Starting off on the right foot...
First Year Seminars

The Introduction to Studying the Social Sciences course (SCS 1150) is a unique opportunity to ensure a successful transition to your university studies. This course was developed to provide you with the opportunity to familiarize yourself with the standards and requirements of the University of Ottawa's Faculty of Social Sciences.

The Faculty of Social Sciences has created the First Year Seminars to ensure that new students develop their critical thinking and acquire essential skills for academic success.

Although the course calendar and the methodological workshops are identical for all sections (limited to 30 students), each professor will introduce a specific topic which students will debate.

INTELLECTUAL WORK METHODS

All the assignments and exercises in this course are supported by customized methodology workshops. These workshops will guide you step by step as you complete your work and help you achieve success. The methodologies applied in these workshops will prove invaluable in all your courses at the Faculty of Social Sciences.

TO REGISTER...

Enrolments for this course are limited to approximately 30 students. To register, simply follow the regular registration procedure at www.sciencessociales.uottawa.ca/eng/ugrad_registration.asp and choose SCS1150 as well as the corresponding section you wish like to attend.

PROFFESSORS AND TOPICS FOR 2012-2013

In addition to presenting specific Social Studies material, the professor will also cover a specific topic related to his or her own area of expertise. We believe that a professor’s passion for a given topic is contagious. Proposed topics vary and cover broad areas of interest such as the environment, effects of globalization, international and national politics, social exclusion and many more.

Sections D, E, G

Protest, Contention, and Social Movements

Social movements are “sustained challenges” by groups of people working together to influence public policy, reform institutions, change public opinion, or transform personal behaviours. This course provides an introduction to some of the key concepts, themes, theories and research involved in the social scientific study of social movements. We use case studies of contemporary activism, including the global justice movement, the women's movement, animal rights and environmentalism. A prominent goal of this course is to help students understand the role that the media plays in shaping our understanding of movements and in shaping their tactics.

Professor Kathleen Rodgers

Sections B, L, M

Social Movements and Human Rights

While learning the skills described above, the course is arranged around four parts. The first is an introduction to social movements and community. This includes an examination of how states encompass multiple communities, how communities and families are divided from one another through restrictive state policies, and how solidarity can improve community welfare. The second part is about providing equal opportunities to all people. This part explores rights to the environment, land, inclusion, and justice. The case studies range from an environmental movement in the Rouge River Valley, to dispossessed indigenous peoples of Tanzania, to Canadian child care centres, and finally to Chechen prisoners. The third part is on freedoms and restrictions, with a focus on movement within and between states. “Practice” presentations will help to understand the readings (without the pressure of being graded). Guest speakers will describe their work in a trade union and a land rights organisation. The final subject will be liberty, and freedom from imprisonment and torture. The fourth and most important part of the course will showcase the work of all people in the course. This is when each person presents the highlights of her or his term paper.

Professor Nadia Abu-Zahra

Section K

Conflict Studies and Human Rights

This course examines social science debates about conflict studies and human rights. It provides an introduction to the key themes and schools of thought on the causes of war and conditions of peace through critical engagement with key texts. In the first half of the course, we examine competing explanations for the causes of war, including Realism, Liberalism, the politics of identity, economics and the competition for resources and humanitarian intervention. In the second half of the course, we consider aspects of the consequences of war and the conditions for sustainable peace, with a focus on the protection and promotion of human rights, including international humanitarian law and the protection of civilians in armed conflict, peacekeeping and peacebuilding, and post-conflict justice. We end by considering the future of conflict studies and human rights in the 21st Century in the context of US hegemony and the Global War on Terror.