• Seminar Type: Honors
• Department: Spanish and Portuguese
• Instructor: Silvia Bermúdez
• Instructor Email: bermudez@spanport.ucsb.edu
• Day - Time - Room: Thursday 1:00-2:50 in HSSB 2201
• Enroll Code: 67116

Course Description:  This Seminar introduces students to some of the most famous Latin American women composers and singers within the musical traditions of boleros, salsa, Chilean and Argentinian Folk music, and contemporary pop. Students are to understand how these genres construct an idea of Latin American identity through instrumentation and the musicians’ performance. Among the artists to be considered are the Mexican bolero composer María Grever, who worked as a film composer for Paramount Pictures and 20th Century Fox beginning in 1920; Violeta Parra, Chilean composer, singer-songwriter, and pioneer of the Nueva Canción Chilena (The Chilean New Song); Celia Cruz (Cuba-United States), known as “The Queen of Salsa,” and whose catchphrase "¡Azúcar!" ("Sugar!") has become an emblem of salsa music. We will also consider Argentinian Mercedes Sosa, regarded as “the conscience of Latin America;” and Colombian Shakira, whose revenge track “Music Sessions, Vol. 53” with Argentine DJ and record producer Bizarrap enriched the time-honored tradition from the wider genre of break-up music.

Bio:  Silvia Bermúdez is Professor of Iberian Studies in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese. Her current scholarship centers on Iberian feminisms, the social function of poetry, and antiracist activism in 21st Century Spain. She teaches courses on modern and contemporary Spanish literary and cultural history, popular music studies, feminist studies, and poetic discourses.

• Seminar Type: Honors
• Department: Physics
• Instructor: Tengiz Bibilashvili
• Instructor Email: tbib@physics.ucsb.edu
• Day - Time - Room: Wednesday 5:00-6:50 in ILP 3103 *Open to Physics, Math, Statistics, Chemistry, and COE students. If you are not in one of these majors and still have interest in the class, please use this link: https://forms.gle/bvogbHBQGNMsX1XC6
• Enroll Code: 57323

Course Description:  The objective of the seminar is to provide an in-depth understanding of thermal radiation physics, starting with a comprehensive introduction to the principles of classical thermodynamics. We will explore foundational concepts and examine instances where certain predictions fall short without the transformative contributions of Max Planck. His paradigm-shifting ideas laid the groundwork for the development of quantum mechanics. As the seminar progresses, attendees will uncover the connection between thermal physics and the emergence of the notion of photons as discrete units of the electromagnetic field. Through this exploration, participants will gain insights into the profound interplay between thermal radiation and the quantum nature of light.

Bio:  Dr. Tengiz Bibilashvili, known as Dr. B, completed his Ph.D. at Tbilisi State University. His doctoral thesis centered around Non-equilibrium Quantum Field Diagrammatics. Following this, he shifted his focus towards educating students in physics and currently holds the position of Academic Director of the U.S. Physics Team for the International Physics Olympiad.

• Seminar Type: Honors
• Department: Black Studies
• Instructor: Roberto Strongman
• Instructor Email: rstrongman@ucsb.edu
• Day - Time - Room: Mondays 2:00-3:50 PM in NH 1109
• Enroll Code: 26633

Course Description:  Yoga is a Sanskrit term that can be best translated as "Integration." The course aims to develop an integral understanding of the history of yogic knowledges with roots in South Asia, creolization with XIX Century European body culture during the era of British imperialism, and a capitalist and often culturally-appropriative global spread in the late XX Century and beyond. This historical and philosophical material will be "yoked" (a cognate of "yoga") with a physical asana practice: the class will be organized in weekly two-hour sessions, with the first hour devoted to lecture, presentation, discussion and journal writing and the second hour to a physical postural and breathing practice thematically wedded to the readings. As such, the deeper, even metaphysical, goal of the course will be to bring "union" to the budding scholar, fomenting a balanced, equanimous and holistic body-mind.

