Humanities & Sciences

The goal of the Race, Power, and Resistance major is to provide students with an option to study concepts, methodologies, and histories related to race, power, and resistance from an interdisciplinary and intersectional perspective. This major has an unapologetic focus on race and power inequalities in the U.S. and the diaspora. It is enhanced by a rich array of interdisciplinary course offerings that is unified by a coherent conceptual core. The Race, Power, and Resistance major has an integrated experiential learning component, and a flexible design that allows students to explore different departments, disciplines, and schools. 

Objectives:

1. Attain a working knowledge of key concepts, debates, and methodologies within the field of Race & Ethnic Studies. 
2. Demonstrate knowledge of major historical developments of Black, Indigenous, Latinx, and Asian communities in the U.S. and in their respective diasporas. 
3. Understand how structural racism operates both historically and in the contemporary moment in relation to Black, Indigenous, Latinx, and Asian communities in the U.S. and in the respective diasporas. 
4. Articulate how race, ethnicity, and indigeneity intersect with other factors such as gender, gender expression, class, sexuality, religion, and nationhood. 
5. Express how racial and ethnic minoritized individuals and communities have organized to resist, survive, and thrive. 

The Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies major is an interdisciplinary program that provides opportunities for feminist study, research, close collaborations with faculty, internships, and community involvement. Students will develop a robust general understanding of how gender and sexuality shape our culture, daily lives, social institutions, and interactions, while focusing their studies on specific issues and areas that are of interest to them. 

The WGSS BA is highly flexible, permits a great deal of student choice, and is a strong pairing for a double major.

A degree in WGSS equips students with the critical thinking, research, problem-solving and communication skills that are highly valued in today’s workforce, thus opening the door to a variety of challenging careers. It also empowers students to put their education into practice in transformative ways, with an emphasis on advocacy, compassion, and social justice.  

The Screen Cultures major is an innovative and interdisciplinary program that provides students with a flexible course of study. It offers a solid understanding of foundational issues related to the study and understanding of the moving image while also allowing students to focus their studies on a range of specific issues and areas.

As a humanities-based course of study grounded in the field of film studies, but drawing on neighboring disciplines such as cultural studies, area studies, media arts, and media theory, Screen Cultures allows students to study in depth the theory, aesthetics, history, and cultural and institutional contexts of film, television, and related screen media from interdisciplinary perspectives. The degree emphasizes international and multicultural foci and is attentive to the role that the moving image plays in the construction of national, racial, ethnic, gender, and sexual identities.

The degree also provides opportunities for experiential learning in the form of on-campus and off-campus internships and projects in collaboration with a variety of film festivals on campus and throughout Ithaca, ensuring that students graduate not only with core liberal arts skills, but with a keen understanding of the important role that visual media play in the contemporary world and in national/international public discourses and multiple industries.

Students involved in pre-law advising participate in workshops on law study and meet distinguished IC alumni who have become successful attorneys. They have access to extensive resources that help them determine the right law school and legal profession based on their interest.

Every semester, the program sponsors Pizza Law night, where students can learn more about the law school application process.

In the spring the program hosts a Seminar Series, during which alumni who work in various positions and practice settings—such as judges, law clerks, in-house counsel, and practicing attorneys—speak to and meet with students.

Pre-Law students are also able to both travel and hone their public speaking skills by participating on the school's Mock Trial Team.

Recent advances in our scientific understanding of the brain and a long tradition of studying behavior make psychology an especially interesting field. Psychologists of the 21st century combine technology, behavioral studies, and neuroscience to help us understand thought and behavior.

In our B.A. program you will enrich your coursework by participating in an intensive, three-semester team research project. Guided by faculty members, our teams have studied mental health, social and personality psychology, cross-cultural development, neural activity, human motivation, emerging adulthood, and the effects of the media. 

Minors in psychology, counseling, media literacy, and neuroscience are also available at the College. All advanced classes take place in our modern facility, which houses 10 laboratories and offers specialized equipment and the newest computers.

Our students have gone on to medical school and graduate schools such as Columbia, Harvard, NYU, University of Michigan, and Syracuse University; others have pursued careers in marketing, law, banking, teaching, investment, and many other areas. 

As a student in the Religious Studies B.A. program, you'll learn to think about religious traditions as evolving historical phenomena and a global force in the modern world while developing a more nuanced awareness of different worldviews—including your own. 

You will also:

• Cultivate critical reading, writing, and thinking skills highly valued by graduate schools and employers. In addition, because religion continues to inform every sphere of public life, from art and business to politics and public health, studying religion will make you a better medical care provider, entrepreneur, teacher, civic leader, attorney, or community activist—or whatever you plan to become. 
• Study a fascinating array of texts, rituals, myths, and material culture from around the world. This will transform you into a global citizen who can appreciate the complexity and diversity of cultures and thus contribute to society in a conscious and constructive manner. 
• Become a more interesting person. By immersing yourself in unfamiliar religious worlds, you will develop a more critical perspective on the familiar. This will add a layer of depth to your personality that is one of the hallmarks of a well-rounded liberal arts education.

You may want to pair the Religious Studies major with another major from a wide range of other fields. This will provide you with a comprehensive undergraduate education and give you a competitive edge when applying for jobs or graduate study. One of the many advantages of this major is that at thirty-three credits, it strikes a balance between maintaining a high level of academic rigor and depth while also encouraging students to pursue a double major and thus adopt a more integrative approach to their studies at Ithaca College.

A grounding in the philosophical concepts that have informed so much of the world's history and culture can form the basis for almost any career path, from social work to business to law. The study of logic, ethics, or systems of morality, for example, prepares students for responsible and effective roles in a variety of life situations -- from the boardroom to the classroom. It's not surprising that students from our other schools often choose to take courses or to minor in the discipline.

You'll not only gain a broad knowledge of fundamental concepts, but you'll also develop your creative and critical skills and be challenged to articulate your own ideas through a dialectical process.