000 media allegory,  concluding with two productions that move 
Hamlet 
into the sphere of digital performance, The Wooster Group 
Hamlet 
(2007) and Annie Dorsen’s 
A Piece of Work 
(2013)
.

• Department: Theatre @Barnard
• W 10:10 a.m.-noon
• Instructor: William B Worthen
  CULPA: 10 Info
• 4 points

JOURNALISM & PUBLIC LIFE

An introduction to the conventions, traditions, values, assumptions, and arguments that have shaped the institution of journalism and its central role in public life. Through close readings/viewings of current and classic works of journalism as well as secondary sources, we explore some of the Big Questions: What is journalism for? What is its role in public life, and how has that changed over time? Is objectivity dead--or should it be? How have new technologies affected our expectations? Is sensationalism bad for you? Can anything be done about "fake news"? What is the future of journalism? The focus is on the American experience from the colonial era to the present day, though it will be placed in a global context.

• Department: Journalism
• TR 2:40 p.m.-3:55 p.m.
• Instructor: Andie Tucher
  Info
• 3 points

FUNDAMENTALS OF GLOBAL HEALTH

Many of the greatest challenges in public health are global. This course uses a multidisciplinary approach to discuss the major underlying determinants of poor health and the relationship between health and political, social and economic development. Drawing upon the sciences, social sciences, and humanities, students will be introduced to the evolution of modern approaches to the setting of global health priorities, the functions and roles of health systems, an overview of current global health practices, and the major institutional players in global health. The first unit of the class will focus on establishing the foundations for a public health approach to understanding the challenges of global health. This will involve exploration of the factors shaping the global distribution of disease and their connection with issues of social, economic, and political development, as reflected in the Millennium Development Goals. The second unit will explore in further detail a number of major health priorities. A significant goal of the class will be to identify common sources of vulnerability and challenge across health risks, and the consequent need for a systemic approach to their being addressed. The third and final unit builds upon this analysis to demonstrate the multi-disciplinary, multi-level approach required to effectively address global health priorities, and the political and organizational cooperation required to achieve this. The class concludes with an analysis of the major challenges and threats to global coordination regarding such threats as pandemic influenza and emerging health threats related to climate change. Offered in the spring.

• Department: Columbia College
• MW 4:10 p.m.-5:25 p.m.
• Instructor: Rachel Moresky
  CULPA: 4 Info
• 3 points

OPEN FICTION WORKSHOP

Prerequisite: Student must have taken beginning workshop in any undergraduate creative writing concentration. Open workshops are for students who are acquainted with and have experience in at least one beginning workshop in creative writing. In Open Fiction Workshops, particular attention will be paid to the components of fiction: voice, perspective, characterization, and form. Students will be expected to finish several short stories, executing a total artistic vision on a piece of writing. The critical focus of the class will include an examination of endings and formal wholeness, sustaining narrative arcs, compelling a reader's interest for the duration of the text, and generating a sense of urgency and drama in the work. A portfolio of fiction will be written and revised with critical input from the instructor and workshop. Outside readings may be used to supplement and inform the exercises and written projects. Please visit
https://arts.columbia.edu/writing/undergraduate
for information about registration procedures.

• Department: Writing
• T 12:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
• W 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• M 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• W 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: Marie G Lee
  CULPA: 3 Info
• Instructor: Samuel Lipsyte
  CULPA: 5 Info
• Instructor: Sophie F Kemp
  Info
• Instructor: Anika J Levy
  Info
• 3 points

ADVANCED BURMESE

• Department: Language Resource Center
• 3 points

INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS

An introduction to the study of language from a scientific perspective. The course is divided into three units: language as a system (sounds, morphology, syntax, and semantics), language in context (in space, time, and community), and language of the individual (psycholinguistics, errors, aphasia, neurology of language, and acquisition). Workload: lecture, weekly homework, and final examination.

• Department: Cognitive Science @Barnard
• TR 5:40 p.m.-6:55 p.m.
• Instructor: Maya Barzilai
  Info
• 3 points

WOMEN WRITERS OF E EUR: BELARUS,UKR,&RUS

WOMEN WRITERS OF EASTRN E

The course addresses the works of women writers of Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia from the 19th century to the present. All assigned readings will be in English. The purpose of the course is to become familiar with the struggles and concerns of these authors, as well as the general features of their lives and cultural contexts. Most readings assigned are primary texts. These will be supplemented during course meetings: the instructor will bring in various materials that would be obscure if assigned to students outside of class, but with live explanations in-class, will enrich their understanding of the primary readings.

• Department: Slavic Languages @Barnard
• MW 10:10 a.m.-11:25 a.m.
• Instructor: John C Wright
  CULPA: 1 Info
• 3 points

SENIOR FICTION WORKSHOP

Prerequisites: The department's permission required through writing sample. Please go to 609 Kent for submission schedule and registration guidelines or see http://www.arts.columbia.edu/writing/undergraduate. Seniors who are majors in creative writing are given priority for this course. Enrollment is limited, and is by permission of the professor. The senior workshop offers students the opportunity to work exclusively with classmates who are at the same high level of accomplishment in the major. Students in the senior workshops will produce and revise a new and substantial body of work. In-class critiques and conferences with the professor will be tailored to needs of each student.

• Department: Writing
• T 12:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
• Instructor: Hilary J Leichter
  Info
• 4 points

APPLIED MATHEMATICS II: PDE'S

Introduction to partial differential equations; integral theorems of vector calculus. Partial differential equations of engineering in rectangular, cylindrical, and spherical coordinates. Separation of the variables. Characteristic-value problems. Bessel functions, Legendre polynomials, other orthogonal functions; their use in boundary value problems. Illustrative examples from the fields of electromagnetic theory, vibrations, heat flow, and fluid mechanics.

