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2012-13 Undergraduate Index A-Z
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Consciousness Studies [clear]
| Title | Offering | Standing | Credits | Credits | When | F | W | S | Su | Description | Preparatory | Faculty | Days | Multiple Standings | Start Quarters | Open Quarters |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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Sarah Williams and Donald Foran
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Program | FR–SRFreshmen - Senior | 16 | 16 | Day | F 12 Fall | W 13Winter | S 13Spring | "Poetry is good for neural development." You can buy a T-shirt that says so. This program will engage you experientially in understanding how and why the recycling of neurons informs poetry's transformative power. We'll explore how reading can be understood from an evolutionary perspective as an exaptation in which the ability to interpret animal tracks and bird flight was co-opted for the ciphering of lines and circles as letters and words. This exploration will include the scientific writing of Stanislas Dehaene as well as the poetry of Susan Howe, who in "Pythagorian Silence" writes: "age of earth and us all chattering/a sentence or character/ suddenly/steps out to seek for truth fails/falls into a stream of ink Sequence/trails off/ ... flocks of words flying together tense/as an order/cast off to crows." We'll recite, analyze, discuss, perform, and write poems about the mind's reflexivity.Our goal is a mindful recycling of neurons, one in which the neuroscience of poetry reveals a continuity with the neurology of our ancestors. Thus, we'll reflect on our experiences of flocks of words and tracks of letters as binding mechanisms for neural integration and ecological adaptation. Indeed, Frederick Turner refers to poetry as a "neural lyre." Urban spoken-word poets and indigenous healers produce what Eliot describes as "music heard so deeply it is not heard at all/ And you are the music while the music lasts." We're equally interested in how poetry can have the opposite effect on consciousness. We'll engage in contemplative practices to learn more about experiences of neural disintegration, such as the thumps and jolts of modern life. As Seamus Heaney put it, poetry is "a thump to the TV set to restore the picture" and "a jolt to the fibrillating heart." Throughout the year we'll be exploring the emergence of a new meta-field of scholarship in which poetry and neuroscience interact, remaking and renewing the meaning and impact of the poetic as words become flesh ... and vice-versa. Emily Dickinson's poetic rendering of this polarity provides one model of the neuro-phenomenological: "I felt a cleaving in my mind/As if my brain had split/I tried to match it, seam by seam/But could not make it fit. The thought behind, I strove to join/Unto the thought before/But Sequence ravelled out of sound/Like balls upon a floor." We'll experiment with this process of "sequence ravelling out of sound" as a transformation of a new archaic.Fall quarter's immersion in the scholarship of this meta-field will include group research projects: ethnographic studies of poetic jolts. When, where and from whom or from what do we hear poetry? Can we sense it in our own reading and writing? Our fall quarter nature retreat to the Hoh Rain Forest and the beaches of the Olympic Peninsula will introduce practices we'll use throughout the year for experiencing the reciprocity between specific forms of poetry and states of consciousness. During winter quarter we’ll experience and articulate specific forms of consciousness and language in relation to a particular passion. One of us might want to explore Gerard Manley Hopkins’ love of bluebells and windhovers in relationship to his poetry, or create a poetic world around a passion for sport or to experience how fantasy sports are a poetic world. One of us might immerse herself in the biodynamic rhythms of chocolate sustainably farmed, or listen for the resonance between silence and sound in YoYo Ma’s performance of Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G. The methodology of our field study will aspire to that of 18 C poet and civil engineer, Novalis for whom "knowledge and creation were united in a wondrous mutual tie.” Writing in response to our field studies will take the form of reciprocal creations such as in Melissa Kwasny’s . Spring quarter work will combine theory and practice. Students will engage in peer group community-based service projects that use poetry to "jolt fibrillating hearts.” Writing projects will accompany this work in order to illuminate the relationship between the growth of dendrites and the flourishing of both neurons and community. There will be a weekly film and poetry series that inspires "poetic jolts" and demonstrates their meaning for communal life. Throughout the year students will keep a creative journal, a field notebook, participate in poetry writing and recitation, and compile an anthology of program work. | Sarah Williams Donald Foran | Mon Tue Tue Tue Wed Wed Thu Thu | Freshmen FR Sophomore SO Junior JR Senior SR | Fall | Fall Winter | ||
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Terry Setter and Cynthia Kennedy
Signature Required:
Spring
