Learning Goals

To engage in a wide range of influential ideas.
To develop skills of close reading and critical analysis of texts (broadly construed to include those works encountered in academia) which are often complex, multifaceted, and conceptually difficult.
To develop skills necessary to communicate effectively about these texts.
1. Written communication:
  To develop the skills necessary to write a thesis-driven, evidence-supported essay (and to see writing as a recursive process).
2. b. Oral communication:
  To develop students’ abilities to engage in critical, and spirited discussion with one another and their professor, in ways that encourage them to be intellectually ambitious, vulnerable, and open-minded.
To integrate written and oral communication skills in pursuit of a more nuanced understanding of the texts and ideas at issue.