UNST 300-0002: Science, Pseudoscience, and Logical Fallacies

MoWe 9:35AM - 10:50AM| DJH 1006 | Philip L Frana & Jennifer M Mangan

UNST 300-0003:The Technology of Dystopia

Tues/Thurs 12:45-2:00 PM | DJH G009 | Michael Klein

How do stories of dystopian futures reflect and critique the technologies shaping our present? Using a science studies lens, this course explores the intersections of dystopian fiction, film, and television with real-world debates about surveillance, artificial intelligence, biotechnology, and climate change. By analyzing classic and contemporary texts, we will consider how dystopian narratives warn, satirize, and reimagine the role of technology in society.

UNST 300-0004: Navigating the Attention Economy

Tues/Thurs 2:20-3:35 PM | Wilson Hall 1012 | Jared Featherstone

The term "attention economy" depicts human attention as a limited resource in a world of ever-increasing connectivity and information overload. The class will take a critical look at the modern cultural situation of individual consumer attention being seen as a commodity that corporations and influencers are competing for. The course will examine both ends of this phenomenon, the efforts of marketing and programmers attempting to control the attention of consumers, as well as the struggle of consumers to maintain agency and even clarity of thought under these conditions.

UNST 300-0005: Design Thinking Across Disciplines and Professions

TUES 3:55-6:25 PM | Burress Hall 349 | Connie Frigo

UNST 300-0006: Designing Experiences for Connection

Thurs 3:55-6:25 PM | Miller Hall 2140 | Connie Frigo

This course examines how people perceive, interpret, and remember live experiences, from concerts and sports to community gatherings and campus programs. Students learn practical methods for observing audiences, understanding engagement, and designing for connection. Working in teams, they will design, prototype, and test their own live or participatory experience. Students gain practical, transferable skills for designing engaging experiences they can immediately apply in future academic work, team settings, creative projects, community initiatives, and professional contexts.

UNST 300-0001: Science, Pseudoscience, and Logical Fallacies

MON/WED 1:50-3:05 PM| DJH G004 | Philip L Frana & Jennifer M Mangan

The world is changing at a rapid pace, driven by science and technology. Countless expressions of cutting-edge science and high technology pervade our world, and they profoundly affect the social, economic, and cultural outlooks of societies and individuals. In this course, we will examine the politics of science, public perceptions of science, scientific literacy, and the co-evolution of scientific expertise and democracy. What does it mean to be objective? Who can we rely upon as trusted authorities? How will science address, and potentially alleviate, the wicked problems plaguing our world? What is the impact of society on science? Topics will include past and present controversies within the history of modern science and technology (e.g. the geocentric universe, evolution, climate change, artificial superintelligence) as well as studies of what are generally considered pseudosciences (e.g. astrology, paranormal activity, cryptozoology, UFOs).

This class is cross-listed with HON 300-0002. 

UNST 300-0002: Science, Culture and Science Fiction

MON/WED 9:35-10:50 AM | DJH 1006 | Matthew Alexander Chamberlin & Jennifer M Mnagan

This course will use an interdisciplinary, module-based approach to examine imagined worlds of science fiction and the cultures that evolved on them, introducing students to scientific and social-scientific theoretical frameworks and methods of analysis. We will investigate a number of planets and their physical parameters, including but not limited to the type of stars they orbit, the climates of the planet, their locations in space, and how they are similar to or different from Earth, and draw on a range of perspectives in the humanities and social sciences to make sense of the various human and alien species that populate these imagined worlds, including their relationship to and adaptation within particular environments. Using the fictional constructions of sentient beings and their behavior and interaction as metaphors for crucial issues in our own present-day human society, we will address questions of cultural evolution, personhood, knowledge, race and gender, power, conflict, and the nature of civilization.

This class is cross-listed with HON 300-0006.

UNST 300-0003: Navigating the Attention Economy

TUES/THURS 9:35-10:50 AM | DJH G004 | Jared Featherstone & Philip Frana

The term "attention economy" depicts human attention as a limited resource in a world of ever-increasing connectivity and information overload. The class will take a critical look at the modern cultural situation of individual consumer attention being seen as a commodity that corporations and influencers are competing for. The course will examine both ends of this phenomenon, the efforts of marketing and programmers attempting to control the attention of consumers, as well as the struggle of consumers to maintain agency and even clarity of thought under these conditions.

