Spring 2026 Course Search

This course introduces students to econometric approaches to asking and answering questions about the economy relating to employment, health, and well-being. The primary aim of the course is to understand how economists analyze data to determine causal effect. We will analyze data sets to ask and answer socioeconomic questions such as: What factors affect a person’s income, and how do we know? How might we investigate the main causes of unemployment?

Commodities such as cars, smartphones, laptops, and refrigerators were initially considered luxuries but are now widely viewed as everyday necessities. This shift suggests that our understanding of need is shaped by social, historical, and cultural context. In this class we will explore questions such as: how do we distinguish what we want from what we need to live a dignified life? Moreover, how might societies determine which types of needs should be satisfied through market exchange and which should not?

This course explores how ideas about the economy – from money, to labor, to distribution – have changed over time. We will focus on different schools of thought in economics, including mercantilism, physiocracy, classical political economy, the Austrian school, Post-Keynesianism, and neoclassical economics, placing these ideas in their global context. A central focus will be on how different thinkers conceptualize capitalism: both its benefits and pitfalls.

Catastrophic events—droughts, earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, and landslides—are growing in frequency and intensity around the world. As more of the global population concentrates in urban areas, the nature and consequences of these natural hazards are taking on a distinct and often violent shape in today’s metropolises and megacities. This course investigates how urban life reshapes both the impact of disasters and our capacity to respond to them.

Economic inequality is often described in terms of uneven distribution of income and wealth. Yet, more importantly, it reflects uneven access to opportunities, advantages, and life chances. Why do some people enjoy a higher standard of living and better quality of life than others? Are such inequalities fair and just? What role do history, policy, and institutions play in sustaining or reducing inequality?

Why does chronic hunger endure even in times of prosperity? How can famine devastate entire regions in extreme cases, while food deserts quietly persist in wealthy countries like the United States? And what does it mean to treat nourishment not as charity or commodity, but as a right of citizenship?

This is an environmental policy course with a focus on public action. The class will explore the dimensions of the production, use and disposal of plastics, including climate change impacts, alternatives to single-use plastic packaging, and the need for innovation. There will also be a focus on environmental justice.

This course enables students to undertake the research essential for composing their thesis or completing a project within their field of study or area of interest. Enrollment requires the submission of a comprehensive project proposal to Ikuko Yoshida, which must include a project title, a brief description, a list of relevant preparatory courses, and clearly articulated objectives and goals. 

This fourth-term Japanese course is purposefully designed to enable students to create digital books that promote cultural understanding among Japanese children. The curriculum begins with students engaging with short stories and Japanese animations to analyze expected behaviors and communication styles among Japanese children. Additionally, students examine social and cultural values in Japan—focusing on how these values are conveyed and how gender roles are represented in children’s literature and media.

How are language and thought connected, and does speaking multiple languages affect these connections?  Most people have had the experience of struggling to come up with a particular word or phrase, sometimes recalling it after a substantial delay.  This course will unpack the mental processes involved in that experience and explore the ways that cognitive psychology -- the study of thought -- has been broadened by investigations of monolingual and multilingual language use.

What do we remember about our lives, and how do these memories contribute to our sense of self?  This course will begin with an introduction to the scientific study of human memory to better understand how autobiographical memory brings episodic, semantic, and other types of memory together.  We will then explore what autobiographical memory has revealed about the development of memory in childhood at brain and behavioral levels.  Cross-cultural research has substantially reshaped the scientific understanding of autobiographical memory, and we will focus particularly on groun

Social psychology is the scientific study of how people think about, influence, and relate to one another. This course will explore social thinking, influence, and social relations that shape our lived experiences through a U.S. contextual lens. Social psychologists are increasingly concerned with the effects of the various systems of domination on outcomes such as health and wellbeing, relationships with others, personal and social identities, as well as political views and participation.

In this second-term Japanese course, students will explore Japanese cultural values and create digital books that reflect Japanese values. Students will read Japanese children’s books and watch children’s TV shows to examine how social and cultural values are portrayed and taught. Based on their analysis and understanding of Japan's social and cultural values, students will write their own digital storybooks, which aim to teach children about embracing cultural differences as a final project.

In this sixth-term Japanese course, students will examine how Buddhism influenced Japanese thought on the afterlife and analyze how Japanese views on the relationship between life and death are depicted in Japanese films.  In the first seven weeks of the course, students will examine and discuss the history, beliefs, and deities of Buddhism, as well as their influences on society.  In the second half of the term, students will analyze how death and the common theme of reincarnation are depicted in different genres of Japanese films, such as love stories and