First-Year Seminar Course List

Instructor(s)

Michelle Stiger-Hayden

Course Description

Apparate into the magical world of Harry Potter in this FYS course. This fantasy fiction series intertwines entertainment with diverse social issues, offering readers a unique lens to examine real-world themes through the eyes of wizards and Muggles alike. Utilizing J.K. Rowling’s novels, film adaptations, and the dynamic world of fan fiction, we will delve into contemporary challenges such as belonging, prejudice, power, identity, resistance, and friendship within our communities.

Section 01: Open to all students
Section 02: Available to first-generation students

Instructor(s)

Bryce Berkowitz

Course Description

In this course, our focus will be a lack of focus. Instead of one long marathon topic, let’s cover a shotgun smattering of topics: from image-based poetry to indie movies, from discovering life’s meaning to finding purpose in small moments, from voice-driven fiction to edgy memoirs, from redefining work culture to social movements, from graffiti art to street theatre, the perils of social media to inspirational Ted Talks to who knows what else… Let’s define our time together by taking a random and organic journey towards collective growth and awareness by asking big questions about some of life’s many topics.

Course Description

From drawings of horses, stags, and bulls on the caves of Lascaux to enduring classics like The Call of the Wild and Black Beauty, animals have captured our imagination as symbols, companions, workers, food, and fellow warriors: our path to modernity tells the tale of a relationship paradoxically fraught with violence and affection. This interdisciplinary First Year Seminar examines how the burgeoning fields of anthropology, psychology, and criminology converged with biology, zoology, and economics in taxonomies of class, race, sex, and gender whose legacy still governs our conversations about which lives matter. Most importantly, we will discover how Writing for Wellness (W4W) helps us grapple with making meaning of nature, nurture, and justice in the new millennium.

Instructor(s)

Robert Norris

Course Description

This course will examine the power of communication. Down through human history, communication has been used by some to exercise power over others. The evolution of speech, the advent of writing, the invention of printing, the ability to broadcast, the ability to post information on the internet–all these represent more than the exchange of information and messages; they have all been used as tools of influence which some seek to appropriate, and others seek to outwit.

Instructor(s)

Barbara Campbell

Course Description

This course will examine representations of disability in American culture in the 20th and 21st centuries through literary texts, film, art, music, and dance. Our class will use disability studies theory to analyze how artists with disabilities critique ableism and complicate conventional narratives of disability. Stereotypical depictions of the disabled figure in literature, art, and popular culture reinforce, sometimes inadvertently, discrimination towards people with physical, intellectual, and psychiatric disabilities. The disabled subject is often represented as the object of pity, scorn, or as heroic inspiration for ableist culture. Works by artists with disabilities tend to challenge these depictions in content and form in unconventional and radical ways. We will engage with a variety of texts to discuss how artists draw attention to inclusivity, access, and social justice.

Instructor(s)

Charles Allen
Brent Hege

Course Description

Through reading and critical discussion around theological, philosophical, and sacred texts, students will be able to explore the meaning of faith, doubt, and reason and ask big implicated questions, such as: what is faith, how do you know what you know, can divinity be proven, and what is the relationship of science to faith? The first semester of Faith, Doubt, and Reason focuses on developing writing skills. The second semester of Faith, Doubt, and Reason will provide an opportunity for students to write and present on issues in need of action in our world.

Instructor(s)

Jeana Jorgensen

Course Description

Often trivialized as “just for kids,” fairy tales have a centuries-long global history as wonder tales told by and for adults striving to articulate the complexities of power relations within social life: identity, gender roles, sexuality, and more. In this class, we will engage with fairy tales from oral and literary traditions, as well as retold fairy tales in the forms of short stories, novels, and films. Our goals are to learn about the messages fairy tales convey about self and society, as well as understand how narrative structure and story appeal apply to both scholarly writing and real life. In other words, we’ll study why the fairy tale is a classic template for coming-of-age experiences as well as more sophisticated political commentaries. Disney will provide only the briefest starting point on this journey.

