School of Arts and Sciences
Environmental Studies Program

Track III: Environmental Communication

Environmental Communication is an interdisciplinary field that examines how individuals, groups, and cultures perceive information, and how they craft and disseminate environmental messages to enhance our understanding of environmental change and/or degradation. Despite extensive data, getting public engagement on environmental issues has proven elusive. Effective communication of environmental issues is a critical need.

At Tufts University, the goal of the Environmental Communication Track is to provide students with an interdisciplinary background that will enable them to evaluate environmental information carefully and critically, and to be able to create messages in ways that are scientifically sound and effective in reaching multiple audiences through various platforms. The requirements below will give students an understanding of how written, spoken and visual messages are communicated and perceived, and the social and cultural contexts in which environmental information is communicated.

View sample paths for Track III: Environmental Communication

Students focusing on the Environmental Communication Track must take the following track courses in addition to other general requirements:

Applied Environmental Studies Stand-alone Majors:

  • Four elective courses
    • One or Two Communication Practice
    • Two or Three Environmental Applications

Environmental Studies Co-Majors:

  • Five courses as follows:
    • One Introductory course
    • One Methods/Research course
    • Three elective courses:
      • One Communication Practice
      • Two Environmental Applications

Unlisted courses that are environmentally-themed might be requested to count toward specific requirements (introductory, research/methods and advanced courses/seminars). Examples might include Experimental College classes or Advanced Independent Research courses offered by different departments. In order to have an unlisted course added to a track, you must complete a Course Petition form and submit it to environmentalstudies@tufts.edu.

Attention: This list is a general guide. Some courses might not be taught every year. Please double-check the current semester course listing and/or SIS.

Introductory (only for Co-majors)

  • ENV 150 Environment, Communication and Culture (Spring)

Methods/Research (only for Co-majors)

  • ENV 120 Intro to Environmental Fieldwork: From Class to Community (Fall, Spring)
  • ENV 170 Environmental Data Visualization (Fall)

Electives

Communication Practice

  • ENG 005 Creative Writing: Fiction (Fall, Spring)
  • ENG 007 Creative Writing: Journalism (Fall, Spring)
  • ENG 011 Intermediate Journalism (Fall, Spring)
  • ENT 105 Entrepreneurial Marketing (Fall, Spring)
  • FMS 010 Film and Media Production I (Spring)
  • FMS 014 From Script to Screen (Fall)
  • FMS 032 Public Relations and Marketing: Unraveling the Spin (Fall)
  • FMS 033 Social Marketing: Theory and Practice (Variable)
  • FMS 045 Media Literacy (Spring)
  • FMS 138 Advanced Filmmaking
  • NUTR 220 Introduction to Writing about Nutrition and Health (Fall)
  • PHTM 064 Photography Foundations (Fall, Spring)
  • PHTM 065 Photography and Computer (Fall, Spring)
  • TPS 058 Public Speaking (Fall, Spring)
  • UEP 231 Interactive Web Mapping (Fall)

Environmental Applications

  • ANTH 020 Global Cities (Spring)
  • ANTH 024 Anthropology of the Environment (Fall)
  • ANTH 148 Medical Anthropology (Variable)
  • ANTH 164 Media, the State, and the Senses (Spring)
  • ANTH 174 Thinking with Plants (Variable)
  • BIO 051/ENV 051 Experiments in Ecology (Fall)
  • BIO 144 Principles of Conservation Biology (Fall)
  • BIO 164/ENV164 Marine Biology (Spring)
  • BIO 180 Seminar in Conservation Biology (Spring - odd years)
  • BIO 181/ENV 181 Tropical Ecology and Conservation (Spring - odd years)
  • BIO 185 Food for All: Ecology, Biotechnology and Sustainability (Fall, Summer)
  • CEE 158 Occupational and Environmental Health (Spring)
  • CEE 189 Introduction to Remote Sensing (Spring)
  • CSHD 034 Children as Earth Stewards (Spring)
  • ECS 104 Geological Applications of Geographic Information Systems (Spring)
  • ENG 160/ENV 160 Environmental Justice and World Literature (Spring)
  • ENG 176 Seminar in English: Earth Matters (Fall)
  • ENV 100 Sustainability in Action (Spring)
  • ENV 107/GIS 101 Intro to Geographic Information Systems (Fall, Spring)
  • ENV 121 Drones for Data Collection, Mapping & Analysis (Fall)
  • ENV 152/PS 188-20 Seminar in Environmental Negotiations (Variable)
  • ENV 190 Practicing in Food Systems (Spring)
  • ENV 197/GIS 102 Advanced GIS (Spring)
  • GER 182 Imagining the Environment: Cross-cultural Perspectives (in German) (Spring)
  • PHIL 025 Food Ethics (Spring)
  • PHIL 028 Climate Change Ethics (Fall)
  • SMFA 155 Interdisciplinary Practices: Science, Art and Cultivating Knowledge (Variable)
  • SOC 040 Media and Society (Spring)
  • SOC 135 Social Movements (Fall)
  • SOC 185 Seminar in Mass Media Studies (Spring)
  • SOC 188-04 Consumers and Consumerism (Variable)
  • UEP 101 Land Use Planning II (Spring)
  • UEP 232/ENV 193 Intro to GIS (Fall, Spring)
  • UEP 265/ENV 265 Corporate Management of Environmental Issues (Fall)
  • VMS 128 Food as Sculpture (Spring)