Because I was already thinking in such terms, when a new “sustainability literacy” requirement was created at my institution last year, I created a new course, Sustainability in the Adriatic: Human–Nature In the Sea of Intimacy (SLAV-S365) and requested and received the designation to allow the course to count for the new requirement. It also was approved as a social and historical sciences requirement, which is a change for me since I usually teach only Arts and Humanities courses. On teaching the course for the first time in spring 2025, I found the twelve students it attracted ranged from first-year to seniors, with majors from art history and economics to Russian, informatics, the pre-med physicians assistant program, political science (pre-law), psychology, and liberal studies. I was really pleased with this, as the course was rather hidden among our South Slavic offerings (the “S” in S365), even if the course content is not limited to South Slavic materials.
I’m still trying to figure out exactly why I liked teaching it so much, but I think a big part of it was the relatively small size, which enabled me to sit down with the students often before class and talk with them for a bit. Sometimes I would just listen as they talked. It slowed me down (“slow is pro”) and gave me some insights into what they were interested in, what they thought was funny, boring, and so on.
Another was that it’s an ongoing area of research for me, so I was learning things as I re-read the items I was assigning to them, reading their responses, presenting overviews in class, and hearing their questions and, occasionally, their objections. In the aftermath of the class, as I’ve written and revised portions of Sea of Intimacy, my perspective has been clearer as a result of having taught portions of the material and gone backwards and forwards through it multiple times.
This, to me at least, is one of the best reasons to have working researchers teaching their subjects to interested students. All these factors build on each other, leading to much more learning (by everyone), as well as unanticipated insights and ideas.
I suspect it will make my book better too.
Russell Scott Valentino 