Course information contained within the Bulletin is accurate at the time of publication in June 2025 but is subject to change. For the most up-to-date course information, please refer to the Course Catalog.
COMC 0801. Contemporary American Social Movements. 3 Credit Hours.
This course introduces students to the study of contemporary American social movements from a communication perspective. Our primary focus is on social movements' symbolic strategies to attract members, address counter-movements, and engage dominant social institutions. The course progresses through three sections: a discussion of the characteristics and types of social movements, an examination of the persuasive tactics used by social movements, and an analysis of the persuasive materials/tactics used by social movements. These materials and tactics include documentaries, speeches, videos, social media posts, protests, campaigns, and violent acts. The course also teaches students how to understand social movements using perspectives from political science, sociology, and economics/business. NOTE: Students cannot receive credit for this course if they have completed
CSI 0801,
CSI 0901, or
COMC 0901.
Course Attributes: GU
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 0836. Interpersonal Communication: Critical Competencies for Professional and Personal Success. 3 Credit Hours.
The primary goal of this course is to help you enhance your interpersonal communication competence so you can have successful interpersonal communication with your family, friends, and work colleagues. In the course's first phase, you will assess your communication skills. You will develop and set personal goals and an action plan to create the change you wish to see. In the course, you will learn the basic components of interpersonal communication situations (communicators, content, and contexts) and investigate how interpersonal communication needs and effectiveness change throughout life (in early childhood, adolescence, young adulthood, middle age, and old age). The course includes frequent small group discussions, which will allow you to integrate course and research information for personal skill development. The course will provide a reflective and supportive environment to expand your communication skills and knowledge. NOTE: This course fulfills the Human Behavior (GB) GenEd requirement.
Course Attributes: GB
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 0901. Honors Contemporary American Social Movements. 3 Credit Hours.
This honors course provides an advanced introduction to the study of contemporary American social movements from a communication perspective. Our primary focus is on the symbolic strategies social movements use to attract members, address counter-movements, and engage dominant social institutions. The course progresses through three sections: a discussion of the characteristics and types of social movements, an examination of the persuasive tactics used by social movements, and an analysis of the persuasive materials/tactics used by social movements. These materials and tactics include documentaries, speeches, videos, social media posts, protests, campaigns, and violent acts. The course also teaches students how to understand social movements using perspectives from political science, sociology, and economics/business. NOTE: Students cannot receive credit for this course if they have successfully completed
CSI 0801,
CSI 0901, or
COMC 0801.
Cohort Restrictions: Must be enrolled in one of the following Cohorts: SCHONORS, UHONORS, UHONORSTR.
Course Attributes: GU, HO
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 1111. Presentations for Policy Change. 3 Credit Hours.
Students will prepare, present, and evaluate speeches on important topics of public concern. The course focuses on the three skills necessary for successful professional public speaking: selecting the appropriate content, organization, and effective delivery style. Students also study more advanced principles of public speaking, including critical thinking, the discovery and evaluation of arguments and evidence, audience analysis and adaptation, peer evaluation, speech composition, and persuasion. The course prepares students for making professional presentations in our increasingly diverse workplace. Note: Prior to Fall 2025, this course was titled "Introduction to Public Speaking" under the CSI subject code (
CSI 1111).
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 1112. Introduction to Communication. 3 Credit Hours.
This course provides an overview of the theory, research, and practice of communication. Students will be introduced to Advocacy, Conflict Management, and Science, Health, Environment, and Risk (SHER), cutting-edge research and how it applies to and/or relates to current events and contemporary culture. Career paths and opportunities for Communication majors are also explored.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 1113. Persuasion Theory and Practice. 3 Credit Hours.
Persuasion is viewed from the perspectives of the persuader and audience. The course is designed to make students more effective in both roles and raise troubling ethical questions. It covers politics, product advertising, education, and much more.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 1118. Presentations for the Digital Workplace. 3 Credit Hours.
Effective presentation skills are essential for professionals across various industries in today's digital era. This course equips students with the knowledge and skills to create compelling and impactful presentations tailored to the digital environment. Students learn strategies for leveraging digital tools to enhance their presentations, engage remote audiences, and effectively communicate their ideas. The course will cover visual design principles, storytelling techniques, and effective data visualization. Students will develop their presentations using popular software and online platforms, honing their skills in creating visually appealing slides, crafting narratives, and delivering impactful presentations remotely. They will receive feedback and guidance from the instructor and have the chance to collaborate with peers through group exercises and discussions. They will develop the skills and confidence to drive action through their digital presentations.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 1301. Resistance, Protests, and Social Movements. 3 Credit Hours.
