Sample Syllabi & Teaching Materials

International Relations: An Introduction

University of St. Andrews

International Education Institute (IEI)

Course Objective:

This IEI course was designed to introduce international students to the study of international relations from an Anglophone perspective. Specifically, it seeks to introduce students to the ways in which major scholars and schools of thought, both historical and contemporary, have theorized about international relations. This foundational module sought to hone students’ understanding of international relations and global politics, providing them with a variety of different perspectives from which to think about, question, and understand the factors, forces, and figures that give shape to the international political realm. The purpose of this course was to: examine the key concepts of international relations and global politics; survey several of the predominant theories of international relations (especially Realism, Liberalism, and Constructivism); and help familiarize students with academic essay writing and sub-honours work in the School of International Relations at the University of St. Andrews.

International Relations: A Continued Introduction

University of St. Andrews

International Education Institute (IEI)

Course Objective:

Continuing the discussion from the spring semester, this module aims to: examine more closely the key concepts of international relations and global politics; survey the predominant theories of international relations (especially the constitutive/critical theories of Marxism, Feminism, and Postcolonialism); and familiarize students more fully with academic essay writing and essay writing for IR at the University of St Andrews.

Continental Thought & the Grounds of ‘the Political’: A Study of Late Modern Political Theory

Working Syllabus* (based on PhD research)

Course Description

This class explores the political thought of late modernity. It offers a study of several key Continental thinkers in order to reconsider what it means – and meant – to exist, think, and act (politically) in a period of human history marked by tremendous change and rapidly-evolving frameworks of understanding, meaning, and knowledge formation. This course examines, in particular, the work of Karl Marx, Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger, Hannah Arendt, Simone de Beauvoir, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida, and Gayatri Spivak. Throughout this course, students will be asked to consider the meaning of ‘history,’ as well as how systems of thought changed with Enlightenment thinking and more liberal conceptualizations of the ‘self’; the advancement of processes of industrialization and mass society; questions of race and racism; and the changing dynamics of the nation-state in (global) politics. Providing a forum for students to discuss the ethico-political implications of the ideational, material, and social dynamics of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, this course investigates the ways in which life during the late modern period called into question – maybe even destroyed entirely – the grounds of ‘the political’.

Several Sample Teaching resources