General Education Requirements
How to Choose a Tandon Humanities (HUSS) Elective
Learn more about Tandon's humanities and social sciences course offerings for the Spring 2021 semester.
Last Updated 11/23/2020
Graduation Requirement
24 credits of Humanities and Social Sciences, as explained below:
1. First-Year Writing Requirement (2 Courses, 8 credits)
Fall Semester: EXPOS-UA 1
Spring semester: EXPOS-UA 2
These courses are offered by the NYU Expository Writing Program.
2. Humanities and Social Science Elective Requirement (4 courses, 16 credits)
Students must complete 4 humanities or social science courses. These 4 courses can be within a single cluster or across multiple clusters. For optimal breadth of experience, TCS encourages students to take electives across clusters and/or across disciplines within a cluster. These 4 humanities and social science electives must satisfy the following:
- 1 must be a 3000/4000 level humanities or social science elective; and
- 1 must be a writing-intensive elective, labeled by “W” in the course listings the semester it is offered.
- The same course, or two different courses may be used to fulfill the writing-intensive requirement and the 3000/4000 requirement.
Please note
- Students must take their Writing Intensive course at Tandon- this requirement cannot be filled at other NYU schools
- The TCS department abbreviates level 2000 to level 2, level 3000 to level 3, and level 4000 to level 4
Cluster Overview
The TCS Department offers elective courses that fulfill Tandon's undergraduate requirement for courses in humanities and social sciences — part of the undergraduate core curriculum. These courses explore the relations among science, technology, and society from three general approaches and modes of inquiry:
Culture, Arts and Media (CAM)
The CAM cluster explores how cultural practices and artifacts in a wide range of media reflect, influence, and interact with developments in science and technology. Courses are based on philosophy, media studies, music, literary studies, art history, rhetoric, and anthropology.
Science, Technology and Society (STS)
STS cluster courses explore the interrelationships among science, technology, culture, and society. STS unites and investigates a myriad of disciplines, including history, philosophy, rhetoric, literary studies, and sociology. The questions posed are: How do science and technology shape society? How do social processes frame scientific and technological enterprises? What is the relationship between the content of scientific and technological knowledge and the social and intellectual context in which it is created?
Society, Environment and Globalization (SEG)
Courses in the SEG cluster address the way the critical areas of society, environment, and globalization are interlinked and how they affect the experience of modern life. Coming from the complementary perspectives of the humanities and social sciences, SEG courses provide students with a broad and multicultural perspective on how environmental issues and global exchange in this “flat world” are changing society, here and across the world.
TCS Elective Offerings
The following courses are offered by the department on a regular basis. However, each course is not offered every semester.
Special Note About Course Descriptions: If a course number doesn't link to the course description, you can find the full description on the Tandon Bulletin.
SEG Electives from Other Departments
FIN-UY 2003 Economic Foundations of Finance
CAM-UY 2014W STEM & Theater
CAM-UY 2204 Disability Studies
CAM-UY 3004/W Special Topics in CAM
EN-UY 2124W The Short Story
EN-UY 2134W The Novella: Between the Short Story & the Novel
EN-UY 2194W The Rise of the Graphic Novel
EN-UY 2334W Literary Inventiveness
EN-UY 2414W The City & Literature
EN-UY 3104 Science Fiction Workshop
EN-UY 3144W Analytical Approaches to Poetry & Art
EN-UY 3154 Fantasy Workshop
EN-UY 3164W Special Topics in English Literature
EN-UY 3194W Ethical Questions in Literature
EN-UY 3434W Machines Made of Words II: Designing Poetry
Cluster 2: STS
EN-UY 2424 Medicine and Literature
PL-UY 2004 Symbolic Logic
PL-UY 3004/W Metalogic
STS-UY 2004/W Science, Technology, and Society
STS-UY 2134 Philosophy of Science, Technology and Science in China and India
STS-UY 2144 Ethics and Technology
STS-UY 2204 Philosophy of Technology
STS-UY 2224/W Science and Sexuality
STS-UY 2234 Introduction to the History of Technology
STS-UY 2244/W Magic, Medicine, and Science
STS-UY 2254 From Heat Engines to Black Holes
STS-UY 2264/W Addressing Public Policy Issues in the Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
STS-UY 2274 Space and Spacetime
STS-UY 2294 Quantum Mechanics and Information
STS-UY 2314 It's About Time
STS-UY 2364 History of Aviation and Aviation Technology
STS-UY 2374 The Ship
STS-UY 2444/W History and Philosophy of Internet Technology
STS-UY 2554 Science and Pseudoscience
STS-UY 2624/W The Rhetoric of Science
STS-UY 2634 Psychology of the Internet
STS-UY 2644 Creativity and Innovation
STS-UY 2664 Intelligence- Real and Artificial
STS-UY 2904 Special Topics in STS
STS 3004/W Seminar in Science and Technology Studies
STS-UY 3204/W Science and Difference
STS-UY 3214 Science and Feminism
STS-UY 3234 The Phenomenon of Life
STS-UY 3244 The History of Light
STS-UY 3254/W Philosophy of Science
STS-UY 3264 Physics, Information and computing
STS-UY 3284 Relativity and Spacetime
STS-UY 3604 Psychology of Internet Security
STS-UY 3624 Science and Technology in the Literary Sphere
STS-UY- 3904 Special Topics in STS
Cluster 3: SEG
EN-UY 3814W The Environment & Literature
HI-UY 2353 A History of NYC Transit and the Development of NYC
HI-UY 2514/W Introduction to New York City History
HI-UY 3034/W History of New York's Urban Infrastructure
HI-UY 3254/W History of Mass Media
HI-UY 4334W Seminar in Urban Infrastructure History
PS-UY 2324W Environmental Psychology
PS-UY 2724 Human Factors in Engineering Design
PS-UY 3164 Health Psychology
PS-UY 3724 Psychology of Sustainability
PS-UY 3754 Psychology of Living in Extreme Environments
SEG-UY 2184/W Beyond Oil- Fueling Tomorrow's Vehicles
SEG-UY 2194/W Writing About Nature and the Environment
STS-UY 3814 Social Psychology of Virtual Worlds
URB-UY 2024/W Design of Cities
URB-UY 2034 Humans in the Urban Environment
URB-UY 2044 Methods for Studying Urban Environments
URB-UY 2054/W Introduction to Urban Policy
URB-UY 2064 Introduction to Urban Planning
URB-UY 2224 Natural Environment of New York City
URB-UY 2234 Natural Environmental Catastrophes and Cities
URB-UY 3034 Evidence- Based Design
URB-UY 3214 Cities in Developing Countries
URB-UY 3314 History and Design of Urban Parks
URB-UY 3354 Urban Impact Assessment
URB-UY 3834 Special Topics in SUE
Courses Outside of Tandon
Tandon students have the opportunity to complete their humanities requirements at other NYU Schools and at other institutions. The TCS Department has created a list of approved NYU courses that satisfy the humanities requirement.
Please note: Your Writing Intensive course cannot be fulfilled at another NYU school; it must be taken at Tandon.
Credits from NYUs School of Professional Studies (SPS) are not accepted at Tandon.
Important Links
List of approved HUSS courses at other NYU Schools -Use the arrows at the bottom of the excel to see all the courses categorized by NYU school/global campus. Please note, you must be signed in with your NYU email/NET ID to access the list.
Form to evaluate NYU course for HUSS credit -A NYU course that is not on the list above
Form to evaluate a non-NYU course for HUSS credit -Completing a course at another institution