Course Listings
ART (Visual art)
ART-101E 2-D Design: Art Techniques and Experimentation (3)
2-D Design is an introduction to a variety of technical, conceptual, and experimental methods used to make art. Students explore color theory and design principles using basic drawing, painting, and mixed materials. Intuitive, intellectual, and contemplative modes of inquiry provoke expanded possibilities and approaches to practicing studio art.
ART-102E Contemplative Ceramics: Form and Human Contact (3)
ART-125E Introduction to Drawing (3)
This studio class focuses on developing skillful use of drawing techniques, paired with an investigation of mind and perception. Drawing is presented here as a method for discovering the beauty and profundity of ordinary things. A graduated series of individual and collaborative exercises is presented for both beginning and experienced drawers.
ART-215E Watercolor (3)
ART-245E Introduction to Painting: Realism (3)
Students develop technical ability as painters and increase their creative options for artmaking. With the still life as subject, the course focuses on color theory, the formal elements of painting, and the various surfaces, tools, techniques, and myriad effects that can be achieved with acrylic paint. Students explore the expressive potential of painting and discuss their process during class critiques. Knowledge gained enables students to be articulate about, and have a better understanding of, the paintings that they encounter in the world.
ART-301E Reconceptualizing Art History (3)
With a global perspective, we explore the historic and mythic lineages of vision, meaning, and craft through a critical and personal experience. From the first artworks to later work that has a social and political Impact, this course will explore all world arts. This course will focus on developing a critical perspective on key themes in global ancient art and art history, recognizing the bias that frames both of these terms. Students will come to understand that the objects and ideas we call “art” are the result of a negotiation among different social factors, including: artist, viewer, patron, context, etc.
ART-340E Contemporary Art History 1945 to Present (3)
ART-371E Installation & Ritual (3)
In this course we build/dream through our materials, sensations, and questions the shrine, ritual, and installation. We will look at examples from a diversity of cultures and traditions with a strict vow not to appropriate these forms but rather, as a way to develop our own questions about what these spaces might be for. What do they need? What do they require? What do they reflect? What kinds of images do they precipitate that were never seen before? How can art making and perception be where we develop or create a memory of images? Our work together this semester will unfold in the axial space between spirituality and art, with a focus on our own art-making, ritual, and installation.
ART-440E Warrior Artist: Risk and Revelation in Studio Art (3)
The artist is trained as a scholar to cultivate confidence and dignity. Students engage in the skills of speaking about art, and its concerns, with regard to inner and outer influences. Research and articulation of influences provide students a greater clarity of how their art form relates from themselves to the world. Warrior exams prompt students to talk about their art on the spot and uncover wisdom. Fundamental questions are explored to provide a larger view of the effect art creates for the viewer. Ongoing art studio practice informs the dialogue and encourages progressive art consciousness. In this class, students join their advanced studio art practice with the disciplines of speaking and writing about art. BA Visual Arts and Art Therapy seniors only; others by permission of the instructor.
ART-490E Special Topics in Visual Arts (3)
The Special Topics seminar investigates application of theories and methods of visual arts specific to historical, critical, and theoretical contexts. Specific topics are announced the semester this course is offered. The seminar is open to advanced undergraduate and graduate students.
ATH (Art therapy)
ATH-230E Introduction to Art Therapy (3)
This course offers an introduction to the history, major theoretical viewpoints, and applications of art therapy. Through readings, seminar style discussions, and experiential exercises, students formulate their own initial working/evolving definition of art therapy.
ATH-330E Art Therapy Theory & Applications (3)
This course offers a general survey of the literature, theories, and practices of art therapy with various client populations. Students will investigate the general literature concerning the practice of art therapy and role of the art therapist when working with various populations (mental health, expressive therapies, community-based). A personal commitment to the exploration of one’s own creative process is highly stressed. Prerequisite: ATH230e.
ATH-430E Art Therapy: Studio Methods (3)
This course is designed to offer students an opportunity to engage in hands-on art experiences that often have direct relationship to art therapy methods and techniques. There is also an opportunity to explore your own creative/visualizing process throughout the course as a way to solidify your connection with your identity as an artist. Prerequisite: ATH230e.
PSYB (Psychology)
PSYB-101E Introduction to Psychology (3)
This survey course explores psychology, especially as it has developed in the Western world. Students learn to better understand mental life and behavior by studying diverse approaches that range from laboratory science to the intuitive clinical work involving clients and therapist. Topics covered include brain function, consciousness, perception, learning, thought, maturation, emotion, personality, mental illness, and therapy. Understanding of these topics is deepened by critically evaluating theoretical frameworks with respect to each student’s experience.