Bio:  Ph.D. Literature (UCSD 2003). I am a scholar of embodiment, specializing in trance states. My latest book "Queering Black Atlantic Religions" (Duke UP, 2019) speaks to my interest in fomenting an awareness of the unity within the body-mind construct, the goal of "yoga." In addition to my academic credentials, I am also certified as a massage therapist by the state of California and as a yoga instructor at the 500-hour level (the highest recognizable credential in the field).

• Seminar Type: Honors
• Department: Earth Science
• Instructor: Alex Simms
• Instructor Email: asimms@geol.ucsb.edu
• Day - Time - Room: Mondays from 4:00-4:50 in HSSB 1224 *This seminar has a field trip
• Enroll Code: 66241

Course Description:  We will discuss the major geologic features and development of the California Coast.  It will include an overnight camping fieldtrip.

Bio:  Alex Simms grew up in Oklahoma, attending Oklahoma State University, and completed a PhD at Rice University on the Texas Coast.  He has studied coastal geology for over 20 years with field areas from Scotland to Antarctica.

• Seminar Type: Honors
• Department: Theater and Dance
• Instructor: Jessica Nakamura
• Instructor Email: jnakamura@ucsb.edu
• Day - Time - Room: Tuesday 1:00-2:50 in  HSSB 4201
• Enroll Code: 66746

Course Description:  This seminar introduces students to the interdisciplinary field of performance studies by analyzing connections between performance and protest. Covering a range of protests and performances, from the 1968 student and worker protests in Europe and the US to the 2017 Women’s March in Washington, the course will explore the role of performance in protest movements and contemplate how artistic performances work as protests. We will think of protest as performance, identifying mechanisms of display, spectacle, and embodiment. And we will look at performance forms that are, themselves, forms of protest. Assignments will include designing a performance element for a protest and critically analyzing the performance of a live (or recorded, depending on access) protest.

Bio:  Jessica Nakamura is Associate Professor in the Department of Theater and Dance. Her research interests include performance in contemporary Japan and East Asia.

• Seminar Type: Honors
• Department: Physics
• Instructor: Deborah Fygenson
• Instructor Email: fygenson@ucsb.edu
• Day - Time - Room: Friday 9:00-10:50 in Broida 3302 *This seminar requires students to spend 6 hours per week (two 3-hour blocks) in the student machine shop (PSB-South 1707). Because the number of students that can be safely accommodated in the shop at one time is limited , students will sign up for blocks of available shop times that work with their schedules during the introductory meeting of the seminar, which takes place on the first Friday of the quarter, from 9:00-10:50 in Broida 3302.
• Enroll Code: 67124

Course Description:  Subtractive manufacturing is an umbrella term for machining and other material removal processes (e.g., cutting, boring, drilling, and grinding) by which solid pieces of plastic or metal are shaped to specification. This is a project-based course geared towards sophomores and motivated freshmen who want hands-on experience with subtractive manufacturing.  The majority of course hours will be spent in the Physics Department Student Shop. The mission of the course is to instill a deep appreciation of machining, its capabilities, limitations and risks.  Safety is paramount. Students must pass a safety screening, sign a liability waiver, adhere to rules regarding dress and comportment, and commit to schedules allowing adequate supervision.

Bio:  Deborah Fygenson received a BS in physics from MIT, and a PhD in physics from Princeton.  Her research seeks to understand and control biomolecular self-assembly and to use this knowledge to explore physical principles of molecular machinery and physical routes to the emergence of animate matter.  Her teaching focuses on making the lower-division laboratory experience of physics majors impart skills essential to experimental research.

• Seminar Type: Honors
• Department: Physics
• Instructor: Paul Hansma
• Instructor Email: phansma@ucsb.edu
• Day - Time - Room: Monday 10:00-11:50 in ILP 4211
• Enroll Code: 61044

Course Description:  Chronic pain, which is pain that persists for at least 3 months, affects one in five of all American adults. It is the most costly health problem - more than cancer and heart disease put together. Engineered devices can help with this enormous problem. This seminar will explore existing and new opportunities for designing and building devices that can help. We will present devices that we have previously designed and used successfully in 9 chronic pain recovery studies. Student teams will design, make and test their own devices using Computer Aided Design (CAD) programs such as Tinkercad and Fusion 360, 3D printing, and Arduio microprocessors. They will graph, statistically analyze and write reports based on their tests.

