Featured Cross Registered Courses

Interested at cross-registering for a course at Babson, Wellesley, or Olin? Click here to find out more information on the cross-registration process. Here are some featured courses being offered for the Spring 2020 semester:

 

Babson College

AHS 1000-06: Foundations of Critical Inquiry: Self in Context
Course Instructor: Jon Hodge
Course Meeting Times: MW 3:00 PM – 4:35 PM

The Arts and Humanities / History and Society Foundation (AHS) engages a combination of perspectives, including aesthetic, ethical, historical and societal, to explore a particular topic or theme. Exploring a topic such as nature, justice, or memory, for example, through a rich array of perspectives aims to develop the ability to see that all interpretations are impacted by the context, values, and attitudes of the interpreter—including, of course, our own. We use course materials from a range of media and genres to explore the topic and learn to use complexity and ambiguity to enrich and deepen our inquiry. This theme-based course aims to establish a foundation of skills that anticipate the more disciplinary and interdisciplinary analytical skills that are introduced at the Intermediate Level of the Liberal Arts Curriculum. A more detailed description of each theme can be found at http://www.babson.edu/Academics/undergraduate/core-experiences/Pages/home.aspx

ARB 4610-01: Elementary Arabic II: Language, Culture, and Business (Prerequisite: ARB2200) 
Course Instructor: Louissa Abdelghany 
Course Meeting Times: 11:30 AM – 1:05 PM 

ARB 4610 is a further study of the Arabic language and Arabic-speaking cultures. It will continue to build Arabic vocabulary, grammar and general communicative competence. It will also stress training in reading and writing short essays, and in enhancing spoken skills necessary for a variety of daily activities. Students will explore the differences between standard Arabic and the dialects used in different regions of the Arab speaking world. As the course progresses, more emphasis will fall on teaching Arabic in business contexts in an interactive and communicative way. This last part of the course will focus on developing students’ abilities in using Arabic in business environments, including commercial, media and financial purposes.

ARB 4650: Business Arabic (Prerequisites: ARB 2200 & ARB 4610. This course is open to High Intermediate, Advanced and heritage speakers of Arabic)
Course Instructor: Louissa Abdelghany
Course Meeting Times: TR 9:45 AM – 11:20 AM

This course aims to help students acquire and develop the tools necessary to learn about business in the Arab world from the Arabic media perspective. It introduces students to business vocabularies and helps them practice the four basic language skills of reading, writing, speaking and listening through extensive use of authentic Arabic business-related materials.
Students will learn the specialized structure and vocabulary of business Arabic, beginning with the analysis of headlines and telegraphic language and messaging, and continuing into video, radio, film, and web-based content. They will examine authentic and recent media Arabic materials taken from different Arabic newspapers and media sources such as Al-Hayat, Al-Ahram and Al-Jazeera with a view to introducing them to a variety of stylistic features and terminologies pertaining to the conventional and specialized writing of Arabic business writing. The course will be taught in Arabic and English.

FRN4640 French Cinema and Culture
Course Instructor: Sophia Niehaus

Course Meeting Times: MW 11:30 AM - 1:05 PM

This course is designed as an advanced-level conversation class, with a strong cultural component. The major course materials are French films and supplementary readings. These films and readings serve as the basis for debate, discussion and written analysis of issues relevant to the history, culture and politics of France and the francophone world of North Africa and the Caribbean, with a focus on global issues of social concern. This course is designed for students who have mastered the grammatical structures of French, although there will be review of grammar as needed. This course is not open to native speaker.

LVA 2039: Curiosity in Literature (Prerequisites: RHT and AHS)
Course Instructor: Melissa Leonard
Course Meeting Times:TR 8:00 AM – 9:35 AM

Curiosity contains within it a contradiction; it is our drive to know battling against our fear of the unknown, and it has played a major role in literature for a very long time. In this course, we will read texts that span several continents and centuries as we study curiosity and ask ourselves myriad questions. Why did the definition of curiosity change from negative to positive in the 14th century? Is curiosity hubristic tinkering or social responsibility? How is curiosity valued? Is the valuation of curiosity dependent on what is being sought? Is curiosity linked to gender? Who is rewarded for possessing it? Who is punished? If curiosity killed the cat, why? We will study Greek Myths and Fairy Tales as well as the following authors: John Milton, Christopher Marlowe, Mary Shelley, Edgar Allan Poe, Sigmund Freud, Agatha Christie, Anne Sexton, and Patricia Highsmith. We will also view Alfred Hitchcock's film Vertigo.

