17.315 Comparative Health Policy (MIT)
This course examines in comparative prospective the health care policy problems facing the United States including providing adequate access to medical services for all, the control of rising health care costs, and the assurance that the quality of health care services is high and improving. It explores the market and regulatory policy options being debated politically in the United States to solve these problems and compares possible foreign models for reform including those offered by the Cana
21L.707 Arthurian Literature and Celtic Colonization (MIT)
The course examines the earliest emergence of stories about King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table in the context of the first wave of British Imperialism and the expanded powers of the Catholic Church during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The morphology of Arthurian romance will be set off against original historical documents and chronicle sources for the English conquests in Brittany, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland to understand the ways in which these new attitudes towards Empir
21L.704 Studies in Poetry - British Poetry and the Sciences of the Mind (MIT)
Do poems think? Recurrent images of the poet as an inspired lunatic, and of poetry as a fundamentally irrational art, have often fostered an understanding of poets and their work as generally extraneous to the work of the sciences. Yet poets have long reflected upon and have sought to embody in their work the most elementary processes of mind, and have frequently drawn for these representations on the very sciences to which they are thought to stand - and sometimes do genuinely stand - in opposi
2.154 Maneuvering and Control of Surface and Underwater Vehicles (13.49) (MIT)
This course is about maneuvering motions of surface and underwater vehicles. Topics covered include: derivation of equations of motion, hydrodynamic coefficients, memory effects, linear and nonlinear forms of the equations of motion, control surfaces modeling and design, engine, propulsor, and transmission systems modeling and simulation during maneuvering. The course also deals with stability of motion, principles of multivariable automatic control, optimal control, Kalman filtering, and l
21H.346 France 1660-1815: Enlightenment, Revolution, Napoleon (MIT)
A century and a half ago, Alexis de Tocqueville argued that the Revolution of 1789 in France constituted the culmination of long-term administrative and social changes, rather than a rupture with the past. In this class, we will consider that Tocquevillian insight by examining four aspects of French experience from the reign of the Sun King, Louis XIV, to the rule of the Emperor Napoléon Bonaparte: Absolutism, Enlightenment, Revolution, and Empire. Through the study of primary and secondary sou
21W.735 Writing and Reading the Essay (MIT)
This is a course focused on the literary genre of the essay, that wide-ranging, elastic, and currently very popular form that attracts not only nonfiction writers but also fiction writers, poets, scientists, physicians, and others to write in the form, and readers of every stripe to read it. Some say we are living in era in which the essay is enjoying a renaissance; certainly essays, both short and long, are at present easier to get published than are short stories or novels, and essays are feat
21F.740 The New Spain: 1977-Present (MIT)
This course deals with the vast changes in Spanish social, political, and cultural life that have taken place since the death of Franco. It examines the new freedom from censorship; the re-emergence of strong movements for regional autonomy: the Basque region and Catalonia; the new cinema including Almodóvar and Saura; educational reforms instituted by the socialist government, and the fiction of Carme Riera and Terenci Moix. Special emphasis is placed on the emergence of mass media as a
SP.694 Issues of Representation: Women, Representation, and Music in Selected Folk Traditions of the
This subject investigates the special relation of women to several musical folk traditions in the British Isles and North America. Throughout, we will be examining the implications of gender in the creation, transmission, and performance of music. Because virtually all societies operate to some extent on a gendered division of labor (and of expressive roles) the music of these societies is marked by the gendering of musical repertoires, traditions of instrumentation, performance settings, and st
H1N1 Myths
It can sometimes be hard to separate fact from fiction when it comes to diseases like H1N1. This video debunks some of the myths surrounding the disease.
21H.101 American History to 1865 (MIT)
This course focuses on a basic history of American social, economic, and political development from the colonial period through the Civil War. The colonial heritages of Spanish and British America; the American Revolution and its impact; the establishment and growth of the new nation; and the Civil War, its background, character, and impact are examined. Readings include writings of the period by Winthrop, Paine, Jefferson, Madison, W. H. Garrison, G. Fitzhugh, H. B. Stowe, and Lincoln.