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Program | FR ONLYFreshmen Only | 16 | 16 | Day | F 12 Fall | W 13Winter | S 13Spring | -Joseph Campbell Joseph Campbell points out that our greatest challenge is how to live a humane existence in inhuman times. Awakening the Dreamer, Pursuing the Dream will focus on the individual's relationship to personal and cultural values, society, leadership and the creative process. This program is intended for students who seek to explore and refine their core values in a context where they can act upon them with increasing awareness and integrity.The program faculty recognize that the social, ecological and psychological challenges of every era have required people to live their lives in the face of significant challenges and it is now widely recognized that crisis often precedes positive transformation. Therefore, this program will begin by focusing on how people in the past have worked to create a meaningful relationship between themselves and the world around them. We will explore movement, stories, and images of various creative practices and spiritual traditions from ancient to modern times to discover their relevance in our own lives. As students gain knowledge and skills, they will develop their own multifaceted approaches to clarifying their identity, then prioritizing and pursuing their dreams.Throughout the year, the program will work with multiple forms of intelligence, somatic practices and integrative expressive arts approaches to learning. Students will explore the practices of music, movement (such as dance or yoga), writing, drawing and theater in order to cultivate the senses as well as the imagination and powers of expression. These practices will help us understand the deeper aspects of the human experience, which are the source of self-leadership, intentional living and positive change. Students will also investigate the relationship between inner transformation and social change through engagement in community service. Students will read mythology, literature and poetry while exploring ideas that continue to shape contemporary culture. We will also look to indigenous cultures to deepen our appreciation of often-overlooked wisdom and values. We will seek to develop a broader understanding of contemporary culture as a stepping stone to thinking critically about how today's dreams can become tomorrow's reality. | the liberal arts, expressive arts, psychology, sociology, and cultural studies. | Terry Setter Cynthia Kennedy | Tue Wed Thu | Freshmen FR | Fall | Fall Winter Spring | |
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Ryo Imamura
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Program | FR–SRFreshmen - Senior | 8, 12 | 08 12 | Evening and Weekend | Su 13Summer Session II | Western psychology’s neglect of the living mind, both in its everyday dynamics and its larger possibilities, has led to a tremendous upsurge of interest in the ancient wisdom of Buddhism which does not divorce the study of psychology from the concern with wisdom and human liberation. We will investigate the study of mind that has developed within the Buddhist tradition through lectures, readings, videos, workshops, and field trips. Students registering for 12 credits will attend a meditation retreat and complete a research paper on meditation. | Ryo Imamura | Fri Sat Sun | Freshmen FR Sophomore SO Junior JR Senior SR | Summer | Summer | ||||
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Sheryl Shulman, Aaron Skomra and Neal Nelson
Signature Required:
Winter
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Program | FR–SRFreshmen - Senior | 16 | 16 | Day | F 12 Fall | W 13Winter | The goal of this program is to learn the intellectual concepts and skills that are essential for advanced work in computer science. Students will have the opportunity to achieve a deeper understanding of increasingly complex computing systems by acquiring knowledge and skills in mathematical abstraction, problem solving, and the organization and analysis of hardware and software systems. The program covers material such as algorithms, data structures, computer organization and architecture, logic, discrete mathematics and programming in a liberal arts computer science curriculum. In both quarters the program content will be organized around four interwoven themes. The theme covers concepts and structures of computing systems from digital logic to operating systems. The theme concentrates on learning how to design and code programs to solve problems. The theme helps develop mathematical reasoning, theoretical abstractions and problem solving skills needed for computer scientists. The theme explores social, historical or philosophical topics related to science and technology. | computer science and mathematics, including computer programming, discrete mathematics, algorithms, data structures, computer architecture, and topics in technology and society. | Sheryl Shulman Aaron Skomra Neal Nelson | Freshmen FR Sophomore SO Junior JR Senior SR | Fall | Fall Winter | |||
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Jehrin Alexandria
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Course | FR–SRFreshmen - Senior | 6 | 06 | Day and Weekend | Su 13Summer Session I | This class is an in-depth study of movement and its role in the organization of the human brain as well as a look at contemporary works in the field of energy psychology. We will explore the emotional issues that can occur when such organization is not complete and various techniques to address them. Students will learn to recognize normal neurological organization by studying specific developmental milestones as well as recognize gaps and abnormalities in brain development and how they impact growth, learning, and psychological well-being. This class will be deeply experiential as well as theoretical. Please wear comfortable clothing as there is basic movement in some classes. | Jehrin Alexandria | Thu Fri Sat | Freshmen FR Sophomore SO Junior JR Senior SR | Summer | Summer | ||||
