An opportunity to design an independent research course of study at the 400 level not otherwise available within the Faculty of Arts and Science. Students must be registered at UC or in a UC-affiliated program. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Students must submit an application form that includes a written proposal and confirms that a faculty member has agreed to supervise. Applications must be submitted to the UC Programs Office (UC 173) for approval by the Vice-Principal. Applications are due before the first day of course enrolment. Application form is available at the University College website at https://www.uc.utoronto.ca/programs-study-academic-programs-independent….

By exploring different popular culture phenomena such as the emergence of hip-hop in the Bronx, Batman's Gotham, and Nollywood, this course works to examine the contributions of popular culture in shaping our understandings of cities (as well as providing different perspectives of the city and the urban experience than is generally captured in scholarly/academic literature). Popular culture becomes a vehicle by which we will explore different aspects of urban life and urban representation.

Focuses on the theoretical foundations of urbanization, urban change, and city building, with particular attention on global urban growth, history of contemporary urbanization, urban planning, governance, built form, and economic development. These topics are explored through a multidisciplinary lens, with an emphasis on understanding urban transitions over time and their meaning for contemporary urban experience.

Cities are centres of innovation and creative energy, but they also face significant and pressing challenges. This course explores various urban issues including inequality, eroding infrastructure, and concerns arising from globalization, while also examining the ways in which municipal governments and urban citizens are imagining and implementing potential solutions to these challenges.

How do power and dominance consolidate in urban settings? How do individuals and communities contest this consolidation, and claim spaces and rights in the city? These questions will be taken up through a range of critical approaches, including Indigenous, critical race feminist, political economy, queer, and anarchist perspectives. Students will have the opportunity to carry out interview-based research on an issue of equality and social justice that matters to them.

Students will have the opportunity to travel to a destination city for a week-long examination of specific social, economic, physical, and/or environmental issues. The trip will include meetings with municipal representatives and other decision-makers (public and possibly private). The findings of the trip supplemented by bibliographic research and in-class discussion will form the basis of a major research essay. Each student is required to pay the cost of transportation and accommodation. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Over the last 50+ years, Toronto has become a national and international centre of economic activity, with a vibrant arts and culture scene and world-renowned research, educational, and health institutions. Additionally, the City has become one of the most culturally diverse cities in the world. That said, Toronto also struggles with deep inequalities along many different axes, an affordable housing crisis, underfunded infrastructure needs, and many other challenges. This course provides a window into how the leadership at the City of Toronto think and approach these and other issues as the City works to plan for the recovery from COVID-19.

A prominent thesis in the fields of planning and economic geography is that the presence of creative occupations in a city correlates positively with the overall health of urban regions. This course will investigate the nature of this link from theoretical and empirical perspectives and examine its potential usefulness in a planning/policy context.

Toronto, like other global cities, is characterized by a stark dichotomy: upscale residential and commercial development transforms the landscape, even while increasing numbers of residents are forced to live on the streets, in encampments, in shelters, or crowded into unaffordable and substandard housing. This course will examine that paradox and activism that is trying to achieve the federal government’s stated goal: “By 2030, everyone in Canada has a home that they can afford and that meets their needs”. Through readings, discussions, guest presenters, and activities, we will trace the links between housing, homelessness, and urban politics; review policies and trends at the municipal, provincial/territorial and national levels; and connect with urban movements to contest displacement.

This course will expose students to a range of contemporary theoretical, analytical, and policy oriented debates in Urban Studies. The emphasis will be on establishing a broad knowledge base in the multifaceted field of urban studies. The exact topics to be covered will fall broadly under the banner of urban socioeconomic change, and specific syllabi, year to year, will follow contemporary and emerging debates.

Focus on the impact of increased economic inequality and economic polarization trends that are reshaping Canada's metropolitan areas, changing neighbourhoods, and affecting the lives of our diverse urban population. Using the Toronto area as an example, students explore the consequences of these trends and the implications for public policy.

This course provides students an opportunity to craft and initiate an Urban Studies capstone research project. Students will gain knowledge, experience and insight in utilizing qualitative research methods including interviewing, focus groups, observational analysis and other techniques. Seminars and assignments focus on the application of qualitative methods to each student’s selected urban research question.

This course is meant to be a senior complement to URB338H1 whereby important theoretical, analytical and/or policy debates are addressed in a research seminar format. Students in URB430H1 will be expected to extend, or refine research topics identified and explored in URB338H1 in a major independent research project. Students will present their proposals, their progress reports, and their final results to the instructor and the class.

