Catalog of Courses for Global Studies
Theories and cases studies concerning social, cultural and historical aspects of business, trade, finance, organizations, property systems, regulation and work. How are economic institutions and systems of exchange shaped by social and cultural contexts that they affect in turn? What alternative ways of organizing commerce are suggested by world comparative and historical study?
This is one of the two introductory core courses in the GCCS major. It surveys academic research on topics that are salient to contemporary global commerce: the global and the local; illicit trade; the body across borders; global labor; technology and digital infrastructures; trade and physical infrastructures; companies and climate change; global economic governance; and social goals in the international division of labor.
New or one-time offerings at the 3000 level in Global Commerce in Culture and Society. Please see Global Studies Program website for full topic descriptions.
In this course, Global Commerce in Culture and Society students will complete a 25-page research paper, as the culminating work of the major. Each student will choose readings relevant to his or her project and present them to the class, leading the discussion.
This introductory social science course develops a cultural understanding of global commerce and travel. We begin with the anthropological notion of cultures and languages as keys to human diversity. We then look at some of the ways different cultures are connected today through international business, including the business of travel.
The course analyzes our global cultural condition from a dual historical perspective and follows a development stretching over the last 60 years, beginning with the period just after WW II and continuing to the present day. Of central concern will be the varieties of cultural expression across regions of the world and their relation to a rapidly changing social history, drawing upon events that occur during the semester.
This course provides the opportunity to offer new topics in the subject of Global Development Studies.
Theoretical approaches to global development from anthropology, economics, environmental sciences, history, politics, and sociology, and analysis of selected case studies. Prerequisite: the student must be a GDS major in order to enroll. Instructor permission.
Theoretical approaches to global development from anthropology, economics, environmental sciences, history, politics, and sociology, and analysis of selected case studies. This is the second course in a two-semester sequence. Prerequisite: GDS 3010 AND the student must be a GDS major in order to enroll. Instructor Permission.
Social entrepreneurship is an approach to creating system-level change through the application of entrepreneurial thinking to social ventures, non-profit organizations, government institutions, and NGOs to create economic, environmental, and social value for multiple stakeholders. Students will survey a range of social-entrepreneurial approaches from the non-profit to the for-profit.
Examines the protocols of planning for and conducting development projects and the research associated with them both locally and internationally. Special attention to the ethical obligations inherent in development work and the dynamics of collaborating with local communities. Prerequisite: Instructor permission AND the student must be a GDS major in order to enroll.
Students are required to enroll in both semesters of this year-long course. The spring semester of this course on engaged learning in global/local development is designed to support students who are already working with non-university colleagues. We continue reading in the theory and practice of community engagement, trouble shoot community-based activities, and begin evaluating student learning and our impacts on those with whom we are working.
Grounded in the field of environmental history, this course examines the ways in which enviornmental changes and perceptions of nature have interacted with socio-economic structures and processes associated with the expansion of Europe since the 15th century.
Buddhism takes an ethical and practical view of how individuals and societies can develop toward greater equity, sustainability, and satisfaction. This course will investigate, from a Buddhist perspective and practicing Vipassana meditation, the state of development in the developed and developing world, in Buddhist and Western societies, with emphasis on the role of the individual, personal choice, and personal growth.
This course will survey the history of scientific and technical interventions in development, as well as examine the factors that shape the outcomes of contemporary practices. We will look at science and technology in two broad areas in which UVA has considerable expertise: the built environment and public health.
Course offers a flexible structure for students studying abroad to learn to be intentional, self-reflective, and curious in how they transact and engage across cultures. It consists of independent assignments organized around methods used by social scientists to understand different cultures and worldviews. It is intended as a supplement to education abroad and can be adapted to different timeframes and locations. Second of 3-course sequence.
This course explores the legacy of the "hidden wounds" left upon the landscape by plantation slavery along with the visionary work of ecofeminist scholars and activists daring to imagine an alternative future. Readings, guest lectures, and field trips illumine the ways in which gender, race, and power are encoded in historical, cultural, and physical landscapes associated with planting/extraction regimes such as tobacco, mining, sugar, and corn.
