WRDS 150B is offered in a wide variety of topics from departments and instructors across UBC.
Course topics and descriptions are subject to change depending on the instructor and their availability. Below is the schedule for the upcoming 2024 Spring and Summer sessions.
2024S Term 1
Below are course descriptions for each topic, as well as instructor and scheduling information.
Instructor: Adrian Lou
Section: 500
Available times: M/W 8:00-11:00AM - online
Online attendance is mandatory in this course.
Traditionally, metaphor has been understood as a stylistic device that poetically decorates language. Metaphorical expressions (e.g. my love is a rose) are thus thought to be statements that do not reside in the realm of everyday speech. However, contemporary research in cognitive linguistics has shown that many conventional expressions are inescapably metaphorical. Consider, for instance, how we rely on metaphors to talk about abstract concepts, such as love (e.g. you’re breaking my heart), illness (e.g. the patients are battling cancer), and time (e.g. we’re running out of time). In this course, we will read academic articles that evaluate the use of metaphors in biology, healthcare, psychology, Indigenous studies and politics in order to have a better understanding of how metaphors shape the way we think about the world around us. Ultimately, students in WRDS 150 will learn how to read academic papers in a critical way, identify the rhetorical strategies used in academic writing, and write an original research paper that draws upon ideas and concepts from the course.
Instructor: Katja Thieme
Sections: 501
Available Times: M/W 12:00-3:00PM
This section of WRDS 150 is specifically designed for students who are studying in a faculty other than Arts at UBC. To help us focus our investigation into how different disciplines write and communicate, we will investigate how the concept of surveillance is developed and used in areas such as health studies, media studies, and ethics in science and engineering. Surveillance has become a research issue of practical concern (e.g., with what surveillance tools can global spread of diseases be effectively observed and controlled?), as well as of ethical questions (e.g., what should the ethics be for using drones in applied science work?). Looking at examples of how these questions have been discussed in research writing, this course will help you identify and use different research methods, types of data and evidence, and elements of style in research writing.
Instructor: Meredith Beales
Sections: 502
Available Times: M/W 12:00-3:00PM
Living in the modern world means being immersed in a sea of textual and internet-based media: we are constantly reading and responding to the infinite variations of electronic texts, videos, images, and memes. But how do the different media in which we encounter these messages change the way we respond to them? And how do our brains and our societies interact under the impact of these new media? In this section of WRDS 150 we will explore how different societies responded to new forms of communication, now and in the past. We will explore, as well, how our brains respond to these same challenges, and how the rise of electronic communication has altered (or not) the ways we respond to it and to each other.
Instructor: Mary Ann Saunders
Sections: 503, 504
Available Times: M/W 2:00-5:00PM, M/W 6:00-9:00PM
In WRDS 150, our course focus will be the multidisciplinary research field of transgender studies. A fundamental premise of trans studies is that ethical research about trans lives and experiences must be attentive to and prioritize the knowledge which trans people have about themselves. This, then, is also the stance we adopt in WRDS 150, understanding trans lives as legitimate and valuable, and trans people as the experts on their own experience. We will examine trans studies research from several academic disciplines to develop an understanding of how different disciplines construct knowledge in ways unique to each. Throughout the term, you will use the knowledge and skills you gain to develop your own transgender studies research and writing project. What do trans people say about their lives and experiences? How can you, as apprentice researchers, ethically translate that lived experience into research scholarship of your own?
Instructor: Heidi Tiedemann Darroch
Sections: 510
Available Times: T/TR 8:00-11:00AM - online
Online attendance is mandatory in this course.
Two hundred years ago, French gastronome Brillat-Savarin wrote, “Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you who you are.” Food is linked to identities, cultures, and politics; it is influenced by geography and history, and, in turn, it has an impact on genetics and physiology.