• Department: Applied Physics and Applied Mathematics
• TR 1:10 p.m.-2:25 p.m.
• Instructor: Michael K Tippett
  CULPA: 8 h-index: 43 Info
• 3 points

ADVANCED BENGALI II

• Department: Language Resource Center
• 3 points

ADVANCED DUTCH II

see department for details

• Department: Germanic Languages
• TR 1:15 p.m.-2:30 p.m.
• Instructor: Wijnie de Groot
  CULPA: 11 Info
• 3 points

ACADEMIC WRITING INTENSIVE

Academic Writing Intensive is a small, intensive writing course for Barnard students in their second or third year who would benefit from extra writing support. Students attend a weekly seminar, work closely with the instructor on each writing assignment, and meet with an attached Writing Fellow every other week. Readings and assignments focus on transferable writing, revision, and critical thinking skills students can apply to any discipline. Students from across the disciplines are welcome. This course is only offered P/D/F. To be considered for the course, please send a recent writing sample to 
vcondill@barnard.edu
, ideally from your First-Year Writing or First-Year Seminar course, or any other writing-intensive humanities or social sciences course at Barnard (no lab reports please).

• Department: English @Barnard
• T 11 a.m.-12:50 p.m.
• Instructor: Meredith A Benjamin
  CULPA: 5 Info
• 4 points

ADVANCED INDONESIAN II

This course offers students the opportunity to practice advanced structures of Bahasa Indonesia, a major language of Indonesia and South East Asia. This course is offered by videoconferencing from Cornell as part of the Shared Course Initiative.

• Department: Language Resource Center
• 3 points

THIRD-YEAR RUSSIAN II

Prerequisites: RUSS UN2102 or the equivalent and the instructors permission. Enrollment limited. Recommended for students who wish to improve their active command of Russian. Emphasis on conversation and composition. Reading and discussion of selected texts and videotapes. Lectures. Papers and oral reports required. Conducted entirely in Russian.

• Department: Slavic Languages
• MWF 10:10 a.m.-11:25 a.m.
• Instructor: Tatiana Mikhailova
  Info
• 4 points

Literary Sinhala II

This one-semester course further develops students' comprehension of written Literary Sinhala, using sample materials from a variety of genres prepared by the instructor, as well as excerpts from texts relevant to graduate student research (when appropriate).

• Department: Language Resource Center
• 3 points

PAINTING III: Advanced Painting

PAINTING III: Adv Paintin

Prerequisites: (VIAR UN1000) and (VIAR UN2100) Painting III:  Advanced study in painting will be a material inquiry into the consequential concepts, histories, and critical language embedded in making painting’s historical past and its’ present.  Is painting now a singular “medium”? How do facture, scale, form and a multitude of image-making options, regardless of “style”, accrue as to create meaning?  Participants are expected to present work weekly, as Individual studio or group critiques. These will be augmented by readings of selected historical essays and contemporaneous writings, as well as visual presentations on a rotating basis.

• Department: Visual Arts
• T 10 a.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: Kenny Rivero
  Info
• 3 points

ADVANCED ZULU II

Prerequisites: ZULU W1201-W1202 or the instructors permission. This course allows students to practice adanced structures of the Zulu language. Please note this course is offered by videoconference from Yale through the Shared Course Initiative.

• Department: Language Resource Center
• MW 1 p.m.-2:15 p.m.
• 3 points

Power, Politics & Society-DISC

POWER, POLITICS & SOCIETY

Discussion section for SOCI UN3203: Power, Politics, and Society

• Department: Sociology @Barnard
• R 2:10 p.m.-3 p.m.
• F 10:10 a.m.-11 a.m.
• Instructor: Jose B Castiblanco Montalvo
  Info
• Instructor: Faculty
  h-index: 37 Info
• 0 points

THE ART OF THE ESSAY

Essay writing above the first-year level. Reading and writing various types of essays to develop one's natural writing voice and craft thoughtful, sophisticated and personal essays.

• Department: English @Barnard
• W 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• M 12:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
• T 12:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
• W 12:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
• Instructor: Shelly Fredman
  CULPA: 3 Info
• Instructor: Margaret R Ellsberg
  CULPA: 54 Info
• Instructor: Vrinda Condillac
  CULPA: 28 Info
• Instructor: Monica F Cohen
  CULPA: 8 Info
• 3 points

The Indigenous Languages of North Americ

The Indigenous Lang of N.

Humans arrived in the Americas no earlier than 30 thousand years ago and perhaps as recently as
13 thousand years ago, yet since that time Native Americans have developed an incredible richness
and diversity of cultures and languages, with well over a thousand distinct indigenous languages.
In this course we will focus on the indigenous languages of the United States and Canada. At the
time of European contact in the sixteenth century, there were around 400 languages spoken across
the territories of these two countries, yet today only around half of these are still spoken, and of
these about 150 are only spoken by elders and in grave danger of not being passed onto younger
generations. It is estimated that only between 20 or so indigenous languages in the United States
and Canada have good prospects of being spoken natively into the twenty second century. In this
course we will survey the variety and diversity of indigenous languages and the cultural values
tied to them in the pre-contact era, and then look into the causes of their current decline in use and
what steps are being taken to reverse this and revitalize them, even languages which no longer
have any first language speakers. We will investigate the amazing diversity in the basic structures

of these languages and the meanings they can express, highlighting the difference between them
and the more familiar patterns of English. We will study how they are used in indigenous contexts,
both traditional and modern, to communicate valued sociocultural and aesthetic ends. Finally, we
will explore three indigenous languages in greater depth, two from New York State, and appreciate
some of the native oral traditions in the original languages. This course will be of interest to any
undergraduate student curious about the prehistory and subsequent Native history and ethnography
of North America.