This class focuses on the communicative dimensions of social movement activity, focusing on the persuasive strategies participants employ to achieve change and justice. Social protest movements are at the heart of change in society; here, ideas are shaped, voiced, and possibly believed, followed, and refuted. This course explores the many facets surrounding protest and resistance - both from the participants and their opposition. More specifically, we will define the social movement, explain its development, and examine the movement's specific strategies. By the end of the course, you should be familiar with several specific social movements and better understand the communicative construction of social protest.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 1401. Conflict and Communication Behavior. 3 Credit Hours.
This course is designed to introduce theories and concepts related to conflict management, with an emphasis on the role of communication in creating, reflecting on, and remediating conflict. In addition, emphasis will be given to increasing awareness of productive and disruptive conflict patterns and how conflict behaviors may affect interpersonal and organizational relationships.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 1601. Communication and Behavior Change. 3 Credit Hours.
Students of this course will develop a strong understanding of communication's role in behavior prediction and change models. Theories such as the Health Belief Model, Social Cognitive Theory, and the Integrated Model of Behavior Change will be discussed in relation to contemporary health, politics, science, and other pro-social campaigns. The class will also cover the effective use of fear appeals, conformity, compliance gaining, and other theories of social influence and the diffusion of new behaviors through social networks.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 1911. Honors Presentations for Policy Change. 3 Credit Hours.
In this honors section of public speaking, students will research, prepare, present, and evaluate speeches on significant topics of public concern. The course focuses on the three skills necessary for successful professional public speaking: selecting the appropriate content, organization, and using an effective style of delivery. Students prepare for more advanced principles of public speaking including critical thinking, the discovery and evaluation of arguments and evidence, audience analysis and adaptation, peer evaluation, speech composition, and persuasion. The course prepares students for making professional presentations in our increasingly diverse workplace. NOTE: Students cannot receive credit for this course if they have successfully completed
COMC 1111 or
COMC 1118. Note: Prior to Fall 2025, this course was titled Honors Introduction to Public Speaking under the CSI subject code (
CSI 1911).
Cohort Restrictions: Must be enrolled in one of the following Cohorts: SCHONORS, UHONORS, UHONORSTR.
Course Attributes: HO
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 2111. Argumentation and Advocacy. 3 Credit Hours.
Students learn the basic principles of making arguments. They also learn the format for analyzing arguments, organizing ideas, providing evidence for claims, and preparing briefs. Finally, students prepare speeches and debates on current public policy issues.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 2112. Communication Theory. 3 Credit Hours.
This course introduces students to the communication field by examining various communication traditions and theories. Students will learn the basic concepts and principles that underlay some of our field's most commonly studied and significant communication theories. Specifically, students approach the study of communication by examining the relevant social contexts in which communication occurs. These contexts include influence, interpersonal, organizational, and social/mass media. Emphasis is placed on integrating these theories into the students' daily communication practices. Note: Prior to Fall 2025, this course was titled "Social Influence Inquiry" under the CSI subject code (
CSI 2112).
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 2301. Countercultural Communication: Opposition, Subversion, Transgression. 3 Credit Hours.
This course explores the communicative dynamics of people, groups, and movements that oppose, subvert, and transgress mainstream society and dominant culture's social norms and standard practices. Examples include punk music, DIY and zine cultures, Beatniks, Riot Grrrl, the 1960s hippie movement, the Gay Liberation Front, underground hip-hop, early jazz, outlaw rave culture, performance art, Afro-surrealism, and back to the land communes.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 2401. Intercultural and Cross-Cultural Conflict. 3 Credit Hours.
This course provides a communication perspective on the nature of intercultural conflict theory, research, and practice. In the increasingly global society, communication and social influence require cultural sensitivity and an awareness of how cultural difference triggers conflict and require sophisticated conflict intervention. This course reviews theories of culture and conflict and proposes models of conflict intervention that have proven successful in addressing that conflict.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 2601. Misperceptions and Misinformation. 3 Credit Hours.
