The exploration level of the University Core Curriculum is a new addition to the Core that started in the Fall of 2022. Classes for this level are designated by an ‘X’ in the course number, with the X suggesting the intersection of multiple Core Habits of Heart and Mind. The list of class offerings evolves each semester.
The exploration level is intended to build off the foundation level, so students should wait until making significant progress on foundation level classes before taking X courses. Students are eligible to take X courses starting in their sophomore year, but many wait until junior or senior year in order to have completed foundation level coursework.
The intention of the exploration level is for students to add interdisciplinary breadth to their educational experiences, so students should try to take X classes outside their major areas. If, for example, students are majoring in a science, technology, engineering, or math (STEM) field, they should look to offerings in the humanities or social sciences. If students are majoring in the arts or humanities, they should look to offerings in the sciences. All X courses are designed to be accessible for any student who has completed relevant foundation level course work.
Exploration level courses intentionally address two Core Habits of Heart and Mind, offering multiple lenses from the liberal arts to understand timely and timeless issues of human concern. Approved exploration level courses designated with an “X” in the course number are listed below with information about the two Core Habits most relevant to the class.
Course Description: This course will engage students with scientific and global perspectives on coral reefs, which are a critical habitat for thinking about how ecosystems and human communities navigate global climate change. Students will explore research from ecology, conservation, economics, history, politics, and cross-cultural perspectives in ways that will help promote interdisciplinary problem-solving and environmental justice.
Course Description: The study of chemistry in a variety of art forms. Students engage in creative processes through in-class activities, some of which result in the creation of a tangible piece of art (etched glass, fresco, cyanotype, diazo print, copper etching, and jewelry colored by thin film interference). Other topics include pigments and dyes, paintings, photography, and techniques used to analyze artworks and detect forgeries. Two papers and a student-designed final project are assigned.
Course Description: In this transdisciplinary course, and with the instruction of faculty across the University, students will engage with ideas about moral and emotional dimensions of a good life. Students will learn how different disciplines think about human flourishing in domains ranging from work and relationships to health and technology. While this course meets one hour weekly for in person dialogue, additional learning will take place asynchronously online.
Course Description: Students learn to interrogate key ways science and communication intertwine in this politically polarized internet era, draw conclusions about those interconnections; and develop means to understand, help shape, advocate, and communicate representative science. Projects, field outings, films, discussions, and community experts help unpack communication’s roles in science.
ENG 373X: African American WritersCourse Description: This course is a study of important works by African American writers, from the slave narratives of the nineteenth century to the prose, poetry, and drama of the twentieth century.
Course Description: Drawing from a range of literature, this course takes an interdisciplinary approach to environmental justice theory and practice. Students will interrogate the historical legacies of the disproportionate burdens of ecological issues on minority groups in the U.S. and worldwide. Students will learn to evaluate the roles that environmental justice movements have played in the struggle to meet the needs of vulnerable populations around the world
Course Description: This course centers on understanding global climate change from science, policy, and social justice perspectives. Rather than approaching these as individual components of climate change, the course focuses on the relationships and dynamics between all three within a global social-ecological system. Emphasis is on current context, bridging the gap between the Global North and South, and the toolsets needed to create solutions.
HST 334X: The Age of the CrusadesCourse Description: What role did the crusades play in the history of Europe and the broader Mediterranean World? Why did so many Christians go on crusade? How did Muslims understand the crusading movement? How did the idea of crusade evolve over time? This course will consider these questions, the evolution of the crusading movement, and its modern legacy.
Course Description: In this course, students will study the historical and cultural contexts of Western music from the Medieval era through the mid-19th Century. How do literature, humanism, war, and religion impact music? Music is not composed in a vacuum, and this class will explore the influence of art, cultural, and sociopolitical conditions.
Course Description: A study of jazz from its roots to the present day, including styles, performers, composers, and culture.
Course Description: This course explains the nature and source of reality in classical and contemporary Asian philosophies. It focuses on such questions as the origin and nature of ultimate reality, the nature of the self in relation to reality, freedom and causality in human existence, idealism and realism, and methodological approaches to apprehending reality.