• Department: Slavic Languages
• MW 2:40 p.m.-3:55 p.m.
• Instructor: William Foley
  h-index: 0 Info
• 3 points

WHAT WAS NAZISM?

How did political theory explain the rise of Nazism in Germany? What models did it develop to understand the structure of the Nazi state, politics and the economy? What can we learn from this for dealing with the crises of democracy and the emergence of authoritarian politics today? This course in political theory and the history of political thought will explore contemporary answers to these questions. It will explore the thought of crucial thinkers on the problems and pitfalls of modern parliamentary democracy such as Max Weber and Hans Kelsen, as well as some of the most influential theoretical voices associated with ideas of Fascism, Totalitarianism and Anti-Semitism such as Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Ernst Fraenkel and Hannah Arendt. 

The course will be structured around texts mainly from the 1920s to the 1960s which still have relevance for political theory today. A strong emphasis will be laid on originally German thinkers who fled to the US in the time of Nazi rule and who contributed decisively to American political science and its particular outlook in the post-war era.  

This course aims to contextualise the discussed texts within the intellectual world of their own time. Students with an interest in twentieth century political, intellectual and social history will, therefore, be particularly welcome. However, the questions raised in the set texts also demand a theoretical and creative engagement with questions of good democratic rule, the challenges of mass society and participation, political in- and exclusion, minority rights and the emergence of terror and authoritarian rule. Additionally there will be a midterm and a final exam which will examine both students’ understanding of the set texts as well as their own thinking on the political theoretical problems raised in this course.

• Department: Political Science
• MW 1:10 p.m.-2:25 p.m.
• Instructor: Clara Maier
  Info
• 3 points

MECHANICS

MECHANICS I

Elements of statics; dynamics of a particle and systems of particles.

• Department: Mechanical Engineering
• F 1:10 p.m.-2:25 p.m.
• Instructor: Jeffrey W Kysar
  CULPA: 9 h-index: 37 Info
• 4 points

Structure of Writing Systems

Why is Turkish spelling easy while English looks chaotic? Why do Japanese, Hebrew, and Armenian carve
language up so differently on the page? And why are game developers and conlang fans obsessed with scripts?
This course is a hands-on tour of how writing systems work. We treat orthography as grammar: principled
mappings from sounds and morphemes to visible forms. You will learn the core toolkit (units of writing,
allography, script typology, depth and transparency, morphographemics), test it on real languages, and run
design-studio labs that evaluate or improve actual orthographies. Labs welcome creative builds: prototype an ingame
script or a conlang orthography, justify its rules, and test its usability. Light formal modeling keeps things
precise without heavy math. By the end you will be able to analyze a script, argue for design choices, and ship a
small reform or a polished worldbuilding system. Although writing systems have traditionally been sidelined in
theoretical linguistics, learning how scripts encode phonology and morphology sharpens core theory and supports
real applications, including teaching children to read and write, designing accessible orthographies, and building
effective NLP architectures. Open to undergraduates of all levels; Intro to Linguistics is a prerequisite.

• Department: Slavic Languages
• MW 1:10 p.m.-2:25 p.m.
• Instructor: Nikita Bezrukov
  Info
• 3 points

FICTION & PERSONAL NARRATIVE

Writing sample required to apply for this course. For the application form and full instructions, please go to https://english.barnard.edu/english/creative-writing-courses

Spring 2026: Fiction and Personal Narrative: Crafting the Narrative "I"

In this workshop, we will practice taking creative risks, writing fiction and nonfiction. We will examine four key craft areas: voice, characterization, imagery, and arrangement, both in contemporary published writing and in the writing of the people in this class. In small and large group workshops, we will consider each writer’s work with care and attention to the writer’s vision. By discussing each work-in-progress on its own terms, we will help our fellow writers deepen the meaning and impact of their work. Through risk-taking, and building a creative community, we will also grow and deepen our personal relationships to craft. Model readings will be contemporary short stories or personal essays, mostly written in the first person, including work by Kali Fajardo-Anstine, Tony Tulathimutte, K-Ming Chang, Cleyvis Natera, Melissa Febos, Ling Ma, and Deesha Philyaw.

• Department: English @Barnard
• T 12:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
• Instructor: Alexandra P Watson
  CULPA: 16 Info
• 3 points

DYNAMICS AND VIBRATIONS

Kinematics of rigid bodies; momentum and energy methods; vibrations of discrete and continuous systems; eigen-value problems, natural frequencies and modes. Basics of computer simulation of dynamics problems using MATLAB or Mathematica.

• Department: Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics
• MW 11:40 a.m.-12:55 p.m.
• Instructor: Andrew W Smyth
  CULPA: 3 Info
• 3 points

Transatlantic Translation

TRANSATLANTIC TRANSLATION

A workshop in which students from the BC/CU community collaborate with a team of students from the École Normale Supérieure-Lyon on two translation projects. In addition to video-conferenced group sessions, students will work virtually with their translation partner in France, and consult in-person with their Barnard instructor. Prerequisite: completion of at least Intermediate II level of French.

• Department: French @Barnard
• MW 10:10 a.m.-11:25 a.m.
• Instructor: Laurie Postlewate
  CULPA: 17 Info
• 3 points

APPLIED MACHINE LEARNING

Prerequisites: STAT UN2103. Students without programming experience in R might find STAT UN2102 very helpful. This course is a machine learning class from an application perspective. We will cover topics including data-based prediction, classification, specific classification methods (such as logistic regression and random forests), and basics of neural networks. Programming in homeworks will require R.

• Department: Statistics
• TR 2:40 p.m.-3:55 p.m.
• Instructor: Bianca Dumitrascu
  Info
• 3 points

Translating the Animal

TRANSLATING THE ANIMAL

Through readings in language philosophy, translation studies, and critical animal studies,
Translating the Animal
 explores how translation, language, and reason have historically worked together to maintain speciesism, preventing human animals from perceiving their commonalities with, and attunement to, sentient nonhuman beings.

