iF&M Academics

Course Selection

Like all first-year students at F&M, you will participate in a core course that introduces you to the critical thinking and writing skills you will need to be successful throughout your F&M education. That Connections course will be taught by your onsite faculty mentor, Professor of History Richard Reitan. 

Each of the iF&M courses has an “Exploration” designation, indicated by a letter following the course title (A, H or S). Exploration requirements constitute F&M’s general education program, and every student is required to fulfill these courses as part of the degree program. Exploration courses are designed to expose you to a broad range of disciplines and forms of intellectual inquiry, regardless of the major you ultimately choose. The iF&M program allows you to complete several Exploration requirements, keeping you on track for graduation and in step with your peers on the Lancaster campus.

The letter designations following each of the course titles indicate the course types:

A: Arts 
H: Humanities
S: Social Sciences

Take a look at our tentative schedule for the Fall 2025 semester:

Connections Course: Better Worlds (Required)

Professor Richard Reitan

The concept of a world radically “better” than our own, a “utopia,” has a long history. Should we pursue such a world? Given all that is wrong with our present-day world, some insist we are morally obligated to plan and pursue a utopian world. Others point to the dangers inherent in seeking the better world’s realization. Still others proclaim that utopia itself is ultimately beyond our capacity to imagine in the first place. These competing positions suggest a need to clarify precisely what we are doing when we imagine, represent, or pursue the better world. In this course, we will consider not only various efforts to envision or realize the better world but also the role such efforts play in society.

China in the British Imagination (S)

Professor Richard Reitan

This is not a course on China per se, but rather, a course on how British scholars, literary figures, film-makers, journalists, and philosophers have imagined China to be. By examining China through the lens of British film, art, literature and so forth, we will consider how Britain’s often disparaging representations of China impacted real world events. We will explore the concept of “orientalism,” a structure of disparaging and exoticizing representations of the Orient that functioned to elevate Britain and to legitimize its colonial projects. By addressing the role of representation in the “orientalizing” of China, we will seek to cultivate a greater self-awareness of the dangers inherent in our imaginings of other societies and our own.

UK-US Comparative Politics and Government (S)

ASE Faculty

The United States and the United Kingdom share assumptions about freedom, democracy, and the rule of law. Yet political and historic evolution, institutions, and constitutional choices have led to very different regimes in the two countries. This course will examine these contrasting systems of democratic government and, through a comparison of the two constitutions and sets of institutions, explore their contemporary politics.

Landscape and Literature (H)

ASE Faculty

This course will introduce you to the wide variety of English literature across the centuries. From the Medieval period to Modernism, from the Romantics to the contemporary, you'll explore written forms that include poetry, prose, plays, and essays in relation to their wider social, historical, linguistic, and cultural contexts.  The course will teach you how to perform a detailed close textual analysis and it will also provide an introduction to critical theory.

Art and Architectural History (A)

ASE Faculty

This course offers an overview of art and architectural history from Classical times through to the twentieth century. We will make full and extensive use of your stay in the UNESCO-World Heritage city of Bath to explore the museums, art galleries and architecture of this beautiful city. Local galleries and visits to the Ashmolean Museum (Oxford) and the National Gallery (London) will help to focus our learning, and the course will provide a general introduction to western art and teach you methods of approaching and analysing visual culture, techniques for writing about art and architecture, and develop research skills.

The Life and Literature of Jane Austen (H)

ASE Faculty

Jane Austen’s works, although relatively few, are crammed with details about her world, her experience and her ideas. Far from being simply ‘marriage plots’, they speak volumes about Georgian England. Here you will find war, economics, class struggles, consumerism, country houses, urban landscapes, enlightenment ideals, gender rights and myriad unforgettable characters. Through the close study of Austen’s work, this course will examine these themes and much more - all against the backdrop of the historic city of Bath itself.