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Ryo Imamura
Signature Required:
Spring
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Contract | SO–SRSophomore - Senior | 16 | 16 | Day | S 13Spring | This is an opportunity for sophomore, junior and senior students to create their own course of study and research, including internship, community service, and study abroad options. Before the beginning of spring quarter, interested students should submit an Individual Learning or Internship Contract to Ryo Imamura, which clearly states the work to be completed. Possible areas of study are Western psychology, Asian psychology, Buddhism, counseling, social work, cross-cultural studies, Asian-American studies, religious studies, nonprofit organizations, aging, death and dying, deep ecology and peace studies. Areas of study other than those listed above will be considered on a case-by-case basis. | Ryo Imamura | Sophomore SO Junior JR Senior SR | Spring | Spring | |||||
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Walter Grodzik
Signature Required:
Fall
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Contract | SO–SRSophomore - Senior | 16 | 16 | Day | F 12 Fall | Individual study offers individual and groups of students the opportunity to develop self-direction, to learn how to manage a personal project, to focus on unique combinations of subjects, and to pursue original interdisciplinary projects without the constraints of an external structure. Individual and groups of students interested in a self-directed project, research or internships in Queer Studies or the Performing and Visual Arts should contact the faculty by email at | Walter Grodzik | Sophomore SO Junior JR Senior SR | Fall | Fall | |||||
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Jamyang Tsultrim
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Program | FR–SRFreshmen - Senior | 8 | 08 | Day and Weekend | Su 13Summer Session I | This class explores similarities and differences between Eastern and Western psychology and examines possibilities for creating an integrated approach to help to alleviate the psychological suffering of others while maintaining emotional balance and professional ethics. Through the integrated practice of clinical East-West counseling skills such as intentional listening/reflection, personal practice/role-play, and cultivation of insight and positive emotions, students will develop knowledge and aptitude to differentiate and apply effective counseling methods in the helping professions. | Jamyang Tsultrim | Wed Sat | Freshmen FR Sophomore SO Junior JR Senior SR | Summer | Summer | ||||
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Heesoon Jun and Donald Middendorf
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Program | JR–SRJunior - Senior | 16 | 16 | Day | F 12 Fall | W 13Winter | S 13Spring | In this interdisciplinary program, we will focus on personal and cultural explorations of the dynamic psyche. We'll explore consciousness by examining personal belief systems, dreams and memories. One of our goals will be to understand the relationship between personal and collective consciousness. Another goal will be to collaboratively and individually integrate what we know about the creative, spiritual and scientific elements of the psyche. We will explore the intricate and complex dynamics of our personal and cultural psyche by examining the following questions. What is the psyche, what is consciousness, and what are their properties and dynamics? What impacts do our memories, dreams and beliefs have on our consciousness? Is our personal consciousness influenced by cultural consciousness or vice versa? Are there different types of consciousness? What are the relationships among the conscious psyche, the unconscious, and personal beliefs in constructing our sense of self? How do our beliefs structure our experience individually and ? During fall quarter, we'll build a foundation for our year-long study by examining theoretical and historical perspectives of identity construction, depth psychology, and belief systems and their relationships to conscious and unconscious mental processes. Our texts will include Jung's autobiography , and the journal . During winter quarter, we'll use this base to provide a foundation for a more in-depth analysis and interpretation of our personal and cultural memories, dreams, and beliefs and their relationship to emotions. These topics will be examined from a research perspective. One of our texts will be Van de Castle's . We'll study mindfulness teachings. In spring quarter, students will choose to work extensively with one of the faculty on more in-depth studies. Possible areas of exploration in spring quarter include psychology of dreams, culture and construction of self, memories and psychological disorders, beliefs and empowerment, Progoff in-depth journal work, and meditation theory and practice. Students are expected to attend every program activity on time and fully prepared to participate. This is a full-time program (16 credits/quarter for three quarters) and students will be expected to work efficiently for a minimum of 40 hours each week (including class time). Activities will include lectures, seminar discussions, workshops, film critiques and self-reflective learning activities. Students will also be expected to keep a personal log of hours spent on academic activities, participate actively in seminar discussions, work in small groups, complete papers, take exams, and give presentations to the class. Be prepared to explore challenging and unfamiliar ideas in a cooperative and friendly manner. | Heesoon Jun Donald Middendorf | Tue Wed Fri | Junior JR Senior SR | Fall | Fall Winter | ||
