Courses

Course: ANTH 389: Topics in Anthropology | Humans and Their Technicolour Cultures
Term: Winter 2026
Section: AS01
Instructor: Kyle Napier

This course looks at communities and societies and their unique processes of creation, adoption and adaption of physical and digital technologies. The course encourages learners to apply an anthropological lens in observing contemporary socio-cultural technology theories. Specific topics include a review of technologies in history, case studies of socio-cultural technological adoption, the role of technology and language, and critical theories in media and technology. The course is grounded in the social and cultural theories which inform the processes of technological determinism and self-determination.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in ANTH 250 or consent of the department.

Permission Required: No

Course: ANTH 497: Topics in Anthropology | Anthropology of Food
Term: Winter 2026
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Franca Boag

This is a seminar course for students interested in advanced study of specialized areas of anthropology. This course is devoted to the detailed study of a single theme—particularly themes of contemporary relevance or debate—and it rotates among the subfields in Anthropology. Beginning this seminar is a review of foundational readings before proceeding to such topics as food and gender, food inequality, food history, anthropological perspectives on food’s role in shaping cultural identity and memory, nationalism, terroir and globalization. Food is also a rich font for exploring group relations and ethnic affiliations, heritage and change, as well as the political economy of food and resistance.

Prerequisites: Minimum grades of C- in ANTH 207.

Permission Required: No.

Course: ANTH 497: Topics in Anthropology | The Social Zooarchaeology of Domestic Animals and Their People
Term: Winter 2026
Term: AS02
Instructor: Dr. Paul Prince

Social zooarchaeology moves beyond the narrow stance that faunal assemblages from archaeological sites can be explained primarily as representing the human exploitation of animals for food to consider more fully the social and symbolic aspects of the human-animal relationship. This course explores the agenda of social zooarchaeology with a particular emphasis upon the emerging theoretical goal of being less anthropocentric and instead viewing relationships between humans and animals as having developed in a symbiotic manner. It does so by concentrating on domestic animals and how our lives have become entangled with theirs in various ways. The subject will be addressed through discussions of case studies and the use of some hands-on activities employing zooarchaeological specimens.

Prerequisites: Minimum grades of C- in any 300-level ANTH course and one of ANTH 206, ANTH 207, ANTH 208 or ANTH 209.

Permission Required: No

Course: POLS 424: Advanced Topics in Canadian Politics | The Politics of Work in Canada
Term: Winter 2026
Section: AS01
Instructor: Daniel Troup

Most people who live in Canada work for an employer to support themselves and their family financially. Given labour’s centrality to the operation of Canadian society, it is unsurprising that matters like the taxation of income, the level of employment and the quality of work available are prevalent subjects of political discussion in the country. Moreover, many of the concepts central to political science including authority, rights, interests, law and collective action are encountered in the daily working lives of people in Canada. However, it is also noteworthy that labour is often perceived apolitically, as a matter of economics that politicians respond to, rather than something intrinsically political. In these respects, work is continuously politicized and depoliticized in Canadian politics. This course examines the politics of work in Canada by discussing when and how work is politicized, which employment arrangements are typical and which are controversial, how governments seek to manage labour markets as well as the ways in which the political scientific study of work resembles or differs from the study of the same subject in other fields.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in POLS 225.

Permission Required: No

Course: POLS 470: Selected Topics in Comparative Politics | Politics of AI: How to Understand and Map the Politics of Artificial Intelligence
Term: Winter 2026
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Chong-su Kim

No aspect of our lives is free from artificial intelligence (AI), whether it is Google search and Spotify song recommendations or the climb up the Capitol Hill wall or the battlefields of Gaza. As artificial intelligence and human intelligence become ever more intertwined, the boundaries between the two are becoming increasingly blurred. Furthermore, the relationship between human intelligence and artificial intelligence is shifting from that of creator and creature to that of a partnership between the two, and now the free will of the former is heavily affected by and dependent on the determinism of the latter. However, being overwhelmed by the technical vocabulary of big data, algorithms, and large language models, as well as the myths of AI, it is arduous to see through and critically scrutinize the black-box of AI. This course aims to examine the history before, the power behind, the material foundations below and human interactions with AI. Specifically, this course explores the relationship and intercourse between AI and labour, democracy, surveillance, war, race and gender, and academia.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in POLS 200.

