Your browser is no longer supported

To get the best experience, we suggest using a newer version of Internet Explorer/Edge, or using another supported browser such as Google Chrome.

Chambers Stream Courses

You will need to complete four half-courses for the Margaret Chambers Stream:

  • VIC186H1F | The Art and Literature of Leadership 1
  • VIC187H1F | Prosperity, Justice and Sustainability: Introduction to Public Policy
  • VIC188H1S | Corporate Citizenship, Sustainability, and Ethics
  • VIC189H1S | The Art and Literature of Leadership 2
VIC186H1F | The Art and Literature of Leadership 1

VIC186H1F
The Art and Literature of Leadership 1
Professor Joel Faflak
R 12-2

What is a leader? Are leaders born or are they made, and if they are made is there a craft to being able to lead others? Through works of art, film, and literature, this course examines the various types of men and women who become leaders from natural-born talents to statesmen and state-crafters and individual entrepreneurs with the purpose of defining those qualities that make for the leaders of tomorrow. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC187H1VIC188H1VIC189H1ECO101H1 and ECO102H1
Exclusion: VIC186Y1
Distribution Requirement Status: Humanities
Breadth Requirement: Creative and Cultural Representations (1)

VIC187H1F | Prosperity, Justice and Sustainability: Introduction to Public Policy

VIC187H1F
Prosperity, Justice and Sustainability: Introduction to Public Policy
Professor Kathleen Wynne
M 3-5

This course introduces policy applications of measurement tools and economic concepts by analyzing current issues in the news, such as public spending and debt, health care, social security, energy, climate change, innovation, and education. Concepts from the philosophy and history of economic thought will be used to address such questions as: What is the nature of economic explanations? Do they tell us the truth about reality? Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC186Y1VIC188H1, ECO101H1 and ECO102H1
Distribution Requirements: Social Science
Breadth Requirements: Thought, Belief and Behaviour (2)

VIC188H1S | Corporate Citizenship, Sustainability, and Ethics

VIC188H1S
Corporate Citizenship, Sustainability, and Ethics
Professor Wendy Cecil
M 5-7

Drawing together philosophical background readings with contemporary applications, this course addresses issues of corporate social responsibility, business ethics, human rights, diversity, and equity, and considers how these topics intersect with a wide range of global practices. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC186Y1VIC187H1ECO101H1 and ECO102H1
Distribution Requirements: Humanities
Breadth Requirements: Thought, Belief and Behaviour (2)

VIC189H1S | The Art and Literature of Leadership 2

VIC189H1S
The Art and Literature of Leadership 2
Professor Joel Faflak
R 12-2

What is a leader? Are leaders born or are they made, and if they are made is there a craft to being able to lead others? Through works of art, film, and literature, this course examines the various types of men and women who become leaders from natural-born talents to statesmen and state-crafters and individual entrepreneurs with the purpose of defining those qualities that make for the leaders of tomorrow. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC186H1VIC187H1VIC188H1ECO101H1 and ECO102H1
Exclusion: VIC186Y1
Distribution Requirement Status: Humanities
Breadth Requirement: Creative and Cultural Representations (1)

Education Stream Courses

You will need to complete two full-year courses for the Education Stream:

  • VIC150Y1Y | School and Society
  • VIC151Y1Y | Theories and Practices of Teaching
VIC150Y1Y | School and Society

VIC150Y1Y
School and Society

Professor Jonathan Hamilton-Diabo
F 10-12 (Fall)

Professor Ken McNeilly
F 2-4 (Winter)

This course will be about the social and historical role of the school. The course will examine schools and learning as social, political, intellectual, and economic phenomena. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite:
 Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC151Y1 and PSY100H1
Distribution Requirement Status: Social Science
Breadth Requirement: Society and its Institutions (3)

VIC151Y1Y | Theories and Practices of Teaching

VIC151Y1Y
Theories and Practices of Teaching
Professor Julia Forgie
R 2-4

This course focuses on connecting theories and practice of teaching with a view to having students develop their personal understanding of teaching. Students will be involved in a practicum. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC150Y1 and PSY100H1
Distribution Requirement Status: Humanities
Breadth Requirement: Thought, Belief and Behaviour (2)

Frye Stream Courses

You will need to complete four half-courses for the Northrop Frye Stream:

  • VIC162H1F | Cultural Forms and Their Meanings
  • VIC163H1S | Cultural Forms and Their Meanings: People and Ideas
  • VIC164H1S | Ideas and Their Consequences: Literary and Artistic Realms of the Imagination
  • VIC165H1F | Ideas and Their Consequences: Isolation and Communion in Modern Culture
VIC162H1F | Cultural Forms and Their Meanings

VIC162H1F
Cultural Forms and Their Meanings
Professor Robert Davidson
R 1-3

A study of culture with a view to developing basic concepts with examples drawn from the visual arts, music, film, literature, architecture, and/or local urban artefacts. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC163H1VIC164H1VIC165H1, and 1.0 credit in any 100-level course in ENG or FAH or PHL
Distribution Requirements: Humanities
Breadth Requirements: Creative and Cultural Representations (1)

VIC163H1S | Cultural Forms and Their Meanings: People and Ideas

VIC163H1S
Cultural Forms and Their Meanings: People and Ideas
Professor Anne Urbancic
M 12-1, W 12-1

Have you ever played the game where you are given two almost identical pictures and you are to find the differences? To be a successful player you must read the spaces of those pictures very carefully to spot the minute discrepancies. In our everyday life we also read the spaces we live in in order to understand differences between one space and another as we move through them. But did you know that our language and literature are filled with similar abstract spaces that we have to recognize in order to understand the text? Memes are a great example.

In VIC163H we will study the ideas of some of the theorists who have considered the spaces of our language and our life, including Derrida, McLuhan, de Certeau and Virilio. We will examine how they posited our understanding of the concept of space: physical, metaphorical, emotional, psychological, linguistic. We will consider how space works in prose and poetry, and how our highly technological and mediated world has affected the concept of space, and, with it, also the concept of time. We will work as a class, and in smaller groups, to show how these theories apply to our everyday lives, from the soap we use, the coffee shop we choose, the stores we frequent, to the way we view literature and creativity. You will be able to undertake some research of your own on spaces you are curious about.

At the end of the course, you’ll be able to consider your personal and global environment from several new perspectives. Be warned: former students tell me that they can no longer enter a shop, a theatre, a church, a hospital etc. etc. without being reminded of what they learned this course!!!

Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC162H1VIC164H1VIC165H1, and 1.0 credit in any 100-level course in ENG or FAH or PHL
Distribution Requirement Status: Humanities
Breadth Requirement: Thought, Belief and Behaviour (2)

VIC164H1S | Ideas and Their Consequences: Literary and Artistic Realms of the Imagination

VIC164H1S
Ideas and Their Consequences: Literary and Artistic Realms of the Imagination
Professor Maria Cichosz
R 1-3

Artists are both markers and makers of their times. As careful observers of cultural conditions and their effects on daily life, artists notice and document major societal shifts as they occur. But artists are also visionaries who have ideas about the potential of a given historical moment—what is, and what could be. How individual artists and the movements they are a part of navigate the world they live in can tell us a great deal about their historical context and its social, cultural, political, and technological implications. It can also teach us about the changing social norms surrounding artists, the work they do, and the institutions that support them.

This course will engage these questions and themes through the lens of the most dramatic cultural shift of the past 100 years: the transition from modernity and its artistic response, modernism, to postmodernity and postmodernism, their aftermath. As ideas about the role of art in social life and the potentials and pitfalls of representing reality began to shift through the advent of modern warfare, globalization, late capitalism, and the explosion of mass media, artists produced works that responded to and challenged these conditions. By critically examining writers, filmmakers, poets, and artists working in various media, we will discover how situating creative activity in its context is a way of understanding the relationship between art, imagination, and society. Students will have the opportunity to choose and research an artwork from a local collection and explore its connections to course themes. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC162H1VIC163H1VIC165H1, and 1.0 credit in any 100-level course in ENG or FAH or PHL
Distribution Requirement Status: Humanities
Breadth Requirement: Society and its Institutions (3)

VIC165H1F | Ideas and Their Consequences: Isolation and Communion in Modern Culture

VIC165H1F
Ideas and Their Consequences: Isolation and Communion in Modern Culture
Professor Adam Sol
W 12-2