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Mukti Khanna, Glenn Landram and Marja Eloheimo
Signature Required:
Winter
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Program | FR–SRFreshmen - Senior | 16 | 16 | Day | F 12 Fall | W 13Winter | Mind-body medicine is an interdisciplinary field focusing on the applications of sociocultural, psychosocial, somatic and behavioral knowledge relevant to health and wellness. Fall quarter will explore historical foundations of mind-body medicine from diverse cultural and disciplinary perspectives. We will look at how mind-body medicine is being integrated into health care in disease prevention, health promotion, treatment and rehabilitation centers. During fall quarter, we will expand upon our exploration of mind-body medicine by examining some of the financial implications of our health care systems and what influence individuals have in the process. We will also explore plants as a medicine to gain both botanical and cultural understandings as well as integrate concepts with practice.Winter quarter will allow students to implement their own Cocreative Learning Plans with program modules and individual project or internship studies. Optional program modules will include readings and seminar, health psychology, statistics for graduate school preparation, and medicinal botany. Students who are in good academic standing may take 4-16 credits of project or internship studies within the program. Student project and internship work will be presented in a program-wide fair at the end of the quarter. | Mukti Khanna Glenn Landram Marja Eloheimo | Tue Wed Thu | Freshmen FR Sophomore SO Junior JR Senior SR | Fall | Fall Winter | |||
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Karen Gaul and Therese Saliba
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Program | FR–SRFreshmen - Senior | 16 | 16 | Day | F 12 Fall | W 13Winter | From Yoga to Facebook, transnational cultural and economic practices and new information technologies are creating an increasingly interconnected world. A central question for this program is, how do highly mobile transnational relationships such as these affect the integrity, identity, and sustainability of local communities?We will examine how particular resources (such as oil, textiles, and food) as well as technologies, labor, and ideas, have propelled migrations, cultural transformations, and movements for sustainability and justice. Tourism, for example, generates the production and consumption of cultural heritage, eco-tourism, and yoga vacations that draw millions of people to new destinations around the world, and are major economic forces, raising urgent questions about cultural sustainability in the face of globalization. At the same time, Facebook has played an instrumental role for Arab youth in organizing revolutions, highlighting the ways people may use foreign technologies to fuel movements for political and social justice.Migrations of peoples, materials, and ideas have been around for millenia, often producing vibrant cultural practices based on adaptation and innovation. Yet colonization, empire, and capitalist globalization have also contributed to the systematic destruction of indigenous and non-Western cultures, inciting various forms of resistance. Focusing on South Asia and the Middle East, we will explore the ways communities and cultures are disproportionately affected by conditions and by-products of resource extraction, unjust labor conditions, pollutants, waste disposal and broader climate change. We will consider lessons that can be learned from their movements to create sustainable and just futures in a transnational world.Through the lenses of cultural studies, cultural anthropology and sustainability studies, we will explore the tensions between movement and rootedness, the familiar and unfamiliar, and how movements for justice are conditioned by both individual and systemic change. We will draw on yoga, both as an example of cultural exchange that has fueled debates about authenticity and appropriation, and as a practice of sustainability from the inside out. Through the writings of Gandhi, Alice Walker, and Arundhati Roy, and a range of cultural, feminist, and postcolonial theories, we will explore the connections between individual and social transformation, as we seek to build communities rooted in the concepts of sustainability and justice.In fall quarter we will develop an intentional learning community, and explore program themes through lectures, films, shared readings, field trips, and workshops. We will build skills in cultural analysis through critical reading, creative writing, ethnographic methods, visual literacy, and seminar discussions. In winter quarter, students will begin to frame projects focusing on program themes in particular cultural areas, which they will develop and research. | Karen Gaul Therese Saliba | Freshmen FR Sophomore SO Junior JR Senior SR | Fall | Fall Winter | ||||
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Scott Coleman