Instructor(s)

Ashley Mack-Jackson

Course Description

Are you a dancer, musician, visual or multimedia artist, performer, writer, creative of any kind, or an enthusiastic lover of the arts? Explore Butler University and Indianapolis’s diverse arts scene, engage in enriching discussions with local creatives, and join with Indianapolis-based arts organizations and artists to create your own artistic projects in “From the HeARTland.” Throughout this course you will investigate your own artistic identity as it relates to your community of origin and the Butler University and Indianapolis communities, consider how art impacts and is impacted by artists’ identities and the community’s culture, reflect on the role that the arts play in creating more diverse, equitable, inclusive, and just communities, and share with and learn from your peers as you all enter together into the vibrant Butler University and Indianapolis arts communities.

Instructor(s)

Janis Crawford

Course Description

“Speech is civilization itself. The word, even the most contradictory word, preserves contact—it is silence which isolates.” -Thomas Mann

Speech can be a very powerful medium of persuasion and communication. Just like producing a written paper, a speech must be concise, present a compelling argument, and use the proper tone, and format to have a lasting effect on its audience. We will examine the orations of such great American speakers as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., President Ronald Reagan, Hilary Clinton, and Barbara Bush. This course will focus on the speech as a template for how to develop effective writing skills. In the course of reading and discussing the works of American orators, students will cultivate the skills necessary for critical thinking, oral communication, and effective writing. Class will involve discussion, student presentations, and writing assignments.

Instructor(s)

Brian Day

Course Description

In this class, students will be exposed to the field of Human Factors Psychology, which, broadly defined, examines the relationship between human beings and technology in an attempt to make human-technology interactions safe, effective, and efficient. Students will be presented with background on human factors and various real-world applications before transitioning to thinking about taking what has been learned to design their own life in accordance with human factors principles. For instance, students will be asked to reassess their study routines, sleeping habits, and daily technology usage. Students will also be tasked with making changes in their lives which will impact things like their happiness and state of mind. The goal of this class is for students to learn about the field of human factors psychology, and to take what is being learned and make intentional changes to how they live their lives. 

Instructor(s)

Robert Stapleton

Course Description

This class drops the needle on popular music as a significant and vibrant body of literature. We will employ the tools of literary analysis and critical thinking to examine the complex ways that 20th century music reflects cultural and artistic movements. We will consider aesthetic and neurological principles of sound, theoretical framings of lyrics, and the role of storytelling in the lyrical canon. We will engage in intellectual inquiry, debate, and scholarly writing in our investigations of how songs can embody the central tenets of literature and have expanded our cultural canon and informed our collective identity.

Instructor(s)

Alessandra Lynch

Course Description

In this course we will be reading texts from various genres (personal essay, memoir, graphic “novel,” and poetry), each focusing on some aspect of the Self– self-image, self and community, self and culture. We will discuss how self-expression manifests itself in each genre–how each genre reveals or clarifies insights about the self. Many of our writings will be personal in nature. The class will be discussion-based, but students will keep a journal, respond to a variety of writing prompts, and write essays triggered by the readings.

Instructor(s)

Susanna Foxworthy Scott

Course Description

In this class, we will explore such topics as mental illness, birth, death, the AIDS epidemic and addiction by reading works that offer ethical, historical, cultural and scientific perspectives. By reading patient and physician memoirs and literary works, we will gain an understanding of how the experience of illness as well as the experience of treating illness can be influenced by socio-economic and cultural factors. We will learn about the ethical, economic, and political dilemmas facing patients, doctors, and communities. Suffering comes not only from medical condition itself but from injustices, unequal access to care, stigma, neglect, and isolation. As patients and perhaps future health care providers, we need a fuller understanding of these dimensions of illness and health care.

Instructor(s)

Darryl Pebbles

Course Description

This Modern American Memoir FYS involves the study of memoir, a category of the larger Life Writing genre. We will study modern lives through the prism of memoirs written by writers with unusual and fascinating backgrounds and stories. We begin with essays offering a history of memoir before reading essays describing the nature of memoir and the many issues that often arise—such as memory recall, memory fallibility, unintended misrepresentation and fabrication.

