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How many different ways can you think of to look at chocolate? or baseball? or tattoos? or music?
Through a course called BCE 111: Perspectives, the first year seminar program at Brevard College addresses these very questions. Each Perspectives instructor chooses a topic of distinctive personal interest to help students practice skills of critical analysis and effective communication while cultivating the type of insight that comes from exploring a single issue through multiple “ways of seeing.” Learning is highly interactive and collaborative. In one seminar, for example, students engage in group projects to find out not only how different kinds of chocolate taste, but also how child labor is exploited in the manufacture and sale of chocolate, and how such abuses can be prevented through practices of “fair trade.” In another seminar, groups research tattoos as a form of cultural expression around the world, study practices of tattoo safety, and create a display of tattoo art featuring members of the local community. Topics and types of projects are limited only by the combined creativity of Brevard College faculty and students—which is to say, the sky’s the limit!
Perspectives classes are intentionally small (15-18 participants) and designed to assist first-year students in making a successful transition to college. Often, an upper-level student serves as a teaching assistant and peer mentor. Skills and dispositions developed in BCE 111 seminars provide a firm foundation for the college experience, and in particular for future courses in the college’s interdisciplinary core (BCE 211: Environmental Perspectives, linked learning communities, and BCE 411: BC and Beyond).
Sample topics offered by the faculty include the following:
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Peace and War
Hawk or Dove, make a choice. Explore it, understand it, own it. Your wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are your generation’s wars. You can love them or hate them, believe in them or disown them. Don’t ignore them. Together, we will explore Peace and War through fiction, drama, poetry, art, movies, essays, academic studies, history, and first hand accounts. In the process, we may discover what we value, cherish, honor, and believe.
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The Taboo of Tattoos
With a growing number of people using various forms of body art, including tattoos, you might be surprised to learn that the views of tattooing still vary greatly. Oklahoma only recently lifted its ban of tattooing and other body art, while numbers of underground artists had been doing business in the state despite the ban. Many of the “old rules” don’t seem to apply to body art of today. We will explore the various perspectives of tattooing through readings such as The Tattoo Artist, “Parker’s Back”, Tattoo Law and through watching documentaries such as Miami Ink.
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Puzzles and Problem Solving
Do you like figuring on ideas? Do you sit around and let your mind twist possible or probable or even exact solutions to problems and curiosities? What kinds of puzzles did you grow up on? Which ones do you still like? In this class we’ll think about various puzzles and problems and explore ways to solve and understand them.
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The Gothic and Popular Culture
Both as an artistic style and a literary genre, “Gothic” has helped shape many aspects of modern pop culture, from television and movies to modern video games and music, even breakfast cereal (“Frankenberry,” “Count Chocula,” etc.). In this class we will examine Gothic tales past and present and examine how aspects from such tales—haunted houses and headless horsemen, demons and Doppelgängers, ghosts and vampires and werewolves—have shaped American history and pop culture and continue to affect pop culture today.
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Thrills and Chills: The Horror Film and American Culture
Halloween, Night of the Living Dead, Scream, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. You have seen them. They have terrified you. Now take a second look at the horror movie genre, armed with a lexicon for “reading” film and an eye for critical detail to understand how horror films from Psycho to the present (with a “dip” back to Bram Stoker’s Dracula) are a major cultural force. This course is as sure to raise your awareness of how film works as it is to raise the hairs on the back of your neck. Come join us and scare up some cinema during your first semester at BC.
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Science Fiction, Religion, and the Meaning of Life
Of all genres, perhaps science fiction best allows creative artists and readers to imagine real and possible answers to the deep religious questions that have historically driven philosophers, theologians, and thinkers. Who are we? What do we want? Where did we come from? How does everything end? What is the meaning of life, the universe, and everything? In this class we examine science fiction short stories, motion pictures, novels, and television programs to ask how creative artists and wider society have asked and answered these questions. We also consider how science fiction has commented on and mirrored real-world religions. We use the tools and techniques of history, philosophy, religious studies, and media studies to ask different questions about religion and the science fiction genre. |
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Listening to Movies
Lights, camera, listen! In this course, you will be exposed to one of the greatest unseen actors in film history; the film soundtrack. Ever since cinema’s genesis, directors have understood music’s ability to heighten the audience’s emotions, bring them to tears, and make them jump from their seats in fear. Interestingly enough, the understanding of music and its ability to alter emotions, or affections, is not new as musicians throughout the past millennium recognized its ability to sooth any passion. In this course you will develop a broader understanding of film appreciation and history, and will understand music’s role as a critical component to the success of any movie. And yes, there will be popcorn!
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The Essence of Cool
What is the essence of cool? Is it a look? A beat? A way of being? Is it Frank Sinatra, Miles Davis, Kanye West? Is it Malian pop star Habib Koité or the ladies of Portuguese Fado? What about John Dowland (1563-1626) and Hildegard von Bingen (1098-1179)? Trends, fads, and styles change constantly. Or do they? Focusing primarily on music as a component of culture, and using a myriad of examples from around the globe and throughout history, we will explore not only the societal impacts of music, but consider how and why musical genres gain and lose popularity.
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Addicted to Jazz
Sex, drugs, and rock ’n roll is the popular phrase that typically associates drugs with music. Long before rock ‘n roll was around, jazz was America’s music and drugs were a large part of the jazz culture. In this course, we will learn about the history of jazz and the pervasive use of drugs by some of the most respected and prolific musicians in the field. Many used and became addicted to illicit drugs and some paid the ultimate price. We will learn about the music, the musicians, and the substances used. We will discuss and debate whether or not drugs contribute to the creative process and the consequences of the choice to use them.
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Food Fight: The Ecology of Food
Unlike Koalas and Panda Bears, human beings can eat a wide variety of foods. But what should we eat? Is being a vegetarian better for our health and our planet than being a carnivore? What is the difference between a Big Mac and an “organic, free-range, grass-fed, locally produced, family-farmed, sustainable, all-natural bison burger?” In this seminar we will explore the ecological, political, economic, and health implications of different diets and food choices.
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The Dinosaurs
This course will examine the gamut of the physical and life sciences as they apply to the dinosaurs. Examples from geology, physics, chemistry, mathematics, biology, paleontology, behavioral sciences, medical sciences, and engineering sciences will illustrate how scientific paradigms are created and destroyed as the course unveils the turbulent Earth of the Mesozoic.
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Chaos in Life, Learning, and Literature
If you think that your life is chaotic, you’re right! The word “chaos” has a “scientific” definition in addition to its common usage, and chaos is descriptive of many aspects of the natural world. What is the “butterfly effect?” What is a “strange attractor?” FRACTAL Hey! How did that word sneak into this paragraph (pretty chaotic, huh?), and what does the word “fractal” mean? Enjoy a foray into some popular, cultural, and scientific literature, open your mind to a small bit of new mathematics (painless, and not too difficult ... I promise!), and be prepared to study some beautiful images as we attempt to make some sense of this chaotic world.
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Batter Up! – Baseball as a Common Thread in American Society
This section will examine the history of baseball, specifically focusing on societal norms that have changed baseball or been changed by baseball. It will also look at baseball through the lenses of the art, music and writings of several generations.
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