Islam and Conflict in Global Context, an upper level history class, provided a valuable look at Islam in today’s world. With roughly 1.8 billion Muslims in numerous countries around the world, understanding the historical context for Islam’s expansion allows for more nuanced analysis of current trends. The class culminated in an extended research project on a specific instance of Islam in a new context that arose from increased global contact. I focused on Islamic studies classes in the German school system.

As the title of this class indicates, we looked at sociology through a political lens. By way of the discussion of major theories on sociology, the class guided examination of how those theories reflect political movements and ideas. Digging deeper into occurrences such as Occupy Wall Street and themes such as voter suppression and criminal justice allowed me to gain a better understanding of how current political structures effect the people within them.

The Middle East and North Africa region is complex regional system whose recent economic developments have global effects and warrant international development efforts. With oil, the youth bulge, forced migration, and other changes deeply affecting how the region operates, this class gave insightful analysis and context to the development efforts in the region. The class-long group research paper allowed me to not only implement what I learned in class but improve my team-work and economic writing skills (see the “Papers and Presentations” tab for the full paper on the effects of oil on the Algerian economy).

This class provided a look at how macroeconomic theory works in the international system. I gained insight into trade, monetary policy, etc. and completed the class with a broad understanding of various aspects of the global economic system and how theory attempts to explain it. Through the knowledge acquired in this class, I am better able to place specific economic trends into global contexts and recognize how each piece works together.

Although World Art: Contact and Conflict was not one of my Global Studies concentration courses, it was one that was instrumental in shaping my thinking about global subjects. The class allowed me to see how broad ideas I learned in my economics and politics classes connected to other disciplines, in this case art. Looking specifically at contact zones, places where people and ideas came in contact with each other, gave an interesting perspective on how people and cultures interact. My final paper on a book of Congolese folktales showed the legacy of imperialism in a stark light and gave me the opportunity to write a type of paper I never had before (see the “Papers and Presentations” tab for the full paper).

• Having picked up the Economics major later in my college career, I tried to make it the perfect complement to my political science and global studies. Here I wanted to gain the skills to incorporate data into my studies. Thus, I chose classes such as Game Theory and Econometrics (both ways problems in both Political Science and Economics is analyzed). I also completed my seminar course in the methodology of Economics which meant I was able to develop a working knowledge of the data analysis program Stata and even conduct my own research using national data sets.
  • Intermediate Microeconomics and Macroeconomics
  • Pro-seminar: Methodology of Economics
  • Economics of Corporate Finance
  • Game Theory
  • Applied Econometrics

• Besides the three years of Arabic language study I completed for this certificate, I also took classes to further my understanding of Arabic linguistics. Specifically, courses such as Introduction to Modern Arabic Literature and Introduction to Arabic Linguistics gave valuable context and skills necessary to further my language study. Since language plays a crucial role in Arabic culture, these classes gave important insight into the background of those connections.
  • Introduction to Modern Arabic Literature
  • Introduction to Arabic Linguistics