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Program | FR–SOFreshmen - Sophomore | 16 | 16 | Day | S 13Spring | This program introduces a broad spectrum of contemporary and classical psychological theories about learning and personality. It has the complementary intent of applying these theories to our understanding of ourselves as a unique learners and human beings. Our guiding questions will be both theoretical and personal, including: How can we make sense of human personality differences? How do people learn? Do I have a unique life calling? What is my learning style?Topics of study will include developmental and educational psychology, depth psychology and personality theory. Our work will be informed by such thinkers as Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung, Roberto Assagioli, Daniel Siegel, Nancy Chodorow, James Hillman, Carl Rogers, Howard Gardner, Jacob Moreno, John Welwood, Helen Palmer, Ken Wilber, Erik Erikson, Lawrence Kohlberg, Richard Schwartz, John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth.In addition to reading, writing, and engaging in weekly seminars, our activities will include experiential workshops and individual and group projects, as well as regular assessments to support our growing understanding of the foundational concepts we will be learning. Learning about and from each other will be an essential feature of learning about the human psyche and its often surprising similarities and differences, so an emphasis will be placed on building a supportive learning community.This program may be particularly useful for those with an interest in bringing a more focused and self-informed perspective to their future learning opportunities. | psychology and education. | Scott Coleman | Freshmen FR Sophomore SO | Spring | Spring | ||||
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Ariel Goldberger
Signature Required:
Winter
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SOS | SO–SRSophomore - Senior | 16 | 16 | Day | W 13Winter | This academic offering is devoted to individual projects researching and exploring the mind and consciousness from various disciplinary and inter-disciplinary vantage points. It takes advantage of the flexibility of the legendary Evergreen style of learning in order to allow students to venture into unique combinations of subjects, imaginative modes of study, internships, and/or travel. Individual projects and activities will be focused on learning about the latest developments in the study of the mind through the study of neuroscience, neuroaesthetics, creativity, art, psychology, mindfulness and/or spirituality. The faculty has a background in the arts, a relatively new but deep interest in the field - especially as it relates to human imagination and creativity - and is venturing into this quarter with a spirit of daring, curiosity, and openness. Participants will collaborate with the faculty to design an independent project based on an individual plan of study before, or by week 1. Students will choose group activities based on common interests, during week 1, in order to enjoy each individual's explorations into this emerging field. Students are encouraged to pursue their interests and to include unique combinations of subjects, imaginative modes of study, internships, and/or travel in the US and abroad. | Ariel Goldberger | Sophomore SO Junior JR Senior SR | Winter | Winter | |||||
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Ryo Imamura
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Program | FR–SOFreshmen - Sophomore | 16 | 16 | Day | F 12 Fall | W 13Winter | Western psychology has so far failed to provide us with a satisfactory understanding of the full range of human experience. It has largely overlooked the core of human understanding--our everyday mind, our immediate awareness of being with all of its felt complexity and sensitive attunement to the vast network of interconnectedness with the universe around us. Instead, Western psychology has chosen to analyze the mind as though it were an object independent of the analyzer, consisting of hypothetical structures and mechanisms that cannot be directly experienced. Western psychology's neglect of the living mind--both in its everyday dynamics and its larger possibilities--has led to a tremendous upsurge of interest in the ancient wisdom of the East, particularly Buddhism, which does not divorce the study of psychology from the concern with wisdom and human liberation.In direct contrast, Eastern psychology shuns any impersonal attempt to objectify human life from the viewpoint of an external observer, instead studying consciousness as a living reality which shapes individual and collective perception and action. The primary tool for directly exploring the mind is meditation or mindfulness, an experiential process in which one becomes an attentive participant-observer in the unfolding of moment-to-moment consciousness.Learning mainly from lectures, readings, videos, workshops, seminar discussions, individual and group research projects, and field trips, we will take a critical look at the basic assumptions and tenets of the major currents in traditional Western psychology, the concept of mental illness, and the distinctions drawn between normal and abnormal thought and behavior. We will then investigate the Eastern study of mind that has developed within spiritual traditions, particularly within the Buddhist tradition. In doing so, we will take special care to avoid the common pitfall of most Western interpretations of Eastern thought--the attempt to fit Eastern ideas and practices into unexamined Western assumptions and traditional intellectual categories. Lastly, we will address the encounter between Eastern and Western psychology as possibly having important ramifications for the human sciences in the future, potentially leading to new perspectives on the whole range of human experience and life concerns. | Ryo Imamura | Tue Thu | Freshmen FR Sophomore SO | Fall | Fall Winter |