Part of the problem of chronic pain is that it is widely misunderstood. Many therapies have focused on fixing the physical body, but when these fail, what is needed is retraining the brain. Neuroplastic changes in the brain create the continuing experience of unnecessary pain. These changes must be reversed to relieve chronic pain. Engineered devices, together with chronic pain education and safe activity can do it.

We will also discuss ongoing research that is being done in collaboration with Prof. Ken Kosik and his research group. We are using multielectrode arrays with thousands of electrodes and amplifiers integrated on silicon chips to study human brain organoids. We see repetitive neural firing patterns in these organoids, with no body and no connections to sensory data, that have similarities to the repetitive neural firing patterns that are involved in chronic pain. There will be opportunities to analyze data from this basic research.

Bio:  Paul Hansma, PhD, is a physicist at the University of California, Santa Barbara and a researcher in the Neuroscience Research Institute. His current research focuses on neurobiology and activity of human brain organoids as revealed by multi-electrode arrays. His inventions include Atomic Force Microscopes that function with samples in air or fluid, which have been commercialized by Digital Instruments (now Bruker) and Asylum Research (now part of Oxford Instruments), the Scanning Ion Conductance Microscope, and Bone Diagnostic Instruments including the Osteoprobe® commercialized by Active Life Scientific.  He has over 350 publications, with over 50,000 citations and an H factor of 117. His most recent publications are primarily in neuroscience.

• Seminar Type: Honors
• Department: Computer Science
• Instructor: Maryam Majedi
• Instructor Email: majedi@ucsb.edu
• Day - Time - Room: Monday 4:00-5:50 in HSSB 1207
• Enroll Code: 61069

Course Description:  In an era where technological advancements are occurring at an unprecedented rate, the course "Ethical Tech: Navigating the 'Should' in Innovation" offers a crucial perspective on the intersection of ethics and technology. This seminar invites students to embark on a thought-provoking journey, exploring not just the limitless possibilities of what they can create with technology, but more importantly, reflecting on whether they should create them. Throughout this course, students will engage with fundamental ethical theories and principles, applying them to real-world scenarios and emerging technological trends.  The seminars will foster critical thinking and ethical reasoning, encouraging students to contemplate the broader implications of technology on society, the environment, and future generations.

Some possible topics include:

The Role of Ethics in Technology Development

Balancing Innovation with Moral Responsibility

Privacy, Security, and Ethical Dilemmas in the Digital Age

From AI and Data Privacy - Where Should We Draw the Line?

Through a combination of interactive discussions, case studies, and presentations, students will gain insights into how ethical considerations can and should influence technological innovation. They will learn to identify potential ethical issues and develop strategies to address them, ensuring that the technology they create contributes positively to society.

Bio:  Dr. Maryam Majedi joined the Department of Computer Science at the University of California, Santa Barbara, as an Assistant Teaching Professor in 2023. She completed a teaching stream postdoc at the University of Toronto, where she worked with the Embedded Ethics Education Initiative (E3I) team and introduced the first ethics modules for CS courses in Canada. Dr. Majedi earned her Ph.D. in data privacy at the University of Calgary. Her Ph.D. work presents a novel privacy policy modeling technique. Prior to her Ph.D., she earned a Master of Science degree in High-Performance Scientific Computing from the University of New Brunswick. Dr. Majedi also completed a fellowship in Medical Innovation at Western University. 

Dr. Majedi's research primarily revolves around Embedded Ethics and Data Privacy. She explores the intersection of computer science and ethical considerations, aiming to develop modules that facilitate the integration of ethics and data privacy principles into computer science education.

