When I was a student, I often found it hard to know what courses to take.
To be sure, course catalogues and programme requirements give one a guide of what is available. Yet scheduling wasn’t the problem. It was deciding how to integrated my courses into a coherent body of knowledge. Having an interdisciplinary sensibility made this harder. There is so much that is useful to know, and so many professors I wanted to learn from.
In higher education, a student should get three things — theory, method and topics. Which is to say a conceptual map of knowledge, methods by which to generate new knowledge, and an introduction to the wealth of knowledge that is already out there. When you look at your own course of study, try to make sure you are getting all three kinds of knowledge. More importantly, make sure you are learning the kind of knowledge most appropriate to whatever it is you are studying.
For example, imagine that you are interested in how people’s religious values informs their personal decisions about animal or environmental protection. With this as your research interest, you might want to take courses in ethics and the environment, animal and ecological theology, religion and society, as well as qualitative research. These will give you the background to properly frame and carry out your research questions.
In keeping with interdisciplinarity, you can find appropriate coursework located in many departments, majors and programs. Take ethics for example. Most people think of ethics as associated only with philosophy, as in ‘moral philosophy’. This is not the case, however, and there are as many worthy ethics courses outside philosophy, in disciplines ranging from medicine and law, to anthropology, geography and political science.
Overall, be attentive to your full range of options. Search course catalogues carefully and creatively, and you are certain to find a wealth of interesting coursework.
Cheers!