In our section we will be considering how academic researchers are approaching the study of the future of water and food, from Star Trek-like food printers and the creation of laboratory-grown meat to the genetic engineering of rice to ensure crop diversity and disease resistance. The readings we will discuss focus on how agricultural, nutritional, and health sciences, as well as technology and engineering disciplines, consider issues and debates linked to water and food from their distinctive disciplinary perspectives. We will explore questions about ethics and politics as they are linked to the science and technology of what—and how—we eat today, and how that might change in the not-too-distant future. Our key concerns will be water and food security, sovereignty (including Indigenous sovereignty linked to traditional lands and foods), and technologies of production and genetic engineering.
Instructor: Nazih El-Bezri
Sections: 511
Available Times: T/TR 8:00-11:00AM - online
Online attendance is mandatory in this course.
This section of WRDS 150 focuses on the relationship among globalization, identity formation, and the literacy practices needed in the 21st century. In today’s technologically-interconnected world, people, ideologies, food habits, fashion, and movies flow easily through borders with a speed unforeseen in the recorded human history. Due to the shrinkage of our world—which has been called a global village—we are faced with questions concerning the knowledges or literacies required to succeed in a highly competitive world, and the impact of these knowledges on our own identities. The focus on the 21st century literacies operates in conjunction with crucial life literacies, such as health literacy, ecoliteracy, second/additional language literacies, religious literacy, financial literacies, and even food literacy studies. As a result of these multiliteracies, individuals in the 21st century are now required to possess and use a variety of literacy competencies that span across various academic disciplines. Individuals’ literacies are thus multiple, dynamic, adaptable, and multidimensional. Due to the significance of these literacies on identity formation, researchers, including novice university students, explore literacies to improve knowledge transmission at every stage of individuals’ lives.
Instructor: Dennis Foung
Sections: 512, 515
Available Times: T/TR 9:00AM-12:00PM, T/TR 1:00-4:00PM
“Big data” is a term commonly used by laymen, scholars, and professionals to describe a wide range of technological innovations. Big data is, in fact, a big leap in scientific research, because the collection of primary data does not rely only on researchers conducting surveys or observing subjects, but on retrieving existing mega datasets from servers. In this course, we will examine how a range of disciplines conduct scientific enquiry using big data and how they present their research findings in scientific articles. For example, what can data scientists do with big data in general? How do educators identify at-risk students? How do marketing specialists profile their customers for improved business outcomes? More importantly, how do scholars in these disciplines answer their questions to extend their knowledge of the disciplines?
Instructor: Michael Schandorf
Sections: 513, 517
Available Times: T/TR 11:00AM-2:00PM, T/TR 3:00-6:00PM
The idea of competition is so fundamental to Western culture that we often take it for granted as a natural good. Nearly every aspect of our lives involves competition: we compete in school and for jobs, we compete both socially and at work, we compete in games for fun, and when we’re not competing ourselves we spend much of our time enjoying watching others compete. But our obsession with competition has complications. For example, a world divided into winners and losers is an inherently inequitable world: there will always be more “losers” than “winners”. Competition also has interesting relationships with our need for social cohesion. Attempting to disentangle cooperation from competition, in fact, can undermine both: a lack of either can lead to unproductive stasis, and worse, but a complete integration of cooperation and competition can lead to us-versus-them thinking and even war (which American rhetorical scholar Kenneth Burke called “the ultimate disease of cooperation”). This seminar will explore some of the ways that competition has been investigated in recent scholarship, and students will design and produce a research project of their own contributing to that scholarly conversation.
Instructor: Laura Baumvol
Sections: 514
Available Times: T/Th 12:00-3:00PM
In this section of WRDS 150, we will focus on how various disciplines, such as environmental sciences, natural sciences, and computer science investigate and write about the dissemination of science knowledge to the public. This communication involves the knowledge popularization to a broad, popular audience through a recontextualization process of text relocation from a primary scholarly context (e.g. academic journals) to a secondary popularized context (e.g. mass media, news media, magazines, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, blogs, Q&A websites, etc.).The replacement of the deficit model of knowledge communication to a passive audience by one that includes a two-way interaction between the academic community and non-specialist audiences has promoted dialogue, empowerment, inclusion, and participation through the public engagement with science. The readings in the course, along with the individual and collaborative writing assignments and activities, will allow students to engage in scholarly conversations and explore multiple research genres and methods, types of data, and writing practices.
