Courses
The listing of a course description here does not guarantee a course’s being offered in a particular term. Please refer to the published schedule of classes on the MyBU Student Portal for confirmation a class is actually being taught and for specific course meeting dates and times.
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CAS SO 951: Professionalization Workshop
Undergraduate Prerequisites: currently enrolled in Sociology graduate program. - Provides an introduction to the professional culture norms and workings of the graduate program, familiarization with faculty's ongoing research and publications, and an overview of departmental, college, and area-wide resources -
CAS SO 952: Professionalization Workshop
Undergraduate Prerequisites: currently enrolled in Sociology graduate program. - Provides an introduction to the professional culture norms and workings of the graduate program, familiarization with faculty's ongoing research and publications, and an overview of departmental, college, and area-wide resources. -
CAS TL 500: History and Theory of Translation
The goal of this course is to familiarize students with the history of translation and the main trends in Translation Studies. Students learn to apply concepts acquired in class to analyze and critique translations and develop their own strategies. Effective Fall 2020, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Aesthetic Exploration, Historical Consciousness, Critical Thinking. -
CAS TL 505: Literary Style Workshop
Undergraduate Prerequisites: Admission to the MA program in translation or permission of instructor. First Year Writing Seminar (e.g., CASWR 100 or WR 120) - Workshop cultivating awareness of and sensitivity to style, cohesiveness, and patterning in literary English. Topics range from text-type to subtle effects of rhythm and sound. Imitation practice. Emphasis on translators' process, from strategic decisions to editing. Workshop format. Effective Fall 2020, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Writing- Intensive Course, Critical Thinking, Creativity/Innovation. -
CAS TL 540: Translation Seminar
Undergraduate Prerequisites: Proficiency in a second language; Undergraduate Corequisite: CASTL 542. - Graduate Prerequisites: Proficiency in a second language; Graduate Corequisite: CASTL 542. - Translation seminar where students produce substantial literary translations into English from their language of choice with the guidance of the instructors and language-specific mentors. Students hone their translation skills, read, and discuss articles about practical issues of translation. Students are required to register for co-requisite CASTL 542. -
CAS TL 541: Translation Today
Undergraduate Corequisites: (CASTL542) - Weekly lectures and discussions with prominent literary translators from Boston and elsewhere. Students engage with a variety of languages and several genres: poetry, drama, essay, fiction, and more. Focus on concrete, practical translation issues arising from the speakers' work. Students are required to register for co-requisite CAS TL 542. Effective Spring 2022, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy, The Individual in Community, Creativity/Innovation. -
CAS TL 542: Literary Translation
Undergraduate Corequisites: (CASTL540 OR CASTL541) - Guest lecture series in literary translation. Mandatory co-requisite with CAS TL 540 and CAS TL 541. This course cannot be taken on its own. -
CAS TL 551: Topics in Translation
May be taken multiple times for credit if topics are different. There are two topics for Spring 2025. Section A1: Self-translation and Bilingualism. Explores self-translation, the process and product of a bilingual author’s rendering of their text into another language. Challenges binary categories of original and translation, of author and translator. Students investigate literary translingualism as scholars and as creative writers-translators. Section B1: Translating the Francophone World. Explores the paratextual, transcultural elements, and challenges entailed in translating Francophone literature, through fictional works with writers, translators, and storytellers, part of the narrative. Authors to be discussed: Assia Djebar, Ananda Devi, Danny Laferrière, Mbougar Sarr. Effective Spring 2022, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Aesthetic Exploration, Historical Consciousness, Critical Thinking. -
CAS WR 597: Tutoring Writing in the Disciplines
Undergraduate Prerequisites: First-Year Writing Seminar (e.g. CASWR 120); Writing, Research, and Inquiry (e.g., CASWR 151, WR 152, or WR 153); and consent of instructor. - Provides instruction and support for department-based writing tutors. Students learn about discipline-specific writing practices, genres, and conventions, explore features of writing, and develop practical tutoring methods that transcend disciplinary boundaries to help peers become more independent writers. -
CAS WR 599: Tutoring in the Global University
Undergraduate Prerequisites: First-Year Writing Seminar (e.g. CASWR 120); Writing, Research, and Inquiry (e.g., CASWR 151, WR 152, or WR 153); and consent of instructor. - Provides instruction and support for CAS writing tutors. Students learn strategies for leading writing consultations, meeting the needs of ELL students, and navigating multimodal assignments. They also explore how their identities and experiences shape their roles as peer mentors. Effective Fall 2020, this course fulfills a single unit in the following BU Hub area: The Individual in Community. -