LVA 2049-01: Pilgrims and Pilgrimage in Literature (Prerequisites: RHT and AHS)
Course Instructor:  Mary C. Pinard
Course Meeting Times: TR 9:45 AM – 11:20 AM

The novelist Joyce Carol Oates has said, "To be an American is to be a kind of pilgrim ... a seeker after truth. The pilgrim is our deepest and purest self." In this course we'll explore the character of the pilgrim in selected fiction, essays, and poems, using questions such as: What inspires someone to take and retake pilgrimages: long, often difficult journeys far from home? What friendships and other communities form along the way and why? What besides self-enrichment do pilgrims hope to find, or possibly lose? Through close reading, discussion, and written analyses, we'll study how writers use setting, plot, and theme to consider these questions. There will also be one field trip, which will serve as a local pilgrimage. Course texts may include contemporary works by Kurt Vonnegut, Ursula Le Guin, and Curtis Sittenfeld, as well as selections from Dante, Petrarch, Chaucer,Basho, and Thoreau.

LVA 2081-01: Native American Literature (Prerequisites: RHT1000 and RHT1001 and AHS1000)
Course Instructor: Jordan Clapper
Course Meeting Times: TR 1:15 PM – 2:50 PM

North American Indigenous narratives take many forms, from the traditional forms of orature in culture formation to modern day practices like novels, comic books, and even video games. Indigenous narratives and the study of indigeneity, especially of the North American varieties, is inherently a multi-ethnic process. This class is designed to help you explore the wide range of indigenous narratives that have risen out of the hundreds and hundreds of individual tribes, both inde- and interdependent of each other, through the course of history. This class will explore various cultural, historical, and theoretical ways that these narratives and their worlds are constructed, while also grappling with the larger conversation of Native narrative and its many relationships.

MKT4525: Sustainable Marketing (pre-requisite:  Principles of Marketing)
Course Instructor:  Asheen Phansey
Course Meeting Times:  W 3:00 PM - 6:10 PM

The purpose of this course is to introduce students to the complexities of integrated sustainability from a managerial perspective. Both consumers and businesses are demanding solutions to sustainability issues for products and services throughout the value chain. Today’s sustainability issues are all encompassing and include strategies for managing structural injustice challenges, and ecological integrity concerns throughout the entire ideation to go-to-market process. Firms must make thoughtful investment and resource decisions that consider multiple stakeholder perspectives using a systems thinking lens, carefully evaluating all risks and rewards. Furthermore, entrepreneurs and marketers must learn to adapt their marketing strategies to sustainable products and services to redefine the value proposition.

SEN 1329 (Non-Credit Course)
Course Instructor:  Melissa Denizard, Babson Senior Instructor
Course Meeting Times:  First 6 Wednesdays in Spring 2020 beginning January 29, 6:30 PM - 9:00 PM

This non-credit course is through the Babson Senior-Led Seminar Program. Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter has been cultivating her rich and dynamic career for over 20 years. The notorious and equally dynamic Beyhive considers each of Beyoncé’s albums to be a new era -- a newly defined moment of Beyoncé’s growth. Contemporary Beyoncé is often described as pro-Black and pro-women, but the picture is more complex. In order to fully understand Beyoncé’s personal branding, we must study how her racial and gender identities have manifested throughout her career. Through a dynamic seminar and an analysis of her body of work, students will study the evolution of Beyoncé’s personal brand by grounding our understanding in the expansiveness of Black feminism, the prevalence of racial capitalism, and the Movement for Black Lives.

SEN 1330: Like a Rolling Stone: Understanding Rock & Roll (Non-Credit Course)
Course Instructor: Natalie Novak, Babson Senior Instructor
Course Meeting Times: First 6 Wednesdays in Spring 2020 beginning January 29, 6:30 PM - 9:00 PM

This non-credit course is part of the Babson Senior-Led Seminar Program. This seminar will examine some of the most influential rock songs of the 1960s, 70s, and 80s. At the course’s core, students will listen to and discuss songs such as Whole Lotta Love, Pinball Wizard, and Help. Students will also learn about how the songs were created and connect them to a broader cultural context. For each song, the seminar will explore “why this song, for this audience, at this time?” Broad topics will include Beatlemania, Psychedelic Rock, New-Wave and Glam, and students should come prepared to hear new songs and enjoy themselves!

SEN 1331: The Taiwan Strait: History, Politics, and a Troubled Relationship
Course Instructor: Viola Du, Babson Senior Instructor
Course Meeting Times: First 6 Wednesdays in Spring 2020 beginning January 29, 6:30 PM - 9:00 PM

This non-credit course is part of the Babson Senior-Led Seminar Program.  The Taiwan Strait, with its significant geographical location and well-publicized political tensions, is an important part of the U.S.’s Asian Pacific strategy. However, many do not fully understand the complex history of this piece of land. How did tensions between mainland China and Taiwan escalate to where they are today? And what is the U.S. role in this relationship?  This seminar explores the history of mainland China and Taiwan, including U.S. intervention, from WWII to present. Students will discuss the triangular relationship among the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), the Nationalist Party (KMT), and the U.S. Topics will include the Chinese Civil War, the U.S. notion of the “loss of China,” conflicts between mainland Chinese immigrants and indigenous Taiwanese, and the changing of Taiwanese identity, to name a few. This seminar stands at the intersection of history, political science, and international relations. It aims to provide an introduction, so that students can form their own analyses about Taiwan, objectively and critically.

