Social Sciences

Blond female teacher, smiling at students in classroom, gestures at equations on blackboard

Faculty Develop New Calculus Course for Social Science Majors

  • by Kathleen Holder
  • September 12, 2022
Data increasingly drives research and policy on a broad array of pressing global issues, including climate change, misinformation in social media, and the future of the social safety net in our aging society. A new mathematics course in the works at UC Davis will help to prepare the next generation of social scientists to analyze and use data in mathematical models.
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Institute for Social Sciences Addressed Societal Challenges

For four years, an institute in the UC Davis College of Letters and Science worked to bring together experts from diverse fields across the campus and beyond to tackle big questions facing society.

The Institute for Social Sciences (ISS), from fall 2014 through spring 2018, provided research seed funding, hosted conferences and talks, and offered graduate seminars and other student programs.

Inaugural ISS Noon Lecture Features an Analysis on the Midterm Elections

The Institute for Social Sciences (ISS) hosted its inaugural Noon Lecture in November with a joint talk by two UC Davis professors of political science presenting an analysis of the 2014 midterm elections.

In their talk on Nov. 12, 2014 — “2014 in the Rear View Mirror: What Have We Learned?” — Professor Benjamin Highton and Distinguished Professor Robert Huckfeldt discussed the implications these midterm elections have for California and the 2016 presidential race.

Excerpt from book cover with illustration of field crops and valley

Olmsted's Noon Lecture Reveals Californian Roots of 'New Right'

Kathy Olmsted, chair of the history department, kicked off the 2015–16 ISS Noon Lecture series with a discussion of her newest book, Right Out of California.

Speaking to a capacity audience on Oct. 20, 2015, Olmsted argued that modern conservatism—the "New Right"—originated in New Deal-era California as a business-backed response to the farmworker unionization movement in the Central Valley.

Smith Reveals Limits of "Conflict Minerals" Concept

The proliferation of smartphones and other personal electronics has led to a booming demand for rare earth minerals. Yet recent legal and corporate interventions designed to eliminate “conflict minerals” from high-tech supply chains have proven equally violent and destructive to people on the ground.

 

Rauchway Investigates Politics of Inflation [Video]

What can the Great Depression and its aftermath teach us about “current unpleasantness” in the U.S. economy? On May 11, 2016, Professor of History Eric Rauchway offered some clues through a discussion of his latest book The Money Makers.

 

Moderated by Professor of Economics Christopher M. Meissner, the event represented a combining of two series: ISS Noon Lectures and DHI Brown Bag Book Chats.

Resendez Reframes Slavery in North America

Unlike the enslavement of Africans, Native American slavery was historically illegal across much of North America. Yet, as UC Davis historian Andrés Reséndez explained to a colloquium held October 12, 2016, in honor of Indigenous Peoples’ Day, it was practiced for centuries—sometimes by Indians themselves.

Reséndez began by framing the enslavement of Native Americans against popular historical perceptions of slavery in North America—perceptions that typically focus on African slavery.

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