This course provides the opportunity to offer new topics in the subject of Global Development Studies.
This seminar takes up questions of responsibility and fairness posed by climate change as ways into a search for shared ground across moral traditions. It investigates the ethical dimensions of climate change as a way to consider broad frameworks for developing responsibilities across national, cultural, and religious borders.
This seminar offers an examination of the state, civil society, and citizens, focusing on the ways in which these actors and institutions interact to shape economic, human, and political development. The course introduces theories of the state, civil society, and citizenship, and examines the linkages between these spheres, applying these theories to substantive issues and policy arenas.
This course provides the opportunity to offer new topics in the subject of Global Development Studies.
This is the first semester internship at either UVA Art Museum or Kluge Ruhe. Students will work approximately 100 hours per semester in the museum, and will participate in three training sessions and three academic seminars. Instructor Permission, by application; deadline May 1. Please see information at www.virginia.edu/art/arthistory/courses and www.artsandsciences.virginia.edu/globaldevelopment
This is the second semester internship at either UVA Art Museum or Kluge Ruhe. Students will work approximately 100 hours per semester in the museum, and will participate in three training sessions and three academic seminars. ARTH/GDS 4951 and instructor permission, by application; deadline May 1. Please see information at www.virginia.edu/art/arthistory/courses and www.artsandsciences.virginia.edu/globaldevelopment
Students learn about the history, demographics, current trends in student mobility, and the principles and practices in effective education abroad advising and administration. Students gain first-hand exposure to the operations of an education abroad office and acquire knowledge and develop skills needed to enter the field of education abroad advising and administration. Prerequisite: Completed a study abroad program, Instructor Permission.
Students continue their examination of student mobility and principles and practices in effective education abroad advising and administration. Students gain first-hand exposure to the operations of an education abroad office and acquire knowledge and develop skills needed to enter the field of education abroad advising and administration. Prerequisite: Completion of GSGS 4961; Instructor permission.
In this seminar, GDS majors complete their GDS research paper. Prerequisite: Instructor permission AND the student must be a GDS major in order to enroll.
Independent Study. Prerequisites: Instructor permission.
This interdisciplinary course introduces students to critical global economic and cultural issues and examines globalization at a variety of scales of analysis (planetary, regional, national, individual). The goal is to provide understanding of the main conceptual approaches to global studies and thus enhance their ability to understand and evaluate important real-world issues and problems.
A liberal arts perspective on commerce, or business, as a part of modern American (and global) culture.
The course analyzes our global cultural condition from a dual historical perspective and follows a development stretching over the last 60 years, beginning with the period just after WW II and continuing to the present day. Of central concern will be the varieties of cultural expression across regions of the world and their relation to a rapidly changing social history, drawing upon events that occur during the semester.
This course will introduce students to the multifaceted worlds of Islam, through an interdisciplinary survey of its diverse instantiations across more than1400 years of history, and geographies that span the globe. Drawing on the resources we have at UVA across multiple departments, students will be offered a pluralistic engagement into social, artistic, intellectual, economic and political worlds infused with Islamic sensibilities and ethics.
This course explores the changing relationships between people in Africa, their environments, and global neighbors since 1900. Issues covered include imperialism, conservation, the Green Revolution, HIV/AIDS, petroleum, Chinese investments, and recent viral epidemics. Course focus is on Africa, but issues are global and comparative, and learning therefore applicable to other places.
This course explores migration's relation to global development initiatives. When do migrants "count" in development projects, and when do they not? What kinds of political, social, and economic claims are migrants permitted to make on their own terms, and when are these claims mediated by development and humanitarian initiatives?
This course provides the opportunity to offer new topics in Global Studies.
This course covers social, economic, political, and cultural dimensions of inequality both within and between countries. We will discuss how systems like slavery, colonialism, and capitalism have entrenched unequal power relations across the globe; how structures of inequality are produced, legitimated, and reproduced at national and international scales; and how individuals experience and negotiate these structures.