Instructor: Andrew Connolly
Sections: 516
Available Times: T/TR 2:00-5:00PM
“I don’t believe it.” That was Donald Trump’s response to a report on climate change prepared by more than 300 leading climate scientists. Trump is hardly the only person in the contemporary world to reject scientific findings. People dismiss evolution, the health benefits of vaccines, even that the earth is a sphere. This rejection of science can seem perplexing, especially for those who understand the rigorous process of producing scientific knowledge and theories. So why is it that some people simply do not believe in science?
This course looks at the ways scholars from various departments seek to answer that question. Some of the scholars develop wide ranging theories about why people believe what they believe. Others focus on specific people and the complexity of their belief systems. Some scholars even raise their own doubts about science and scientific methods. The differences in the approaches each scholar takes to this question sometimes relates to the discipline they are from. These scholars come from Political Science, Sociology, Philosophy, and English departments. Each of these disciplines has its own methods and conventions. In other words, a particular discipline influences what scholars ask questions about, how they phrase the questions, how they answer the questions, and how they present their findings. As a result, this course will not only introduce you to the academic study of science, politics, and belief. It will also introduce you to the various disciplinary approaches to research and writing.
Instructor: Kimberly Richards
Sections: 518
Available Times: T/TR 6:00-9:00PM - online
Online attendance is mandatory in this course.
As the volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity of the future seems to accelerate in local and global contexts with massive socio-environmental planetary challenges, there is an increasing interest in reimagining futures beyond dystopias and utopias. Futures studies is an interdisciplinary effort to aggregate and analyze trends to predict what is likely to continue, and what could plausibly change. Predicative techniques, such a forecasting, are being used to develop design solutions to wicked problems, like the impacts of rising waters on coastal communities. Planners and policy-makers also attempt to prevent, manage, and/or minimize crisis through methods of systems analysis and futures study. Such efforts at strategic foresight are always bound up in cost-benefit analyses, and decision-making processes that either reify existing inequities, or strategically undermine entrenched colonial and supremacist thought. The exploration of alternative futures by Indigenous futurists and Afro-futurists and other traditional knowledge perspectives marginalized within modernity invites investigation of the worldviews and mythologies that underlie possible, probable, and preferrable futures. Together, we will explore critical concepts in futures studies alongside personal and collective practices for creating desirable futures at the individual, collective, and societal level.
Instructor: Jennifer Gagnon
Sections: 519
Available Times: T/Th 7:00-10:00PM - online
Online attendance is mandatory in this course.
Video games are neither “just for kids,” nor simple escapist entertainment. Indeed, video games are fast becoming one of the most profitable and innovative forms of creative and artistic expression today. Deeper study reveals that video games as a genre are heavily influenced by social and political understandings of ability, gender, race, sexuality, and identity. Issues related to diversity and inclusion such as who gets to play, whose stories are told, and who is represented, have taken centre stage in recent explorations of the future of gaming at the intersections of fun, profit, and politics. While video games let the player be in control, not everyone’s stories are represented. The theme of this course will explore how aspects of identity such as gender, race, ability, and sexuality, influence the ways that we experience and respond to the genre of video games as a media making and political practice.
Instructor: TBA
Sections: 521
Available Times: T/Th 6:00-9:00PM - online
Online attendance is mandatory in this course.
Topic: TBA
2023S Term 2
Below are course descriptions for each topic, as well as instructor and scheduling information.
Instructor: Susan Blake
Section: 551, 561
Available times: M/W 8:00-11:00AM - in person, T/TR 9:00-12:00PM - online
WRDS 150B/561: Online attendance is mandatory in this course.
