Bachelor of Science (Honours) in Great Books/Liberal Studies and Physics
Entry requirementsThe Program will be of interest to students wanting to understand the most important ideas in the physical sciences within the context furnished through the reading and discussion of the major works of reason and imagination that have animated our cultural tradition. The program is flexible enough to accommodate students with varying interests.
Academic titleBachelor of Science (Honours) in Great Books/Liberal Studies and Physics
Course descriptionYear 1
- LART 1F90 and 1F93
- MATH 1P01 and 1P02, or MATH 1P05 and 1P06 (recommended)
- PHYS 1P21 or 1P91
- one of PHYS 1P22, 1P23, 1P92, 1P93
- one Social Sciences context credit
Year 2
- LART 2P90
- one LART credit numbered 2(alpha)00 or above
- MATH 2F05
- one credit from PHYS 2P20, 2P31, 2P50 (recommended), 2P51
- one and one-half elective credits
Year 3
- PHYS 3P90 (see program note 5)
- one and one-half LART credits numbered 2(alpha)90 or above
- two credits from PHYS 3P35, 3P36, 3P41, 3P70, 3P91
- one elective credit
Year 4
- LART 4P99
- one and one-half LART credits numbered 2(alpha)90 or above
- one credit from PHYS 4F90, 4P30, 4P41, 4P51, 4P52, 4P61, 4P70, 4P94
- two elective credits (see program note 6)
LART 1F90
Poets, Painters and Philosophers
Literature, art and philosophy from creative cities (e.g., classical Athens, Renaissance Florence, modern Paris) during periods of cultural and intellectual transformation from the ancient world to the present.
Lectures, seminars, 3 hours per week.
LART 1F93
Order and Chaos in the Cosmos
Important works of science, philosophy, literature and art addressing the origin and structure of the universe and its association with the divine. Readings include selections from the Bible, Lucretius, Plato, Aristotle, Copernicus, Galileo, Milton, Newton, Darwin, Einstein, Dawkins and Hawking.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 1F93 and 2P93.
# LART 1Q98
Introduction to Visual Culture
(also offered as IASC 1Q98 and VISA 1Q98)
Concepts of art, its vocabulary, structure and varied cultural contexts. Problems of meaning, visual perception and formal structure of the visual arts, functions of art in contemporary society, the function of galleries and museums, and the role of patrons and critics. Contemporary critical methodology.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours week.
Note: no studio work. Materials fee required.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 1Q98.
# LART 1Q99
Introduction to the History of Western Art
(also offered as IASC 1Q99 and VISA 1Q99)
Analysis of key monuments and on the prerequisite technology, as well as on various ways of looking at the visual past and present. Focus on the visual arts from prehistory through the early 20th century.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours week.
Note: no studio work. Materials fee required.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 1Q99.
# LART 2F80
History of Science
(also offered as HIST 2F80)
ideas and practices, their cultural roots and impact from Aristotle to the atom bomb.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Restriction: open to HIST (single or combined), HIST (Honours)/BEd (Intermediate/Senior), GBLS, LART majors and minors until date specified in Registration guide.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 2F80.
# LART 2F94
Theatre as Cultural Practice I
(also offered as DART 2F94)
Integrated study of theatre history, theory and dramatic literature from its origins to the advent of realism in the 20th century, concentrating on the context of cultural developments, including theories of acting, dramatic criticism and theatre historiography.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Prerequisite: one of DART 1F93, one ENGL credit numbered 1(alpha)90-1(alpha)99, one LART (GBLS) credit numbered 1(alpha)90-1(alpha)99.
Note: students with credit in IASC 1F00 may be able to register. Contact the instructor. Materials fee may be required.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 2F94.
# LART 2P20
Abrahamic Religious Thought
(also offered as PHIL 2P20)
Roots of the monotheisms of Judaism, Christianity and Islam: Who and what is God? What is our relationship to God? What are the ethical bases of religion? What is the nature of faith?
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Prerequisite: PHIL 1F90, 1F91, 1F92, 1F93 or 1F94.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 2P20.
LART 2P70
Religions of the World
Development and character of major religious traditions and worldviews.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 2P70.
