Current Students

This course explores leadership through the lens of literature and film, using creative narratives to investigate the complexities, moral dilemmas, and responsibilities tied to leadership. Students will engage with literary works such as:  

• “Bartleby the Scrivener” by Herman Melville   

• “The Secret Sharer” by Joseph Conrad   

• “Things Fall Apart” by Chinua Achebe 

• “The Red Convertible” by Louise Erdrich   

• “The Paper Menagerie” by Ken Liu   

• "The Garden Party by Katherine Mansfield 

Alongside these, students will examine films like:   

• “The Great Gatsby” adapted from F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel 

• “Death of a Salesman” adapted from Arthur Miller’s play   

• “Gandhi” directed by Richard Attenborough 

• “Bicycle Thieves” directed by Vittorio De Sica 

• “The Song of Sparrows” directed by Majid Majidi 

These works provide a rich canvas for examining how characters confront issues of power, ethics, and transformation. 

Students will participate in discussions and produce two response papers, analyzing how leadership challenges are addressed in the texts and films. The final paper will encourage students to reflect on their own leadership potential, informed by the themes and insights developed throughout the course. 

The Mattering of Life examines moral and ethical complexities at the borderlands between human and “other” — from death row to the dinner table. During the course, we will problematize the category “human” and perform a social autopsy of sorts: examining the body as a site upon which we tell the story of who and what we are. While we’ll examine real-world phenomena about the mattering of life, we’ll also straddle the fuzzy edge between the real and the imagined, confronting a sci-fi world in which humans become monsters and monsters become human. 

What is “mattering”? What does it mean to “matter”? We’ll begin the course with philosophical, ethical, and theoretical constructs, first making sense of “mattering.” We’ll then map “mattering” onto bodies, questioning what it means to be human and what it means to matter. To do so, we will “read” selected bodies as texts, including animal bodies; human and human-animal hybrids; monstrous and alien bodies; fetal and aging bodies; minority, queer, and gendered bodies; disabled bodies; trafficked and imprisoned bodies; immigrant and undocumented bodies; cloned, enhanced, and modified bodies; machine, cyborg, and AI bodies; and military bodies, “risky” bodies, and (dis)advantaged bodies. 

Several questions animate this course:  

• What does it mean to be “human”?  

• What is consequential about the category “human,” and what are the rights, privileges, and protections therein?   

• What are the ways in which “being human(e)” matters, and in which contexts?  

• At what point, if any, is someone no longer considered “human” and thus rendered “other”?  

• By extension, what does it mean to have “human” rights, and in the absence of rights, are we no longer “human”?  

• Who can live while others must die, and who decides what/who is deserving of life and death?  

At its most expansive, this course considers the complex ways in which lives are “mattered,” and with what consequences. 

Foundational to this pursuit, we will examine film and literature. Exemplary films include: 

• “Us” (2019) 

• “Annihilation” (2018) 

• “The Shape of Water” (2017) 

• “Sorry to Bother You” (2018) 

• “The Platform” (2019) 

• “Avatar” (2009) 

• “The Companion” (2025) 

Select novels and novellas may include: 

• “The Metamorphosis” by Franz Kafka 

• “Animal Farm” by George Orwell 

• “Frankenstein” by Mary Shelley 

• “The Test" by Sylvain Neuvel 

As with all imaginative pursuits, this course is experimental and students will have the opportunity to shape it with Dr. Salim. 

This course is designed as a comparative presentation of current issues across international health care systems with a focus on South Africa, Italy, Japan, and France. Emphasis is on discussing diverse areas of health and is appropriate for students of any major interested in health care delivery, personal health, or health education. We will discuss and debate topics such as: 

• Health care delivery systems 

• Medical malpractice 

• Physical/mental health 

• Physician-assisted suicide 

• The opioid crisis 

• Women’s reproductive health 

• Medical devices 

• Health care disparities in the United States and abroad 

This is a ‘hands-on’ class, and students will be actively engaged and working in teams to complete a project. Although health and health care in other countries might seem far removed from our daily concerns in the United States, many nations face issues of uneven access, constrained resources, and a focus on improving the efficiency of services. Understanding how different nations confront issues of universal coverage, access, equity, and quality will enhance students’ ability to develop new ideas and approaches for addressing these challenges in the United States. Students will be introduced to community partners of USF's Area Health Education Center (AHEC) for project ideas. 

This course examines the forces that drive conflict and cooperation in political life, focusing on why some political rivalries remain peaceful while others escalate into instability and violence. It explores the boundary between normal political competition and destructive political breakdown, analyzing the social, institutional, and psychological factors that shape political outcomes. 

Through historical and comparative case studies, students will investigate how political conflicts have emerged, evolved, and been managed across different political systems and time periods. The course begins with early examples of political violence, such as the assassination of Julius Caesar, and moves through major modern cases including the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, illustrating how struggles over power, legitimacy, and authority can intensify into violence. 

Key themes include: 

• The role of political institutions in regulating conflict 

• The impact of ideology and polarization 

• The influence of leadership and mass mobilization 

• The conditions under which political competition breaks down.  

Students will also examine contemporary debates on political violence, extremism, and democratic resilience. 

By the end of the course, students will be able to identify recurring patterns that explain when political conflict turns violent and how political systems can promote cooperation and manage rivalry through peaceful and legitimate means. The course encourages critical thinking about citizenship, political responsibility, and the importance of institutions in sustaining stable political life. 

This class is designed to give students an enhanced understanding of world events and civic institutions that influence their lives. Having a better grasp of the daily news is essential to becoming a more engaged citizen. To that end, students will be required to read the online editions of The Tampa Bay Times, The New York Times and The Washington Post, as well as follow other information platforms such as NPR, CNN, Fox News and other news outlets. This course will include a weekly news quiz. Students will also participate in weekly team presentations. 

It is said that journalism often presents the first draft of history. The goals of this class are two-fold. First, students will become better informed and thus more aware of the stories that will serve to shape their world view. Second, students will also gain a keener understanding of the journalistic challenges associated with bringing the news to the public's attention.