• Department: Comparative Literature and Society @Barnard
• W 12:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
• Instructor: Hana Worthen
  Info
• 4 points

Russian Through Theater

Russian Through Theater is a content-based language course designed for students who already have the equivalent of two semesters of college-level Russian and want to continue exploring their path as Russian language learners. This course is experimental in that it combines elements of traditional language learning with theatricality and creativity.  A stress-free learning environment will stimulate language skills and fluency. Staging skits, theatrical pieces, short at first and longer by the end of the semester, will encourage students to focus on phonetics, intonation contour, and idiomatic expressions. In addition to performing skits and short plays, the course includes various forms of improvisation. Reading, listening and speaking - these three essential skills of language learning are constantly practiced. Incorporating theater into language learning not only makes the process enjoyable but also creates a rich, immersive environment that supports language development holistically. Various performative and ludic models, offered by the theater productions -- rehearsed and improvised alike – will help students with shaping a language persona, a skill that students may use in life situations. This skill adds confidence to their conduct of language and allows to communicate effectively with limited linguistic knowledge.

Classes will be conducted primarily in Russian, with sporadic instruction in English when necessary for clarification of assignments or for better understanding of terminology used during mini-lectures.

• Department: Slavic Languages
• W 5 p.m.-6:40 p.m.
• Instructor: Tatiana Mikhailova
  Info
• 2 points

Undergraduate Mentored Research

Prerequisites: the project mentors permission. This course provides a mechanism for students who undertake research with a faculty member from the Department of Statistics to receive academic credit. Students seeking research opportunities should be proactive and entrepreneurial: identify congenial faculty whose research is appealing, let them know of your interest and your background and skills.

• Department: Statistics
• Instructor: Daniel Rabinowitz
  CULPA: 19 h-index: 34 Info
• 3 points

INTRODUCTION TO FICTION WRITING

INTRO TO FICTION WRITING

Writing sample required to apply. Instructions and the application form can be found here: 
https://english.barnard.edu/english/creative-writing-courses
.
The most exciting, and the most terrifying, aspect of writing fiction is that there are no rules that cannot, under certain conditions, be broken. Good fiction makes and lives by its own rules. In this course, we will discuss common tenets of fiction writing—regarding character, plot, point-of-view, and more—and also examine cases in which writers break rules for the better. This course involves attentive reading of stories by various authors, discussions of craft, in-class writing, and workshops of student fiction. Readings may include Shirley Hazzard, Elias Khoury, James Wood, Elena Ferrante, Federico Garcia Lorca, and Sylvia Townsend Warner, among others.

• Department: English @Barnard
• M 6:10 p.m.-8 p.m.
• Instructor: Faculty
  h-index: 37 Info
• 3 points

CLIMATE PHYSICS

Climate Physics

This is a calculus-based treatment of climate system physics and the mechanisms of anthropogenic climate change. By the end of this course, students will understand: how solar radiation and rotating fluid dynamics determine the basic climate state, mechanisms of natural variability and change in climate, why anthropogenic climate change is occurring, and which scientific uncertainties are most important to estimates of 21st century change.

This course is designed for undergraduate students seeking a quantitative introduction to climate and climate change science. EESC V2100 (Climate Systems) is not a prerequisite, but can also be taken for credit if it is taken before this course.

• Department: Earth and Environmental Sciences
• TR 10:10 a.m.-11:25 a.m.
• Instructor: Adam H Sobel
  CULPA: 6 Wikipedia Info
• 3 points

THE OTTOMAN PAST IN THE GREEK PRESENT

Almost a century after the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, the Ottoman past lives on in contemporary Greece, often in unexpected sites. In the built environment it appears as mosques, baths, covered markets, and fountains adorned with Arabic inscriptions. It also manifests itself in music, food, and language. Yet Ottoman legacies also shape the European present in less obvious ways and generate vehement debates about identity, nation-building, human rights, and interstate relations. In this course, we will be drawing on history, politics, anthropology, and comparative literature as well as a broad range of primary materials to view the Ottoman past through the lens of the Greek present. What understandings of nation-building emerge as more Ottoman archives became accessible to scholars? How does Islamic Family Law—still in effect in Greece—confront the European legal system? How are Ottoman administrative structures re-assessed in the context of acute socio-economic crisis and migration?

• Department: Classics
• T 12:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
• Instructor: Dimitris Antoniou
  h-index: 5 Info
• 3 points

INTRODUCTION TO POETRY WRITING

Writing sample required to apply. Instructions and the application form can be found here:
https://english.barnard.edu/english/creative-writing-courses
.

Spring 2026:

Section 1, taught by Angel Nafis: Poetry Belongs With Us
 
As legend Lucille Clifton said, “poetry began when somebody walked out of a cave and looked up at the sky with wonder and said, “Ahhh.” That was the first poem.” In this class we will be demystifying the fundamentals of writing poetry by sharpening our most natural sonic and narrative instincts. We will use these instincts to guide our insights as we explore and practice specific craft elements and structural gestures—from the Ode, Elegy, and Sonnet, to Ekphrasis and Erasure. We’ll study the work of contemporary luminaries like Gwendolyn Brooks, Kaveh Akbar, Sharon Olds, Jenny Xie, June Jordan, Ocean Vuong, and more; using their example to inspire us on how best to understand and command the poetic line. Class time will include weekly writing prompts and share-outs. Come prepared to take risks and foster curiosity.