The course analyzes our global cultural condition from a dual historical perspective and follows a development stretching over the last 60 years, beginning with the period just after WW II and continuing to the present day. Of central concern will be the varieties of cultural expression across regions of the world and their relation to a rapidly changing social history, drawing upon events that occur during the semester.
This course examines leading schools of thought in Global Studies from a critical perspective. Students will engage with foundational political, social, and cultural concepts that underpin contemporary economic, cultural, and political institutions of power. The course brings together material from anthropology, political theory, and cultural studies.
This course examines the US military tradition of humanitarian aid, civil reconstruction, and economic/rural development, through case studies from the last two decades. We study the history, policies, and doctrines that made this work possible, but our primary focus will be to ask and, collaborating with practitioners, learn methods, ethics, precedents, and insights for international development from this largely neglected tradition.
Epistemologies, methodologies and methods currently used in Global research as well as emerging alternatives. We will examine: pressures for knowledge production that is co-authored with non-academic actors; historical and contemporary uses of research methods by global actors; the differing audiences for research that our students speak to across global spaces; and interest in knowledge that contributes more directly to social action.
This course takes an ethnographically informed approach to the question of how to understand corruption by examining practices of and perspectives on corruption from across the globe - including the so-called Global North. It aims to encourage students to 1) critically assess assumptions at the heart of international anti-corruption discourses; 2) examine tensions between global discourses of corruption and local practices; 3) compare and contrast corruption between different localities.
What is 'work'? Are women seen as 'workers'? Are there women who do not 'work'? What is the history of paid, less paid, and unpaid work? This course focuses on new trends in the relationship between gender, class and work; and will reveal emerging possibilities in knowledge and practice through changes or reversal in the gender order and its impact on work and its relationship with capital.
This course examines debates about social movements and development, from workers responding to changes in their sphere of work, to communities responding to the seizure of land, water or other resources. Issues will include displacement, migration, trafficking, labor rights, environmental damage; gender, class and caste aspects of movements; human rights of marginalized groups; the role of the state and non-state organizations.
How do developing countries in the global South navigate the emergence of renewed great power competition? This class will explore the impact of European & non-Euro imperialism on large parts of the developing World. We will seek to answer this question by looking at the engagement of countries & actors in the global South with established and emerging powers in an increasingly multi-polar World.
Geography matters! We'll explore theories & cases to better understand issues as the struggle over the ocean/other public commons, the role of sacred spaces in Indigenous communities, how migrants make a place for themselves in their new homes, economic resilience and how capital, goods and people circulate in the economy, and more. This is a good introduction to themes raised in Global Studies.
Course offers a flexible structure for students studying abroad to learn to be intentional, self-reflective, and curious in how they transact and engage across cultures. It consists of independent assignments organized around methods used by social scientists to understand different cultures and worldviews. It is intended as a supplement to education abroad and can be adapted to different timeframes and locations. First of three-course sequence.
Course offers a flexible structure for students studying abroad to learn to be intentional, self-reflective, and curious in how they transact and engage across cultures. It consists of independent assignments organized around methods used by social scientists to understand different cultures and worldviews. It is intended as a supplement to education abroad and can be adapted to different timeframes and locations. Second of 3-course sequence.
This course provides an academic framework for students who are engaging in virtual internships with organizations located outside the US. Students will develop familiarity with broader trends in remote and cross-cultural work while also analyzing the global connections which define their geographically distributed labor. Theory- and research-based readings will complement experiential and reflective assignments.
Ecological Economics augments standard economics by stressing the coevolution of natural systems with human institutions, including markets, and elevating sustainability and justice (not merely efficiency) as essential societal goals. In this course, students examine ecological-economic relationships, outcomes, challenges, and solutions, in the context of local and global agricultural, resource, environmental, and development issues.
Non-governmental organizations are essential in the work of building a sustainable, just, and aesthetically pleasant world. In this course, we examine the history and role of NGOs, explore the legal and institutional frameworks that govern them, and exercise skills in planning, budgeting, fundraising, and communications. Students study existing NGOs as examples and propose and plan for the launch of a new NGO to address unmet societal needs.
