Syllabus highlights

This course provides a capstone experience for students majoring in the Arts, Humanities, and Communications disciplines. Combining shared readings and seminar discussion with independent projects and the development of an ePortfolio, the course provides structured opportunities for students to reflect on their education, showcase their learning and disciplinary skills, and translate them for professional environments. The course concludes with a celebratory Arts and Humanities symposium in which students present their projects and/or portfolios.

This course satisfies the following requirements: History capstone, ISH capstone, Art capstone, ENG 334: Methods in Literary and Cultural Criticism. It is a recognized elective for the ENG and WRT minors as well.

ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS & TOPICS

  • How do we define the humanities? How has that definition–or its connotations–changed over time?
  • What do the humanities do for us? What do we do with them?
  • What do artists, historians, literary critics or authors have in common? How do their assumptions, approaches, methods, and materials differ?
  • Can study of the humanities make us more empathic people or better citizens?
  • Should the humanities be valued for their “soft skills” or precisely for their “uselessness”?
  • What story do I want to tell about my education and myself? 
  • How can I translate my education as a historian/artist/literary critic/philosopher for a general audience? 
  • How can I use my digital identity to “market,” “brand,” or position myself in relation to a specific employer?

COURSE GOALS

  • Bring students into multidisciplinary conversations about the cultural role and value of the Arts and Humanities in the 21st century
  • Reinforce critical reading, writing, and communication skills through seminar discussion, independent writing projects, ongoing development of ePortfolio
  • Help students articulate the potential applications of their disciplinary skill sets in future careers
  • Help students develop outward-facing professional materials
  • Help students develop the story of  their undergraduate education experience

STUDENT LEARNING OUTCOMES

Students who complete the Arts and Humanities Capstone will be able to

  • Synthesize and reflect on their academic coursework and experiential learning
  • Select, re-envision, and revise (or remediate) previous work in an independent project
  • Connect their specific disciplinary education to broader conversations in the Arts and Humanities
  • Showcase their work digitally through the development of an ePortfolio
  • Present and discuss their work orally in a public symposium
  • Identify, adapt, and present their disciplinary skills in resumes and cover letters

REQUIRED TEXTS
To ground our discussions, we’ll read articles, essays, and book chapters that will be available from UNE’s library subscriptions and/or made available through this course site. To minimize distractions in class, please PRINT the assigned pages when you access the eBook.

Harris, Joseph. Rewriting (Utah State 2017)

Nussbaum, Martha. Not for Profit: Why Democracy Needs the Humanities, Princeton, 2016.

Small, Helen. The Value of the Humanities (Oxford 2013). (Also in Ketchum library AZ 182 S6355v 2013  

Additional Sources of Interest

  • Zakaria, Fareed. In Defense of Liberal Education (Norton 2015)
  • Scarry, Elaine. On Beauty and Being Just (Princeton 2001)

GRADING AND EVALUATION

Workload Expectations in College Courses

College courses in the US are required to include both in- and out-of-class work. For a three-credit course, a student should expect to work, on average, 3 hours per week in class and 6 hours per week out of class.

ASSIGNMENTS AND PROJECTS

  • Daily reading, informal writing, and engagement………………….50%
    • Attendance (20%)
    • Journals (20%)
    • Benchmarks (10%)
  • Independent Revision Project and framing statement………….25%
    • Peer Review draft (10%)
    • Final Draft (10%)
    • Framing Statement (5%)
  • ePortfolio and framing statement…………………………………………….15%
    • Maintenance/navigation/completeness (5%)
    • Framing (10%)
  • SAH symposium presentation…………………………………………………..10%