Many firmly hold beliefs about science, health, and/or politics that are often unsupported or completely false. This course will explore the psychological and social factors that make people vulnerable to deceptive communication, misinformation, and conspiracy theories and why correcting misinformed beliefs is often hard. This course will cover theories of cognitive biases, conformity, identity protection, motivated reasoning, cultural cognition, and many more.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 2696. Professional Writing for Science, Health, and Policy Issues. 3 Credit Hours.
In this course, students will gain a deep understanding of the current research and practice of communicating health, scientific, and environmental risk. We will discuss public understanding of issues that pose risks, such as climate change, global infectious diseases, and engineering the human genome. Different perspectives on risk communication across various disciplines will be explored to provide students with an understanding of how people make sense of and use information about risk. Techniques for communicating risk across multiple channels (e.g., mass media, interpersonal, mobile, and social) will be covered. Note: Prior to Fall 2025, this course was
CSI 2696: Risk Communication.
Course Attributes: WI
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 3085. Study Away Internship. 1 to 3 Credit Hour.
Students will work at a professional location earning valuable experience that relates to future professional opportunities. Students will keep a diary of their experiences and build a portfolio project that will aid their professional development.
Repeatability: This course may be repeated for additional credit.
COMC 3100. Special Topics in Communication. 3 Credit Hours.
Subject matter not covered by regular departmental course offering. Topics announced in advance.
Repeatability: This course may be repeated for additional credit.
COMC 3182. Independent Study. 3 Credit Hours.
Students will undertake an independent study of an area of Communication not otherwise offered. The study and results of that study will be completed under the supervision of a faculty member. Arranged each semester.
Repeatability: This course may be repeated for additional credit.
COMC 3185. Internship. 1 to 3 Credit Hour.
Students will work at a professional location, earning valuable experience that will help them land future professional opportunities. They will keep a diary of their experiences and build a portfolio project that will aid their professional development.
Class Restrictions: Must be enrolled in one of the following Classes: Junior 60 to 89 Credits, Senior 90 to 119 Credits, Senior/Fifth Year 120+ Credits.
Repeatability: This course may be repeated for additional credit.
COMC 3189. Field Experience. 3 Credit Hours.
Field Experience will acquaint students with actual professional practices in their disciplines. Serves as the first opportunity for the student to gain experience in the communication career path.
Class Restrictions: Must be enrolled in one of the following Classes: Junior 60 to 89 Credits, Senior 90 to 119 Credits, Senior/Fifth Year 120+ Credits.
Repeatability: This course may be repeated for additional credit.
COMC 3191. Directed Research. 1 to 3 Credit Hour.
Students will engage in the practice of knowledge generation with a full-time faculty member.
Class Restrictions: Must be enrolled in one of the following Classes: Junior 60 to 89 Credits, Senior 90 to 119 Credits, Senior/Fifth Year 120+ Credits.
Repeatability: This course may be repeated for additional credit.
COMC 3202. Communication, Attitudes, and Opinion. 3 Credit Hours.
This course investigates the public use of reason and communication as it relates to attitude, opinion formation, and collective will to influence social, political, and economic outcomes. Topics include investigations of the traditional and digital public sphere, the role of mass, social, and emergent media in attitude and opinion formation, communicative acts that influence attitude and opinion formation, and how collective will affects civic engagement. From a normative perspective, the course will cover the history, theories, methods, and practice of attitude and opinion formation using a communication lens.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 3296. Speechwriting. 3 Credit Hours.
Students prepare speeches for their own presentations and ghostwrite speeches for others. Emphasis on audience analysis, speech construction, style, persuasion, and manuscript preparation. This includes a study of the practices of prominent speechwriters and their speeches, as well as great speeches in American history.
Course Attributes: WI
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 3401. Social Activism and Community Organizing. 3 Credit Hours.
This is a "how-to" course for becoming a social activist and community organizer focusing on creating and running grassroots campaigns for social justice. Students will learn how to assess social/political problems, how to organize communities into a political force, how to develop mobilization tactics, how to build coalitions with like-minded people, how to lobby elected officials, how to design street actions, and how to implement communication strategies. Over the course of the semester, students will develop their "activist toolbox" for creating real-world change on issues that are most pertinent to their personal passions. Given the location of Temple University, the course places particular emphasis on urban contexts and concerns.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 3402. Conflict and Influence: Identity, Emotion and Power. 3 Credit Hours.