Linguistic Landscapes — Scholarly Research Practices, Language Use, and Disciplinarity:
A Corpus-Based Discourse-Analytic Perspective
This course aims to explore the question of how scholars in a variety of different disciplines within the university use language to write up their research results in the form of academic research articles (RAs). This course also connects scholarly writing practices (academic literacy) with a wide-range of scholarly research practices, and views academic writing as a “complex social activity” that takes both content and context into consideration.
We engage in asking the following kinds of questions: How do researchers from different disciplines formulate research questions? What kinds of research methods do they use? What kinds of data (evidence) do they incorporate in scholarly research articles? How are those scholarly research articles organized? How are the data and their research findings presented in written and/or visual form? What is the relationship between the authors and their intended readers? What kinds of scholarly activities are researchers engaged in?
This course focuses on corpus construction and discourse analysis (method) & provides relevant examples from the STEM disciplines (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) as a point of departure.
Students will build their own working corpus (research articles from their own discipline) and analyze this textual material. They will have opportunities to draft and revise and present their own original research findings in both oral and written forms. Research will be carried out either collaboratively (2-3 students per research team) or individually (1 student per team), and provides students with opportunities to reflect on their own research and writing practices, as they become apprentice members of different research communities on campus.
Instructor: Mi-Young Kim
Sections: 552, 564
Available Times: M/W 7:00-10:00PM - online, T/TR 7:00-10:00PM - online
Online attendance is mandatory in this course.
The world is full of friction (conflicts); some argue it is the constructive force that prompts ideas and innovation while others warn that it is a destructive force producing fear and conflict. Media, particularly social media which has been an indispensable part of people’s lives, reflects or generates friction in our society and is often criticized for being a brewing ground for misinformation, disinformation, and malinformation.
This section of WRDS150B will introduce a selection of unabridged, peer-reviewed scholarly articles and discussions on “friction” with the subtopics such as inclusive societies, gun control, vaccination, neoliberalism, GMO food, climate change, and ChatGPT/AI/robots. We will observe how scholars from various disciplines such as environmental sciences, natural sciences, media studies, business, and political science construct knowledge on these topics: e.g., what questions they ask and how they phrase their inquiry as well as why they choose to use a certain methodology for their inquiry and how it may affect the way their inquiry is answered. Along with exploring various research genres and methods, types of data, and writing practices, we will investigate how different types of knowledge are produced and friction aggravated by media can generate.
We will also become familiar with the conventions of academic writing and the basic premise of research through the individual and collaborative writing assignments and activities, as well as participate in scholarly conversations through our own research on the topic of friction and the role of media.
Instructor: Tom Andrews
Sections: 562
Available Times: T/TR 12:00-3:00PM
This section of WRDS150 is focused on Critical Thinking in the Digital Era. These modules cover issues including social networking behavior and privacy, climate change denial and hyper-critical thinking, and ‘slacktivism’ and bandwagon political engagement in the 21st century. We will read articles from scholarly and non-scholarly sources from social science, political science, and humanities backgrounds as well as watching interviews, Ted Talks, and discussion panels. In doing so, we will endeavor to answer such questions as: does the internet still offer users a place to share and consume information honestly? Do the harms caused by social media use outweigh its many advantages in contemporary society? How have internet communication platforms changed political engagement and awareness? What biases or fallacies are perpetuated by an online world?
Instructor: Rohan Karpe
Sections: 563
Available Times: T/TR 2:00-5:00PM
In this WRDS 150 section we explore behaviours, norms, and behavioural change.
We have voluntarily adopted some of these behaviours, norms, and changes; some have been enforced, and still others have been influenced by those around us. These behaviours, norms, and changes appear at personal as well as at societal levels. How do various disciplinary researchers study behaviours, norms, and behavioural change. What research writing practices do they engage in to communicate their findings about behaviours, norms, and behavioural change? Using peer-reviewed scholarly journal articles, writing exercises, discussions, and critical feedback on writing assignments, you will be able to construct your own text-based research proposal and research paper on a behaviour, norm that you’re keen to study. Your paper will assist keen readers to change their understanding of your chosen topic.