Course Description: This course explores Native American philosophy with particular emphasis on Mexico or the continental U.S. Topically, the course focuses on metaphysical aspects of Native American thought such as the nature or reality, time, space, truth, freedom, the self, and the relationship between the self and the world.
Course Description: Drawing on critical theory and practice perspectives, this course examines how social forces operate to marginalize non-dominant groups and introduces methods for dismantling oppressive systems. Students will engage models for liberation and anti-oppressive practice across interpersonal, institutional, and societal levels. Special emphasis will be placed on addressing white supremacy, heterosexism/cis-sexism, ableism, and their intersections.
SOC 336X: Race and Racism in the United StatesCourse Description: This course introduces concepts and theories in the sociology of race and racism to develop racial literacy. The course examines how race and racism structure everyday life and shape the life chances of individuals and groups. The course emphasizes historical and contemporary race relations in the U.S., but comparative analyses of race and racism are also explored.
Course Description: This course invites students to engage with questions concerning God in general and gendered metaphors used for the reflection about God in particular. This class emphasizes that theological reflection is always rooted in historical and cultural context of people engaged in that reflection. It examines both "Father" and "Mother" language used for the Divine from various historical/cultural locations and highlights how the feminine imagery for the divine and women were written out of the Christian tradition due to a particular view of women held within the Roman Empire. This course draws on multiple disciplines and different ways of knowing.
Course Description: This course explores the prophetic tradition in biblical and contemporary times. Selected texts are read in context of cultural and global realities to discover how culture has shaped texts and how texts continue to create and shape cultures and worldviews. Topics include God, gender, power, politics, justice, empire, ecology, hope, prophetic vision, and what it means to be prophetic today.
THE 328X: Encountering Grief and LossCourse Description: This course explores the human experience of suffering, loss, and grief from the perspective of practical theology, incorporating multi-disciplinary and inter-religious learnings and insights. It seeks to help students understand suffering and prepare them to encounter loss and grief in their personal and professional lives.
THE 330X: Environmental Justice and Interreligious Ecological EthicsCourse Description: Drawing from the wealth of Catholic social teaching, Hindu dharmic ecology, Buddhist ecology of interdependence, and American Indian Lakota ecology, and using vision, norm, and choice paradigm, this course addresses issues of environmental justice in various global contexts. It engages in case studies, using an ethical methodology that navigates conflict situations, forming students to be intelligent interlocutors of environmental issues and agents of transformative change in the world.
Course Description: This course will explore the connection between rituals of worship and the ethical behavior of the people who practice those rituals. As a form of language, rituals exert influence on how people understand themselves and how they behave toward others. This course will address topics such as ecology, gender, economics, race, culture, and technology.
Course Description: This course is an exploration of the wisdom offered by various religious traditions for responding to a time of ecological crisis. In this course, students will examine the role of religious experience in making ethical decisions about creation-care, reflect upon their own response to ecological crisis, and design spiritual practices expressive of that response.
Course Description: This course introduces, explores, and evaluates queer Christian theologies. Examining sources and methods within this burgeoning theological sub-field, it traces developments of queer(ing) theologies—from early turns to Scripture/doctrine affirming same-sex relationships, to efforts revising theologies in light of queer lives—and considers key themes, future possibilities, and impacts on ecclesial and public contexts.
Course Description: This course examines the phenomenon of violence in the first five centuries of Christian history. While the study of religious violence often concerns themes such as sacrifice, martyrdom, and holy war, this course focuses on practices of social violence, especially those related to the propagation of Christianity. The course is built upon three lines of inquiry: first, the presence of divinely-legitimized violence in Christianity’s sacred texts and how those texts have been subsequently interpreted; second, the utilization of violent rhetoric and behavior towards religious outsiders; and third, the employment of violence within Christian communities as a mechanism for disciplining members and policing sectarian boundaries.
Course Description: An in-depth study of the diverse landscape of theatre in the United States from pre-Colombian performances up to our present moment. Students will consider how the modern American theatre is the product of a variety of theatrical movements, styles, and genres and envisage how they, as the next generation, can foster a more equitable theatrical landscape. Special emphasis will be placed on plays written by playwrights of color and in discovering the long legacy of racial theatre in the U.S.
University of Portland
5000 N. Willamette Blvd.,
Portland, Oregon 97203-5798
503.943.8000