PSYB-301E Research Methods and Statistics (3)
This course introduces statistical analysis and research methods used to test theories within psychological science. Students learn the most common techniques for describing data and making inferences in psychological research. Students learn to develop research questions; design rigorous and ethically sound experiments; and collect, analyze, and interpret data.
PSYB-304E Somatic Intelligence: The Neuroscience of Our Body-Mind Connection (3)
An introduction to somatic psychology, this course presents a theoretical study of the body-mind continuum. The importance of emotions, movement, perception, and the nature of illness and healing is illustrated by recent scientific theories and findings. By studying how our bodies and psyches weave together, we become aware of their interdependence and can construct more effective therapeutic experiences, both for ourselves and for others. Students learn the fundamental principles of the somatic psychology field and explore, in depth, their relationship with advanced developmental psychology theories. Prerequisite: PSYB101e and any 300-level PSYB course. PSYB332: Human Anatomy is strongly recommended.
PSYB-314E Psychology of Mindfulness Meditation (3)
An introduction to the psychological principles and sitting practice of mindfulness-awareness meditation. The meditation is drawn from the Tibetan and Zen Buddhist traditions, as well as teachings of sacred warriorship. By exploring the many ways ego fixation creates suffering and confusion in our lives, students are trained to develop inner tranquility, insight, and loving-kindness. This develops an essential ground for working effectively with personal life challenges and those of others. Co-requisite: PSYB101e. Open to Psychology, Art Therapy, and Interdisciplinary Studies students with 45+ credits only. Others by permission of instructor.
PSYB-325E Awakening Compassion: Working with Others (3)
An in-depth examination of the principles of compassionate action as taught in the bodhisattva path of Mahayana Buddhism and Contemplative Psychology. Students learn and practice relational, social, and psychological skills, including embodied presence, deep listening, empathic attendance, compassionate inquiry, and metta and tonglen meditation. Students are required to engage in an attending relationship in order to apply learned skills. This course explores compassion in various cultural contexts. Prerequisite: PSYB314e or meditation experience with permission of instructor.
PSYB-329E Approaches to Healing (3)
A basic overview of the theory, practice, and use of various natural approaches to health and healing. Emphasis is placed upon understanding and appreciating these modalities and discerning when and for what they are appropriate. Students research and articulate the paradigms of holistic medicine, clarifying their personal interest for future work in this field. Open to upper-division students with 60+ credits only.
PSYB-345E Developmental Psychology (3)
A study of theory in human development from birth through the span of life. Students are introduced to major theorists and discuss the philosophical and practical relationships of ethics to psychology, including cross-cultural issues. Students clarify, formulate, and develop their own beliefs and approaches to human development in relation to these major schools of thought and explore the relationship of these traditional approaches to the contemplative and transpersonal perspectives. Prerequisite: PSYB101e.
PSYB-354E Transpersonal Psychology (3)
An exploration of the basic principles of transpersonal psychology and psychotherapy. This is the so-called fourth force in the modern Western tradition of psychology, which emerged in the 1960s as an expansion and alternative to the psychoanalytic, behavioral, and humanistic schools that preceded it. Transpersonal, meaning beyond the persona or mask, studies human transcendence, wholeness, and transformation. Focus is on the work of Jung, Assagioli, Grof, Wilber, Walsh, Vaughan, and others to introduce students to transpersonal theory and practice. Students also explore their personal journey through a transpersonal lens.
PSYB-355E Dynamics of Intimate Relationships (3)
This course investigates intimate relationships using the lenses of transdisciplinary science, particularly a psychological perspective. It explores phenomena such as attraction, attachment, social cognition, communication, interdependency, love, sexuality, and relationship as spiritual path. It interrogates gendering and heteronormativizing by incorporating feminist and queer modes of inquiry. Critical thinking and contemplative introspection and reflection invite students to apply their learning to their own experiences of intimate relationships. This course occasionally contains readings/films that include sexually explicit material. Prerequisites: Any 300-level PSYB course. Strongly recommended: INTD210e.
PSYB-357E Cognitive Science (3)
This course concerns the study of thought, conscious experience, and associated mental functions from a variety of scientific perspectives. This multidisciplinary exploration focuses on the high-level mental processes and related brain activity involved in conscious mental life and unconscious information processing. Specific topics include attention, language, intelligences, imagery, emotion, conceptual knowledge, memory, problem solving, expertise, reasoning, and decision making. This course emphasizes the perspectives of information processing, systems neuroscience, and contemplative psychology. Prerequisite: PSYB101e.