# LART 2P80
Shakespeare 1590-1603
(also offered as ENGL 2P80)
Representative plays from the first half of Shakespeare's dramatic career emphasizing theoretical and cultural issues raised by the plays in the context of fin-de-siècle Elizabethan England.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Prerequisite: one of LART 1F90, (GBLS 1F90), one ENGL credit numbered 1(alpha)90 to 1(alpha)99, MARS 1F90 or permission of the instructor.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS (ENGL) 2Q92, and GBLS 2P80.
# LART 2P81
Shakespeare 1603-1614
(also offered as ENGL 2P81)
Representative plays from the second half of Shakespeare's dramatic career emphasizing theoretical and cultural issues raised by the plays in the context of the opening decade of James I's culturally divisive reign.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Prerequisite: one of LART 1F90, (GBLS 1F90), one ENGL credit numbered 1(alpha)90 to 1(alpha)99 or permission of the instructor.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS (ENGL) 2Q93 and GBLS 2P81.
# * LART 2P82
Shakespeare's Comedies
(also offered as ENGL 2P82)
Representative comedies and tragicomedies emphasizing the variety of Shakespeare's comic modes, from the grotesque to the miraculous, and on theoretical approaches to the comic.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Prerequisite: one of LART 1F90, (GBLS 1F90), one ENGL credit numbered 1(alpha)90 to 1(alpha)99 or permission of the instructor.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS (ENGL) 2Q94 and GBLS 2P82.
* LART 2P83
Shakespeare's Tragedies
(also offered as ENGL 2P83)
Shakespeare's development of tragedy as a genre in the context of early modern aesthetic and cultural concerns. Attention to recent theoretical approaches.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Prerequisite: one of LART 1F90, (GBLS 1F90) one ENGL credit numbered 1(alpha)90 to 1(alpha)99 or permission of the instructor.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS (ENGL) 2Q95 and GBLS 2P83.
# LART 2P90
Beowulf to Boccaccio: Great Books and Writers of the Middle Ages
(also offered as MARS 2P90)
Major medieval writers and selections from their works. Writers include the Beowulf poet, Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio, Chaucer and Christine de Pisan.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Restriction: open to LART, GBLS and MARS majors until date specified in Registration guide.
Prerequisite: one of LART 1F90, (GBLS) 1F93, MARS 1F90, one Humanities context credit or permission of the Director.
# LART 2P91
Political Theory I
(also offered as POLI 2P91)
Socratic origins of political philosophy as understood by Plato and Aristotle. May include their Christian, Jewish Islamic successors and Machiavelli's critique.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Prerequisite: one of LART 1F90 (GBLS 1F90), one POLI credit numbered 1(alpha)90 to 1(alpha)99.
Note: strongly recommended that students have taken POLI 2P92.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 2P91.
# LART 2P97
Philosophy of Religion
(also offered as PHIL 2P97)
Traditional issues, such as the proofs for the existence of God, the problem of evil, the relationship of faith to reason and the nature of religious knowledge.
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
Prerequisite: one PHIL credit or permission of the instructor.
# * LART 2P99
Ideas and Culture before 1850
(also offered as HIST 2P99)
Major developments in European intellectual and cultural life, such as the Renaissance, the Scientific Revolution, the Enlightenment, Romanticism, and the emergence of modern ideologies.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Restriction: open to LART, GBLS, HIST (single or combined) and HIST (Honours)/BEd (Intermediate/Senior) majors and minors until date specified in Registration guide.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 2P99.
LART 2Q98
The Artistic Experience
(also offered as PHIL 2Q98 and VISA 2Q98)
Classical theories of art through analysis of painting, photography, video, film, music, and drama examining such concepts as beauty, creativity, artistic intention, perception, interpretation and the nature and possible role of art.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Prerequisite: one PHIL credit or VISA 1Q98 and 1Q99 (1F98) or permission of the instructor.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 2Q98.
# LART 3F01
The Ancient Epic Tradition
(also offered as CLAS 3F01)
Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, Apollonius Rhodius' Argonautica, Vergil's Aeneid and Ovid's Metamorphoses. Topics include the conventions of epic, the original oral transmission of heroic verse and its transformation into a written genre, concepts of heroic conduct and character.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Prerequisite: one LART (GBLS) or ENGL credit, or one credit from CLAS 1P91, 1P92, 1P95, 1P97, 2F05.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 3F01.