UNST 300-0004: Urban America: Detroit 

TUES/THURS 2:20-3:35 PM| DJH G004 | Johnathan Walker

Urban America: Genesis and Necrosis of Detroit. The focus of this seminar will be to understand the city of Detroit, Michigan through spatial dynamism and cultural place-making in what became America's "Motor City". The goal of the course is to develop an inclusive perspective of the people and powers that shaped Detroit with emphasis on equity/inequity and the development and perpetuation of diverse and "un-diverse" landscapes. Students will develop a critical eye toward issues of gender, race, and power and understand its spatial manifestation.

UNST 300-0005: Imagining Just Futures with Genetic Engineering

TUES/THURS 2:20 - 3:35 PM | EnGeo 0303 | Christine L May

Genetic engineering is a rapidly developing biotechnology that has potential to alter the fundamental blueprint for life. Students will actively explore the topic through the interdisciplinary lenses of Science, Technology and Society.

This section meets with UNST 300-H005.

UNST 300-0006: Dystopian Fiction and Technology

MON/WED 9:35-10:50 AM | Burr 0349 | Philip L Frana

How do stories of dystopian futures reflect and critique the technologies shaping our present? Using a science studies lens, this course explores the intersections of dystopian fiction, film, and television with real-world debates about surveillance, artificial intelligence, biotechnology, and climate change. By analyzing classic and contemporary texts, we will consider how dystopian narratives warn, satirize, and reimagine the role of technology in society.

This class is cross-listed with HON 300-0008.

UNST 300-0007: Human-Subject Experimentation

MON/WED 1:50-3:05 PM |PH/CH 2116 | Mark E Mattson

Although amazing knowledge can be gained from human-subject experimentation, why is it so highly regulated? The history behind it is complex. For instance, following World War II the United States offered amnesty to enemy medical personnel who gained unique data through brutal human-subject experiments in exchange for their help to interpret the information. Was it right to reconcile the otherwise unobtainable information gained with the horrifying suffering of the victims? How is science used nowadays to justify “destructive research on human embryos?”1 Through the use of historical role-playing, debate, and project development, students will gain greater understanding of the intersection between ethics and human experimentation and how it may affect them in their career.

1 Douglas, T., & Savulescu, J. (2009). Destroying unwanted embryos in research. Talking Point on morality and human embryo research. EMBO Reports, 10(4), 307–312. http://doi.org/10.1038/embor.2009.54 

UNST 300-0008: Archiving Global Immigration in Harrisonburg: Institutions and Communities 

MON/WED 1:50-3:05 PM | Gabb 0101 | Mary K Gayne 

This section introduces students to the history of migration into Harrisonburg from the post–Civil War era to the present. The course emphasizes archival and institutional sources that document immigrant and refugee communities, including Jewish merchants, Chinese entrepreneurs, and the diverse populations arriving after the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. Students will work with local archives, organizational records, and institutional partners to begin the important work of identifying, cataloging, and narrating archival sources that tell the story of global immigration in the Shenandoah Valley. Potential public-facing projects, such as a bus poster series linked by QR code to digital narratives, digital archive entries, or small exhibits, will highlight immigrant contributions while laying the foundation for future research and community collaborations. 

UNST 300-0009: Understanding Texts in Context

MON/WED/FRI 9:10-10:00 AM | Roop 0202 | Nicole Barnes

This course examines how communication shapes and reflects social reality through the concept of context. Focusing on the postwar 1950s through the countercultural rebellion of the 1960s, students will explore how media, activism, and identify influence public discourse.

This course satisfies Critical Thinking or Human Communication requirement. 

UNST 300-0001: The Unfinished Journey of People of Color in the United States 

MON/WED 3:25-4:40p.m.| Online | Professor: Dr. Howard Gelfand 

This course is an interdisciplinary in-depth study of People of Color in Contemporary America, with a focus on the antecedents and factors that have led to our current circumstances, utilizing studies and works from a number of academic disciplines.  We will examine the experiences of African Americans, Asian Americans, Latinx Americans, Native Alaskans, Native Hawaiians, and people of other identities through the lenses of art, cultural revival, culture, economics, ethnicity, historic preservation, memory, place, politics, and sexuality, particularly as pertains to social and cultural activism.  We will utilize a broad variety of sources and tools, and we will work together to figure out paths forward toward making life in this country more equitable, understanding, inquisitive, and celebratory.  This course has the format of a classical college seminar in which each member of the course will, together as a team, study, discuss, and contemplate the readings during course meetings. 

UNST 300-0002: Urban America: Detroit As “Motor City”

TUES/THURS 12:45-2:00p.m. | Roop Hall 0202 | Professor: Dr. Johnathan Walker 

Urban America: Genesis and Necrosis of Detroit. The focus of this seminar will be to understand the city of Detroit, Michigan through spatial dynamism and cultural place-making in what became America's "Motor City". The goal of the course is to develop an inclusive perspective of the people and powers that shaped Detroit with emphasis on equity/inequity and the development and perpetuation of diverse and "undiverse" landscapes. Students will develop a critical eye toward issues of gender, race, and power and understand its spatial manifestation. 