PSYB-359E Learning From Trauma: Understanding Its Effects and Building Personal Resources (3)
Learning from Trauma: Understanding Its Effects and Building Personal Resources Unresolved trauma affects our psychological and physical well-being. This class educates students about the after-effects of trauma, such as the inability to modulate physiological arousal, dissociation, emotional problems, and negative beliefs that often follow traumatic experiences. An experiential class, we explore somatic resources for dealing with trauma and work with the effects of trauma in a group setting. The primary focus is on accessing the body and developing somatic resources to help a person cope with and resolve the symptoms of trauma. This encourages mastery over helpless and overwhelming feelings. Prerequisite: PSYB101e.
PSYB-368E Psychology & Neuroscience of Emotion (3)
This course explores diverse approaches to studying emotional experience and its regulation. It discusses the evolutionary origins and biological bases of emotions and emotional expressions; the universal and culturally variable aspects of emotion; emotional development in infants, children, and adults; the role of emotion in attachment relationships and social interactions; emotion-cognition relations; and applications of emotion research in clinical psychology, the health professions, education, and the business world. This course also provides an introduction to the structure and function of the human brain. Students gain firsthand experience with research findings and methods through classroom demonstrations, experience sampling, and team projects. Prerequisite: PSYB101e or by permission of the instructor.
PSYB-371E Personality Theories (3)
Students explore the development of human personality by studying the theories of major traditional systems of psychology, including psychoanalysis, analytical psychology, behavioral, humanistic, systemic, feminist, and existential models. Students clarify, formulate, and develop their own thoughts and approaches to the psychology of personality in relation to these major theories and explore the relationship of these approaches to the contemplative and transpersonal perspectives. Prerequisite: PSYB101e.
PSYB-373E Social Psychology (3)
How do attitudes form and change? How do group dynamics influence decision making? What factors influence altruistic behavior? This course examines concepts and research evidence from areas of social psychology, such as the social self, social influence, cultural variation, attraction, and humanitarian behavior, among others. The underlying variables of mindfulness and arousal are examined as a bridge to the contemplative perspective. Prerequisite: PSYB101e.
PSYB-415E Maitri: Working With Emotions (3)
This course introduces the Vajrayana approach to the Five Buddha Family principles through Maitri Space Awareness practice and study. Students practice particular postures in specially designed rooms, inviting a personal exploration of psychological states of mind and emotions such as pride, passion, paranoia, ignorance, and aggressions. Approaching these emotions with curiosity and openness, there is the possibility of discovering one’s inherent wisdom, compassion, and insight. The course includes weekly lectures, practice in the maitri rooms, and participation in a smaller group to process material more personally. Prerequisite: PSYB325e.
PSYB-420E Psychopathology (3)
Students investigate the merits and liabilities of Western assessment and treatment approaches to psychological problems. We consider the sociocultural contexts in which assessment and treatment approaches are variably formulated and applied. We investigate both transcultural understandings of psychological problems and the wisdom of cultural relativity. Students acquire a solid foundation in traditional Western clinical approaches to mental health as articulated and codified in the DSM-V. Prerequisite: PSYB345e or PSYB357e.
PSYB-462E Contemplative Neuroscience (3)
This course provides training in the cognitive neuroscience of mindfulness, as well as contemplative experience beyond mindfulness. Students learn practical knowledge about research design, quantification of brain activity, scientific writing, and techniques used by contemplative neuroscientists in laboratory research. This includes training in combining neuroscientific approaches with a variety of complementary psychological research methods, including phenomenology, experimentation, task performance, and experience sampling. Students visit one or more neuroscience laboratories for demonstration of brain electrophysiological methods and data collection. For their final project, students design a contemplative neuroscience study to investigate a contemplative practice or experience, including practices or experiences not yet well-represented in scientific literature. Prerequisite: PSYB357e or PSYB368e.
PSYB-490E Advanced Practicum in Psychological Research (3)
An advanced examination of a topic drawn from psychology. Assignments may include reading, labs, papers, oral presentations, quizzes/exams, literature searches, and manuscript preparation. This course culminates in a public oral presentation. Topics vary by semester and section. Prerequisites: PSYB101e and any PSYB 300-level course. May be repeated.