 

Section 2, taught by Miranda Field:
 
This class approaches poetry as a practice energized as much by playful provocation as by engagement with urgent issues of the day. In-class writing and weekly prompts designed to provoke creative ingenuity will keep you writing, ensuring everyone has new poems to workshop regularly. A list of quotes headed “
What is This Thing Called Poetry?
” starts the class off with a discussion intended to open our minds and challenge pre-conceived notions on the topic. This will be followed by other, more focused questions and propositions, providing discussion topics for each class: How do artifice and raw reality intertwine in a poem’s making? In what ways can poems deepen our understanding of ourselves, each other, and the world we share? How do we, as poets, unlock the full potential of our chosen medium, language? What do we mean by “voice” in a poem, and when and how does “voice” emerge? Required readings are central to our work together, and specified titles and volumes must be acquired by the third week of the semester. Supplemental material will be provided as handouts and distributed in class.

• Department: English @Barnard
• T 4:10 p.m.-6 p.m.
• R 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: Angel Nafis
  Info
• Instructor: Miranda Field
  Info
• 3 points

FRENCH NEW WAVE CINEMA

This course traces the emergence and development of “New Wave” cinema in France in the 60s. Through a detailed analysis of some of its most iconic films: 400 Blows, Breathless, Hiroshima mon amour… the course will examine the radical artistic and social innovations of its major “auteurs”; Truffaut, Godard, Resnais et al. FREN BC1204: French Intermediate II or the equivalent level is required.

• Department: French @Barnard
• TR 2:40 p.m.-3:55 p.m.
• Instructor: Anne Boyman
  CULPA: 16 Info
• 3 points

PLAYWRITING II

Writing sample required to apply. Instructions and the application form can be found here:
https://english.barnard.edu/english/creative-writing-courses
. What makes a play alive? Often a playwright is surprised into their strongest work. The practices of experimentation and analysis, curiosity and audacity lead to new possibilities. Students will read and respond to plays, identifying elements and strategies, and each week bring in fragments and scenes written in response to weekly prompts. By the middle of the semester, students will choose the piece that feels the most viable and develop it into what in most cases will be a thirty page play. NOTE: Playwriting I (ENGL BC3113) is NOT a prerequisite, and students need not have written a play before.

• Department: English @Barnard
• T 4:10 p.m.-6 p.m.
• Instructor: Kathleen Tolan
  CULPA: 1 Info
• 3 points

EXPERIMENTAL MECH OF MATERIALS

Material behavior and constitutive relations. Mechanical properties of metals and cement composites. Structural materials. Modern construction materials. Experimental investigation of material properties and behavior of structural elements including fracture, fatigue, bending, torsion, buckling.

• Department: Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics
• W 1 p.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: Shiho Kawashima
  h-index: 24 Info
• 4 points

WHY DO BAD THINGS HAPPEN TO GOOD PEOPLE?

WHY BAD THINGS GOOD PEOPL

This course is an introduction to the field of inquiry called The Problem of Evil, or Theodicy – that is, the investigation of God in the face of evil and suffering in the world.  How do we justify God? How do we reconcile disaster, pain, and suffering with an all-good, all-knowing, all-compassionate God?   This question arises in all religious traditions, but here we will study only four: the Jewish, Christian, Muslim, and Hindu traditions, each of which proposes its own array of answers. Our emphasis will be on primary texts from each tradition, with introductory and interpretive secondary sources brought in as supplementary.  These primary sources will be discussed in class, but especially in required section meetings.  A sub-theme of the course is the “pastoral” dimension of answers to the Problem of Evil: to what extent are the answers we study comforting?  This course has been created with the many crises presently afflicting our world – COVID-19, climate change, and the injustice of racism, to name a few – in mind.

• Department: Asian and Middle East @Barnard
• MW 10:10 a.m.-11:25 a.m.
• Instructor: Rachel McDermott
  CULPA: 37 Info
• 4 points

STORY WRITING II

Writing sample required to apply. Instructions and the application form can be found here: 
https://english.barnard.edu/english/creative-writing-courses
. 

Spring 2026
Story Writing II is an advanced workshop in writing, with emphasis on the short story. Some experience in the writing of fiction is required. Each week we will read and analyze a variety of published short stories with an eye for craft and authorial decisions that might be applied to our own work. Writers we will read may include: Jean Stafford, Yiyun Li, Bryan Washington, Garth Greenwell, Lorrie Moore, Jamel Brinkley, Ling Ma, Cesar Aira, Mavis Gallant, and more. Exercises and in-depth workshop letters will push students to think more deeply about their own choices and the many layers that make up each work. Conference hours to be arranged.

• Department: English @Barnard
• R 12:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
• Instructor: Nellie G Hermann
  Info
• 3 points

MOD ARCHITECTURE IN THE WORLD

Prerequisites: Designed for but not limited to sophomores; enrollment beyond 60 at the discretion of the instructor. 

Modern Architecture in the World is an introduction to different arenas in which architecture’s modern condition has been disputed in the last two centuries across different geographies. The course will address significant transformations in the built environment as well as the forms of practice, epistemic frameworks, and ideologies that led them. It will also attend to the forms of labor and economies that engendered new structures and organizations of space, the material resources and industries mobilized in their construction, the identities and forms of power they represented and imposed, the manifold embodiments that they hosted and shaped, the diverse socialites and politics they supported, and the ecologies they negotiated.

The course is organized around a number of key themes, with each class covering episodes spanning the whole period under consideration, up until the present. In this way, it will question the existence of a single line of development, a master narrative, or a teleological line of progress and will highlight instead the multiple, simultaneous, conflicting, and branching genealogies unfolding throughout the period. Students will gain knowledge of key buildings, artifacts, trends, and schools as they relate to those genealogies.

