New Programs
What's new
New Arts programs launched in 2023-2024
Major in Public Humanities and Heritage
The new Public Humanities and Heritage program gives students a foundational understanding of theory and practice in the core areas of public humanities (archaeology, archive and museum studies, public history, tourism, digital humanities and collections management). Students gain valuable critical thinking, research and writing skills, and historical and cultural literacy, alongside hands-on, practical work experience in field placements.
The program includes a wide variety of courses, drawn from a range of disciplines in the Faculty of Arts, and prioritizes experiential learning including placements in museums, archives and heritage sites. Students may choose to major in Public Humanities and Heritage or add it as a second major.
Major in Law and Ethics
Available as a major, this new program offers the opportunity for diverse disciplinary perspectives on the law and on ethics. It will give students the chance to think critically about the law and legal institutions, as well as a wide range of moral and legal issues. Studying law and ethics together makes it possible to raise fundamental questions about the ethics of various social practices, and about how laws can function to make a society more (or sometimes less) just.
Ethics, as practised in Philosophy, gives students the tools to assess the values expressed in the law and legal institutions. Students can also fulfil program requirements by taking courses in Ancient Studies, Anthropology, Criminology, English, History, Political Science, Religion, Social Justice and Community Studies, and Sociology.
Minor in Climate Change Studies
Climate change is one of the defining environmental and social problems of our lifetime. As a student pursuing a Minor in Climate Change Studies, you will engage in an interdisciplinary program of study that will prepare you for an understanding of climate change from diverse perspectives, examining scientific, political, psychological, economic and ethical dimensions of the problem and its solutions.
The new minor is housed within the Bachelor of Environmental Studies program, but it’s open to students in all programs across Saint Mary’s. Courses are drawn from disciplines such as Geography and Environmental Studies, Environmental Science, Global Development Studies, and Social Justice and Community Studies.
Special Topics courses: Spring/Summer 2024
Note: Courses are in person on campus, unless otherwise noted. When registering, look for the course and CRN numbers, as the special topics course titles are not always available in Banner.
HIST 3835.1 History of Women Artists (CRN 31352)
May–June, 2024 | TR 9:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m.
Instructor: Dr. Lyndan Warner
This course charts the history of women in the arts over the past half century and examines how academies of art, galleries and art historians came to ignore or erase their contributions. With a focus on Europe, the course extends to women's creative works around the globe. The Spring 2024 session runs on campus May 6 to June 9, Tuesdays and Thursdays 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., with a field trip to Toronto June 10-15. Visit artworks by women artists at the Royal Ontario Museum, the Gardiner Museum and the Art Gallery of Ontario's exhibition 'Making her Mark: A History of Women Artists, 1400-1800'. For more details, visit the Department of History's Field Study website and contact Dr. Lyndan Warner.
POLI 3826.1 Canadian Health Care: Law, Policy & Politics (CRN 31356)
May 6 to June 22, 2024 | Remote asynchronous
Instructor: Megan Aiken
Canada’s healthcare system is regularly touted as a point of national pride and pillar of Canadian national identity. In this course, students will come to understand the complexities of healthcare in Canada – beginning with the idea that Canada has no single healthcare system. Learn about the laws, policies, and politics that led to health insurance (Medicare), how it developed through federal and provincial relations, and the contemporary crises existing within this complex regime. Topics include fiscal restraint and the COVID-19 pandemic, the ongoing fight for reproductive justice, equitable access to healthcare, and overcoming racial discrimination in the healthcare system. For more info, contact politics@smu.ca.
SJCS 3825.1 Special Topics in Social Justice & Community Studies
May 6 to June 22, 2024
MW 1:30–4:30 pm | Remote synchronous
Instructor: TBA
WGSS 4828 Polyamory and Non/Monogamies (CRN 40898)
Special Topics in Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies
July 3 to August 19, 2024 | Remote synchronous, Tuesdays and Thursdays, 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.
Instructor: TBA
In this course, students are introduced to key issues and debates in Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies from historical, contemporary and transnational perspectives with a focus on polyamory and non/monogamies. Students address diverse experiences of, and ways of understanding non-normative relationship configurations and alternative ways of being and living, foregrounding how they intersect with sexuality, gender, race, class, ethnicity, ability, nationality, settler and other forms of colonialism, as well as other social identities and locations. For more information, contact Dr. Michele Byers, the WGSS program coordinator.
For the most current course information, please refer to the Academic Calendar and Banner.