UNST 300-0003: Conceptualizing the Artificial in Fact and Fiction 

TUES/THURS 9:35-10:50a.m. | Keezell Hall 0107 | Professor: Dr. Michael J. Klein and Dr. Philip Frana 

This course will examine the artificial in literature, media, and science & technology. In conceptualizing artificial things as the “other,” we can see how they are something we can have dominion over. Or they can become a deus ex machina for overcoming human problems. Topics will include the examination of the artificial in popular culture (fiction, films, and other media), adoption into industry and the workplace, and integration in everyday life. Class activities and assignments will include a mix of in-class discussions that incorporate critical thinking, especially assessments of media coverage, and written projects. We are adopting a very interdisciplinary approach drawing upon concepts found in history, STS, technical communication, ethics, and the sciences of the artificial (computing, robotics, automation, artificial intelligence, complex systems). 

This section is cross-listed with HON 300-0010 

UNST 300-0004: Navigating the Attention Economy 

MON/WED 1:50-3:05p.m. | Darcus Johnson Hall G009 | Professors: Jared Featherstone and Dr. Philip Frana 

The term “attention economy” depicts human attention as a limited resource in a world of ever-increasing connectivity and information overload. The class will take a critical look at the current cultural development of individual consumer attention being treated as a commodity for which corporations are in competition. The course will examine the struggle of consumers to maintain agency within manipulative information environments and evaluate potential solutions at the individual and systemic levels. Assignments will emphasize personal experience in connection to course concepts.    

This section is cross-listed with HON 300-0009. 

UNST 300-0006: AI for Global Impact: Tackling Grand Challenges with Generative AI 

MON/WED 1:50-3:05p.m. | Lakeview Hall 1150 | Professors: Dr. Raafat Zaini & Dr. Christian Early & Venkat Kolluri

X-Labs courses are cross-disciplinary, team-taught, and challenge driven, using design thinking to tackle real world problems.

It aims to empower students to collaboratively leverage Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) as a transformative tool for envisioning and developing innovative solutions to significant global challenges and imagining radically different futures for humanity. Through crafting ambitious proposals, students will apply systems and design thinking to address ethical, legal, social, and environmental impacts, fostering critical thinking, creativity, and responsible innovation skills necessary to drive exponential advancements in technology and society. Students will explore ways in which they can work on developing a working demo to showcase the viability of their proposed ideas. (keeping the class aligned with the spirit of getting things done!) 

Listen to this audio for the course descritption. 

UNST 300-0007: How Does 3D Printing Help Us Tell the Story of Montpelier 

Wed 5:00-7:30p.m. | Lakeview Hall (The Tank) & Lakeview 1102 (3SPACE) | Professors: Dr. Aaron Bodle, Dr. Jamie Calcagno-Roach & Dr. Carole Nash 

X-Labs courses are cross-disciplinary, team-taught, and challenge driven, using design thinking to tackle real world problems.

With its renewed emphasis on community archaeology, the Archaeology Department at Montpelier is trying to reestablish its context within the larger landscape of the Montpelier estate. The program is physically isolated from the Main house and Visitor's Center in the new lab space. This isolation changes how the Archaeology program's variety of community constituents interacts and relates to the rest of the Montpelier property. How might we use 3D printing and design to develop solutions to this problem? 3D design has been used to develop products and processes. To learn how we can do this, we will explore how 3D design can be used to develop solutions. You will then apply these skills to provide prototypes of solutions to the Montpelier Archaeology Program. Students do not need to have experience with 3D printing or design for this course. The class size is limited to 24 students. How Does 3D Printing Help Us Tell the Story of Montpelier is available to all JMU students and will satisfy the Cluster 1, Critical Thinking requirement. 

UNST 300-0008: Communication & Social Media 

Tues 3:55-6:25pm | Online | Professor: Dr. Kathryn Hobson 

Communication is an ever-changing process in which we construct and respond to messages that are consistent with a communication purpose, audience, and context. With media having such a large presence in our lives, how could different mediums and platforms affect your verbal and nonverbal communication skills? How does the media platform alter the way you both portray yourself and others online? Are there consequences for different portrayals? If so, what are they? How do different types of media affect how you negotiate relationships with others?  What communication barriers might arise as you negotiate those relationships? Come study how messages are shaped and altered by media platforms and messaging.