Each lecture will emphasize contending and shifting positions across geographies within the arenas explored, understanding hegemonic trends as well as dissenting positions. While different locations around the world will be highlighted in each class, the course positions modern architecture in the world by privileging an exploration of the cultural and material networks and hierarchies characteristic of the period—with attention to colonialism, coloniality, migration, resource extraction, and war, among others.

• Department: Architecture @Barnard
• M 1:10 p.m.-2:25 p.m.
• Instructor: Anooradha I Siddiqi
  CULPA: 1 Info
• 4 points

FICTION WRITING

Writing sample required to apply. Instructions and the application form can be found here:
https://english.barnard.edu/english/creative-writing-courses
. 

Section 1 (taught by Sarah Wang in Spring 2026)
 
Narrative Strategies: 
This course will explore the different ways that stories can be told. How a story is written is as important as what a story is about. Is there a turn at the end that changes everything you thought you knew? Is the narrator speaking from inside experience, reportage from the front lines of another world? How can the epistolary form be utilized to effect? Students will workshop their own stories, participate in four in-class generative writing sessions, and read weekly short stories demonstrating various strategies for style, voice, setting, dialogue, form, and point of view. Particular focus will be placed on writing from the margins and writing as an act of bearing witness.

Section 2 (taught by Gina Apostol in Spring 2026):
 
This course will focus particularly on crafting the literary technique of point of view in fiction. Students will craft work with this question in mind: in what ways are art and ethics combined in the crafting of point of view? Students will practice writing from different narration modes: third person limited and omniscient, free indirect discourse, first person, and so on. They will consider the ethics of point of view by reading short stories, among them stories from Borges’s 
Labyrinths
, John Keene’s 
Counternarratives
, and Angela Carter’s 
Saints and Strangers.
 Some theoretical matters will include: postcoloniality in narration; identity in narration; ‘queering’ history; and critical race thought. Students will write three different pieces with the crafting of point of view in mind. Students will workshop each other’s pieces as well as discuss the texts in relation to their practice of the art of fiction.

• Department: English @Barnard
• T 6:10 p.m.-8 p.m.
• R 6:10 p.m.-8 p.m.
• Instructor: Sarah Wang
  Info
• Instructor: Gina Apostol
  Info
• 3 points

MODERN ARCHITECTURE IN THE WORLD - DISC

MODERN ARCH IN WORLD - DI

N/A

• Department: Architecture @Barnard
• W 1:10 p.m.-2:25 p.m.
• W 2:40 p.m.-3:55 p.m.
• W 1:10 p.m.-2:25 p.m.
• 0 points

ADVANCED POETRY WRITING

Writing sample required to apply. Instructions and the application form can be found here:
https://english.barnard.edu/english/creative-writing-courses
. 

What drives the music of a poem? How does one create rhythm and song? In what ways do chunks of language sort and arrange the perception of our readers? The purpose of this advanced poetry workshop is to closely study syntax, or in the words of Ellen Bryant Voigt, “the order of the words in each human utterance.” To further build upon our technical foundation as writers, we will also engage in other elements of craft, such as deep imagery, grammatical moods, tone, and poetic closure. We will be reading a variety of poets, including Etel Adnan, Rita Dove, Brigit Pegeen Kelly, John Murrillo, Choi Seungja, and Yuki Tanaka. Be prepared to generate new material independently for peer workshops where you will gain valuable feedback and constructive criticism. 

Apart from challenging your poetics on a technical level, I expect you to come to class with a strong desire to create meaning out of your daily lives, your personal or collective histories, and the futures that you are actively imagining. Your openness and willingness to grow as a human, poet, and critical thinker are fundamental to fostering a kind and supportive community in the classroom. Not only will you be writing poems, you will also learn to translate your soul’s language and help others do the same.

• Department: English @Barnard
• W 6:10 p.m.-8 p.m.
• Instructor: Monica Sok
  Info
• 3 points

SCREENWRITING FUNDAMENTALS

SCREENWRITING FUNDMENTALS

Prerequisites: FILM BC3201 or equivalent. Enrollment limited to 12 students. Priority is given to Film Studies majors/concentrations in order of class seniority. Corequisites: (Since this is a Film course, it does not count as a writing course for English majors with a Writing Concentration.)

This course is ideal for writers of their FIRST, SECOND AND THIRD screenplays. The first several weeks will focus on STORY: What it is, what it isn’t, how to recognize the difference. How to find your own individual stories that nobody else in the universe can tell.

From there we will make the transition to the highly individualized techniques, the strengths and limitations, the dynamics of telling a SCREEN STORY; what to leave in, what to leave out. As Michelangelo puts it—starting with a block of marble and chipping away everything that isn’t David.  Through studies of existing screenplays and films in coordination with and hands-on writing exercises which we will share in class, we will develop our skills in all aspects of screenwriting; building fascinating characters, dialogue, story construction (The BIG PICTURE) and scene construction (The Small Picture)

Perfection is not the goal; but rather it is to be able to say truly at the end of each day’s writing, “I did the best I could with what I had at the time. (Phillip Roth quoting heavyweight champion Joe Louis)

• Department: Film @Barnard
• R 5:40 p.m.-8:30 p.m.
• Instructor: Peter Nickowitz
  Info
• 3 points

CITY,LANDSCAPE, & ECOLOGY

City, Landscape, Ecology 
is a thematically driven course that centers on issues and polemics related to landscape, land settlement and ecology over the past two centuries. The class looks at changing attitudes to the natural world from the eighteenth century to the present, tracing important historical shifts in the consideration of nature across the ecological sciences, conservation practices, landscape design, and environmental activism, law and policy. Lectures focus on the critical role that artists and architects have played, and are to play, in making visible the sources of environmental degradation and in developing new means of mitigating anthropogenic ecological change.