CAS WR 698: Teaching Composition
Presents central theoretical questions and accepted best practices in writing pedagogy, and specific principles underlying the CAS Writing Program curriculum. Required of all graduate writing fellows and teaching fellows prior to their first semester of WR 120 teaching. -
CAS WR 699: Teaching Writing Practicum
Guides graduate writing fellows through their first semester of teaching writing, providing support and supervision in the practical application of effective writing pedagogy. Required of all graduate writing fellows during their first semester of WR 120 teaching. -
CAS WS 501: Justice and Community Engagement
Community engagement as it exists at the intersection of justice ¿ social justice, criminal justice, educational justice, food justice, housing justice, restorative justice, and healing justice will be central to this course. You will examine these through both historical and contemporary perspectives. Using writing as a tool for advocacy, activism, and change-making, you will engage with seminal texts, critical discussions, and reflective practices to examine topics including racism, gender justice, LGBTQIA rights, and other social justice movements. Voices of those doing the work of change are highlighted and invited as guests. We will investigate justice and public health issues including attention to individual, intergenerational, and systemic trauma. With an intersectional lens, we explore how social justice issues are uniquely shaped by identity characteristics (race, gender, sexuality). Collectively, the class engages diverse approaches to understanding and facilitating justice and resilience. Inclusive and trauma-informed approaches to inquiry and writing provide a foundation for community centered justice work. Designed to foster a deeper understanding of change-making, we hope to equip you with practical skills to become an effective agent of change in your community and beyond. -
CAS WS 505: Topics in Women's, Gender, & Sexuality Studies
May be repeated for credit as topic changes. -
CAS WS 507: Diversity of Sex
Undergraduate Prerequisites: senior or graduate standing, and at least one of the following courses or equivalent: CAS BI 225, BI 309, BI 315, BI 4 07, or BI 410; or consent of instructor - Examines the integrative and comparative biology of sex and sexes based on readings drawn from recent primary literature, review papers, and book chapters. Effective Fall 2023, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Writing-Intensive Course, Oral and/or Signed Communication. Effective Fall 2025, this course fulfills a single unit in the following BU Hub area: Oral and/or Signed Communication. -
CAS WS 512: Sexual Violence
This course engages the topics of sexual deviance and sexual trauma through multiple lens. These lenses include psychological, sociological, criminal justice, public health, and social justice perspectives. The course explores multiple facets of understanding sexual deviance and sexual trauma including legal and philosophical perspectives, historical activism, understanding and treatment of sexual offending, and survivor responses. The roles of multiple systems including the media, mental health organization and the criminal justice system are taken into account. This course includes ongoing group work that engages critical inquiry, addressing relevant topics in sexual trauma in practical ways. Students utilize knowledge of theory and research methodology to pursue real world responses to issues of sexual violence and trauma. -
CAS WS 525: Judith Butler
Undergraduate prerequisites: two previous XL, WS, or PH courses; or consent of instructor. Graduate prerequisites: graduate standing. - An intensive study of Judith Butler's philosophical thought and social theory from the 1990s to the present, with an emphasis on the continuities and discontinuities between Butler's early work on gender performativity and more recent writings on racial justice, war, and violence. -
CAS WS 530: Global Intimacies: Sex, Gender, and Contemporary Sexualities
Undergraduate Prerequisites: advanced undergraduate standing or graduate standing, or consent of instructor. - Explores theoretical and ethnographic approaches to gender, sex, and sexuality as linked to globalizing discourses and transnational mobilities. Readings and discussion emphasize intersections of sex, gender, labor, love, and marriage in a globalized world. -
CAS WS 559: Feminist Killjoys & Cynical Queers: Intersectional Theories of Affect
Prerequisite: First-Year Writing Seminar (e.g., CASWR 100 or 120). - This class examines the affective turn, which has been marked by a shift towards bodily sensation, structures of feeling, and modes of relationality. We pay particular attention to cultural constructions of emotion such as happiness, shame, anger, and fear. Effective Fall 2025, this course fulfills a single requirement in each of the following BU HUB areas: Philosophical Inquiry and Life's Meanings, Research and Information Literacy, Writing Intensive. -
CAS WS 562: Studies in Asexualities
Pre- Requisites: First Year Writing Seminar (e.g., WR 100 or WR 120) - Writing intensive seminar that explores asexuality studies as well as various kinds of sexual and romantic absences in contemporary literature, literary analysis, and critical theory with particular attention to race and disability. Effective Spring 2024, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU HUB areas: Writing-Intensive, The Individual in Community, Aesthetic Exploration.