Firstbridge courses are offered to degree seeking freshmen and registration is done via webform in pre-arrival checklist.
Professor(s)
Notes
By looking at Burgundy, students will explore their new home, France, through one of its iconic regions. A focus on Burgundy shows the limitations of national perspectives, from the time of the dukes and their rivalry with the kings of France to how the European Union, international organizations and world markets affect us today. Burgundy is not just French, it is enmeshed in larger regional and global contexts, and its fascinating history continues to shape its contemporary dynamics.
Why is Burgundy a region and not a state? How did Cassis de Dijon, the key ingredient of the Kir Royal cocktail, shape the course of European integration? How did the climats of Burgundy’s vineyards get recognized as UNESCO World Heritage? Why did the multinational corporation Vallourec sell its last steel factory in its “home” town Montbard in 2022?
By looking at two specific sectors, wine and steel, students will examine the social, political, and economic relationships between local, regional, national, and global actors and frameworks. Within global competition, wine-making is a French success story, whereas steel, once at the center of Europe’s industrial rise, has been in decline. Theoretical concepts like historical path-dependence, globalization, or multi-level governance will come alive as students pursue concrete research projects around wine and steel in Burgundy.
A study trip to Montbard and Dijon will accompany our course.
Learning Outcomes
- Students will comprehend how information is produced and valued in order to discover, evaluate, use, and create information and knowledge effectively and ethically. In FirstBridge, students will demonstrate the conversational nature of scholarship, and recognize their potential role and responsibilities as contributors to that conversation. For each discipline taught in FirstBridge, students will identify reference works, journals, databases and/or major works in history, in order to start effective research in the field. (FB LO1)
- Students will acquire the study skills, time management, and interpersonal skills needed to meet the demands of university-level academic work at a Liberal Arts College individually or as a team. Students will value the multiple meanings of place through experiential learning at AUP and beyond in the Parisian or global context. (FB LO2)
- Students will understand how Burgundy today is shaped by its past and by current European and global contexts.
- Students will understand the relationships between local, national, and global dynamics.
- Students will understand key concepts of the social sciences such as historical path-dependence, globalization, and multi-level governance.
- Students will be introduced to a variety of methodologies within the social sciences.
- Students will be introduced to the design of research projects.
- Students will enhance their intercultural understanding of languages, cultures, and histories of local societies and the global issues to which these relate. (CCI LO1)
- Students will demonstrate awareness of ethical considerations relating to specific societal problems, values, or practices (historical or contemporary; global or local) and learn to articulate possible solutions to prominent challenges facing societies and institutions today so as to become engaged actors at various levels in our interconnected world. (CCI LO4)
Syllabus
Schedule
| Day | Start Time | End Time | Room |
|---|---|---|---|
Monday | 12:10 | 13:30 | SD-4 |
Thursday | 12:10 | 13:30 | SD-4 |