What is the role of the artist in contemporary society? As a spokesperson for “the people”? As a prophetic instigator? As an insider or an outsider? And what if the poet herself is outside the centre of “mainstream culture”? What do minority poets “owe” to their communities? Is incorporating new techniques and styles a betrayal or an extension of tradition? These are some of the questions this course will address, focusing mainly on poetry, and spanning over 150 years in literary history. A major goal will be to examine how different poets have approached the role of the artist in relation to community, and how that relationship manifests itself in their work. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC162H1VIC163H1VIC164H1, and 1.0 credit in any 100-level course in ENG or FAH or PHL
Distribution Requirement: Humanities
Breadth Requirement: Thought, Belief and Behaviour (2)

Gooch Stream Courses

You will need to complete four half-courses for the Gooch Stream:

  • VIC166H1F | Common Vices and Neglected Virtues: Intro to Ethics of Character
  • VIC167H1S | Ideas and Fine Thoughts
  • VIC168H1F | Identity and Equality in the Public Sphere
  • VIC169H1S | Ethical Living in a Pluralistic World
VIC166H1F | Common Vices and Neglected Virtues: Intro to Ethics of Character

VIC166H1F
Common Vices and Neglected Virtues: Intro to Ethics of Character
Professor Paul Gooch
R 2-4

Vice is popular: a prestigious university press has brought out a series of seven books on the Seven Deadly Sins. This course examines such questions as the following. Are greed, lust and gluttony just bad names for necessary and otherwise acceptable instincts? What is the place, in a good human life, of such qualities as honesty, trust, civility and the like? Are vices and virtues culturally determined or a matter of individual preference? Can character be taught, or is it rather a matter of genes and luck? Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC167H1VIC168H1VIC169H1, and 1.0 credit in any 100-level course in ANT or PHL or RLG
Distribution Requirement Status: Humanities
Breadth Requirement: Thought, Belief and Behaviour (2)

VIC167H1S | Ideas and Fine Thoughts

VIC167H1S
Ideas and Fine Thoughts
Professor David Cook
M 2-4

This course examines how political ideas are formed and developed through literature, art, plays, essays and philosophical works in the twentieth century. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC166H1VIC168H1VIC169H1, and 1.0 credit in any 100-level course in ANT or PHL or RLG
Distribution Requirement Status: Humanities or Social Science
Breadth Requirement: Creative and Cultural Representations (1)

VIC168H1F | Identity and Equality in the Public Sphere

VIC168H1F
Identity and Equality in the Public Sphere
Professor Andrew Lawless
W 11-1

This course explores current legal and philosophical debates around equality, discrimination, and the shaping of individual and group identities. It addresses the way values, affiliation, and identities have an impact on the public sphere of law and policy-making – and the ways in which law and policy, in turn, shape our conceptions (and misconceptions) of people's identities. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC166H1VIC167H1VIC169H1, and 1.0 credit in any 100-level course in ANT or PHL or RLG
Distribution Requirement Status: Social Science
Breadth Requirement: Society and its Institutions (3)

VIC169H1S | Ethical Living in a Pluralistic World

VIC169H1S
Ethical Living in a Pluralistic World
Professor Nestor Medina
T 1-3

This course examines different values, beliefs, and traditions relating to the natural and social world, ethical living, and the common good. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC166H1VIC167H1VIC168H1, and 1.0 credit in any 100-level course in ANT or PHL or RLG
Distribution Requirement Status: Social Science
Breadth Requirement: Thought, Belief and Behaviour (2)

Jewison Stream Courses

You will need to complete two courses for the Jewison Stream:

  • VIC190Y1Y | The Arts and Society
  • VIC191Y1Y | Artistic Creation and Public Issues
VIC190Y1Y | The Arts and Society

VIC190Y1Y
The Arts and Society
Professor Adam Sol
F 10-12

No artist works in a vacuum. All art is created in a context that is rich with political, social, and technological complications. One essential question for every artist is, How can I integrate what I have inside me (my personal vision, my inspirations, my various identities and concerns, etc.) with what is “out there” in society? Some of what’s “out there” is important to learn: craft, the history of an art form, professionalism, etc. But some of what’s “out there” is also worthy of resistance or critique: craft can get stale, history is neglectful and sometimes narrowminded, and professionalism can be a disguise for calcification. We’re working under the assumption that art is an essential form of knowledge in the world, but as such it must always change, adapt, incorporate new forms of expression, and challenge both its best practitioners and its audience. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC191Y1 and 1.0 credit in any 100-level course in ARC or CIN or DRM or ENG or MUS or VIS
Distribution Requirement Status: Humanities
Breadth Requirement: Society and its Institutions (3)

