During the 2014-15 academic year RISD introduced a new interdisciplinary concentration in Nature–Culture-Sustainability Studies. Built on a popular pilot program, the 21-credit NCSS concentration invites undergraduates to shape individualized courses of study focused on the environmental humanities. Through the concentration, students are pursuing issues related to biomimicry, emerging technologies, global warming, hybridity and sustainability, among other options.

The Nature-Culture-Sustainability Studies Concentration (NCSS) is a 21- credit concentration that allows RISD students to construct a pathway for undergraduate environmental education working across liberal arts and the studio departments. Whilst housed-in and administered-by the Division of Liberal Arts, the NCSS is an all-college interdisciplinary undergraduate concentration. The concentration allows students to create their own pathway of study drawn from the fields of: sustainable design, the environmental social sciences, the environmental humanities, social and environmental justice studies, the environment, and the fine arts. Courses that can earn NCSS credit and are open to NCSS concentrators are identified as such in the NCSS course catalog. Students will also complete a 3-credit core course in Nature-Culture-Sustainability Studies – The NCSS Core Seminar.

Typically, concentrators meet or communicate with their concentration coordinator once or twice a year to discuss course options and to update their records. NCSS concentrators may pre-register for a select range of Liberal Arts courses that are identified in the NCSS catalog as NCSS credit-worthy courses. The concentration coordinator will contact all concentrators with the relevant instructions shortly before the official registration period. This pre-registration option is available in fall and spring only. The learning and making objectives of this concentration are to enable students to:

– Study the historical and contemporary causes and consequences of environmental challenges.

– Advance a sophisticated, critical understanding of the ways aesthetics, objects, and language interact with culture, power relations, and institutions to shape our perceptions of the natural and built world.

– Identify the connections among cultural, social, political, philosophical, and scientific perspectives that shape human-environment interaction.

– Reflect on the contours of their own socio-ecological identity and its potential impact in the world.

– Refine the intellectual, conceptual, and technical skills they need to generate art and design-based responses, critiques, and solutions to contemporary and future environmental challenges.

– Expose and expand the connections between the environmental social sciences, nature-culture studies, design, and the fine arts through the lens of sustainability.

– Develop the leadership skills they need to become critical voices, innovators, and actors, extending our understanding of nature, culture, and sustainability through art and design.

The NCSS concentration can be completed within a 4- or 5-year degree program. Requirements: To complete this interdisciplinary undergraduate concentration in Nature-Culture-Sustainability Studies (NCSS), students will complete a minimum of 21 credit hours of relevant coursework.

Students will also complete a 3-credit core course in Nature-Culture-Sustainability Studies – The NCSS Core Seminar. This course will receive credit as a non-major studio elective cross-listed in the Divisions of Liberal Arts, Fine Arts, Architecture and Design. Students may distribute their remaining credits for the concentration according to their individual needs and creative passions.

Brown classes may qualify for NCSS credit, but do not appear in the NCSS catalog. Concentrators may petition for inclusion of these classes by submitting a request to the concentration coordinator that includes the course description.

NOTE:

⟩⟩ RISD students will be able to ‘double count’ up to 9 credits of courses they have taken in their major as NCSS courses as long as such courses are identified as fulfilling NCSS requirements;

⟩⟩ Students must receive a B- or above for any RISD course they wish to count toward the NCSS concentration;

⟩⟩ NCSS concentrators will be able to transfer a maximum of 6 credits from other universities to fulfill their NCSS concentration requirements; all these courses must receive at least a B-, or in the case of universities where letter grades are not issued, a passing grade;

⟩⟩ All 4-credit courses from other universities will transfer into this concentration as 3-credit courses;

⟩⟩ Discretion regarding whether courses from other universities meet the standards for an NCSS course rests with the NCSS concentration coordinator;

⟩⟩ RISD students will be able to petition their NCSS coordinator to request consideration for NCSS credit for work completed in studio courses that are not designated NCSS courses. Students need to demonstrate and document to the satisfaction of the NCSS coordinator that their work is substantively informed by the themes of the concentration.