To receive a Master of Arts in Liberal Studies, students must earn a total of 30 approved graduate credits. Since SUNY Brockport graduate courses are generally three credits each, a normal Plan of Study consists of 10 graduate courses. These courses include four required Liberal Studies courses and six elective courses. The required block includes one topics course from each of three disciplinary perspectives, and the Project Portfolio.

REQUIRED TOPICS COURSES

Although the specific topics courses may vary from semester to semester, and from instructor to instructor, one course from each of the following three areas must be taken:

LST 700-719: Topics in the Arts and Humanities 

LST 720-739: Topics in the Natural Sciences    

LST 740-759: Topics in the Social Sciences                  

The list below is representative of the nature and range of topics courses that have been recently offered:

ARTS AND HUMANITIES

LST 705 Violence in Art
A multidisciplinary approach to understanding the role of violence in art and literature. By employing a variety of theoretical perspectives, including cultural interpretations of Greek tragedy, the philosophy of nihilism, and psychoanalysis, students will acquire the methodological tools to understand the role of violence in modern art, literature and drama. This critical undertaking requires an understanding of race, gender and class in modern art.

LST 706 Contemporary Asian American Art and Literature
Examines issues of aesthetics, identity, politics and gender in the Asian American literary tradition. Includes poetry, drama, and fiction, ranging from popular novels such as Amy Tan's Joy Luck Club and Maxine Hong Kingston's The Woman Warrior to the experimental writings of John Yau. The readings will attempt to provide an overview of Asian American writing in a cultural context, presenting key debates on gender (as in the controversy between Frank Chin and Kingston), sexual orientation (in Timothy Liu's poetry), and various culture strategies of dealing with ethnic identity.

LST 707 19 th Century Arts and Letters: The Rise of an American Culture
This course provides an in depth study of the emergence of a uniquely American culture that developed along with the expansion Westward and the movement from slavery to freedom over the course of the 19 th Century. Other influences include the advancement of technology in the later half of the century, the influx of immigrants, and the rapid rise of an affluent middle class in the urban centers of the Northeast. All of this gave birth to a flourishing of the fine arts, creating a distinctly American style in music, literature, the visual arts and dance. Class participants will deal with five essential questions that must be answered in order to understand the importance of 19 th century cultural developments and their implications for the arts in the 21 st Century. Topics to be covered will include: Southern folk music, songs of slavery, ragtime and early jazz, glorification of the West through the visual arts, literature of the Western frontier, architecture and the Victorian home, the beginnings of American musical theatre, the skyscraper, mass production of the arts in the industrial age, and social dancing and the rise of the middle class.

LST 708 Love in the Western World
This course will examine the philosophy of love in the West, examining classical theories of eros, agape and philia. Then students will read representative literary works and analyze how love functions in literature and reflects on the gaps and omissions of classical theory. Students will also be required to give oral presentations on classic philosophical and scientific theories, as well as non-Western texts, which will throw additional light on the classical perspectives.

 

NATURAL SCIENCES

LST 721 Environmental Issues
Examines ecology, environmental quality, agriculture, pest management, economics and waste to develop a responsible awareness of natural resource use and availability.

LST 722 Great Lakes Issues
This interdisciplinary course focuses on geological, ecological and socioeconomic issues in the Great Lakes Basin. It will address topics from the physical character of the region to invasive species and water quality policy issues, from pre-European settlement to post-9/11. Human impacts on the lakes and the lakes’ impacts on society will be examined. Activities include lectures, readings, group discussions, guest speakers, and writing assignments.

LST 726 Social Role of Science & Technology
Discusses ways that society and science have affected each other, and identifies trends and changes. Introduces a historical perspective of this relationship for the past several decades, including the contemporary society.

LST 728 Scientific Enquiry in the 21 st Century
A critical review of a) The traditional hard science based logical positivist model which is essentially reductionist in quality; b) Phenomenological methodologies including descriptive, participant observer, realist (vs. nominalist), expert systems, and ethnographic approaches; and c) 21 st century feedback based systems methodologies.

 

SOCIAL SCIENCES

LST 743 Multicultural Global Village
Studies the American ethnic mosaic culturally, historically, and sociologically, including the roles of technology, economics, educational and cultural institutions in the global village. 

LST 747 Biography and Culture
This course is about feeling, recording, and writing peoples’ life stories. The perspective is anthropological, considering the influences of audience, gender, and culture upon life story telling. What do we seek and gain from life stories, and what are their limitations? Students gain hands-on experience in collecting and analyzing life stories.

LST 748 Including Violence Prevention in the Academic Curriculum
This course covers an overview of social and emotional development in children and adolescents and how this work contributes to knowledge of violence prevention in the schools. The course will allow students to begin to learn how to incorporate state-of-the-art violence prevention techniques in their lesson plans without compromising the quality of the teaching or the material.

 

PROJECT PORTFOLIO (LST 797*)

A pre-graduation "culminating project" that entails both a reflective component and a knowledge application component.  Includes (a) a statement of the specific programmatic goals around which the Plan of Study was developed; (b) a reflective statement describing how the interrelationships between the areas of knowledge and skills acquired through the student's Plan of Study have provided an integrative experience that has contributed holistically to one's educational objectives; (c) a paper applying insights and/or methodologies from the three Liberal Studies disciplinary approaches (arts and humanities, the social sciences, and the natural sciences) to an understanding of some issue or problem within contemporary society; and (d) sample work from the student's required and elective courses.

(*Note: Students may not register for this course until they have completed all other Liberal Studies degree requirements, or are concurrently registered for their final course requirements as specified in their Plan of Study.)

 

ELECTIVE COURSES

In the Liberal Studies program, elective courses are selected through advisement (a required procedure that must be completed before a student may continue with the matriculation process, but which may be revised as circumstances warrant).  The electives must reflect a programmatic theme or focus that satisfies the degree candidate's personal and/or professional goals. The following restrictions apply to the selection of elective courses:

• At least two elective courses (six credits) must be at the 600-level or higher (i.e., courses designed exclusively for graduate students).
• No more than two courses (six credits) may reflect content intended for application in a specific professional setting (these courses are usually designated as 'B' courses at Brockport).
• No more than three courses (nine credits) may be taken within the same department or discipline (e.g., history, English, etc.).
• No more than six credits may be taken as Independent Study.
• No elective course may be taken on a "Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory" grade basis.
• No internships allowed.