Constructive Dialogues Assignment (Dr. Andrew Guest, University of Portland)
Developed during the 2023 Engaged Humanities Institute for CORE 391X – The Good Life: Ethics, Happiness, and Dialogue Across Disciplines, this assignment uses reflective conversations as an engaged humanities practice that encourages students to blend the UP Core habits of ‘Faith & Ethics’ with ‘Literacy & Dialogue.’
Book Club Assignment (Dr. Jen McDaneld, University of Portland)
This assignment was developed as part of an ENG 112 course titled “American Burnout: Literary Interventions through Conversation.” The book clubs, in which groups of 4 students meet outside of class 5 times across the semester, offers students the opportunity to intentionally build their conversational practice while honing their abilities to connect literature to the world (it also has the added benefit of increasing the likelihood students will actually read the texts!) You can also check out some of the related learning experiences of the course: one of the small scaffolding activities called Conversation Starters; a larger assignment, the Campus Conversation Project, or a final oral exam designed on the book club model.
Podcast Assignment (Dr. Cara Hersh, University of Portland)
Cara Hersh asks British Literature I students to review an already-existing podcast and submit a proposal for their own. There is also a reflection/translation assignment for students to complete after they create their podcast.
Engaged Humanities assignment ideas (Bard College Center for Experimental Humanities)
This set of adaptable assignments was created for distance learning during the pandemic, but remains useful for in-person learning as well. Explore a selection of prompts for reflective walking, researching through collage, collective annotation, and other in-class exercises and major project assignments.
“City as Text” Assignment Sequence
“City as Text” is a National Collegiate Honors Council program that takes students through a process of understanding their city via sequenced assignments.
Podcast Assignment (Elizabeth Taveres,University of Alabama)
Tavares’s course, “Aphra Behn: the Podcast,” borne from a need to migrate to online learning, considers the work English poet, playwright, and translator Aphra Behn, one of the first women to earn a living from writing using the podcast medium.
Final Project Prompt for English 303: American Literature Survey (Dr. Molly Hiro, University of Portland)
This prompt is an example of a way to offer engaged humanities as an option alongside more a traditional research paper option. In Fall 2022, Molly Hiro’s English 303 students were given a range of possible project ideas to choose from, including some that used digital humanities platforms. See this completed project as one example of what students produced.
Course Website Project (Dr. Jen McDaneld, University of Portland)
This project prompt, developed for English 356: American Modernism, asked students to work in groups to create a website introducing a popular audience to themes and contexts of American modernism. See the completed website here.
Psychology 463: Children, Youth, and Society Community Based Project (Dr. Andrew Guest, University of Portland)
This group project assignment has students doing informal field work and writing ethnographies of what they observe. The field work involves spending time in community contexts with children—after-school programs, shelters, sports programs—helping out and keeping field notes about what goes on in the observed community.
Visual Analysis for American Environmental History (Andy Kirk, UNLV)
This assignment asks students to write visual analysis of one or more historical photographs that could be used in an exhibit for a general audience. The document, provided by TILT Higher Ed (Transparency in Learning and Teaching) actually includes two versions of the assignment: one that is quite spare, and the other revised for better clarity of purpose, skills, and criteria for assessment.