An analysis of the historical forces which shaped the African American experience in America from past to present.
Black Identities, Families and Cultures
This course examines relevant issues about life within the Black Family and the impact that these issues have on the individual, the community, and culture.
Racial Identity and Socialization in the African Diaspora
This course will examine how race, culture, and ethnicity is constructed across the African Diaspora through course readings and discussions along with a MANDATORY one-week global immersion experience in Havana and Santiago de Cuba. Students will survey social identity constructions based on African Heritage in Latin America, the Caribbean, and the US. Students will participate as class discussion leaders and may participate in community-based activities that focus on issues of race and culture. Students’ final project will be a research paper using a racial analysis across at least two countries
Asian and Pacific Studies
Contemporary Issues of Asian Pacific Americans
Topical studies of timely and pertinent contemporary interest involving Asian Americans in the U.S. Focus will change from year to year.
Field Study in China: Philosophy and Religious Rituals
The class will focus on two main activities each day. After a morning lecture by a faculty participant, the LMU and Chinese students will discuss the topic in groups and together deliver a brief report. In the afternoon, students will visit religious sites in Guangzhou, including Buddhist and Daoist monasteries, Sacred Heart Cathedral, and a Protestant church. Then, LMU students will write a joint report with a Chinese classmate.
Chicana/o and Latina/o Studies
Contemporary Urban Issues
Topical studies of timely and pertinent contemporary interest involving Asian Americans in the U.S. Focus will change from year to year. Using service learning in Los Angeles, the course helps students understand how the lives of Chicanas/os and Latinas/os are shaped by politics, economics, culture, history, and access to nation-state institutions.
Classics and Archaeology
Ancient Greece
Explores the origins of the Greeks from Homeric times to the death of Philip of Macedon. Topics include the developments of political forms, including democracy, and most notably, drama and philosophy against the background of war and conflict.
Archaeology Field Experience
Active participation, usually of three-weeks duration, in an archaeological excavation or survey at selected Near Eastern, Classical, or New World sites.
Classical Mythology
Study of the basic myths and myth patterns of the Greeks and Romans, and the mythological heritage in Western Literature
Representations of Greece: Ancient and Modern
This interdisciplinary 4-unit course offers students the unique opportunity to study complex issues surrounding representations of Greece from the classical to the modern world through an interdisciplinary approach that will highlight four areas of study: politics and economics; food and travel; theater and film; family, religion, and state.
English
Ancient Landscapes/Modern Voices
Literary texts supplement the visits to museums, archaeological sites, and cultural centers in Greece. Discussion will focus on the diverse forms of cultural expression in contemporary Greece.
Imagining the Holocaust: Contested and Forgotten Landscapes
Into the Desert
An exploration of the desert as a root metaphor for deep spiritual experience and place of social, political struggle.
Language of Journalism
A course in journalistic fundamentals and an introduction to reading, analyzing, and writing news across platforms.
Prison Literature
Surveys literature written by political prisoners to examine its artistry as well as its attempt to intervene in a culture of incarceration.
Representations of Greece: Ancient and Modern
This interdisciplinary 4-unit course offers students the unique opportunity to study complex issues surrounding representations of Greece from the classical to the modern world through an interdisciplinary approach that will highlight four areas of study: politics and economics; food and travel; theater and film; family, religion, and state.
Streetread
Students will respond critically to literature in the classroom and run reading groups in the community. Open to English majors and minors who are juniors or seniors.
Environmental Studies
Capstone Seminar
A capstone seminar in which student groups will bring to bear the multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary perspectives they have developed in the minor by analyzing a local Environmental Impact Report (EIR).
European Studies
Ancient Landscapes/Modern Voices
Literary texts supplement the visits to museums, archaeological sites, and cultural centers in Greece. Discussion will focus on the diverse forms of cultural expression in contemporary Greece.
Aristotle
Ethics: Roman Moral Philosophy
Paris Metisse: Multiculturalism in Paris
The course’s objective is to understand the concept of “metissage” in contemporary Parisian society through contact with the modern arts - poetic, pictorial, and musical - through an analysis of various texts and through personal interviews with exiles.
Paris Through Film
An examination of filmic narratives about/in Paris by representative international directors from the 1950s up to the present day through a study of filmic themes, genres, trends, movements, and gender issues. Students analyze how selected filmic narratives in/about Paris manage to represent “Frenchness” in the global context.
History
Nazi Germany
An examination of the history of Nazi Germany, including the National Socialism as an ideology, the Nazi seizure of power, the power structures of the Third Reich, German society and culture under Nazism, and the Holocaust.
South Africa: Imperialism and its Legacy
Topics in Public History
This course introduces students to the issues and practice of public history, which is dedicated to addressing and engaging the broader public in issues of history, memory, commemoration, and identity. Public history refers to all of those aspects of historical work that engage the public with the past, offering interpretation, inviting active consideration, and communicating the importance of history to current ideas, practices, identities, and debates. Such public venues include museums, historical sites, archives, government agencies, popular media, and now the broad spectrum of historical exhibition online.
