Academic Programs
Conflict and Dispute Resolution Program
Become the expert everyone needs. Learn to transform organizations and relationships, address inequity, and reimagine conflict. The University of Oregon Conflict and Dispute Resolution (CRES) program prepares professionals from all disciplines to be collaborative problem-solvers in every aspect of society. Taught by top-ranked faculty from the School of Law, across campus, and beyond, our highly regarded curriculum provides you with the skills you need to become an effective negotiator, mediator, and facilitator.
Partnered with Oregon Law’s nationally ranked Appropriate Dispute Resolution Center, the CRES master's program is intimate and intense. The faculty is passionate. The curriculum is deep. You will learn theory and put it into practice. You will stretch yourself to consider new perspectives on competition and cooperation, relationships and responsibility, and even war and peace.
Minor in Middle East and North Africa Studies
The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region is home to a diversity of peoples and cultures, rich literary and artistic traditions, extensive trade networks, urban planning, and governance systems. Through our minor program, students can explore critical issues across the region while focusing on their areas of interest.
BA/MA in Global Studies
The Department of Global Studies offers interdisciplinary approaches to human wellbeing. We are inspired by human-centered approaches to development and globalization, with an emphasis on both theory and practice. Throughout the department, we focus on bottom-up approaches to problem solving rather than top-down policy promotion, and our research-active faculty focus on integrating cutting edge scholarship with innovative solutions to pressing real-world issues.
Sample of Relevant Courses
University of Oregon offers a wide range of courses that explore diverse perspectives and how to navigate political and cultural differences. The following list is a sampling of recent options.
ARB 301: Arabic Language and Culture
Provides intermediate level Arabic proficiency. Activates and augments grammar structures of modern spoken Arabic, colloquial Egyptian Arabic, and the study of Arabic culture.
CRES 435/535: Israel and Palestine
Examination of the Palestinian and Israeli conflict. Evolution of the political struggle with a broad look at the human side of conflict, and examination of critical negotiation issues.
DAN 301: Dance in Traditional Cultures: Africa
Explores African cultural traditions and their significance through the lens of dance.
EDST 457: Immigration, Diaspora and Education
Examines the way educational institutions have responded to human migration generally and to immigrant students specifically.
ENG 340: Jewish Writers
Forms and varieties of fiction, poetry, and drama by Jewish writers from the 19th century to the present.
ES 452: Race and Ethnicity and the Law
Addresses issues of social justice and the participation of Asian Americans, African Americans, Chicanos and Latinos, and Native Americans in the legal system.
GEOG 209: Geography of the Middle East and North Africa
Provides intermediate level Arabic proficiency. Activates and augments grammar structures of modern spoken Arabic, colloquial Egyptian Arabic, and the study of Arabic culture.
GLBL 101: Introduction to Global Issues
This course surveys major political, economic, and cultural themes in international studies, encouraging in-class debates on contemporary issues.
GLBL 240: Perspectives on International Development
Introduction to major ideologies, theories, historical processes, and contemporary challenges in international development.
GLBL 250: Value Systems in Cross-Cultural Perspective
Introduces various cultural value systems and their relation to religion, social organization, and conflict resolution.
GLBL 360: International Cooperation and Conflict
Utilizes case studies and selected themes to examine the root causes, stakeholder perspectives, and attempts to resolve international conflicts.
GLBL 370: International Human Rights
Survey of human rights, examining diverse perspectives on the concept, practice, and implementation of human rights and human rights regimes.
GLBL 421: Gender and International Development
Focuses on the changing roles of women in developing societies, emphasizing the social upheavals tied to development and inequality
GLBL 521: Gender and International Development
Analysis of the changing roles, opportunities, and expectations of Third World women as their societies undergo social upheavals associated with the problematic effects of development.
HBRW 101: First-Year Modern Hebrew
In this class, you will engage in readings and writing using Modern Hebrew script, vocabulary related to the immediate environment, basic grammar, and basic morphological structure.
HC 444H/431H: Diversity and Intergroup Relations
This seminar covers contemporary issues in intergroup relations, focusing on diversity, prejudice, and intergroup behavior.
HIST 317: Migrants and Refugees in Modern World History
Human beings have always moved; the system of borders and passports to regulate that movement is just a few centuries old. This course gives students historical tools and reference points to help them better understand the controversial issues surrounding international migration in the world today.
JCOM 318: Documenting International Human Rights
This class, using close studies of the documentary films that have greatly influenced our understanding of human rights, will take up the advanced requirements of storytelling, tracing the parallel developments of an art that can reveal both horror and the progress toward real defenses against it—that can tell the truth but also distort it into lies. What are human rights and how can documentaries convey the realities of human experience—the worldwide crisis we are in—so that we can understand the situation of ourselves and others in our world?
JCOM 649: International Communication
Examines global communication structures and processes and their consequences. Topics include new technologies, news and information organizations, cross-cultural uses of Western media, and information policies.
JDST 213: The Jewish Encounter with Modernity
The course investigates contemporary American Jewish Culture by focusing on the shifting cultural transformation from European Jewry.
JDST 354: Jewish Thought and History
Focuses on Jewish philosophy, critical theory, and history. Possible topics included but are not limited to: Contemporary Jewish Philosophy, the writings of Emanuel Levinas, Spinoza, Modern Jewish History, etc.
MENA 111: Media Coverage of the Middle East
This course deals with how the Middle East has been portrayed in the U.S. through news reports, films, graphic novels, Web pages, and other media. It examines the construction of the Middle East as a category of inquiry, and explores ethical issues surrounding this construction.
PS 205: Introduction to International Relations
Introduction to theoretical and methodological tools for the analysis of world politics.
PS 302: States' Rights and Wrongs
Explores the division between U.S. federal, state and municipal power through the lens of our nation's most contentious and most critical political and policy debates. Examines how elected officials, judges and activists influence fights over federalism.
PS 304: Democracy, Dictators, and Development
Examines key questions in political science like why some countries are rich while others are poor, why some countries are democratic and others are authoritarian, how these different political systems work, and which are best equipped to address ethno-nationalist conflict and economic development.
PS 316: Black Lives Matter and American Democracy
Investigates the intersection of race, justice, and protest in American society.
PS 624: International Relations
Survey of major works in the field of international relations.
SOC 304: Community, Environment and Society
Interrelationship of social and environmental factors in human communities, processes of community change, impact of environmental change on human communities.
SOC 313: Social Issues and Movements
Contemporary social issues viewed in relation to the social structure of American society. Social movements and ideologies related to these issues.