Special topics courses are offered periodically for senior students in the Urban Studies Program. Offerings in any given year will depend on program priorities, availability of specialized expertise and funding. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Special topics courses are offered periodically for senior students in the Urban Studies Program. Offerings in any given year will depend on program priorities, availability of specialized expertise and funding. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Special topics courses are offered periodically for senior students in the Urban Studies Program. Offerings in any given year will depend on program priorities, availability of specialized expertise and funding. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Designed to allow strong students in the Major and Specialist programs to extend a piece of urban research under the supervision of a faculty member from any aligned department. Choice of ‘H’ or ‘Y’ session pursuant to the scope of the research envisioned, the proposed supervisor’s assessment of depth of the inquiry, and the approval of the program director. Proposals, including a letter from an agreeable supervisor should be submitted to the program director by June 1 for a Fall or Year session course and by November 1 for a Spring session course. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Designed to allow strong students in the Major and Specialist programs to extend a piece of urban research under the supervision of a faculty member from any aligned department. Choice of ‘H’ or ‘Y’ session pursuant to the scope of the research envisioned, the proposed supervisor’s assessment of depth of the inquiry, and the approval of the program director. Proposals, including a letter from an agreeable supervisor should be submitted to the program director by June 1 for a Fall or Year session course and by November 1 for a Spring session course. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Designed to allow strong students in the Major and Specialist programs to extend a piece of urban research under the supervision of a faculty member from any aligned department. Choice of ‘H’ or ‘Y’ session pursuant to the scope of the research envisioned, the proposed supervisor’s assessment of depth of the inquiry, and the approval of the program director. Proposals, including a letter from an agreeable supervisor should be submitted to the program director by June 1 for a Fall or Year session course and by November 1 for a Spring session course. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

A method of studying city issues that combines readings, seminar discussions, and field trips with an 8 hour / week internship in the office of a municipal politician, local government, or non-profit organization. Readings focus on community development, urban planning, economic development and local governance. Students must fill out a ballot for the course (available by contacting the Urban Studies Program Office) by June 1st. Enrolment in this course is competitive and at the discretion of the Urban Studies Director and/or course instructor.

This course will allow students to investigate an urban topic of their choice in a guided seminar environment. This course will guide students through the various steps of the research process including: proposal writing and refinement, secondary research, primary data acquisition, analysis and the production of a senior research paper. The course emphasizes the connections between the design, implementation and write-up of an in-depth research paper. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Mega-events, like the Olympics, give cities the opportunity to showcase themselves to the world, but the production of television-friendly urban images do much to obscure the processes, compromises and social consequences in host cities. These events are powerful tools for city branding. They are also potential opportunities for social movements and other groups and individuals to highlight their own sets of concerns. This course will explore the challenges and opportunities that cities face in hosting such events.

This course is a collaboration with the organization Regent Park Focus Youth Media Arts Centre, a not-for-profit organization that was established to counter negative stereotypes about the Regent Park community. Together, University of Toronto students and Regent Park Focus youth members will learn about media projects initiated by young people across the world, and how these creative forms of communication, organizing, and expression spurred change and social movements in their respective communities. U of T students and Regent Park Focus youth will work together to create their own media project about the neighborhood.

This course will provide a broad overview of the roles of both the citizen and the professional practitioner in advancing effective and meaningful public participation in the policy-making process, particularly as it relates to city planning. Through an examination of a mix of theoretical frameworks and case studies from Toronto and elsewhere, you will gain an understanding of the ways in which effective public participation can contribute to the maintenance of a healthy democratic society while also exploring some of the key challenges and opportunities faced by public participation practitioners today. The course has two key objectives: to give you a practical understanding of all of the elements of an effective public participation process, and to explore how public participation processes can be designed to be more inclusive and effective. In addition, students will be able to apply this knowledge towards the development of a project or report for a client.

Surveys the development of human societies from their origins to the present. Topics may include the environment, cultural development and interaction, the creation and nature of belief systems, political, economic and social structures, gender relations, and the relationship between global patterns and local development. Restricted to students enrolled in the UTPrep program.

This course is a general orientation to conflict theory, and develops a basic understanding of essential conflict resolution principles that will complement the study of conflict theory. The course will examine the differences between conflicts and disputes, the functions and desirability of conflict, and the conditions that facilitate conversion of conflicts from destructive to constructive. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

This course examines a specific event, or events, in relation to the public sphere. The course will use events or an event as an entry point to discuss the nature of society including topics such as major revolutions, economic crises, the impact of the appearance of significant artistic or cultural works, and the impact of technological changes. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

This course examines what it means to be a leader through narrative presented in media such as text or film. Such works of creative fiction aspire not simply to depict actions and events, but also to lay bare the inner psychology of protagonists. They capture and convey realities with a psychological depth that social scientists cannot always replicate. Students will study such narratives to understand various kinds of leadership skills and leadership types. By creating narratives of their own, students will practice the communication skills that leaders need. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

Metaphors and motivations of journeying have long intrigued human beings as they have attempted to understand the meaning of their existence: the setting out, the seeking for a desired object, the pilgrimage of religious observance, and the longing to return home. Through texts, art, music and film, this course will explore some of the shaping journey-myths of our culture from classical, Hebrew, medieval and modern sources. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.

This course explores central developments and ongoing controversies in the scientific study of the human mind, brain and behaviour. It examines topics such as: psychoanalysis, behaviourism, humanistic psychology, evolutionary psychology, intelligence testing, and feminist perspectives. Goals include understanding the historical evolution and social relevance of scientific psychology. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.