This course is designed to introduce students to theories and concepts pertaining to conflict management with an emphasis on the role of identity, power and emotion in conflict and social influence. All conflict is driven by identity, emotion and power; the focus of this course is how these drivers create and reflect conflict and how interpersonal and social conflict management must attend to these drivers to secure constructive resolution.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 3701. Intercultural Communication. 3 Credit Hours.
This course considers how culture influences communication processes by examining intercultural communication theories and looking at many processes that make up cultural differences.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 3702. Communication, Culture and Identity. 3 Credit Hours.
This course explores how individual and collective identities are constructed, maintained, and transformed. From rhetorical and sociological perspectives, this class highlights the fundamental role of intersectionality (i.e., the connections between gender, sexual orientation, class, race, ethnicity, and bodily difference when shaping who is who and what is what) in constructing personal and social identities. In this class, students will learn not only theoretical issues such as similarity and difference, selfhood and mind, and self-image and public image but also will be able to analyze the influences and consequences of a mediated discourse of identity.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 3703. Intercultural Communication in the Workplace. 3 Credit Hours.
This course brings together research and practice from three areas of study: intercultural communication, organizational communication, and negotiation. Research in these areas has grown extensively over the past decade across disciplines that include communication, management, political science, and psychology. In this course, we will look at how culture influences communication within organizations and in the contexts of negotiating and managing conflicts.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 3801. Communication Research Methods. 3 Credit Hours.
This course addresses the research of social influence from a qualitative, quantitative, and critical perspective. It provides students with a working knowledge of how to ask a research question and how to choose a method to address it. It also provides an overview of a broad range of qualitative and quantitative methods, engages students in the challenges of conducting research in the digital era, and offers a cursory glance at data analysis. The course covers key ethical issues involved in the study of individuals and the public. Note: Prior to Fall 2025, this course was titled "Social Science Research Methods of Social Influence" under the CSI subject code (
CSI 3801).
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 4111. Careers for Social Impact. 3 Credit Hours.
The senior seminar is an upper-level capstone experience in which students will be asked to integrate their knowledge and skills from the range of courses they completed during their major's coursework. The focus is on synthesis, cohesion, and integration of knowledge from across the Communication major. This course will focus on career preparation with an emphasis on social impact. Note: Prior to Fall 2025, this course was titled "Senior Seminar" under the CSI subject code (
CSI 4111).
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 4202. Multiparty Conflict Processes: Dialogue, Facilitation and Multiparty Mediation. 3 Credit Hours.
Intergroup and intragroup conflicts require more complex conflict management processes. This course examines primary multiparty conflict processes of dialogue, facilitation, and multiparty mediation with a focus on analysis of these processes in environmental and public policy disputes. Note: Prior to Fall 2025, this course was listed under the CSI subject code as
CSI 4402.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 4404. Podcasting for Civic Engagement. 3 Credit Hours.
How can podcasting be used to engage audiences in important conversations around social issues? This course explores that question and covers fundamental skills needed to produce quality podcasts. By the end of the semester, students will have gained hands-on experience leading two original podcast projects from development to distribution.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
COMC 4571. International Studies in Media and Communication. 1 to 6 Credit Hour.
This course is an immersive study of media and communication institutions, practices, norms, societal, governmental, and legal structures in a culture outside of the U.S. that is conducted during a Klein GO! program. Klein faculty lead students, while living abroad, in media consumption, in comparative analysis and evaluation of media and non-mediated communication, in interaction with local media and communication leaders in the program location. The specific aspects of media and communication to be covered will vary from city to city, and semester to semester, depending on the events of the day. Available only to student participating in a Klein GO! Program.
Repeatability: This course may be repeated for additional credit.
COMC 4601. Narrative Persuasion. 3 Credit Hours.
Storytelling has historically been used to convey culturally, politically, and socially relevant information. Narratively structured messages offer persuasion and social influence communicators a unique way to deliver information to diverse audiences. From Hollywood films to online advocacy videos, narratives are used as vehicles for developing persuasive messages through mass, entertainment, social, and emergent media. This course offers students an opportunity to study how narratively structured messages are developed, as well as when and why they are persuasive. Topics will cover various theories and uses of narrative persuasion and media engagement, ranging from entertainment education to political docudramas. The theories and concepts will be used to analyze examples of health, science, and social campaigns that have used this strategy compared to more traditional persuasive campaigns.
Repeatability: This course may not be repeated for additional credits.