City, Landscape, Ecology 
is divided into three parts. Part I explores important episodes in the history of 
landscape
: picturesque garden theory, notions of “wilderness” as epitomized in national and state parks in the United States, Modern and Postmodern garden practices, and place of landscape in the work of artists from the 1960s to the present. The purpose here is to better understand the role that territorial organization plays in the construction of social practices, human subjectivities, and technologies of power. Lectures in this part are shaped around a dialectical pair of historical episodes–– for example, the picturesque garden is paired with the enclosure of the commons, and American national parks are discussed in relation to the systematic removal of native peoples.

We then turn to 
ecology
 and related issues of climate, urbanization and sustainability in Part II. Here we will look at the rise of ecological thinking in the 1960s; approaches to the environment that were based on the systems-thinking approach of the era. In the session “Capitalism, Race and Population Growth” we examine the history of the “crisis” of scarcity from Thomas Robert Malthus, to Paul R. Ehrlich (
The Population Bomb
, 1968) to today and look at questions of environmental racism, violence and equity. 

The course concludes with Part III on 
Environmental Repair
. At this important juncture in the course, we will ask what is to be done today. We’ll examine the work of contemporary theorists, architects, landscape architects, policy makers and environmentalists who have channeled some of the lessons

• Department: Architecture @Barnard
• MW 4:10 p.m.-5:25 p.m.
• Instructor: Ralph Ghoche
  CULPA: 1 h-index: 2 Info
• 3 points

ADVANCED SCREENWRITING

Prerequisite: FILM BC3201 or equivalent. First priority enrollment is given to senior Film Studies majors/concentrations. 

This screenwriting seminar provides students an in-depth understanding of the short form which will help them turn their ideas into a short film script (up to 10 pages in length). With a focus on studying contemporary international short films students will learn to write their own short screenplay, as well as learn to give and receive feedback and receive tips on revising their scripts. Homework assignments will include watching films, reading short stories, writing exercises and reading screenplays.

• Department: Film @Barnard
• R 2:10 p.m.-5:30 p.m.
• Instructor: Danielle T Douge
  Info
• 3 points

CENS/FREEDOM-EXPR-ERLY MOD EUR

• Department: History
• M 4:10 p.m.-6 p.m.
• Instructor: Elisheva Carlebach
  CULPA: 6 Wikipedia Info
• 4 points

STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS

Methods of structural analysis. Trusses, arches, cables, frames; influence lines; deflections; force method; displacement method; computer applications.

• Department: Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics
• MW 10:10 a.m.-11:25 a.m.
• Instructor: Maria Q Feng
  CULPA: 3 h-index: 46 Info
• 3 points

PUBLIC SPEAKING

FIRST-YEAR PUBLIC SPEAKNG

Open only to undergraduates. 


This course will introduce you to principles of effective public speaking and debate, and provide practical opportunities to use these principles in structured speaking situations. You will craft and deliver speeches, engage in debates and panel discussions, analyze historical and contemporary speakers, and reflect on your own speeches and those of your classmates. You will explore and practice different rhetorical strategies with an emphasis on information, persuasion and argumentation. For each speaking assignment, you will go through the speech-making process, from audience analysis, purpose and organization, to considerations of style and delivery. The key criteria in this course are content, organization, and adaptation to the audience and purpose. While this is primarily a performance course, you will be expected to participate extensively as a listener and critic, as well as a speaker.

• Department: English @Barnard
• TR 11:40 a.m.-12:55 p.m.
• Instructor: Daniela Kempf
  Info
• 3 points

PUBLIC SPEAKING

Open only to undergraduates. 


This course will introduce you to principles of effective public speaking and debate, and provide practical opportunities to use these principles in structured speaking situations. You will craft and deliver speeches, engage in debates and panel discussions, analyze historical and contemporary speakers, and reflect on your own speeches and those of your classmates. You will explore and practice different rhetorical strategies with an emphasis on information, persuasion and argumentation. For each speaking assignment, you will go through the speech-making process, from audience analysis, purpose and organization, to considerations of style and delivery. The key criteria in this course are content, organization, and adaptation to the audience and purpose. While this is primarily a performance course, you will be expected to participate extensively as a listener and critic, as well as a speaker.

• Department: English @Barnard
• TR 1:10 p.m.-2:25 p.m.
• Instructor: Daniela Kempf
  Info
• 3 points

LITERATURE&CULTURES OF STRUGGLE IN S.AFR

Generations of resistance have shaped contemporary life in South Africa -- in struggles against colonialism, segregation, the legislated racism known as apartheid, and the entrenched inequalities of the post-apartheid era. Two constants in this history of struggle have been youth as a vanguard of liberation movements and culture as a weapon of struggle. As new generation of South African youth -- the born frees -- has now taken to the streets and social media to decolonize the university and claim their education as a meaningful right, this course traces the ways that generations of writers, artists, and activists have faced censorship, exile, and repression in an ongoing struggle to dismantle apartheid and to free the mind, the most powerful weapon in the hands of the oppressor according to Black Consciousness activist Steve Biko. This course traces the profoundly important roles that literature and other cultural production (music, photography, film, comics, Twitter hashtags like #rhodesmustfall and #feesmustfall) have played in struggle against apartheid and its lingering afterlife. Although many of our texts were originally written in English, we will also discuss the historical forces, including nineteenth-century Christian missions and Bantu Education, as well as South Africas post-1994 commitment to being a multilingual democracy, that have shaped the linguistic texture of South African cultural life.

