New Urban Studies Minor

Today more than half the world’s population lives in cities, and projections suggest that almost all population growth in the next thirty years will occur in cities.  Both today and historically, cities occupy a key position in our symbolic imaginations and lived experience.  Seats of political power, cities are also crucibles for cultural and social change.  They are simultaneously centers of economic development, cultural energy, civic, intellectual and artistic achievement, and sites of social hostility, political chaos, economic inequities and cultural malaise. 

Most Dartmouth students grew up in and will increasingly encounter an urbanized world.  Geography’s new minor in Urban Studies is intended to guide students through a series of courses that will provide the intellectual training and critical thinking skills necessary to navigate that world, and to address some of its central socioeconomic, environmental and spatial challenges.   

The Urban Studies minor will consist of six courses:

Required

GEOG 22 Urban Geography

GEOG 25 Social Justice and the City

Four other courses, two drawn from Geographic perspectives, and two drawn from Interdisciplinary perspectives:

Geographic Perspectives

GEOG 57 Urban Applications of GIS

GEOG 28 Immigration, Race and Ethnicity

GEOG 29 Global Cities

GEOG 18 Urbanization and the Environment

GEOG 32 The Physical City

Multidisciplinary Perspectives (subject to change):

AMES 53 Discovering an Islamic City

ANTH 58 Sustainable Cities

ARTH 13 Rome: The Eternal City

ARTH 52 Building America: An Architectural and Social History

COCO 5/GEOG 80 Visualizing American Cities, Creating “Modern” Identities

ECON 38 Urban and Land Use Economics

ENGS 44 Sustainable Design

COCO 5/GEOG 80 Visualizing American Cities, Creating “Modern” Identities

ECON 38 Urban and Land Use Economics

ENGS 44 Sustainable Design

HIST 32 The Life, Death and Rebirth of Great American Cities

PBPL 81.03 Urban Politics and Public Policymaking

REL 30 Sacred Cities

SART 65 Architecture 1