GE World Cultures Literacy

I. Regulations

Davis Division Regulation 522 sets forth the Baccalaureate Degree Requirement in General Education. Civic and Cultural Literacy, a component of Core Literacies (522.C), includes the requirement for 3 units in World Cultures (522.C.2).

Regulation 523 sets forth the Criteria for General Education Certification of courses, stating “A course in World Cultures combines the historical and social context, and core analytic skills, necessary to understand, and adopt a critical perspective on, social relations and/or cultural practices in one or more cultures outside of the United States.” (523.C.5)

II. Interpretation

The objective of World Cultures Literacy is to help students develop a global perspective, so that they might live comfortably and productively in a world where communication technologies, economic relationships, and the flow of people across national borders increasingly challenge national identities and create transnational, migrant, and immigrant cultures.

Courses that meet the World Cultures literacy must present material pertaining to social relations and/or cultural production in one or more societies outside of the United States and provide students with the necessary interpretive skills to analyze social relations and/or cultural production in these societies. They may examine culture and/or social relations, as the institutions, practices, ideas, and values of a particular society. They may also examine culture as the practices and modes of cultural production in the arts in relation to their social-cultural context.

Minimum Elements Checklist

Courses in the World Cultures Literacy must:

ME1) Demonstrate that a substantial portion of the course materials concern social relations and/or cultural production in one or more societies outside the United States.

ME2) Require that student assignments show more than a superficial understanding of the unique characteristics of the world culture(s) covered in the course.

ME3) Require that student assignments analyze and/or compare world culture(s) from the perspective of that culture rather than an American perspective.

ME4) Demonstrate that achieving the minimum set of learning objectives of the literacy is an integral part of the class.

III. ICMS Submission Requirements

The Committee on Courses of Instruction (COCI) evaluates whether the course proposal satisfies the minimum elements checklist above. COCI uses the information provided in the answers to the General Education literacy justification questions and the Expanded Course Description. Departments requesting that a course be approved for this GE literacy must answer the literacy questions in the Integrated Curriculum Management System (ICMS), as listed below.

For this literacy, COCI evaluates the minimum elements as follows:

  • ME1: ICMS literacy question 1 and Expanded Course Description
  • ME2: ICMS literacy question 2
  • ME3: ICMS literacy question 2
  • ME4: Expanded Course Description
  1. How will the course combine the historical and social context and core analytical skills necessary to understand and adopt a critical perspective on social relations and/or cultural practices in one or more cultures outside of the United States?
  2. How will the instructors assess student competency in this GE literacy?

Departments may leave the “ICMS Justification” field blank, or use it to provide any additional information about the GE literacy for this course that may be helpful as COCI reviews the request.