Program of Study

The following is also available as a PDF from the College Catalog.

Students should discuss plans and proposed courses with both the Director of Undergraduate Studies and the Interdisciplinary Studies College Adviser. These meetings will help students evaluate the available courses of study to arrive at a balanced and coherent interdisciplinary plan.

In preparation for the B.A. essay, students in Spring Quarter of their third year enroll in a course taught by the B.A. essay preceptors, The B.A. Colloquium (ISHU 29801). This workshop, which meets three times, must be taken for P/F grading. While it does not generate course credits toward the major, it is a formal requirement of the program unless an exemption is granted for unusual circumstances. The workshops are a crucial part of the B.A. process that is overseen by the preceptor and the Director of Undergraduate Studies. Students who are writing their B.A. paper are expected to register for both ISHU 29801 and 29900.

Program Requirements

Each student’s program of study must meet the following five distribution requirements. Students can ensure that these requirements are met by completing the Inclusive Option Worksheet that is available from the Director of Undergraduate Studies or the Interdisciplinary Studies College adviser:

1. Six courses in a primary field or in closely integrated subject areas in more than one field.
2. Three courses in a secondary field or in closely integrated subject areas in more than one field.
3. Three courses in a supporting field or combination of fields.
4. A sequence or group of two courses that emphasizes intellectual approaches, or scholarly and critical methods germane to a student’s particular interdisciplinary course program. One of these two courses must be Critical Methodologies (ISHU 23902), which is offered in Autumn Quarter.
5. One course devoted to the preparation of the B.A. paper or project (ISHU 29900). A faculty member of the student’s choice will supervise the development of the B.A. paper. This faculty member need not be drawn from the Interdisciplinary Studies faculty. The Director of Undergraduate Studies for the Inclusive Option will assist in finding a suitable faculty director, and will also be a resource in advising on the development and writing of the B.A. paper. Similarly, a preceptor (typically a graduate student with interdisciplinary expertise) will also be available to help at every stage, teaching the series of seminars (The B.A. Colloquium [ISHU 29801]) in the Spring Quarter of the third year and advising during the B.A. write-up.

Any one of the fields listed under Numbers 1, 2, and 3 in the preceding paragraphs may be drawn from outside the humanities. The sequence of two courses described in Number 4 must be from the humanities offerings.

The rationale for the proportional distribution of courses specified in the guidelines is twofold: (1) to ensure that students are given substantial exposure to more than one aspect of humanistically centered inquiry, and (2) to cultivate a level of sufficient competence in at least one field so that this field, alone or in combination with material learned in other fields, can serve as the basis for the B.A. paper or project.

Summary of Requirements

6		primary field courses
3		secondary field courses
3		supporting field courses
2		critical/intellectual methods courses (including ISHU 23902)
1		ISHU 29900 (B.A. paper)
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Sample Programs. While the potential for developing individual B.A. programs in Interdisciplinary Studies is as great as the combined ingenuity, imagination, and interest of each student in consultation with his or her advisers, there are identifiable patterns in the choices of fields and lines of inquiry currently being implemented in the Committee. The most prominent of these include the following:

1. Study in philosophy and literature (as six- and four-course fields with either literature or philosophy emphasized) to investigate differences in handling concepts and language in philosophy and literature and/or mutual influence between the two fields.
2. Study in verbal and nonverbal art forms and expressions (art and literature; and music and literature) leading to consideration of the implications of the verbal and nonverbal distinction for interpretation and criticism.
3. Study in the history, philosophy, language, religious expression, and literary and artistic productions of a given culture or of a given historical period within one or more cultures. Examples include American studies, the Renaissance, or Greece (and the Mediterranean) in the preclassical and classical ages.
4. Study in humanistic fields (e.g., literature and philosophy) and in a social science field (e.g., sociology, psychology, anthropology, political science). This option is particularly adapted to a focus on gender studies. Please note, however, that the College offers a major in Gender Studies.
5. Study of modern culture in its various aspects of popular and elite forms of cultural expression.
6. Study in humanistic approaches to biological or physical science. This option is particularly adapted to interest in problems or aspects of intellectual and cultural history (e.g., the impact of Newtonian physics on eighteenth-century European thought) or to study of modern society and science’s role within it (medical ethics being one possible focus among many).
7. Study in human rights in relation to one or two humanistic disciplines such as philosophy, literature, or history.

Application. Students who are interested in this option should make application to the Committee as soon as possible upon completion of general education requirements (typically by the end of the second year and, except in extraordinary circumstances, no later than the end of Autumn Quarter of the third year). Transfer students in particular are urged to apply at the earliest point that they can, given the large number of courses required for the Interdisciplinary Studies B.A. program. An application is initiated by securing an interview with the Chair of the Inclusive Option, and with the Interdisciplinary Studies College Adviser, to discuss the feasibility of shaping and implementing a given set of interdisciplinary concerns into a course of study for the B.A.

After consultation, students who wish to pursue an application to the Committee must submit a two-part written proposal. The first part consists of a personal reflective statement of approximately five hundred to one thousand words in length, explaining the character of their interdisciplinary interests and stating as thoughtfully as possible how they propose to channel and expand them within course offerings currently available. Some consideration of prospects and possibilities for a B.A. paper or project is a desirable part of these statements, if it can be provided. The second part of the application consists of a proposed list of courses (the course prospectus) to fill the headings given in the above set of guidelines. In addition to considering the substance and workability of a proposed program, the Committee generally requires a B average in preceding course work. After the written proposal and GPA have been reviewed, a twenty-minute interview will be scheduled with the Director of Undergraduate Studies and at least one of the preceptors. A successful interview completes the application.

Grading. All courses in the major must be taken for a quality grade.

NOTE: The zero-unit ISHU 29801 must be taken for P/F grading. ISHU 29801 does not meet requirements in the major and it cannot be used an elective because it is a noncredit course. To meet requirements for full-time student status, students must carry at least three additional courses while registered for this course.

Honors. To be eligible for honors, a student must a maintain an overall GPA of 3.25 or higher and a GPA of 3.5 or higher in the major. Honors are reserved for the student whose B.A. paper shows exceptional intellectual merit in the judgment of the faculty adviser, the Chair of the Inclusive Option, and the Master of the Humanities Collegiate Division.

Advising. This program emphasizes clarity as well as flexibility in the shaping of each student’s interdisciplinary plan of course work and B.A. paper. Accordingly, we encourage discussion at an early stage of the student’s career and, indeed, throughout the course of study. Close contact with advisers (including the Interdisciplinary Studies College Adviser, the Chair of the Inclusive Option, the graduate student preceptor, and the faculty adviser of the B.A. paper) is essential in a program that involves so much individual initiative and experimentation.