IMAGINING SCIENCE
ENGLISH 404-06 (SPRING 2008)
UNIVERSITY OF IDAHO

A course associated with the Distinguished Humanities Professor endowment, sponsored by the College of Letters, Arts & Social Sciences.

This first-time-offering investigates the aesthetic qualities of writing about science, examining modes of expression developed by both scientists and non-scientists to help non-specialists understand scientific issues and methods.  Although the course readings span almost two centuries, the goal is not to deliver an inclusive chronological overview of scientific writing. It is rather to spotlight several important texts that have become benchmarks in public thinking about science and to examine contemporary examples of excellent science writing.

 The course includes an excursion to New York City in March 2008, during which students will meet with David Grimaldi, curator of entomological collections at the American Museum of Natural History; Glen Campbell, an editor for Elsevier Publishing Company; Carlos Armesto, Associate Artistic Director of the Ensemble Studio Theatre; and Jimmy Kolker, former U.S. Ambassador to Uganda, currently head of the UNICEF HIV/AIDS Project.   Meets Thursdays, 6-8:30 p.m.

Texts:

 Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (Penguin; 0141439475)
 Charles Darwin, Darwin (ed. Philip Appleman) (Norton; 0393958493)
 Henry David Thoreau, Walden (Yale UP; 0300110081),
 Paul Farmer, Pathologies of Power: Health Human Rights, and the New  War on the Poor (U California P; 0520243269)
 Stephen Asma, Stuffed Animals and Pickled Heads: The Culture and  Evolution of Natural History Museums (Oxford; 0195163362)
 David Zellnik, Serendib (online)
 Michael Pollan, The Omnivore’s Dilemma (Penguin; 0143038583)
 Elizabeth Kolbert, Field Notes from a Catastrophe (Bloomsbury;    1596911301)
 E.O. Wilson, The Creation (Norton; 0393330486)
 Richard Powers, The Echo Maker (Picador; 0312426437)
 

Information and Reading Schedule
Links to online resources
Report from the New York Trip

Humanities/science colloquia schedule
Gary Williams home page
Humanities Professor projects