One of the things our students love best about our course offerings (aside from all classes being faculty-taught; no T.A.s here!) is that in addition to all the staples they'd expect to find in their majors, there are a bunch of interesting classes and seminars that are unique to Siena. As a student here, you'd have plenty of opportunities to learn about topics you wouldn't normally consider, and enroll in classes that are just downright fun to take.
Want to read about a few examples of unique courses that have been offered in the past? Pull up a chair...
Zombies!
Fan of The Walking Dead? This seminar explores the complex monster that is a zombie. Are zombies mindless creatures driven purely by "hunger?" Or, are they still human but trapped in deteriorating bodies? Or, does the fear factor lie not in the zombies, but in those who survive? How does this rhetoric of disease, contagion and bioterrorism resonate for us today, as we grapple with these threats in the 21st century? Zombies! aims to answer these questions and more through research and critical reading skills.
Food and Film
Food is both a necessity and is loaded with social, familial, cultural, personal and religious meanings. So it's not surprising that food gets worked into films in a variety of ways. In this course, students explore the ways in which food has played a role in movies and are asked central questions about what is significant in human life: connections, or lack thereof, to the natural world, to each other, to ancestors, to progeny and to transcendence.
Rhetoric(s) of Hip-Hop Culture
Remember reading about this before? In this course, students explore the deeper meanings of hip-hop, focusing on the intellectual arguments present in hit songs and the history of hip-hop and culture surrounding it. Students present scholarly research on popular albums of both past and present, analyzing every aspect from artwork to phrases and beats.
Religious Studies Field Experience to Trinidad and Tobago
Palm trees, calypso music and the rainforest may sound as if they are an odd combination for a religious studies class, but not for the students that enroll in this course. For two weeks, students leave the campus behind and explore the religions of Islam, Christianity, Hinduism and Carib (Amerindian) religion in Trinidad and Tobago. They also meet with community leaders and students from the University of West Indies, among others.
Ancient Sport
This course explores the importance of athletic competition and sport in the cultures of ancient Greece and Rome from the Olympic Games to the spectacles of the Colosseum. Students read and discuss literary depictions of sport, including the funeral Games of Patroclus in Homer’s Iliad, Pindar’s Victory Odes and evidence of inscriptions, which detail the lives, stature and achievements of victors in the chariot races or gladiatorial contests in Rome.
If you're interested in learning more about Siena's academics, click below to request information. Maybe we'll see ya in class.
