My Freshman Inquiry Courses
What is FRINQ?
Freshman Inquiry is a year-long Freshman course intended to help students new to college learn about college success skills, gain a sense of community and understand content orgainized around a given theme. The theme I am currently teaching is Portland. However you can learn about past themes I have taught below. To learn more about Freshman Inquiry click
PORTLAND: THE CITY AS COMMUNITY IN THE PAST, PRESENT and FUTURE
In this course students learn about Portland of the Past, Present and Future. Each term we focus on one segment of Portland's history. During the fall term we study Portland's past, Winter term we study Portland in the present day and in spring term we study what Portland may become in the future.
In the past, Portland was not a very welcoming town to people of color or women. In fact, many homesteaders wanted to make Portland, and the Oregon Territory, a white man's paradise. At one time Portland was known as the most racist city outside of the American South. This certainly has ramifications today. Today, Portland has the largest Caucasian population of all major American cities. Recently Portland author Mitchell S. Jackson won widespread acclaim for his novel The Residue Years, in which he describes his experiences growing up black in a very white Portland Oregon. We are honored to count Mr. Mitchell amongst PSU alumni. Over the past decade Portland has also become a hotspot for "hipsters" as young people and artists flock to the city. In fact, Portland is home to many "artisans," who contribute a significant amount to the city's economy by crafting products from microbrews to bikes as examined in Charles Heying's book Brew to Bikes: Portland's Artisan Economy. In the future, Portland, like every other American city, must plan to accommodate an increased population as well as how to address Climate Change. These are just some of the topics we explore in this course.
See "Portland" tab under "FRINQ" for more information and syllabi.
The Constructed Self: Me, Us, Them
Cyborg Millennium: Transforming Technologies and Human Society
This course examined the transformation of human society in the wake of innovations in a variety of technologies. This course considers the impact of technologies from the Internet and social sites like Facebook, to new scientific breakthroughs resulting in the possibly of cloning humans, animals, and other organisms; genetic engineering of plants and animals; and the acceleration of technological change as we move towards the Singularity.
This course explored the issue of the construction of
identity, society and the self. I designed this course
with a dream team of faculty members including Dr.
Becky Boesch, Teresa Taylor and Dr. Susan Ameri.
In the fall term, using theoretical models developed bysociologists Cooley and Mead, we explored what it means, quite literally to say "I"
and "Me."
In the winter term we explored what it means to be
part of a group identity such as the species Homo
sapiens or the national identity of Americans.
Spring term we explored the concept of the "other"
and how we create conflicts locally, regionally,
nationally and internationally based on our notions of
alterity and the "other."