VIC191Y1Y | Artistic Creation and Public Issues

VIC191Y1Y
Artistic Creation and Public Issues
Professors Claire Battershill, Eric Friesen, and Ray Robertson
T 3-5

Art often involves an intricate dance between individual and society, and between public and private experiences. Co-taught by three instructors who are all professional practitioners in their artistic fields, VIC191: Artistic Creation and Public Issues examines the paradox of our connected separateness and the ways in which artists contribute to local and global communities. In this course we will look at, listen to, move through and read work that imagines and re-imagines creative practice as social engagement. How different artists -- from visual artists to graphic novelists to poets to musicians -- render that relationship, between self and world, is what we’ll be looking at together. Together we'll learn to critique examples of socially-engaged art in various media and try our hands at critically analyzing and making our own art in a variety of forms. We will conclude the course by learning what happens to art once it’s made. We will think about the galleries, museums, concert halls and libraries that care for and display art to the public and how these institutions can shape our perceptions as consumers of art. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: 
Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC190Y1 and 1.0 credit in any 100-level course in ARC or CIN or DRM or ENG or MUS or VIS
Distribution Requirement Status: Humanities
Breadth Requirement: Creative and Cultural Representations (1)

Pearson Stream Courses

You will need to complete four half-courses for the Pearson Stream:

  • VIC181H1F | Events in the Public Sphere: World Affairs
  • VIC183H1F/S | Individuals and the Public Sphere: Shaping Memory
  • VIC184H1F/S | Individuals and the Public Sphere: History, Historiography and Making Cultural Memory
  • VIC185H1S | Events in the Public Sphere: Social Justice
VIC181H1F | Events in the Public Sphere: World Affairs

VIC181H1F
Events in the Public Sphere: World Affairs
Professor David Wright

M 2-4 (L0101)
W 2-4 (L0201)

This course will review issues in contemporary world affairs, from the fall of the Berlin Wall to the present day. The course will examine the politics and practice of foreign policy decision making. Issues to be covered include the collapse of the Soviet Union, intervention in humanitarian crises, and the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC183H1VIC184H1VIC185H1, and 1.0 credit in any 100-level course in ECO, HIS or POL
Distribution Requirement Status: Social Science
Breadth Requirement: Society and its Institutions (3)

VIC183H1F/S | Individuals and the Public Sphere: Shaping Memory

VIC183H1F/S
Individuals and the Public Sphere: Shaping Memory
Professor Sunil Johal
R 10-12

This course explores how public service and citizenship are developed. Topics may include the role of law and government, civil liberties, rights and responsibilities, and the creation of policy, as well as how these factors shape collective memory. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC181H1VIC184H1VIC185H1, and 1.0 credit in any 100-level course in ECO, HIS or POL
Distribution Requirement Status: Social Science
Breadth Requirement: Creative and Cultural Representations (1)

VIC184H1F/S | Individuals and the Public Sphere: History, Historiography and Making Cultural Memory

VIC184H1F/S
Individuals and the Public Sphere: History, Historiography and Making Cultural Memory
Professor Anne Urbancic
M 2-4 (Fall)
M 2-3, W 2-3 (Winter)

Did you trust all the information in your high school history books? How did the authors get all the information? What did they have to leave out?

In VIC 184H we ask essential and thought-provoking questions about how History is written. What is History anyway? We consider your perspective as a historian of your own story, of that of your family, your community, your responsibility to citizenship. What will you include in your history? What will you omit? What will you change? How will you deal with your biases? What is the truth of history in an era of post-truth?

In order to begin answering these questions in this course, we participate in two experiments:
➙FIRST, we examine the past by working in archives to produce a brief history of a forgotten person or event, basing ourselves on primary source documents like diaries and letters
➙SECOND, we choose events or persons from our own contemporary environment and study them, showing why they should become part of history yet to be written.
Both of the exercises are guided, with ample opportunity for consultation. More importantly, your reports will become part of a permanent record of research and knowledge building that will be of interest to historians in their work. In other words, you will be engaged in real research that other scholars will look at and use.

This course will make you feel confident about doing research in places where first year students don't venture traditionally: archives, rare book libraries, the wider community. You’ll learn how to work with and document primary sources (and perhaps you’ll solve a mystery or even be able to correct an error that previous history books and articles have repeated– both of these have happened in VIC184H).