Jewish Studies
Imagining the Holocaust: Contested and Forgotten Landscapes
Interreligious Experience and Engagement
This seminar focuses on interreligious engagement and experience, exploring the diversity of faith traditions at LMU, in Los Angeles, and throughout the nation and world, by deliberate encounters with the Other. It will challenge students to reflect on fundamental questions of faith and identify within communities. It will examine the theory and practice of interreligious engagement, including: Bilateral (e.g., Catholic-Jewish) and trilateral (e.g., Christian-Jewish-Muslim) seminars and conferences of scholars and clergy; Multi-faith religious celebrations and worship services; Joint social action and social justice programs; Conflict resolution projects; Coalitions based on shared values.
Modern Greek Studies
Ancient Landscapes/Modern Voices
Literary texts supplement the visits to museums, archaeological sites, and cultural centers in Greece. Discussion will focus on the diverse forms of cultural expression in contemporary Greece.
Angels and Demons: Female Literary Stereotypes from the Greeks to the Present
The course examines the social issue of women’s position and representation in modern patriarchal society (late 19th century to the present) through the interdisciplinary lenses of Greek and World literature and Women’s Studies.
Out of Control: Women, Madness and the Cultural Imagination
A cross-cultural exploration of social, cultural, and literary representations of female madness from antiquity to the present.
Modern Languages and Literatures
Cinema in Rome / Rome in Cinema
Comparative Cultures: Screening Migrations
Hispanic Cultural Studies
General survey that may include Iberian, U.S. Latino, and/or pre-Columbian civilizations and the literature of Meso- and South America; the impact of the Encounter with Europe; the Conquest; the Colonial Period; the Independence Era; and modern literary, socio-historical, economic, and political events that have shaped present-day Spanish American cultures.
Latin American Poetry
Survey and comparative study of Spanish language poetry of the Americas from a variety of historical periods, national origins, and cultural and literary movements.
Paris Metisse: Multiculturalism in Paris
The course’s objective is to understand the concept of “metissage” in contemporary Parisian society through contact with the modern arts - poetic, pictorial, and musical - through an analysis of various texts and through personal interviews with exiles.
Paris Through Film
In this course students will examine filmic narratives about/in Paris by representative international directors from the 1950s up to today through a study of filmic themes, genres, trends, movements, and gender. They will analyze how selected filmic narratives in/about Paris manage to represent “Frenchness” in the global context. As part of the course work, students will be expected to see all films, participate in all local visits and walking tours, and attend all guest lectures, with the class, in groups, or on their own.
Spanish Stylistics and Composition
A study of different modes of writing and of the major grammatical, stylistic, and vocabulary challenges when translating from English into French and vice versa. Practice with a broad range of literary, professional, and journalistic texts.
Stylistics and Translation
A study of different modes of writing and of the major grammatical, stylistic, and vocabulary challenges when translating from English into French and vice versa. Practice with a broad range of literary, professional, and journalistic texts.
Topics in Contemporary Chinese Society
This course intends to help students develop knowledge and perspectives about contemporary Chinese society. Students will be exposed to different aspects of Chinese culture and their relationship with the Chinese language in the process of China’s social and cultural transformation. This class will be taught in both Chinese and English.
Philosophy
Aristotle
Ethics: Roman Moral Philosophy
Field Study in China: Philosophy and Religious Rituals
The class will focus on two main activities each day. After a morning lecture by a faculty participant, the LMU and Chinese students will discuss the topic in groups and together deliver a brief report. In the afternoon, students will visit religious sites in Guangzhou, including Buddhist and Daoist monasteries, Sacred Heart Cathedral, and a Protestant church. Then, LMU students will write a joint report with a Chinese classmate.
Happiness: Philosophical and Psychological Perspectives
Philosophy and Literature -- The Inklings
War and Peace
Political Science
Elder Law
A study of the intersection of aging issues with the legal system including advance directives, guardianships, wills and trusts, assisted living arrangements, health care benefits, age discrimination in employment, long term care, and elder abuse.
International Affairs and Social Justice
This course is designed to expose students to issues in international affairs in terms of ethics and social justice.
International Security
A survey of challenges to security and peace in modern international relations, such as war, the nuclear peril, terrorism, revolution, ecological dangers, economic pressures and sociodemographic crises.
Political Internship
Internship seminar course includes participation in a governmental, nonprofit, or corporate internship as well as in-class discussion.
Politics of the Middle East
An overview and analysis of the major patterns and problems in political development and life in the Middle East and North Africa from a cross-national perspective.
Poverty: A Global, Comparative Perspective
U.S. Congress
A study of the workings of the U.S. Congress with an emphasis on the legislative process. Course is primarily conducted as a simulation of either the House or Senate.
Psychology
Advanced Research Methods
Building on lower division statistics and research methods Psychology requirements, this course further investigates research designs and statistical analyses psychologists use to understand, predict, and influence human behavior.
