GRADUATE SEMINAR IN DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY (Psyc 402)

This course examines basic approaches to the study of human development, drawing on both theoretical perspectives and empirical studies, and uses them to trace some key processes in the growth and shaping of individuals from infancy through childhood and adolescence. It particularly stresses the complex ways that individual and sociocultural elements interact in the formation of mind and personality, including such areas as the relationship between learning and development; the interplay of thought and language; moral development and its socio-emotional contexts; family and peer-group socialization; and issues of identity. It aims to provide a solid grounding in the essential frameworks and conceptual resources of developmental psychology in order to enhance students' ability to make use of this understanding in their own work, both scholarly and practical.

CHILD DEVELOPMENT (Psyc 107)

An introductory undergraduate course that examines basic approaches to the study of human development, drawing on both theoretical frameworks and empirical studies, and uses them to trace some key processes in the growth and shaping of individuals from infancy through adolescence. Focusing on the complex interplay of physical, cognitive, socio-emotional, and personality development, it particularly stresses the ways that individual and socio-cultural elements interact in the formation of mind, the emergence of the self, and the definition and reproduction of culture.

PERSONALITY AND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT IN CHILDHOOD (Psyc 363)

Examines issues related to socio-emotional development (e.g., attachment, aggression, social competence), personality development (e.g., temperament, identity, gender roles), and the social contexts of development (e.g., family, day care) from infancy through adolescence.

CHILDREN AND NARRATIVES: NARRATIVE, CULTURE, AND IDENTITY (Psyc 364)

The world of childhood is enmeshed in a web of narratives: those written for and told to children; those that children themselves tell; and those that children enact in the form of fantasy play. Children use these narratives to represent the world--to themselves and others--and also to make sense of it, both factually and emotionally. This course examines these various narrative forms (spanning such different genres as fairy-tales, accounts of personal experience, stories from popular culture, children's own fictional stories, and the larger cultural narratives used to frame identity and the life course) and considers how they appeal to and shape children's social understanding and symbolic imagination; how they influence children's understanding of the world; their role in the growth of cognitive structures and moral sensibility; and their significance in the formation of the self--for example, in the emergence of gender identity.
In the process, the course introduces students to several important approaches to the analysis of narratives and considers their complementary strengths (and weaknesses). While the main focus of the course is on children's narratives, the significance of these issues goes beyond childhood. The course attempts to address the problem of narrative in its interconnected aesthetic, psychological, and socio-cultural dimensions; and one of its central concerns is to examine how the analysis of narrative fits into the larger study of human development.

HUMAN DEVELOPMENT IN CROSS-CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE (Psyc 398)

The formation of mind and personality is shaped in profound and complex ways by the sociocultural contexts within which individuals grow up and develop. Increasingly, significant tendencies in psychology are paying systematic attention to these cultural dimensions of human development and to the ways that cultural differences influence the processes and outcomes of development. This course focuses on basic theoretical and methodological issues concerning the role of culture in development, and explores some important examples of cross-cultural variation and diversity, using comparisons between different national societies (in the Americas, Asia, Africa, etc.) and between different subcultures within American society. Topics include cross-cultural similarities and differences in areas such as cognition, language, personality, moral development, socio-emotional development, identity, attachment, and socialization. The course is interdisciplinary, drawing on materials from anthropology, sociology, and education in addition to psychology. (Prerequisites: One of the following courses or consent of instructor: Psyc 107, Psyc109, Psyc/SSP121, Anth 11.)

LITERACY IN CROSS-CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE

This course examines the significance of literacy for both societies and individuals, the processes and institutions by which it is transmitted across generations, and its role in development and education. The course begins by asking why literacy is such a highly charged issue in contemporary America. It then places these issues in a larger historical and theoretical framework by outlining some key debates in the study of literacy; goes on to explore more closely the nature and social organization of literacy in different socio-cultural contexts, as well as its place in individual development; and concludes by dealing with some current inquiries and controversies regarding such issues as cultural variations in the forms and uses of literacy, the determinants of success and failure in the acquisition of literacy, and the relationship of literacy to patterns of power and inequality in contemporary society.

THE CHILD IN MODERN SOCIETY

This course examines the experience of childhood in modern society and the ways that this experience is culturally defined and socially organized. In the process, simultaneously addresses, and tries to integrate, three sorts of questions: (1) What is "childhood"? How can we distinguish those aspects of it that are universal from those that are socio-culturally variable, and how can we most usefully grasp the interplay of individual and socio-cultural elements in human development? (2) What is "modern society"? What are the key features of modern societies that make them distinctively "modern," and how do these features affect the social organization of childhood and our changing conceptions of both children and child-rearing? (3) What are the similarities and differences between patterns of child-rearing in different "modern" societies; and how does the experience of childhood differ along lines of gender, class, ethnicity and so on within specific societies, particularly American society? Pursuing these issues involves locating child-rearing institutions (such as the family and formal education) in their wider social context, and placing them in comparative and historical perspective.
The approach of the course is interdisciplinary, and it draws on both theoretical treatments and empirical studies (including historical and ethnographic analyses). Its larger aim is to help students develop a theoretically, historically, and culturally informed perspective on childhood and human development which they can bring to bear, now and later, in thinking about the dilemmas that confront children and families in modern societies.