Environmental Humanities Curriculum

FAIN: AKA-270192-20

Misericordia University (Dallas, PA 18612-7752)
Melanie Shepherd (Project Director: September 2019 to November 2024)
Cosima Wiese (Co Project Director: March 2020 to November 2024)

Planning for a new interdisciplinary major and minor in environmental studies with a specific humanities focus.

The College of Arts and Sciences at MU will create a curricular project that expands the role of the humanities by addressing crucial environmental topics from the perspectives of multiple humanities disciplines as well as those of the natural sciences in collaboration with a community partner. Specifically, we will create a curriculum that allows students to: 1) develop an appreciation for the philosophical and ethical dimensions of environmentalism, and to the various meanings of the idea of nature, 2) cultivate an understanding of the natural environment that is shaped by evolutionary history, human history and pre-history, the history of environmental advocacy, 3) demonstrate the scientific, geographical, and socio-economic literacy necessary to analyze an environmental situation, and 4) construct and apply a framework for understanding environmental challenges from a multi- and inter-disciplinary perspective.