Capstone Seminar Part II: Service Learning, Integration and Mission
Part of a year-long sequence, this course seeks to enliven the three pillars of the LMU Mission by integrating Ignatian spirituality and discernment with the biopsychosocial model in psychology. Students conceive and effect 30 hours of an organized service project and engage in guided reflection and critical analysis. The primary goal of this seminar is to inspire students to integrate academic learning and community-based experiences that are intentionally and deeply interrelated.
Community Practicum
This course is an integration of psychological theory and research with field work in real-world settings within underserved and/or diverse communities. The course includes an academic component in which students learn the history, objectives, and practice of community psychology and an applied component in which students participate in a formal placement/internship within the community.
Contemplatives in Action: Psychology, Spirituality, and Liberation
An exploration of how contemplative practice can deepen and give meaning to ordinary human existence.
Culture and Community Engagement Seminar
Happiness: Philosophical and Psychological Perspectives
Liberation Psychologies 2: Research Methods
Lifespance Development
Research and theories of normal human development from conception through adult maturity, old age, and death. Focus on growth and change in biological, cognitive, and social processes in psychological development.
Psychology and Community Resilience
Research Assistantship
This course is for students who are research assistants (RAs) in faculty research. It provides an engaging, in-depth opportunity to learn the ethics, methods, and principles of psychological research. It is designed to flexibly accommodate a student either over several semesters (taking 1-2 semester hours in any combination one semester at a time up to a maximum of 4 semester hours) or in one semester (for the full 4 semester hours). A formal agreement between the student and faculty member shall define the academic expectations and workload and incorporate specific requirements for a writing assignment related to the research on which the student works that will serve as a formal basis for the grade. The area of research shall reflect the faculty member’s interests and fit within the department’s applied engagement requirement.
Sociology
Community Internships in Sociology
Concepts and Issues in Aging
A general introduction to the study of physiological, psychological, and sociological aspects of aging. The focus is on the individual in society throughout the adult phase of the lifespan.
Culture and Community Engagement Seminar
Faith, Politics, and Civic Engagement
The broad objective of this class is to introduce students to studying religion and its impact in the social world, including politics, social policy, community services, and social movements. We will examine the relationship between religion and society, taking into consideration both how religion is shaped by society and how religion shapes society, with an emphasis on religion in the U.S. Additionally, we will look at emerging religiously based social movement and political action.
Social Inequalities
Theological Studies
Catholic Theology and Social Justice
Contemplatives in Action: Psychology, Spirituality, and Liberation
An exploration of how contemplative practice can deepen and give meaning to ordinary human existence.
Field Study in China: Philosophy and Religious Rituals
The class will focus on two main activities each day. After a morning lecture by a faculty participant, the LMU and Chinese students will discuss the topic in groups and together deliver a brief report. In the afternoon, students will visit religious sites in Guangzhou, including Buddhist and Daoist monasteries, Sacred Heart Cathedral, and a Protestant church. Then, LMU students will write a joint report with a Chinese classmate.
Into the Desert
An exploration of the desert as a root metaphor for deep spiritual experience and place of social, political struggle.
Leadership and Ministry in the Third Millennium
This course - which includes both an oral presentation and engaged learning flag - invites students into the examination and the practice of Christian (especially Roman Catholic) pastoral ministry and leadership, including exploration of the relationship between ministry and personal transformation, human suffering, the secularization of society, social justice, and intercultural and interreligious relationships. All students will be required to engage in 24 hours of service in a faith community of their choice throughout the semester.
Ministry and Pastoral Leadership
Invites students into the examination and the practice of Christian (especially Roman Catholic) pastoral ministry and leadership, including exploration of the relationship between ministry and personal transformation, human suffering, the secularization of society, social justice, and intercultural and interreligious relationships. All students will be required to engage in 24 hours of service in a faith community of their choice throughout the semester.
Mystics and Heretics
This course explores the construction of otherness as it is related to divergent visions of authentic imitation of Christ and experiences of the presence of God. Spanning from late antiquity to the present, the course studies, among others, Augustine, Francis and Clare of Assisi, the Waldensians, the Humiliati, Meister Eckhart, Julian of Norwich, Thomas Merton, Leonardo Boff, Dorothy Day and the Catholic Worker movement, and the IHM sisters.
Practice of Everyday Life
A critical examination of ordinary practices of everyday life as a source for spiritual knowledge and social-political transformation.
Prisons and People
Women's and Gender Studies
Community Internships in Sociology
Feminist Research Methods
Examines feminist methodologies through hands-on research and considers the complex relationships between researchers and their subjects, the impact of social location on our field of vision, ethical issues in the research process, as well as research that facilitates social and gender justice.
Women and Environmental Justice
This course explores the relationships between peoples and environments, focusing on the roles and resources, identity, power relations, and geography. We will explore the theoretical and material implications of the different ways in which environmental injustice leads to the degradation of gendered environments and bodies. The course will provide multiple interdisciplinary perspectives on the state of gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, and the environment.
Women in Global Communities
This course introduces students to the cultural, social, political, and economic contexts in which non-Western women live. It addresses the impact of globalization, colonialization, and post-coloniality, and women’s responses to these processes.