21F.703 Spanish III (MIT)
This course is the first intermediate-level course in Spanish, with a focus on grammar review, additional vocabulary, writing of essays in Spanish and enhancement of cultural awareness. Group activities and projects, and conversation are emphasized. There are detailed simulation activities, readings about literature and art from Latin America and Spain, activities with music videos and interviews, and viewings of recent films such as El espinazo del diablo, Juana la loca, and María llena
21L.000J Writing About Literature (MIT)
Writing About Literature aims:
To increase students' pleasure and skill in reading literary texts and in writing and communicating about them.
To introduce students to different literary forms (poetry, fiction, drama) and some tools of literary study (close reading, research, theoretical models).
To allow students to get to know a single writer deeply.
To encourage students to make independent decisions about their reading by exploring and reporting back on authors whose works they enjoy.
The
Selgin on Free Banking
George Selgin of West Virginia University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about free banking, where government treats banks as no different from other firms in the economy. Rather than rely on government guarantees to protect depositors (coupled with regulation), banks would compete with each other in offering security and return on deposits. Selgin draws on historical episodes of free banking, particularly in Scotland, to show that such a world need not be unduly hazardous or filled with
CMS.998 New Media Literacies (MIT)
This course serves as an in-depth look at literacy theory in media contexts, from its origins in ancient Greece to its functions and changes in the current age of digital media, participatory cultures, and technologized learning environments. Students will move quickly through traditional historical accounts of print literacies; the majority of the semester will focus on treating literacy as more than a functional skill (i.e., one's ability to read and write) and instead as a sophisticated set o
2.14 Analysis and Design of Feedback Control Systems (MIT)
This course develops the fundamentals of feedback control using linear transfer function system models. It covers analysis in time and frequency domains; design in the s-plane (root locus) and in the frequency domain (loop shaping); describing functions for stability of certain non-linear systems; extension to state variable systems and multivariable control with observers; discrete and digital hybrid systems and the use of z-plane design. Assignments include extended design case studies and cap
Novel Writing - David Dabydean
Critic, writer and novelist David Dabydeen is Director of the Centre for Caribbean Studies and Professor at the Centre for British Comparative Cultural Studies at the University of Warwick.
Producing ‘The Queen’ - Andy Harries
The man who produced the award-winning British film, “The Queen” has swapped the red carpet of Hollywood for a Coventry University lecture hall this week.
Andy Harries, who saw Dame Helen Mirren win the Oscar for her outstanding performance as the Queen, spoke to John Mair, as part of the Coventry Conversations series.
Andy was appointed Controller of Drama and Comedy in 2000 having spent seven years creating and running Granada’s acclaimed Comedy Department. In his capacity as Controlle
Can we trust the International Media? - John O Oucho and Fred Mudhai
John O Oucho holds a PhD in Population Geography and was a post-doctoral fellow of the Carolina Population Center in the university of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, U.S.A. in 1982-3. He has taught at the University of Nairobi (2 decades), University of Ghana (3 years) and University of Botswana (8 years). He was elected Fellow of the Kenya National Academy of Sciences (KNAS) in 1989 and the World Academy of Art and Science (WAAS) in 2003. He is a well traveled and well published academic and ha
The Specials - Horace Panter in Conversation
Horace Panter is a true icon of British music. In the 1970s Horace formed "The Specials" who went on to become one of the biggest bands of the 1980s. This year they are reforming to play a number of big shows, including headlining slots at Glastonbury and V Festival.
In 1972 Horace started studying fine art at Coventry’s Lanchester Polytechnic, now known as Coventry University. In his second year there he met Jerry Dammers and soon they formed The Specials. They started playing in Coventry b
21L.472 Major European Novels (MIT)
This subject traces the history of the European novel by studying texts that have been influential in connection with two interrelated ideas. (1) When serious fiction deals with matters of great consequence, it should not deal with the actions of persons of consequence—kings, princes, high elected officials and the like—but rather with the lives of apparently ordinary people and the everyday details of their social ambitions and desires. To use a phrase of Balzac's, serious fiction d
