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This course will proceed from two basic assumptions: that the built environment, as a cultural product, is a rich archival record; and that architecture and urbanism are not born complete but made by people through discussion, debate, contingency, use, and reuse.

Philadelphia is a vibrant literary city - and one without a single, monolithic literary center of gravity. In this class, taught by novelist, poet, and Swarthmore Visiting Assistant Professor of Creative Writing, Moriel Rothman-Zecher, students will have a chance to get to know, and contribute to, Philadelphia's vibrant literary culture.

This course will use the lenses of sociology to critically and comparatively examine various immigrant communities that historically, economically, politically, and socially have shaped the city of Philadelphia.

This course investigates the history and evolution of Philadelphia as a globalized and multi-ethnic city, using as a case study for this analysis the impact and legacy of transnational Italian culture across the centuries.

This transdisciplinary and community-engaged course focuses on challenges of responding to extreme heat in Philadelphia. Site visits, guest speakers, readings, and community-driven research will deepen students’ understanding of the intertwined social, economic, health, and environmental challenges facing Philadelphia in a warming world.

This course will explore the vibrant contemporary art world of the city of Philadelphia—a city uniquely positioned to attract artists with its many top-tier fine art schools, world-class museums, relatively affordable living and studio spaces, and thriving network of artist-run galleries and exhibition spaces.

In this course, and in the city itself, we will examine literature written in and about Philadelphia before the Civil War, exploring how and why Philadelphians engaged questions of love, freedom and non-freedom.

The aim of the course would be to examine the political and economic constraints generated by poverty and racial and class segregation in contemporary urban environments and how grassroots economic initiatives rooted in mutual aid often fill the gaps and provide alternative ways to meet needs and generate supportive community.

This inter-disciplinary upper-level seminar will explore the complex school policies, teacher instructional decisions, as well as historical, political, social, economic, cultural, and structural forces that have given rise to documented reality of the “school-to-prison pipeline.”

This course will cover, as the title suggests, the role of people and political organizations in Philadelphia in the 2024 Election as it is happening. We will work together to understand how people understand politics, and how political campaigns, PACs, and non-profit organizations work to persuade and mobilize potential voters.

This course will explore the vibrant contemporary art world of the city of Philadelphia—a city uniquely positioned to attract artists with its many top-tier fine art schools, world-class museums, affordable living and studio spaces, and thriving network of artist-run galleries and exhibition spaces.

This class aims to trace the history of higher education and its ongoing impact on the geography, economy, and culture of greater Philadelphia and U.S. urban space broadly.