Community Studies

Community studies explores issues of social justice and social change as they relate to community-based organizing, community economic development, education, social and ecological movements, and activism.

This focus area will be of interest to:

• students working with community groups, the non-profit sector, social enterprises, and social economy organizations, and within public sector partnering agencies.
• those interested in Collaborative Economic Development (CED) theory and practice for social change.
• adult and distance educators interested in social transformation in local and global contexts.

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Foundational courses

Paced study

paced study foundational courses

MAIS 603 – Community Development	(3)
MAIS 604 – Planning and Action for Community Change	(3)

Electives

Paced study

paced study community studies electives

EDST 630 – Transformative Learning for Social Change	(3)
EDST 632 – Transformative Approaches to Sustainability Education	(3)
EDST 645 – Curriculum: Provoking Inquiry	(3)
ENVS 608 – Questioning Extinctions	(3)
GLST 611 – Social Movements	(3)
INST 511 – Indigenous Knowledge and Education	(3)
MAIS 610 – Work and Society	(3)
MAIS 616 – Writing the Self: The Experience and Potential of Writing for Personal Development	(3)
MAIS 620 – Digital Storytelling	(3)
MAIS 624 – Critical Approaches to Technology and Society	(3)
MAIS 635 – Equality in Context	(3)
MAIS 644 – Adult Education, Community Leadership, and the Crisis of Democracy	(3)
MAIS 658 – Critical Disability Studies: The Making of Normal Bodies	(3)
MAIS 662 – Mourning and Trauma: Theoretical and Historical Debates	(3)
MAIS 663 – Critical Race Theory in Global Context	(3)
MAIS 665 – Cultural Studies: Reflections, Democratic Possibilities, and Futures	(3)
MDDE 611 – Foundations of Adult Education	(3)
MDDE 614 – International Issues in Open and Distance Learning	(3)
WGST 505 – Decolonizing Mental Health	(3)

Individualized study

individualized study community studies electives

ANTH 591 – Ethnobiology: Traditional Knowledge of Plants, Animals, and Land in Contemporary Global Context	(3)
GLST 695 – Political Economy of Development – People, Processes, and Policies	(3)
GOVN 500 – Governance and Leadership	(3)
MAIS 638 – What I Tell You May Not Be True: Autobiography, Discourse Analysis, and Post-Colonialism	(3)
MAIS 640 – Grounded Theory, Exploration, and Beyond	(3)

Available as a reading course

available as a reading course

GLST 650 – Sustainable Development in an Age of Global Change

(3)