SPN4640-01: Spanish at the Movies (Prerequisites: SPN4620, or equivalent proficiency as demonstrated through a required placement test)
Course Instructor: Meghan Allen
Course Meeting Times: MW 1:15 PM – 2:50 PM

This course is designed as an advanced-level conversation class, with a strong cultural component. The major course materials are contemporary Spanish language films and supplementary readings. Through the lens of ethical questions and concerns that surface in these films, students will study issues relevant to the history, culture, and politics of contemporary Latin America and Spain. Films and readings serve as the basis for debate, discussion, and written analysis. This course aims to ease the path towards greater fluency through improvements in accuracy and more spontaneous communication.  Not open to fluent speakers of Spanish.

Olin College

ENGR 3199: Satellite Systems and Consulting Business Practices
Course Instructor: Professor Whitney Lohmeyer
Course Meeting Times: W 3:20 pm - 6:00 pm
This course provides students with the opportunity to learn about the multifaceted engineering discipline of satellite systems through the experience of a semester-long, customer-client consulting simulation. The primary technical areas covered are orbital mechanics and satellite communications design (link budgets, availability, propagation impacts). On the first day of class, students will begin building their orbit propagator in Matlab, which they will expand upon (including aspects of communications design) throughout the course of the semester. To gain insight into the policy and regulatory hurdles the satellite industry faces, students will also dive into orbital debris mitigation (understanding the legalities, or lack thereof, of launching and deorbiting spacecraft) and spectrum management (licensing spacecraft through the FCC and the International Telecommunications Union (ITU)). Throughout the semester, students will be given assignments in the form of consulting arrangements for which they have to negotiate their hourly rate, invoice their customer, and pay estimated quarterly taxes. The course will conclude with a satellite communications system design project that will require use of their orbit propagator, industry tools like STK and NASA’s Orbital Debris Assessment software and build upon each of the lessons learned throughout the course.

ENGR 3535/SCI2235: Biomimicry (Prerequisite: ENGR 2250, SCI12** - Waived for Babson and Wellesley students)
Course Instructor: Jean Huang and Ben Linder
Course Meeting Times: MR 10:50AM-12:30PM
We can learn from nature! From studying a leaf to make a better solar cell to emulating natural processes to develop living buildings, the discipline of Biomimicry views nature as “model, mentor and measure (Benyus, 1997). Spiders spin protein silk with the strength of steel yet much lighter all at ambient temperature and pressure. Cuttlefish change color to match their surroundings in milliseconds by contracting their chromatophores and even bioluminesce. In this course we will study wonders like these to appreciate the beauty and sophistication of life by investigating the biological mechanisms and functions of organisms as well as the dynamics of whole ecosystems. By examining biological systems at multiple scales, we can draw insights from understanding how they work. By collecting data, running experiments, creating models, or building prototypes, we can translate these insights into design ideas and practice. We will examine and discuss big ideas and thinking in biology and design and then synthesize and reflect on the intersection of these fields. Students will develop skills and insights through critical analysis of readings and the development of projects that draw on both fields. Biological systems have undergone 3.8 billion years of evolution, resulting in time-tested approaches to living on earth that are efficient and embody sustainability. By exploring the intersection of biology and design, we might learn to do the same. This course is cross listed with SCI2235. Enrollment in ENGR3235 is as design depth as projects will be focused on engineering design solutions. If advanced science credit is desired, enroll in SCI2235.

 

Wellesley College

AMST/ENG 116: Asian American Fiction
Course Instructor: Yoon Sun Lee
Course Meeting Times: M/R 11:20 AM - 12:35 PM

At various times over the past century and a half, the American nation has welcomed, expelled, tolerated, interned, ignored, and celebrated immigrants from Asia and their descendants. This course examines the fictions produced in response to these experiences. We will see in these works irony, humor, tragedy, mystery, the emergence of a self-conscious Asian American identity, as well as transnational structures of feeling. Writers include Maxine Hong Kingston, Jhumpa Lahiri, Chang-Rae Lee, Le Thi Diem Thuy, Lisa Ko.

ENG 282,: Topics in Literary Criticism (Ghost Stories Around the World)
Course Instructor: Yoon Sun Lee
Course Meeting Times: M/T 2:20 PM - 3:35 PM

Everyone loves ghost stories, but why? Do we believe in their truth? Do we see ghosts as something that people from other cultures believe? We will explore stories about ghosts from across the world and through history, as well as literary criticism that addresses how we read and how literature represents reality. Stories and plays will include well-known works such as Hamlet and Toni Morrison's Beloved, as well as non-European fiction such as Amos Tutuola's The Palm-Wine Drinkard, and Hwang Sok-Yong's The Guest