• Department: Middle Eastern, South Asian and African Studies
• MW 2:40 p.m.-3:55 p.m.
• Instructor: Jennifer Wenzel
  CULPA: 3 h-index: 15 Info
• 3 points

PLATO

• Department: Philosophy
• TR 10:10 a.m.-11:25 a.m.
• Instructor: Wolfgang R Mann
  CULPA: 36 Info
• 3 points

Figure Painting: Alternative Source Mate

This class is designed to introduce you not only to the subject of painting the human figure and its expressive potential, but also to focus on the art and craft of Painting. We will be painting the figure from secondary source material that can include photos, other artworks, clay models etc. The focus will be on figurative narration. We will be learning to see color, and use paint in response to that. Painting is a way to account for, express and communicate what you have seen with your eyes, mind or in your imagination. You will be introduced to different approaches to the craft of painting, and will by the end of the semester be more free and confident in interpreting your inner and outer vision. We will also be looking at paintings made in different times and places and discuss how and why they look the way they do. You will also be designing and carrying out your own independent project to be completed by the final critique.

• Department: Visual Arts
• F 10 a.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: Wardell Milan
  Info
• 3 points

HOW TO BUILD A PERSON

Prerequisites: No prerequisites. Departmental approval NOT required. Character is something that good fiction supposedly cannot do without. But what is a character, and what constitutes a supposedly good or believable one? Should characters be like people we know, and if so, how exactly do we create written versions of people? This class will examine characters in all sorts of writing, historical and contemporary, with an eye toward understanding just how characters are created in fiction, and how they come to seem real to us. Well read stories and novels; we may also look at essays and biographical writing to analyze where the traces of personhood reside. Well also explore the way in which these same techniques of writing allow us to personify entities that lack traditional personhood, such as animals, computers, and other nonhuman characters. Does personhood precede narrative, or is it something we bestow on others by allowing them to tell their story or by telling a story of our own creation on their behalf? Weekly critical and creative exercises will intersect with and expand on the readings and discussions.

• Department: Writing
• R 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: Mina Seckin
  Info
• 3 points

STRUCTURAL DESIGN

Design criteria for varied structural applications, including buildings and bridges; design of elements using steel, concrete, masonry, wood, and other materials.

• Department: Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics
• TR 10:10 a.m.-11:25 a.m.
• Instructor: Tom T Panayotidi
  CULPA: 3 Info
• 3 points

Medieval Encounters

Though often thought of in mainstream culture as closed, conservative, and backwards, the medieval world was actually a place where the circulation of people and ideas resulted in generative encounters. This course will consider texts that brush up against the unfamiliar. We’ll read travelogues containing Western views of the East
and
Muslim views of Christian society, plus texts of questionable literary merit
and
difficult, artful poetry. Via our course readings, you’ll cross borders into strange lands with unaccountable customs, experience the possibilities of the marvelous, and interact with the afterlife and its denizens. Along the way, you’ll be having your own
medieval encounter
with worldview(s) that require contextual analysis to recuperate.

• Department: English and Comparative Literature
• W 8:10 a.m.-10 a.m.
• Instructor: Hannah Weaver
  Info
• 4 points

LITERACY:THEORY&PRACT FIELDWORK

• Department: Education @Barnard
• MW 8 a.m.-noon
• TR 8 a.m.-noon
• Instructor: Lisa Edstrom
  CULPA: 1 Info
• 0 points

INTRO TO SEXUALITY STUDIES

• Department: Women's and Gender Studies
• MW 2:40 p.m.-3:55 p.m.
• Instructor: Jack Halberstam
  Wikipedia Info
• 3 points

COMPUTER-AIDED STRUCTRL DESIGN

Corequisites: CIEN E3125. Introduction to software for structural analysis, design, and modeling with lab. Integration of software into project workflows. Introduction to best practices for modeling and verification of results using hand calculations.

• Department: Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics
• R 4:10 p.m.-6:40 p.m.
• 1 points

DESIGN PROJECTS

Capstone design project in civil engineering. This project integrates structural, geotechnical and environmental/water resources design problems with construction management tasks and sustainability, legal and other social issues. Project is completed in teams, and communication skills are stressed. Outside lecturers will address important current issues in engineering practice. Every student in the course will be exposed with equal emphasis to issues related to geotechnical engineering, water resources / environmental engineering, structural engineering, and construction engineering and management.

• Department: Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics
• R 1:10 p.m.-2:25 p.m.
• Instructor: Tom T Panayotidi
  CULPA: 3 Info
• 4 points

How to Write Funny

"Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die."   

--Mel Brooks 

"Comedy has to be based on truth. You take the truth and you put a little curlicue at the 

End."                                                                                                                --Sid Caesar 

"Analyzing humor is like dissecting a frog. Few people are interested and the frog dies of it."                                                                                                                                  --E.B. White 

 

"What is comedy? Comedy is the art of making people laugh without making them puke."                                                                                                                                       --Steve Martin 

"Patty Marx is the best teacher at Columbia University."

--Patty Marx 

O

• Department: Writing
• M 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: Patricia A Marx
  Info
• 3 points

An Odyssey of Odysseys: Receptions of Ho

Homer’s Odyssey, likely composed around the 9 th or 8 th century BCE, has had an enduring legacy. Our journey this semester will bring us into contact with a varied selection of artistic endeavors, spanning different cultures, times, and media, that draw on the Odyssey for material or inspiration. A guiding set of broadly-formulated questions will steer our course: Can we find in the Odyssey some of the same meaning, today, that it held for its original audience and that it held, subsequently, for later Greeks? Do receptions of the Odyssey try to recapture it, reframe it, refashion it, or become something independent?  (Are these mutually exclusive options?) How
do we read these works in light of the Odyssey, and also how do we re-visit and re-read the Odyssey in light of its receptions? It is no secret that the present bears the enduring weight of the past, but is the past changed as a result? There is no requirement to have read the Odyssey previously: students who have read it or have not read it will approach the course in different, but equally fruitful, ways.

• Department: Classics @Barnard
• TR 2:40 p.m.-3:55 p.m.
• Instructor: Darcy Krasne
  h-index: 5 Info
• 3 points