Permission Required: No

Course: POLS 490: Advanced Study in Political Science | Theories of Public Governance
Term: Winter 2026
Section: AS02
Instructor: Dr. Brendan Boyd

As a concept, governance defies a single succinct definition, but clearly involves questions of authority, decision making and accountability. In plain language, it is how groups of people establish the rules and processes that control and shape their conduct. Public governance refers to the systems by which a population, community or country governs itself as opposed to the governance of a private corporation or business. In this course, we investigate the evolution of modern public governance since the mid-1800s by examining the theoretical approaches and organizational forms of governance and how they have been applied in practice. The themes and debates that are examined include how do different governance approaches distribute power and authority, how do they make and enforce decisions about policy and the distribution of public resources, and how do they secure accountability and legitimacy from the public that is bound by these decisions.

Prerequisites: Minimum grades of C- in POLS 200, POLS 214, POLS 215, POLS 224, POLS 225 or POLS 264 and either POLS 244 or POLS 265 or consent of the department.

Permission Required: No

Course: POLS 490: Advanced Study in Political Science | How to Read Political Philosophy
Term: Winter 2026
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Ryan McKinnell

How is the activity of studying the history of political thought best understood? What does it mean to read or interpret a text honestly? On what grounds do we distinguish persuasive from unconvincing interpretations of particular texts? Should a student of the history of political thought seek to understand the ways in which particular ideas or concepts have been debated, transformed, and developed over time, or should the student instead study particular deployments of ideas in particular historical and ideological contexts? To what extent are elements of the past retrievable? Should students aspire to ascertain the true intentions of the authors they study? If so, how do esoteric and exoteric readings of texts enter differently into that endeavour? How do we define a period in the history of political thought? Are there any perennial problems? Are truth and knowledge objective categories, or are they discursively structured? How does the notion of canonical texts shape the study of political theory? How we answer these and other related questions will shape the ways in which we read, interpret, and understand texts in the history of political thought. In this course, we will distinguish different methodological approaches and explore major methodological debates in the field with an eye to improving the intellectual rigour of our work.

Prerequisites: Minimum grades of C- in POLS 200, POLS 214, POLS 215, POLS 224, POLS 225, POLS 264 and either POLS 244 or POLS 265 or consent of the department.

Permission Required: No

Course: URBW 497: Topics in Urban Wellness | Global Perspectives on Urban Wellness
Term: Winter 2026
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Marielle Papin

In this course, we will discuss urban wellness in a global context. We will discuss how different cities look at urban wellness from different cities. We will analyze differences between cities from developed and developing countries or between global, large and small municipalities. We will also look at how cities work collectively on urban wellness, particularly through transnational networks and partnerships. We will discuss the involvement of private actors, including philanthropic foundations and companies, in the governance of urban wellness. We will use an interdisciplinary lens on urban wellness, building on fields such as political science, anthropology, economics, geography or urban planning.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in URBW 289 or consent of the department.

Permission Required: No

Course: ANTH 389: Topics in Anthropology | Anthropological Approaches to Multilinguism
Term: Spring/Summer 2026
Section: OP01
Instructor: Dr. Jenanne Ferguson

What is life like in multiple languages, for an individual? For a whole community? In this course, multilingualism—from the personal to the societal—is considered through both anthropological and sociolinguistic approaches. We begin by looking at multilingual language acquisition and socialization before moving on to understanding the sociopolitical dynamics of speaking multiple languages in a community, as well as within the modern nation-state and beyond. We examine code-mixing practices and how those can lead to the eventual creolization and the formation of mixed languages while looking at how language ideologies impact the processes of language contact and change. Topics such as urban multilingualism and linguistic landscapes as well as linguistic spread and evolution via popular media online are approached both ethnographically and theoretically to illuminate processes of linguistic creativity and change.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in one of ANTH 206, ANTH 207, ANTH 208, or ANTH 209. A minimum grade of C- in ANTH 208 is recommended.