This course offers an experiential social venture incubator integrating mindfulness-based leadership and contemplative practices and social entrepreneurship tools. Students will work in teams to develop a business plan for a real or hypothetical social-purpose venture. Daily contemplative practice, interactive personal leadership work and dialogue will allow students to explore both the inner and external dimensions of becoming change leaders.
Various topics offered in Global Studies. See department website for full course descriptions.
This course provides the opportunity to offer new topics in Global Studies.
Each student or small group will develop a project, be matched with a Global Studies faculty mentor, identify relevant community groups, and spend the semester working on that project. Students will discuss ideas, formulate plans, identify tactics, and engage with important social justice literatures. Importantly, the course will engage with the project of activism itself, which has the potential to replicate systems of inequality.
This seminar offers an examination of the state, civil society, and citizens, focusing on the ways in which these actors and institutions interact to shape economic, human, and political development. The course introduces theories of the state, civil society, and citizenship, and examines the linkages between these spheres, applying these theories to substantive issues and policy arenas.
In this course, students gain experience applying global perspectives, as well as research methods and techniques, to one of several real-world issues. Team-taught, the course allows students to choose a path that includes a methodological foundation, a deep dive into a particular method, a chance to practice a useful skills related to Global Studies professions, and culminating in the applied research project.
In this course, we explore what actually makes a body¿biology, flesh and bone, technology, maybe even immigration documents? We¿ll think about how medicine sees the body¿what makes us ¿healthy¿ or ¿sick¿¿as well as when concepts like race, gender, and sexuality help us understand bodies¿ and when they don¿t.
This two-part program will pair students in Rwanda studying at the University of Global Health Equity with UVA students to investigate global health topics relevant to both countries. In groups of four, students work over the course of the year on a research topic of their choice. eGlobal provides a faculty-supported platform for UVA students to engage in meaningful long-term engagement with international peers.
This two semester course aims to prepare students for effective and culturally appropriate engagement in Global Health activities by providing a background in Global Health theory, key issues, and culturally appropriate practice. Discussion 1-2 landmark articles and case studies focused on Global Health, using the Partners in Health Engage Curriculum supplemented with other relevant articles authored by global partners and UVA faculty.
Various topics offered in Global Studies. See department website for full course description and offerings.
This course provides the opportunity to offer new topics in Global Studies.
Life, including ecosystems, social interactions, and policy interventions are complex, and while some simplification of reality to try to make sense of it all is necessary, simplistic thinking and modeling can lead to market, policy, and other actions doomed to fail. This course dives into the complexity inherent in global systems and uses software tools to build models that help us build understanding and more effective solutions.
Students learn about the history, demographics, current trends in student mobility, and the principles and practices in effective education abroad advising and administration. Students gain first-hand exposure to the operations of an education abroad office and acquire knowledge and develop skills needed to enter the field of education abroad advising and administration. Prerequisite: Completed a study abroad program, Instructor Permission.
Students continue their examination of student mobility and principles and practices in effective education abroad advising and administration. Students gain first-hand exposure to the operations of an education abroad office and acquire knowledge and develop skills needed to enter the field of education abroad advising and administration. Prerequisite: Completion of GSGS 4961; Instructor permission.
Independent study to be arranged by student in consultation with professor.
The Middle East and South Asia as locations within the "Global South." This class will de-center Euro-American spaces and intellectual histories, and work toward a grounded re-centering of attention on place-particular histories and intellectual contributions. We will also examine what globalization, as concept and as a set of semi-coherent processes, has meant in particular local and regional spaces in the Middle East and South Asia.
New course in the subject of Global Studies - Middle East and South Asia.
In this seminar, GSMS majors complete their GSMS research paper.
Independent study to be arranged by student in consultation with professor. Requires instructor permission.
This course will provide a political and economic history of how migration flows have affected societies and social movements in both North and South America.
This lecture course provides the opportunity to offer new topics in Global Security and Justice.
This practicum course provides the opportunity to offer new topics in Global Security and Justice.
This seminar course provides the opportunity to offer new topics in Global Security and Justice.
This is the capstone seminar for students in the Security and Justice track of Global Studies.