• Seminar Type: Honors
• Department: East Asian Languages & Cultural Studies
• Instructor: Sabine Frühstück
• Instructor Email: fruhstuc@ucsb.edu
• Day - Time - Room: Monday 1:00-2:50 in HSSB 1224
• Enroll Code: 61176

Course Description:  Today, aging, disease, and death appear to be dramatically less immutable facts of the human condition than even 100 years ago. Scientific advances on the one hand and accelerated environmental destruction on the other have given the human body and its relation to selfhood a newly problematic status. Some scholars even suggest that the body should be conceived of not as an entity but as an interactive process of life and death combined. In this course, we will read, watch, and discuss how scholars in History, Sociology and Anthropology along with Japanese artists, creators of popular culture, film makers and literary authors have attached meanings to human bodies and selves in various stages and conditions.

Bio:  Distinguished Professor and Koichi Takashima Chair in EALCS, Sabine Frühstück is also an affiliate faculty in History, Anthropology, Feminist Studies, and Global Studies. She studies modern and contemporary Japanese culture and its relations to other parts of the world; enjoys building synergies, rethinking the conventions of scholarly work, and probing and transgressing national, cultural, and disciplinary boundaries. Frühstück mostly uses historical and ethnographic methodologies and takes visual culture seriously. She has most recently authored the monographs, Playing War: Children and the Modern Paradoxes of Militarism in Japan (University of California Press, 2017) and Gender and Sexuality in Modern Japan (Cambridge University Press, 2023). Her current research is about modern manifestations of immortality and the malleability of the human body and its parts.

• Seminar Type: Honors
• Department: Political Science
• Instructor: Clayton Nall
• Instructor Email: nall@ucsb.edu
• Day - Time - Room: Monday 12:00-1:50 in GIRV 2124
• Enroll Code: 66878

Course Description:  This course delves into the politics of housing in California, with a focus on the state's unique challenges related to housing shortages and high prices. Through a political economy lens, we'll explore how institutions shape housing markets and create special interests. Weekly readings will cover topics such as why cities restrict housing development to benefit homeowners, why single-family homes receive tax benefits, and why effective housing reforms are unpopular.

We’ll address the following questions in our weekly reading discussions:

• How does the politics of housing differ from other issues?
•  Why do cities restrict housing development, usually to the benefit of homeowners who control local land-use regulation?
• Why do single-family homeowners receive so many tax benefits, especially in California?
• Why are necessary reforms for affordable housing so unpopular while ineffective policies get bipartisan support?

Class members will contribute to a collective project related to Professor Nall’s research.

Bio:  My research seeks to explain how policies that change geographic space change American politics, and my broader research interests encompass American political development, public policy, political geography, and political methodology. My book, The Road to Inequality: How the Federal Highway Program Polarized America and Undermined Cities (Cambridge University Press, 2018) uses a range of new data sources constructed from public archives and databases to examine how the largest public works project in U.S. history created Republican suburbs, increased the urban-suburban political divide, and worsened spatial inequality in the nation's metro areas.

I am currently pursuing research broadly addressing the politics of housing, examining how much voters understand housing markets and how their economic self-interest in local politics interacts with ideologies forged in national politics.

• Seminar Type: Honors
• Department: PBS
• Instructor: Tamsin German
• Instructor Email: tamsingerman@ucsb.edu
• Day - Time - Room: Wednesday 4:00-5:50 in  HSSB 1227
• Enroll Code: 66639

Course Description:  This seminar addresses the propensity for humans across all cultures, and across history, to believe in conspiracy theories. Conspiracy theories propose that certain significant world events are caused by the secret and deliberate actions of powerful malevolent groups. The class will look at the elements that make something a conspiracy theory, including how they are to be distinguished from actual conspiracies, and draw on recent research in a variety of areas of psychological science (evolutionary, perceptual, cognitive, social, and neuro) as well as on anthropological, historical, and sociological evidence to account for why belief in them is so widespread. We cover specific topics including the way our minds can see patterns even when none are there, how we identify actors with different kinds of intentions, especially hostile intentions, how our identification with the groups to which we belong can promote sensitivity to threats from outgroups, and how our minds systems for guarding against misinformation can be circumvented. We look at the thinking biases that can maintain beliefs once they are formed, and the ways in which people are resistant to evidence that challenges their beliefs. Consulting this evidence allows us to diagnose why some people are more likely to believe in conspiracy theories than others and what the consequences of widespread belief in conspiracy theories can be, as well as how we might approach combating the negative effects of conspiratorial thinking. Students will engage in readings, in class exercises, small group discussions and short class presentations, and the seminar will end with a session devoted to longer group presentations of conspiracy theories that the class will be invited to invent based on the material covered across the quarter. This class is similar to the one-unit transfer exploration seminar I have run a few times in prior years; one aspect of the feedback that I receive from that seminar is students wishing we had more time in each session to dig a little deeper, and so expanding it to a 2 unit, two hour class will give me the option to meet that goal.