Permission Required: No

Course: POLS 390: Topics in Political Science | Ethics, Crisis, Conflict, and War
Term: Spring/Summer 2026
Section: OP01
Instructor: Luke Sandle

This course is an exercise in international ethics. It focuses in particular on themes of war, obligation and responsibility. It builds from the idea that the question of the ethical is more pronounced, and more in need of articulation during periods of conflict. While global politics in general may pose questions such as: what do we owe to those who are distant to us; should borders be open or closed; or how do we navigate dilemmas of cultural difference—times of conflict heighten the stakes, asking us to consider whether or on what terms we can have a global community, what is permitted during emergency and how do we judge the behaviour of political actors acting in the tumult of often tragic, traumatic or urgent events? This course thus asks students to form ethical judgements from a historically situated position. More broadly, it asks students to be attentive to the particular manifestations of long-standing concerns in international ethics such as the tensions between order and justice, necessity and the good.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in a 200-level course in Political Science. A minimum grade of C- in POLS 264 is recommended.

Permission Required: No

Course: ANTH 497: Topics in Anthropology | The Anthropocene: Past and Present Human Interactions with the Environment
Term: Fall 2026
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Cynthia Zutter

For millennia, humans have evolved and interacted with their environments. Students investigate how humans interrogate their world in the past and today. Topics include connections between human evolution and environmental change, domestication and human cultural evolution, and perceptions of the environment as humans define the Anthropocene.

Prerequisites: Minimum grades of C- in any 300-level ANTH course and one of ANTH 206, ANTH 207, ANTH 208 or ANTH 209

Permission Required: No

Course: POLS 349: Topics in Global Politics | North American Politics in a Global Perspective
Term: Fall 2026
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Daniel Troup

This course examines contemporary US politics, US-Canada relations and global perceptions of North American affairs. It concentrates on the role of electoral competition, ideological rhetoric and media narratives in shaping regional politics. The course prioritizes ongoing political events and examines the applicability of various concepts and theories to them. Accordingly, it aims to further students’ knowledge in the areas of election studies, public opinion analysis, political communication, global media studies and contemporary political thought.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in POLS 264

Permission Required: No

Course: POLS 390: Topics in Political Science | Justice, Law and Policy
Term: Fall 2026
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Mackenzie Common

This course examines the successes and failures of the law in addressing the most pressing challenges of our time. Anchored in a Canadian context but with global comparisons, it explores how legal institutions structure power, allocate responsibility and pursue justice in complex, pluralistic societies. Rather than treating law as a static body of doctrine, the course approaches law as a problem of institutional design and as a contested site of political struggle and resistance. Students examine the evolution of the common law tradition, the rise of international and regional legal regimes and the development of modern human rights law. Through case studies in emerging technology, corporate accountability, reconciliation and reparations, and climate governance, the course investigates how legal frameworks can both entrench and transform existing power relations.

Prerequisites: Minimum grade of C- in a 200-level course in political science

Permission Required: No

Course: POLS 424: Advanced Topics in Canadian Politics | Here Be Dragons: The Politics of Mega-Constitutionalism
Term: Fall 2026
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Ryan McKinnell

For long stretches of the country’s history, constitutional debates have become entangled with day-to-day politics. In the pre-1960 period, these issues primarily involved the evolution of Canadian federalism, the search for a constitutional amending formula and a concern with rights and freedoms. The introduction of the Charter and Amending Formula broadened the field of salient constitutive actors, yet did little to quell fundamental concerns around competing visions of the purposes of the constitution on both procedural and substantive grounds.

In particular, the Quebec Government’s refusal to sign the Constitution Act, 1982, motivated intensifying attempts at mega-constitutional change, which preoccupied the country for the last decades of the twentieth century. Ultimately, this led to the failure of the Meech Lake and Charlottetown Accords, the fracturing of the federal Progressive Conservative Party and the near breakup of the country with the 1995 Quebec Referendum.

In the aftermath, political actors at the federal and provincial levels concluded it was more optimal to pursue reform on an ad hoc and informal basis. However, the Alberta Government’s intention to submit to a referendum a series of questions on constitutional issues ranging from the Canadian Senate to provincial jurisdiction over immigration and judicial appointments to the public in the fall 2026 heralds the return of mega-constitutionalism to Canadian politics.