This course is designed to allow Global Studies-Security and Justice majors to pursue independent study of relevant topics that go beyond the program's core, track and/or elective curricula.
New course in Global Environments and Sustainability
This course investigates a major source of human impact upon the Earth - energy consumption to fuel human activity. The course a) provides a cross-disciplinary perspective on the challenge of human-centered energy use, b) explains the historical origins of today's energy systems, c) describes current energy systems, d) examines the components of sustainable energy systems, and e) considers keys to their deployment.
This integrated and interdisciplinary course provides foundational knowledge on the multifaceted aspects of both problems and solutions related to sustainability, and challenges participants to deepen their understanding of global sustainability issues through a real-world, collaborative Think Global/ Act Local project.
This course interprets humanity's changing ecological relationships through religious and philosophical traditions. It takes up ethical questions presented by environmental problems, introduces frameworks for making sense of them, and examines the symbols and narratives that shape imaginations of nature.
This course provides the opportunity to offer new topics in Global Environments and Sustainability, in Global Studies.
This course is a collaborative design thinking experience that emphasizes sustainability. Students work in self-selected teams through the first half of the design process, identifying a challenge and conceiving of a solution. The course emphasizes sustainability, multidisciplinary teamwork, and client-stakeholder engagement. Students define their own challenge space, conceive of their own solution, and articulate solution requirements.
This course is a collaborative design thinking experience that focus on sustainability. Students work in self-selected teams through the second half of the design process, prototyping and testing a sustainability-related concept and articulating a robust description of a solution ready for transfer to end-users. The course emphasizes multidisciplinary teamwork and client-stakeholder engagement.
This seminar investigates the principles of sustainable community development--environmental quality, economic health, and social equity--as reflected in buildings, rural landscapes, towns, and cities. Through case studies, class activities and site visits, we will examine how communities impact and improve basic environmental-quality variables such as air and water quality, food supply, mobility, energy, and sense of place.
In this experiential, workshop-based course, students will develop leadership skills in translating ideas into action, using UVA's Grounds as a living lab for sustainability - the campus as a sustainability classroom. Students will gain insight into a process in which individuals can catalyze change to solve global problems and advance strategic goals on a local level though a place-based, project-based, and human-centered approach.
How and what we eat is basic to who we are as individuals, as a culture, and as a polity. This course looks at the production and consumption of food in a political context, focusing on controversies over agricultural subsidies, labeling requirements, taxation, farming practices, food safety, advertising and education.
Clean energy (CE) systems require far more minerals than their fossil fuel-based counterparts, minerals sourced, refined, and disposed of globally. The course examines which minerals are needed for the CE transition and why. It considers social, economic, and environmental sustainability challenges from use of these materials and highlights the sociotechnical reality of sustainability, i.e., Success depends upon social and technical advance. 3rd year standing or instructor permission
Students will survey the main currents of US & international sustainability policy (air & water quality, endangered species protection, public land management, private land conservation), consider their origins in conservation thought, and learn to evaluate these policies via examples and assignments from current natural resource and environmental challenges. Students will learn about the actors and processes by which policy decisions are made.
This course provides the opportunity to offer new topics in Global Environments and Sustainability, in Global Studies.
In this course, students will learn how to trace the "causal chains" from such actions/inactions to various ecosystem, social, and economic outcomes and to measure and value those outcomes. We will consider the philosophical/ethical underpinnings of the Ecosystem Services framework, use computer mapping and other software tools for evaluation, and review current applications of the framework by private and public sector entities.
The practicum uses problem-based learning to develop relevant facts and sound arguments surrounding local, national and global sustainability challenges. Working with live case studies in the U.S. and abroad, we will follow the steps from problem formation, through model building, data collection, and qualitative and quantitative analysis, and finally on to technical and advocacy communications grounded in our facts.
Explore various topics in Global Studies Environments & Sustainability
This course provides the opportunity to offer new topics in Global Environments and Sustainability, in Global Studies.
This course is the required Capstone Seminar in the Global Environments and Sustainability track of Global Studies
This course is an independent study to be arranged by student in consultation with faculty.