Academic Bulletin Freshman Tutorials - 2012-13 - 12 FT 12

Ethan Hollander, Department of Political Science
Bugs can be beautiful or ugly, great or small. In formal terminology, bugs are a specific type of insect – a sizeable order that includes aphids, bedbugs and cicadas. But in common parlance, bugs can be everything from scorpions to shrimp, computer glitches to listening devices, sophisticated weapons of war or people who annoy us. Bugs get in our hair and under our skin. Like a fly on the wall, they can hear what we are saying. In some places, people live in fear that bugs will eat their food. In other places, bugs are the food they eat. Bugs are simultaneously the most deadly and the most essential creatures in our environment. True to the liberal arts mission of the Freshman Tutorial and Wabash College, this course puts bugs under the lens of every conceivable microscope. Our perspective will sometimes be scientific or biological; however, we will also see bugs from the perspective of poets, priests, historians, cartoonists, and cooks. We will examine them, write about them, handle them, dissect them, and even eat them. Most of all, we will try to understand them. You don’t have to be a budding biologist or even an eager entomologist to enjoy this course. Just be the curious kind of person who thinks that bugs are cool. And be prepared to get your hands dirty.