Fall 2023 Course Descriptions
Make the Healthy Choice!
Health Decision Making MW 2-3 Hybrid with Dr. Donovan
Do We Have a Story for You…
Leadership Stories MW 4-5 Hybrid with Dr. Cutbirth
Now This is Innovative…
Communication for Innovation MWF 12-1 Hybrid with Dr. Shorey
Play Ball!
Communication and Sports T/Th 9:30-11
“Sounds” Good:
Rhetoric and Popular Music T/Th 12:30-2 with Dr. Gunn
It’s Time To Take This Class…
Time Matters T/Th 12:30-2 with Dr. Ballard
Get a Job!
Or at least an Internship with CMS 307K and 370K
Speak Up!
Take Any of our Many Sections of Professional Communication Skills
Course Descriptions for Three of Our Newest Courses in CMS!
CMS 355S - COMMUNICATING WITH ANIMALS
Jürgen Streeck - jstreeck@austin.utexas.edu
MWF – 12:00 PM – 1:00 PM @ CMA 6.170
DESCRIPTION: How is it possible to communicate and become friends with someone whose body and mind are shaped entirely unlike our own, for example an octopus? How do elephants express grief? How do I know that my cat loves me and what do dogs know about their owners? These are the type of questions that we will try to answer in Communicating with Animals.
Animal and human-animal communication has become the focus of intense study and lively debates among communication researchers, biologists, and philosophers, and we also know much more about the cognitive abilities and social and emotional lives of various animal species than a generation ago, when animals were seen as machine-like, instinct-driven clones of one another. Today, animal rights activists propose to treat animals as citizens that should have a voice in political decision-making that affects their lives.
This course carries a writing and an independent inquiry flag. Students’ work centers around an individual research project. This can be a video-based, ‘ethnographic’ study of your own or your family’s or friends’ interactions with a pet, or of a professional who interacts with animals (shelter volunteers, pet groomers, veterinarians), or a historical study of a human-animal ‘subculture’ (e.g., horse-breeders).
The course works from the premise that every animal is an individual, a person. Animals have feelings, thoughts, memories, and, to different degrees, consciousness. Our task in communicating with them is to try to see the world and ourselves as much as possible through their eyes.
CMS 367I-1 - IMMIGRATION/COMMUNICATION
Roselia Mendez Murillo - roselia.mendezmurillo@austin.utexas.edu
MW – 2:00 PM – 3:00 PM @ DMC 4.212
F – 2:00 PM – 3:00 PM @ Internet
DESCRIPTION: Migrants are a heterogeneous group of people (the term “migrants” is used to encompass different immigrant communities). The reasons for relocating to the United States, or another country, the conditions under which they relocate, whether they are authorized to remain in a country, their cultural backgrounds, their ethnic/racial identities, their education level, their gender identity and sexual orientation, and their socio-economic status are merely a few factors that contribute to immigrants’ diverse experiences.
Thus, this course will introduce us to different frameworks, research, and practices that can help us understand the important role of communication in different, U.S., migration experiences. On the one hand, communication can help mitigate some of the social and structural barriers that migrants face in the United States and elsewhere. On the other hand, communication can also exacerbate or lead to educational, economic, and health inequities among migrants. We will consider both ways in which communication can function for migrant communities. Overall, migration: (1) is a diverse area of research that can incorporate intrapersonal, interpersonal, community, organizational, institutional, cultural, and policy levels of analysis; (2) is studied using a wide range of methodologies; and (3) is affected by a variety of communication channels. The readings and content of this course primarily focus on the experiences of Latina/o/x immigrant communities in the U.S.
CMS 367P - Dark Side of Political Communication - WB
Josh Gunn - josh_gunn@austin.utexas.edu
Asynchronous Web Based
DESCRIPTION: This course is designed to explore various environmental theories as they relate to communication contexts. We will examine how communication plays a role in environmental issues such as journalism and news reporting, sustainability, consumerism, politics, environmental organizations, and tourism. We will also examine how environmental theories and communication contexts play out in local, national, and international debates and contexts, particularly as related to race, ethnicity, social justice, and globalization. This course is also designed to connect theories to environmental experiences in the world, through self and practical observations as well as intersections of race, gender, sexuality, ability, and class.