Rivers, Daniel Lanza
Course: AMS 139: Animals and Society
Course material: Nezhukumatathil, Aimee. World of Wonders : In Praise of Whale Sharks, Fireflies, and Other Astonishments. First edition, Milkweed Editions, 2020.
The textbook is a series of essays exploring the natural world and reflecting on how its creatures provide lessons, encouragement, and inspiration. The main motivation to adopt a digital textbook was to save students money, and guarantee that the class has equal access to an excellent, bestselling text by a contemporary author. Enrolled students access the textbook as an ebook through the library’s website.
About the Course: Introduction to the practices of animal observation and the critical methods of the interdisciplinary field of Human-Animal Studies, paying particular attention to intersections among behavior, ecology, space, and critical theories of race, class, gender, colonialism, and power. To engage more deeply with the scientific methods and cultural theories that underpin this course, students engage in field observations and read texts from ethology (the study of animal behavior), evolutionary biology, ecological theory, history, philosophy, literature, and cultural studies.
Student Population: This is a popular GE course, which regularly draws significant enrollment from students in animation, psychology, and design, among others. This course is also a keystone part of the curriculum for SJSU’s new certificate in Environmental Humanities.
About the book: This book uses a braided essay format to interweave memoir, science writing, and cultural reflections on humans’ relationships with nonhuman animals. We use this text to do the following: a) introduce cultural and social dimensions of humans interspecies relationships, b) to introduce creative and artistic engagements with “umwelt” (the theory of species’ different perceptual worlds, and c) to help students think about how they might use observation and the creative arts to practice observation of nonhuman animals. We also use excerpts from John Muir Laws, The Laws’ Guide to Nature Drawing and Observation, both also free to students through the SJSU Library.
Aimee Nezhukumatathil, World of Wonders:
https://csu-sjsu.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/discovery/fulldisplay?&context=L&vid=01CALS_SJO:01CALS_SJO&search_scope=MyInst_and_CI&tab=Everything&docid=alma991014191698302919
These books are made available through Canvas or the library website.
World of Wonders: $20 savings
License:
Copyright © 2022 Bernan Press. All rights reserved.
Library access via ProQuest Ebook Central (Unlimited user access; 30-minute inactivity/idle timeout).
Please provide an explanation or what motivated you to use this textbook or OER/Low Cost. To save students money, and guarantee that the class has equal access to an excellent, bestselling text by a contemporary author. Along with supporting us in meeting the class’ pedagogical goals, this helps students see connections to contemporary discussions and artistic trends relevant to our subject matter.
How did you find and select the open textbook for this course? Consulted the librarian.
Sharing Best Practices: It’s great to post a link on Canvas. Also, make sure that your text has a multiple-user link. This is especially important for large classes. If you are working with a book that only has single user access, be sure to let the students know that they will only be able to access it one at a time. They can work with this limitation if they download chapters to read, especially if they are traveling or on public transit.
About the instructor: Daniel Lanza Rivers. I am a Humanities and American Studies professor at San Jose State University
https://www.sjsu.edu/people/daniel.rivers/
Describe your teaching philosophy and any research interests related to your discipline or teaching.
My interdisciplinary pedagogy focuses on activating students’ curiosity and broadening their perspectives by using a mix of texts, lessons, and activities that help them place multiple (conflicting and complementary) perspectives into conversation with one another. My teaching assignments have spanned environmental humanities, US literature, and American studies, with a significant emphasis on helping students understand the regional, national, and global roots of climate change and extractive industry, as well as the movements to address social inequity and the climate crisis. Along with coordinating SJSU’s certificate in environmental humanities, I regularly teach upper-division and graduate courses in English.
My research interests include: feminist science studies, American studies, ethnic studies, queer and feminist studies, environmental humanities, California studies, climate justice, environmental literature, and environmental justice movements.
Please describe the courses you teach – Please list all courses that you regularly teach
AMS/HUM/RELS 180: Water & Culture (special topics course, California focus)
AMS/ENVS/HUM 159: Nature & World Cultures (GE course I teach regularly, focuses on troubling histories of conservation while exploring Indigenous science and movements for land return, environmental justice, climate justice, environmental arts and literature.
AMS 139: Animals & Society (see above)
AMS 129: US in a Global Context (course exploring connections among migration, policy, memoir, and political critique)
AMS 10: Stories that Make America (explores cultures of public memory by exploring history, literature, and the arts)
ENGL 281:Environmental Futures (graduate literature course)
ENGL 254: Environmental Horror and the Unnatural (graduate literature course)
ENGL/WGSS 184: Queer and Trans Literary Studies (upper division literature elective)
https://www.sjsu.edu/people/daniel.rivers/