We read a variety of essay-length memoirs as well as excerpts from book-length memoirs before turning to Tobias Wolff’s This Boy’s Life and Tara Westover’s Educated. These writers ask interesting questions: What is truth in memoir? How do memoirs differ from fiction? Are memoirists fiction writers in disguise? At what point does embellishment of an event transform into fabrication? Finally, why do we enjoy telling nonfictional stories about ourselves and reading nonfictional stories about other lives?

Instructor(s)

Alexander Roehrkasse

Course Description

Many of our most salient watchwords— binging, multitasking, clickbait, doomscrolling—betray the pervasive feeling that attention in contemporary life is misused, even abused. By engaging with scientific, journalistic, and literary texts, this course investigates the nature of attention, mounting efforts to control and profit from attention through technology and design, and emerging movements to resist attentional exploitation. The course also explores attention-based practices such as mindfulness meditation to better align our attention with our goals and values and leverage it for vocational reflection. 

Instructor(s)

Sunny Romack
Tracy Jaffe

Course Description

“In this course, students will learn and practice civil discourse in a constructive community through study of women’s ongoing struggle for basic human rights in the US and around the world. By reading, viewing, or listening to feminist thinkers from across the globe, both historical and contemporary, students will reflect on the systemic nature of patriarchal oppression that, despite feminist progress on many fronts, continues to marginalize and dehumanize women even today. This course will ask: What are the limitations of white, Western liberal feminism for supporting women’s rights across lines of national origin, race, ethnicity, religious identity, disability status, socioeconomic standing or caste, sexual orientation, and gender identity? What can transnational, intersectional feminism teach us about the deep connections between patriarchal structures, capitalism, and imperialism, as well as how feminism can address the injustices inherent within all three? What role has collective feminist action played in furthering women’s basic human rights in the past? What role can it play today?

How do women’s rights relate to human rights more broadly? What are the benefits of a transnational, intersectional approach to feminism in countering patriarchal oppression of women and other marginalized groups?”

Instructor(s)

Jules Grable

Course Description

In an era of unprecedented global and personal stress, well-being is not a passive state – it is a radical, deliberate practice. Through the lens of the BU Be Well model, this course invites students to move beyond surface-level self-care to explore the intersections of neuroscience, mindfulness, resilience, and community. Students will not only leave this course with the skills needed to navigate the demands of university life, but to lead with a purpose that balances personal boundaries with a deep commitment to community flourishing.

Instructor(s)

Nicholas Reading

Course Description

Throughout this process, students explore what it means to be happy, content, and centered. Our intention considers the inquiry, What does a peaceful life look like? A seemingly simple topic, we will investigate the social, economic, and personal complexities enmeshed in lifelong pursuits. I hope students read something they needed to hear and write something they didn’t know they needed to say.

Instructor(s)

John Perkins

Course Description

Coming soon.

Instructor(s)

Jesse Van Gerven

Course Description

This FYS will explore the stories that people tell each other about food.  Stories and narratives are extraordinarily powerful tools that people develop, use, and share for making sense of the world and making their way through it. Stories give structure and meaning to our lives.  Stories shape our perceptions of food and what food means to us.  We swim through a sea of stories about which foods are good to eat, and which foods are bad to eat; what foods are healthy, and what foods are unhealthy; stories about where food comes from, how it is prepared, and by whom; as well as stories about the nature of human societies and our relationships with other species and the environment.

In this course we will begin an exploration of these stories, their deeper meanings, and the  connections between them across different places, different times, and different social locations.  We will explore a wide variety of “texts” including children’s stories and nursery rhymes, short stories, novels, films, recipes and cookbooks, investigative journalism, TikTok and other videos, as well as academic articles and books.  This will include exploring various elements of different “food cultures” from around the world and from different periods of time.  Later, we will focus more specifically on stories about good and bad food, including the scientific stories of nutrition and food science.  This will lead us to yet other stories about food politics and how decisions about food are made and by whom, which leads to yet more stories about food companies and their roles in the food system.  Throughout the course you will have many opportunities to critically engage with these materials, issues, and ideas.  We will do some hands-on, experiential learning at Butler’s campus farm, you will have an opportunity to do some creative work writing a children’s story, nursery rhyme, or poem, as well as other individual and group projects and assignments.