In this seminar, we situate and contextualize the key political conflicts and turning points that contributed to shaping the mega-constitutionalism of the previous century and to grasp the historical development, principal ideas and primary debates that form the bases of the Canadian constitutional framework. Our goal is to understand why mega-constitutionalism failed, what lessons can be learned and whether contemporary political actors who seek a constitutional terra incognita risk discovering monsters instead.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in POLS 225

Permission Required: No

Course: POLS 470: Selected Topics in Comparative Politics | Politics of AI
Term: Fall 2026
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Chong Su Kim

This advanced seminar critically examines artificial intelligence (AI) as a profound political and social force, moving beyond purely technical narratives. We begin by tracing the genealogy and materiality of AI from its cybernetic origins to its role in establishing cloud sovereignty and reinforcing systems of whiteness and imperial aims. The course interrogates the architecture of power, analyzing how AI is central to surveillance capitalism and algorithmic governmentality and how its application accelerates the crisis of democracy.

We critically explore the implications of AI across various domains: its deployment in warfare, focusing on lethal autonomous weapons (LAWS) and techno-biopolitical regimes; the shifting nature of labour, analyzing algorithmic exploitation and precarity in the context of ghost work and capital; and the entrenchment of global inequalities through digital colonialism and the encoding of hegemonic worldviews. We also consider AI’s implications for knowledge production and the university itself. Finally, we turn to practices of reimagination and reorientation, asking whether AI can be remapped toward critical technical practice, rejecting both techno-utopian determinism and fatalism. The core inquiry remains: how does AI fundamentally reshape the concepts of the human, the social and the political?

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in POLS 200

Permission Required: No

Course: POLS 490: Advanced Political Science | Global Environmental Politics
Term: Fall 2026
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Michaela Pedersen-MacNab

The race to solve existential challenges like climate change and biodiversity loss defines this century’s politics. Curiously, progress to solve these global challenges remains slow, incremental and contested. In this course, we investigate how and why global environmental governance evolved from a system focused exclusively on multilateralism to a diverse, complex and multi-level arrangement of institutions, norms and actors; why some global environmental issues have received more attention than others; how various actors have historically defined and apportioned responsibility for global environmental harm; why some international institutions and regimes have proved more effective than others; and ethical trade-offs associated with investing in radical governance and technological solutions to global environmental challenges.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in POLS 200, POLS 214, POLS 215, POLS 224, POLS 225, POLS 264 and either POLS 244 or POLS 265, or consent of the department

Permission Required: No

Course: ANTH 389: Topics in Anthropology | The Anthropology of Marginalized Groups
Term: Winter 2027
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Franca Boag

This course investigates how anthropology has contributed to research at the margins of society, often described as activist anthropology or public anthropology, that is, studies of people who are systematically excluded from social, economic and political power. Topics explored include ethnographic studies of urban spatial inequalities, of migrant labourers, of "illegal" or undocumented migrants, of houseless people, of those suffering from addiction and of the mentally ill—people in a state of social abandonment.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in one of ANTH 206, ANTH 207, ANTH 208, or ANTH 209; of these, ANTH 207 is recommended.

Permission Required: No

Course: ANTH 497: Topics in Anthropology | Skeletal Evidence and Social Worlds: Contemporary Bioarchaeology
Term: Winter 2027
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Hugh McKenzie

Bioarchaeology is the field of study that investigates human skeletal remains from archaeological contexts to aid in the reconstruction of past lifeways. So unlike ANTH 390: Human Osteology, which focuses on individual skeletal anatomy, or ANTH 486: Archaeology of Death, which examines cultural practices surrounding death, this course focuses on the excavation and analysis of human skeletal remains to gain insights into past lifeways. We survey contemporary topics in bioarchaeology including but not limited to the following:

• techniques and ethical obligations for the excavation of human skeletal remains
• interpersonal violence, injury and trauma
• social identity and the cultural modification of bodies
• social stratification and organization
• health, disease, diet and nutrition through differential diagnosis and epidemiology
• diet and mobility patterns through the analysis of bone chemistry
• habitual activity patterns
• paleodemography, kinship and biological ancestry

Such topics are considered within both evolutionary and biocultural theoretical frameworks, and we explore the potential of human skeletal remains for investigating larger issues such as the origins of agriculture and social complexity; the effects of urbanization and industrialization; migration and cultural contact; war and conflict; and childhood and social identity.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in any 300-level ANTH course and one of ANTH 206 or ANTH 209;  ANTH 390 is recommended.