# LART 3P00
Ideas and Culture since 1850
(also offered as HIST 3P00)
Intellectual and cultural developments in Europe and America during the 19th and 20th centuries.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Restriction: open to LART, GBLS, HIST (single or combined) and HIST (Honours)/BEd (Intermediate/Senior) majors and minors until date specified in Registration guide.
Prerequisites: one HIST credit numbered 1(alpha)90 to 1(alpha)99 and one HIST credit numbered 2(alpha)00 to 2(alpha)99 or permission of the instructor.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 3P00.
# LART 3P90
Prose and Poetry of the Renaissance
(also offered as MARS 3P90)
Themes and style in the works of 15th- and 16th-century continental writers; humanism and philosophical treatises; realism and classicism; Petrarchan ideal in lyric poetry; quérelle des anciens et des modernes; imitation and originality; the status of the vernacular. Authors may include Machiavelli, Castiglione, Ariosto, Pico, Valla, Ficino, Erasmus, the Plaeiade poets, Rabelais, and Montaigne.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Restriction: open to LART, GBLS and MARS majors until date specified in Registration guide.
Prerequisite: one of LART 1F90, (GBLS) 1F93, MARS 1F90 or permission of the Director.
* LART 3P93
Science, Politics and Philosophy
(also offered as POLI 3P93)
Philosophic founding of modernity as a political and scientific project in selected works including Machiavelli's Discourses, Bacon's New Organon, Galileo's Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, Descartes' Discourse on Method, Hobbes's Leviathan, Milton's Paradise Lost, Rousseau's Discourse on the Arts and Sciences and Smith's Wealth of Nations.
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
# LART 3P94
Literary Criticism
(also offered as ENGL 3P94)
Literary criticisms from Aristotle to Brooks and Leavis emphasizing enduring literary critical problems.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Prerequisites: two ENGL credits numbered 2(alpha)00 to 2(alpha)99 or permission of the instructor.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 3P94.
# LART 3P95
Aesthetics of Music
(also offered as MUSI 3P95)
Issues of meaning, beauty, value, and greatness in music through analysis of selected readings from Aristoxenus to the present.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Restriction: permission of the instructor.
Prerequisites:(GBLS 2P94) or MUSI 2F90; MUSI 1F50.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 3P95.
# LART 3P99
Modern Narratives: Expressionism and Surrealism
(also offered as MLLC 3P99)
French, German, Italian and Hispanic writing dealing with Expressionist and Surrealist concerns such as revolt, emotion, dream and unconscious.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Prerequisite: one of FREN 2F03, GERM 2F00 (2F90), ITAL 2F00, SPAN 2P19 (2P21) and 2P20 or permission of the instructor.
Note: given in English. May be counted as part of a major program in French, Italian or Spanish.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 3P99.
LART 3V90-3V99
Special Topics in Liberal Arts
Selected topics in Western or non-Western works of art, literature, philosophy, history, science and/or theology.
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
* LART 3V96
2009-2010: Imitation in Art and Culture
(also offered as STAC 3V96 and VISA 3V96)
Imitation in Western visual art and culture from Plato to postmodernism focusing on the Renaissance and the modern period.
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
# LART 3V97
2009-2010: Appropriation in Art and Culture
(also offered as STAC 3V97 and VISA 3V97)
Authorship and appropriation in visual and literary culture. Topics include the historical development of the notions of the artist, copyright and plagiarism, quotation, parody and intertextuality, the role of found objects, collage and montage, and the significance of digital technologies. Historical and contemporary examples from a wide range of media.
Lectures, 3 hours per week.
# LART 4P01
The Philosophy of Law
(also offered as POLI 4P01)
Traditional and contemporary accounts of law and their implications for issues of contemporary concern.
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
Restriction: open to LART, GBLS and POLS (single or combined) majors with either a minimum of 14.0 overall credits and a minimum 70 percent major average or approval to year 4 (honours).
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 4P01.