Bio:  Tamsin Cleo German is a Professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences. Her research concerns the cognitive foundations of the human capacity for understanding other people, and its relationship to other domains of human thinking, including how we represent and reason about supernatural phenomena and how and why humans can be subject to beliefs in conspiracy theories and pseudoscience.

• Seminar Type: Honors
• Department: East Asian Languages & Cultural Studies
• Instructor: Thomas Mazanec
• Instructor Email: mazanec@ucsb.edu
• Day - Time - Room: This seminar will meet on Wednesday evenings in HSSB 1237 at the following dates and times:
  • W, Jan 8, 5:00pm–11:00pm
  • W, Jan 22, 5:00pm–11:00pm
  • W, Feb 5, 5:00pm–11:00pm
  • W, Feb 12, 9:00pm–11:00pm
• Enroll Code: 66720

Course Description:  In our current age of constant, global interconnection, many people acutely feel the need for disengagement from society, whether in the form of a digital detox, a meditation retreat, practices of "self-care," or simply setting limits on screen time. But this problem is hardly new: whether among the Daoists of Tang China (618–907), the Desert Fathers of early Coptic Christianity (3rd-4th centuries CE), or the renunciants who admired Milarepa in medieval Tibet, ancient societies have long formulated strategies for retreating from socio-political life. In this class, we will read and discuss three books on social disengagement from three distinct premodern traditions. We will also practice small-scale reclusion as we read about it. We will meet three times for six hours, for four hours of reading in silence with devices locked away, followed by a 30-minute break for food and a 90-minute discussion section. Our fourth and final session will meet for two hours, during which students will be asked to silently write a reflection essay in person, on paper, while consulting their physical books and any notepaper they've brought with them. There will be no outside assignments: just read the books in class, discuss them, and write about them in our final session. By reading in community, we hope to cultivate the rapidly fading humanistic skills of deep focus, long attention, and slowness of lifestyle.

Bio:  Thomas Mazanec is associate professor of premodern Chinese literature in the Department of East Asian Languages & Cultural Studies. He is also an affiliate of UCSB's Program in Comparative Literature, for which he directs Translation Studies. His first book, Poet-Monks: The Invention of Buddhist Poetry in Late Medieval China, was recently published by Cornell University Press, and his new translation of Three Hundred Tang Poems, with Commentary, is forthcoming from Oxford University Press. He is also the East Asia editor of one of the oldest and most well-respected journals in the study of premodern Asia, JAOS. At UCSB, he regularly teaches undergraduate classes on premodern East Asian traditions, classical Chinese language, Chinese literature, and Buddhist poetry, as well as graduate seminars in research methods and Chinese manuscript studies.

• Seminar Type: Honors
• Department: Earth Science
• Instructor: Syee Weldeab
• Instructor Email: sweldeab@ucsb.edu
• Day - Time - Room: Friday 2:00-3:50 in GIRV 1108
• Enroll Code: 61051

Course Description:  The focus of this seminar is to unravel and discuss the manifestation of ongoing climate changes in various parts of the eco-system. The seminar informs how our understanding of past climate changes improve and refine the impact and feedback mechanism of current and future climate changes.

Bio:  I am Professor at Depart of Earth Science and I study past climate changes that inform us about the sensitivity of the climate system to changes in climate forcings (for instance greenhouse gases) and climatic amplifying feedback mechanisms. For more,visit my website: https://weldeab.geol.ucsb.edu/