Instructor(s)

Daniel Durso

Course Description

Across the globe, researchers have uncovered ancient dwellings adorned with images of human and non-human animals, geometric designs, and what appear to be early musical instruments.  Rather than asking that standard question of what these artifacts reveal about past civilizations, this course reverses the question: what can these artifacts teach us about ourselves?  Drawing inspiration from prehistoric artists, musicians, and storytellers, we will examine the human drive for beauty and creative expression.  In the first semester, we explore why humans create and respond to images, sounds, and narratives.  In the second semester, we investigate the nature of creativity itself, whether it is unique to the arts or extends across domains such as science, and whether artificial systems can genuinely exhibit creativity.  Bringing together insights from philosophy, psychology, biology, neuroscience, and artificial intelligence, this course encourages students to consider how beauty and creativity help define what it is to be human.

Instructor(s)

Karly Keiper

Course Description

Many people do not realize that the laws prohibiting discrimination on the basis of disability are younger than most of our grandparents. In this course, we will explore the life of the “mother of the disability rights movement”, Judy Heumann. We will analyze how her unique personal story, life experiences, and fierce advocacy have shaped the law-making around disability and civil rights. We will discuss the evolution of the movement beyond Judy’s “birth” of it, exploring what accessibility meant, currently means, and what Judy (and many, many others) hope for it to one day mean.

Content warning: abuse, neglect, and violence against people with disabilities

Instructor(s)

Undraa Maamuujav

Course Description

Delving into the rhetoric of auto ethnography and other creative nonfiction genres, we will explore the many dimensions of our lived experiences: the complicated web of identities, actions, thoughts, feelings, memories, imaginations, and encounters that shape our sense of who we are and what our place in society is. We will examine written and multimodal texts of various genres, encompassing both creative nonfiction and fiction writing, to understand how self-expression manifests itself in these genres and how these genres illuminate insights about the interplay of self and society. Through creative remixing of multimodal elements and multiple genres(e.g, poetry, memoir, podcast, infographic, digital storytelling), we seek to understand how our personal identities and experiences are intricately and inextricably linked to the larger cultural, political, economic, historical, and social structures within which we live. This course will help students develop critical thinking, close reading, persuasive writing, academic research, and digital literacy skills while tapping into their creativity. 

Instructor(s)

Dan Barden

Course Description

In this seminar, we will spend the first semester reading and writing about the literature of addiction. Human beings have been fascinated with intoxication since they first learned how to intoxicate themselves, and the disease of addiction has influenced every part of our culture.

The second semester will explore the literature that has emerged, particularly in the last 75 years, from the experience of recovery from addiction. What have writers made from our attempts, both successful and unsuccessful, to triumph over addiction in all its forms.

Instructor(s)

Tom Paradis

Course Description

Along with its roles in contemporary pop culture, Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games can be interpreted through numerous disciplinary perspectives. This FYS invites you to “unpack” numerous layers of meaning embedded within Collins’ original dystopian series (fall semester) and her recent prequels (spring semester). Students with any level of (in)experience are welcome, though some level of passion for exploring this world is a must. We will first examine this allegorical saga as a cultural and literary phenomenon before moving into connections with our own world. We will take our own academic tour of sorts, sampling a variety of perspectives including psychology, history, philosophy, English, gender studies, political science, communication, music history (the Covey!), and health science, among others. You will have the opportunity to explore any of these disciplinary connections within your own creative projects. This will all wrap around your professor’s focus on the human and urban geography of Panem, and especially the central Appalachian home of an unlikely heroine, Katniss Everdeen.