# LART 4P02
Ancient Political Theory
(also offered as POLI 4P02)
Premodern political philosophy examined in the works of Plato and Aristotle, emphasizing those features distinguishing ancient political science and philosophy from that of modernity.
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
Restriction: open to LART, GBLS and POLS (single or combined) majors with either a minimum of 14.0 overall credits and a minimum 70 percent major average or approval to year 4 (honours).
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 4P02.
# LART 4P03
Modern Political Theory
(also offered as POLI 4P03)
Modern political theory examined in selected texts. Topics may include historicism, consent, progress, equality or a selected author such as Rousseau, Kant, Hegel.
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
Restriction: open to LART, GBLS and POLI (single or combined) majors with either a minimum of 14.0 overall credits and a minimum 70 percent major average or approval to year 4 (honours).
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 4P03.
# LART 4P04
Politics and Tyranny
(also offered as POLI 4P04)
Comparative accounts of ancient and modern tyranny examined in light of the question: has political domination varied significantly in the Western tradition.
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
Restriction: open to LART, GBLS and POLS (single or combined) majors with either a minimum of 14.0 overall credits and a minimum 70 percent major average or approval to year 4 (honours).
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 4P04.
# LART 4P05
Shakespeare's Politics
(also offered as POLI 4P05)
Issues of justice; politics, law and morality; republican, monarchical and tyrannical government as explored in selected Shakespearean comedies, tragedies and histories.
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
Restriction: open to LART, GBLS, INPE and POLI (single or combined) majors until date specified in the Registration guide. After that date open to ECUL, ENGL (single or combined) and HIST (single or combined) majors. Students must have either a minimum of 14.0 overall credits and a minimum 70 percent major average or approval to year 4 (honours).
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 4P05.
# LART 4P06
Philosophy, Politics and the Family
(also offered as POLI 4P06)
Family relations and their significance for the political community as both have been treated by ancient and modern political philosophers and by contemporary feminists and their critics.
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
Prerequisites: POLI 2P91; POLI 2P92 or 2P93 or permission of the instructor.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 4P06.
# LART 4P07
Postmodern Political Theory
(also offered as POLI 4P07)
Perspectives on the postmodern condition in the works of selected 20th-century thinkers. Topics may include notions on the self; aesthetics and politics; reason and power; the construction of meaning.
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
Restriction: open to LART, GBLS and POLI (single or combined) majors with either a minimum of 14.0 overall credits and a minimum 70 percent major average or approval to year 4 (honours).
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 4P07.
# LART 4P09
Faith, Philosophy, and Politics
(also offered as POLI 4P09)
Examination of challenges based upon revelation to the sufficiency of unassisted human reason as a guide to human political action.
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
Restriction: open to LART, GBLS and POLS (single or combined) majors with either a minimum of 14.0 overall credits and a minimum 70 percent major average or approval to year 4 (honours).
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 4P09.
# LART 4P10
Modernity
Important works of art, literature, philosophy, science and theology from the 19th and 20th centuries that address such questions as: What does it mean to be modern? Is modernity to be greeted or opposed?
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 4P10.
LART 4P70
Apocalypse in Literature, Art and Music
Fear and hope in the coming end of time, as portrayed by artists, writers and musicians. Focus on the long Judeo-Christian apocalyptic tradition.
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 4P70.
LART 4P90
Forbidden Knowledge, Dangerous Art
Important works of art, literature, philosophy and science that were banned for religious, moral or political reasons.
Lectures, seminar, 3 hours per week.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 3V95.
LART 4P99
Senior Essay and Workshop
Discussion of Liberal Arts and issues related to the preparation of a senior essay.
Seminar, tutorial, two terms.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 4P99.
# LART 4V00-4V09
Selected Problems in Political Theory
(also offered as POLI 4V00-4V09)
Particular writer, work or theoretical problem in political philosophy examined.
Seminar, 3 hours per week.
Restriction: open to LART, GBLS and POLS (single or combined) majors with either a minimum of 14.0 overall credits and a minimum 70 percent major average or approval to year 4 (honours).
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 4V00-4V09.
LART 4V70-4V79
Text and Context
Topics in Literature and Intellectual History.
Completion of this course will replace previous assigned grade and credit obtained in GBLS 4V70-4V79.