Core courses in aesthetics focus on the application or development of levels of expressive or technical skill in artistic production or aesthetic inquiry.
Primary departments: Art, Music, Theatre, Communication Studies
Core courses in communications focus on understanding the transactional nature of oral communication in its relation to audiences of one or many. Some group and several short speeches are usually part of the course.
Primary Department: Communication Studies
Composition courses demonstrate a fundamental commitment to the writing process consistent with the objectives and outcomes as Composition I and Composition II courses offered in the English department, and for which there will be a portfolio assessment process.
Primary Department: English
Historical Reasoning courses embody the application of rational inquiry to past events or periods. Courses usually employ primary sources to examine and attempt to account for change and persistence in human events over time, not in one particular sphere of life but in human life more generally across a variety of disciplines.
Primary departments: History/Political Science
Core Humanities courses involve the application of uniquely literary and interpretive modes of inquiry with regard to the study of written and spoken languages, literatures, and to the traditions of interpretation, theory and criticism of religious, philosophical, and textual ideas.
Primary departments: English, Religion, Philosophy, Foreign Languages
Core Lifetime Wellness courses include substantial components of the following areas: physical fitness, leisure studies, proper nutrition, weight training and cardiovascular activity, stress management, and lifestyle choices (concerning topics such as tobacco, alcohol, drugs and medications, and sexually transmitted diseases). Core courses usually include significant lab work and individual assessment.
Primary Departments: Sports Sciences, Family and Consumer Sciences, Nursing
Core math/logic courses involve the intrinsic study of and application of formal deductive modes of inquiry.
Primary departments: Mathematics, Philosophy
Core courses in the natural sciences involve the application of the scientific method primarily to events in the natural world, explored via applied inquiry.
Primary departments: Biology, Chemistry, Geology, Physics
Core courses in religion are academic rather than devotional, and explore the traditions, doctrines, and practices of religious life. From the perspective of the liberal arts, the academic study of religion is the critical and rigorous investigation of matters of belief in God, faith, and ritual practice, and includes theological and confessional traditions. Given the historic role of the Brethren Church and the Judeo-Christian heritage at Ashland University, it is expected that many core religion courses will have Christian themes and Biblical content. Courses that examine other world religions may be included.
Primary Department: Religion
Social Science courses focus on the study of how people live, both as individuals and as members of society. Such courses might study humans as individuals, as members of various groups, as participating in and shaped by various institutions, or as members of society as a whole. While no single method characterizes the social sciences, each social science course is concerned to understand the method used in its attempt to understand how humans live.
Primary departments: Psychology, Political Science, Social Work, Economics, Criminal Justice