Instructor(s)

Angela Hofstetter

Course Description

This two-semester course featuring authors from Butler’s acclaimed Vivan Delbrook Visiting Writer’s Series dynamically engages with the art (film, poetry, podcasts, novels, television shows, short stories, etc.) of the 21s century in conversation with the rich history that precedes it. Our interdisciplinary, international, and intertextual approach will help you hone your writing, research, and speaking skills as well as your appreciation of the vital tradition the humanities play in making meaning out of the mystery, magic, and madness of the human condition.

Instructor(s)

Felicia Williams

Course Description

I chose this topic because it is important to be cognizant of our individual process and habits. It is imperative that one knows how to articulate their voice and be comfortable doing so. I also think it is important that we seek to hear the voices of others. Listening to and thinking about others can be both educational and transformative on multiple levels.

Instructor(s)

Joseph Long

Course Description

Coming soon.

Instructor(s)

Bryce Berkowitz

Course Description

In this course, our focus will be a lack of focus. Instead of one long marathon topic, let’s cover a shotgun smattering of topics: from image-based poetry to indie movies, from discovering life’s meaning to finding purpose in small moments, from voice-driven fiction to edgy memoirs, from redefining work culture to social movements, from graffiti art to street theatre, the perils of social media to inspirational Ted Talks to who knows what else… Let’s define our time together by taking a random and organic journey towards collective growth and awareness by asking big questions about some of life’s many topics.

Instructor(s)

Melissa Etzler

Course Description

Inspired by the ambiguity of “breaking bad,” this course explores intersections of crime and madness. We will examine texts featuring issues of guilt, justice, abnormality, and deviance to uncover particular and universal social commentaries on moral values and community constructs. Focusing primarily on written and visual texts from the 18th century to the present, multidisciplinary fields will inform our interpretations.

Course Description

From drawings of horses, stags, and bulls on the caves of Lascaux to enduring classics like The Call of the Wild and Black Beauty, animals have captured our imagination as symbols, companions, workers, food, and fellow warriors: our path to modernity tells the tale of a relationship paradoxically fraught with violence and affection. This interdisciplinary First Year Seminar examines how the burgeoning fields of anthropology, psychology, and criminology converged with biology, zoology, and economics in taxonomies of class, race, sex, and gender whose legacy still governs our conversations about which lives matter. Most importantly, we will discover how Writing for Wellness (W4W) helps us grapple with making meaning of nature, nurture, and justice in the new millennium.

Instructor(s)

Barbara Campbell

Course Description

This course will examine representations of disability in American culture in the 20th and 21st centuries through literary texts, film, art, music, and dance. Our class will use disability studies theory to analyze how artists with disabilities critique ableism and complicate conventional narratives of disability. Stereotypical depictions of the disabled figure in literature, art, and popular culture reinforce, sometimes inadvertently, discrimination towards people with physical, intellectual, and psychiatric disabilities. The disabled subject is often represented as the object of pity, scorn, or as heroic inspiration for ableist culture. Works by artists with disabilities tend to challenge these depictions in content and form in unconventional and radical ways. We will engage with a variety of texts to discuss how artists draw attention to inclusivity, access, and social justice.

Instructor(s)

Hannah Sullivan-Brown
Julie Searcy
Grant Vecera

Course Description

In this course, students will explore the values, choices and goals that inform their decisions and guide their own lives. By reading carefully selected texts — from writers across the vast array of disciplines, students will seek answers to the following questions: how can I do both well and do good in the world? How do I know what I am meant to do, for work and for leisure? How can I find the path in life that is uniquely mine? What are the philosophical and practical goalposts that I should aim for? How do I live a meaningful life?

Instructor(s)

Natalie Carter

Course Description

This seminar introduces students to critical thinking and a discussion of values, and develops oral and written communication skills through an investigation of contemporary women’s literature written in a variety of global cultures. Through contemporary literary texts, the course will explore women’s perspectives on current issues influencing women’s sense of self, relationships, worldviews, opportunities, and challenges; we’ll consider the ways that sexual politics intersect with the politics of race, class, ethnicity, sexual orientation, nationality, and other markers of difference. By examining literary texts and other cultural materials, we’ll consider possibilities for understanding and changing the cultural, political, and social systems that define women in the world.