Permission Required: No

Course: ECON 357: Topics in Applied Economics | Introduction to Blockchain Economics
Term: Winter 2027
Section: AS01
Instructor: Emre Inan

This course provides an introduction to blockchain and cryptocurrencies. It explores what blockchain is, how it works, the different types of cryptocurrencies and the principles of distributed ledger technology (DLT). The course examines the economic implications of cryptocurrencies including long-standing issues related to money, payments, trust and financial intermediation as well as regulatory considerations. Students gain insight into how digital currencies are shaping financial markets and payment systems and learn about the advantages of DLT over traditional finance. Emphasis is placed on descriptive analysis, real-world examples and critical evaluation.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in ECON 101; ECON 281 is recommended.

Permission Required: No

Course: POLS 410: Topics in Political Philosophy | Language and Authority: Technology and Education in a World Without Words
Term: Winter 2027
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Gaelan Murphy

We are living at a time that Hans Jonas described as the “loss of the cosmos” or what George Steiner described as living in a “post-culture.”  This involves, amongst other things, a loss of language. We speak, obviously, but do these words mean anything? And if they don’t—if our words are not our words, but merely my truth, if they don’t say anything about culture, if culture is just a fancy words for entertainment—what does this say about the tie between words and deeds?

This course explores these questions, their relationship to the phenomenon of education, the challenge to education by adoption of technological thinking and the effect this has on our ability to distinguish good from bad.

Authors to be discussed include Hannah Arendt, George Steiner, Walker Percy, Josef Pieper, Jacob Klein, Hans-georg Gadamer, George Grant and Neil Postman. 

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in POLS 214 and POLS 215, or consent of the department.

Permission Required: No

Course: POLS 461: Topics in International Politics | Critical Political Economy
Term: Winter 2027
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Daniel Troup

This course examines economic theories as they relate to the study of power and inequality. It applies and expands upon foundational concepts in political economy in order to deepen students’ understanding of the application of economic theories in commerce and public policy. The course introduces competing perspectives about how economic thought is constructed, challenged, preserved and reformed. It devotes substantial attention to the long-standing effort by critical political economists to simultaneously critique and explain economic affairs. The course primarily aims to introduce students to the advanced application of political economic frameworks mentioned in introductory courses.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in POLS 264

Permission Required: No

Course: POLS 490: Advanced Political Science | Weaponization of Information
Term: Winter 2027
Section: AS01
Instructor: Dr. Jeffrey Rice

This course examines the politics of knowledge and information in the context of national and international security. Although disinformation campaigns and fake news have garnered significant attention in recent years, especially when used by foreign powers, the act of using information as a tool (or weapon) is not new. In order to better understand the present-day concerns surrounding information and disinformation, this course examines the politicization and weaponization of information in contemporary and historical settings. Some of the core topics covered in the course include the history of state-sponsored propaganda, the role of mass communications in conflict, disinformation campaigns and their impact on electoral integrity, the rise of fake news and conspiracy theories, and seemingly more benign, but no less consequential, topics such as the politics of education and the role of popular culture in creating and perpetuating ideas.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in POLS 200, POLS 214, POLS 215, POLS 224, POLS 225, POLS 264 and either POLS 244 or POLS 265, or consent of the department.

Permission Required: No

Course: POLS 490: Advanced Political Science | Politics of Memory
Term: Winter 2027
Section: AS02
Instructor: Dr. Chong Su Kim

“Learning from history” or “what the past can teach us” presupposes both a solid line separating the past from the present and the out-there history assuring the stable past with archived lessons waiting to be excavated. While history served as a key architect for nation-state building since the Enlightenment, memories have emerged as a key building-block of post-colonial, -modern, and -truth eras. In recent decades, the politics of memory has been deeply embedded into key political and historical events such as the Holocaust, apartheid, democratic transitions and the war in Ukraine. Politics of memory unearths the past and buries the future while it looks backward to move forward.

This course explores how the politics of memory intervenes in the present and remembers the future and how critical memory reclaims and negotiates the past. This course examines key dimensions of collective memory and its relationship with politics. It visits various mnemonic sites to understand the politics of memory such as commemoration, forgetting, nostalgia, forgiveness, resentment, postmemory, digital memory and multidirectional memory. In this course, students learn how closely politics are intertwined with the mnemonic practices of remembering, forgetting, mourning and commemorating. This course also explores the recent development of the politics of memory in the transnational and digital era.

Prerequisites: A minimum grade of C- in POLS 200, POLS 214, POLS 215, POLS 224, POLS 225, POLS 264 and either POLS 244 or POLS 265, or consent of the department.

Permission Required: No