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC181H1VIC183H1VIC185H1, and 1.0 credit in any 100-level course in ECO, HIS or POL
Distribution Requirement Status: Social Science 
Breadth Requirement: Thought, Belief and Behaviour (2)

VIC185H1S | Events in the Public Sphere: Social Justice

VIC185H1S
Events in the Public Sphere: Social Justice
Professor Vic Falkenheim

T 9-11 (L0101)
R 9-11 (L0201)

This course uses events to discuss the nature of society including major revolutions, economic crises, and the impact of significant artistic, cultural and technological developments. Emphasis on our responsibilities towards social justice. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC181H1VIC183H1VIC184H1, and 1.0 credit in any 100-level course in ECO, HIS or POL
Distribution Requirement Status: Social Science
Breadth Requirement: Society and its Institutions (3)

Schawlow Stream Courses

You will need to complete two full-year courses for the Schawlow Stream:

  • VIC172Y1Y | Physical Sciences Today
  • VIC173Y1Y | Philosophy of Science for Physical Scientists
VIC172Y1Y | Physical Sciences Today

VIC172Y1Y
Physical Sciences Today
Professor Emanuel Istrate
W 2-4

What does science do for our society, and what does society do for science? Who are today’s scientists? Why, where and how are they doing their work? In this course we discuss the way science works, taking a multi-disciplinary look at the physical sciences, the factors that enable scientific progress and the environment in which we advance science today.  We will look at the norms guiding the work of scientists, the way scientists communicate and share findings, the value of scientific results and the ways in which scientists and others make use of these results to improve our lives. At the same time, we discuss our social and ethical responsibilities as scientists. The course complements the content of the science courses taught at the university, discussing issues that today's scientists should consider. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC173Y1 and 1.0 credit selected from first-year course offerings in the sciences (0.5 credit must be a CHM, MAT or PHY course)
Distribution Requirement: Social Science, Science
Breadth Requirement: Society and its Institutions (3)

VIC173Y1Y | Philosophy of Science for Physical Scientists

VIC173Y1Y
Philosophy of Science for Physical Scientists
Professor Hakob Barseghyan
F 2-4

This course introduces students to some of the issues in the philosophy of science, in general, and in the philosophy of physics, in particular. Topics include the scientific method and its controversies, the meaning of time and its properties, realism versus competing approaches, thought experiments, and quantum mechanics. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC172Y1 and 1.0 credit selected from first-year course offerings in the sciences (0.5 credit must be a CHM, MAT or PHY course)
Distribution Requirement: Social Science, Science
Breadth Requirement: Thought, Belief and Behaviour (2)

Stowe-Gullen Stream Courses

You will need to complete two full-year courses for the Stowe-Gullen Stream:

  • VIC170Y1Y | Introduction to Probability, Persuasion, and the Rhetoric of Science
  • VIC171Y1Y | Methodology, Theory and Practices in the Natural Sciences
VIC170Y1Y | The Impact of Science on Our Society

VIC170Y1Y
The Impact of Science on Our Society
Professor Angus McQuibban
T 10-12

How rhetoric and statistical analysis are used to communicate scientific observations and theories to different audiences will be examined in lectures and seminars. Uncertainty, belief, evidence, risk assessment, random error and bias will be discussed using examples drawn from literature, the arts and the physical, life and social sciences. Students will prepare a research grant application on a scientific topic of their own choice. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC171Y1 and 1.0 credit selected from first-year course offerings in the sciences (0.5 credit must be a BIO course)
Distribution Requirement: Humanities, Social Science 
Breadth Requirement: Thought, Belief and Behaviour (2)

VIC171Y1Y | Methodology, Theory and Practice in the Natural Sciences

VIC171Y1Y
Methodology, Theory and Practice in the Natural Sciences
Professor Cory Lewis
F 10-12

An examination of scientific theories and their logic in life and physical sciences. Experimental design, novel device production, data analysis and modeling will be discussed using examples drawn from primary source material in the natural sciences. Students will prepare a research paper on a topic designed in consultation with the instructor. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Prerequisite: Admission to Vic One
Corequisite: VIC170Y1 and 1.0 credit selected from first-year course offerings in the sciences (0.5 credit must be a BIO course)
Distribution Requirement Status: Humanities
Breadth Requirement: Creative and Cultural Representations (1)