The Spring ‘16 line up of Denison Seminars is here!

3-D Printing: Realizing the Imagined is a Denison Seminar offered by Lew Ludwig (Math) and Chris Faur (Art) that will explore the world of additive manufacturing process known as 3-D printing. This course involves student-centered interactive learning in which students design and create 3-D printed projects. Students will learn to be “makers” rather than “consumers” of knowledge. An over-night visit to the ThinkBox MakerSpace at Case Western University is planned.

Dave Bussan (Cinema) and Cathy Dollard (History) are running a seminar on Divided Cities in Film and History that explores the historical and aesthetic experience of urban division in the European context. The course examines three cases in detail: Berlin, Germany; Belfast, Northern Ireland; and Nicosia, Cyprus. Students will participate in a required field trip to Ireland and Northern Ireland to make these concepts come alive in a more practical sense.

Climate Change is the topic at hand for Peter Kuhlman’s seminar (Chemistry). “Climate Change” means different things to different people in 2015. The course will touch briefly on many of those perspectives, but the real focus is on the future: what you can expect to happen in a world altered in climate and altered by climate, what that might mean for your life, and what you can do about it. Through readings and encounters with professors, authors, and activists from Denison and abroad, students will interrogate alternate visions of the future of life in a changing climate, and through their writing and oral presentations they will fine-tune their own vision of that future.

Kirk Combe (English) and Bob Ghiloni (Health, Exercise & Sport Studies/Men’s Basketball Coach) offer Hoops: Discipline(s) and Culture(s). This seminar is a cultural investigation of basketball in America. In particular, it focuses on issues of class, race, and gender as these social phenomena manifest themselves in various ways through the organization and playing of the game. Students will engage in both classwork and lab work. Lab work will involve learning and playing the game of basketball. Students will travel to various high school and college basketball games in Ohio. There are two required trips to area high schools and one required trip to OSU in Columbus to study a practice session of the OSU Men’s Basketball team. Other optional trips to watch area basketball games will be offered.


Joy Sperling (Art History and Visual Culture) and Cindi Turnbull (Theater) are exploring the Historic Costume Collection at Denison. The seminar examines of the history and theory of costume collection. As a practical study of its implementation, the class will visit several collecting institutions then students will design and begin to implement a curatorial and conservation strategy for the historic costume collection at Denison University, each student choosing to work on a specific garment. Class trips to costume collections include Chicago, Philadelphia, and Columbus.

December 7, 2015