Course overview
Despite their diversity, the contemporary Humanities and Social Sciences (HUMSS) share an intellectual genealogy and a core set of methodologies and critical approaches. This course will introduce you to several of these, including feminism, postcolonialism, historical materialism, science and technology studies, and indigenous knowledges. It will situate the HUMSS disciplines in their longer-run historical contexts, exploring how events like the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, and imperialism have shaped contemporary thought, and addressing critiques of these developments advanced by more recent scholars. This rigorous and systematic overview of the field will prepare you for your further studies whatever your major, while introducing you to the cohort of your fellow Arts Advanced students. The course will equip you with foundational academic skills in research and writing, and also serves as background and preparation for the third year Advanced Arts: Theory and Method course.
Course learning outcomes
- Situate their own program of study in the context of the history and development of the Humanities and Social Sciences
- Give an account of the broad forces shaping HUMSS thought between its emergence and today, including those of Indigenous and non-Western traditions
- Recognise the contributions of HUMSS thinkers and paradigms to contemporary debates over identity
- Make use of those paradigms in framing students' own analyses and critiques, and develop these in discussion with peers
- Organise content from a range of sources to aid knowledge retention as well as research and assessments
- Find, evaluate, and incorporate pertinent scholarly sources
- Present the results of research and critical analysis in the form of an academic essay