Urban Studies

Designed as an interdisciplinary program, the urban studies major offers a broad introduction to the city and the urban environment. Students combine coursework and research on urban issues with hands-on experience in New York City as well as other American and international cities. The curriculum prepares majors for graduate school and professional programs in teaching, social work, public policy, architecture and urban planning as well as for careers in government service and community development, the nonprofit sector, journalism and law.

Accelerated Master’s Program

Undergraduate students from the Fordham Colleges with a GPA above 3.5 will be invited to apply for early admission to the master’s degree program in Urban Studies in the second semester of their junior year. Students applying for this option are not required to submit GRE scores. Students admitted to the Urban Studies Master’s Program under the early admissions policy will take the two 5000-level required core courses during their senior year (Issues in Urban Studies and Urban Political Processes). These courses will count toward the bachelor’s degree (which is awarded at the end of the fourth year) and are accepted for the master’s, which can be completed by the May of the following year under full-time study.

Program Activities

The Urban Studies Program hosts a wide variety of events throughout the academic year, including lectures, field trips, and tours, and informational lunches. The Urban Studies Week takes place every spring, bringing urban scholars and practitioners to Fordham University for lectures and faculty-student seminars revolving around one particular issue, such as climate change and sustainability, Hip Hop as a culture of (urban) resistance, or immigration. The annual Senior Thesis Dinner presents the outstanding research of graduating seniors. Urban Studies students also take part in undergraduate conferences and research forums.

Urban studies majors have received numerous prestigious awards, including the New York City Teaching Fellows and the City of New York Urban Fellows Programs.

For more information

Visit the Urban Studies program web page. 

Our Courses

URST 1999. Tutorial. (1 Credit)

Independent research and reading with supervision from a faculty member.

URST 2999. Tutorial. (2 Credits)

Independent research and reading with supervision from a faculty member.

URST 3070. Urban Design. (4 Credits)

A studio course in urban design for public spaces, neighborhoods, urban districts, campuses, parks, infill developments and expansions. A major design project is prefaced with research in urban design history, infrastructural technologies, case studies, and diagrammatic analysis. Portfolio layouts. Field trips, workshops, lab fee, and office hours visits are required. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

URST 3340. Urban Psychology. (4 Credits)

"How does living in a large city impact us—our inner personality, outer behavior, values, and relationships?" This interdisciplinary urban studies course focuses on this question, including the methods and findings of behavioral research on: the growth of cities, crowding, prosocial and antisocial behavior, primary and secondary relationships, ethnicity, happiness, deviance, pace of life, urban personality, the future of cities. This Fordham course meets three days weekly (Tues/Wed/Thurs), including related excursions and fieldwork on city life in New York City. Note: Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

URST 3800. Internship. (3 Credits)

Supervised placement for students interested in work experience.

URST 3999. Tutorial. (3 Credits)

Independent research and reading with supervision from a faculty member.

URST 4800. Urban Studies Internship. (4 Credits)

Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

URST 4890. Research Seminar. (4 Credits)

Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

URST 4999. Tutorial. (4 Credits)

Independent research and reading with supervision from a faculty member.

Courses in Other Areas

The following courses offered outside the program have the URST attribute and count toward the Urban Studies major and minor:

Course Title Credits
AFAM 1650Black Popular Culture4
AFAM 2005American Pluralism4
AFAM 3036Global Black Youth Cultures4
AFAM 3102The Black Family4
AFAM 3112The Sixties4
AFAM 3115Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X4
AFAM 3130Racial and Ethnic Conflict4
AFAM 3132Black Prison Experience4
AFAM 3134From Rock-N-Roll to Hip-Hop4
AFAM 3136U.S. Civil Rights4
AFAM 3150Caribbean Peoples and Culture4
AFAM 3632Harlem Renaissance4
AFAM 3633The Bronx: Immigration, Race, and Culture4
AFAM 3663Minorities in the Media4
AFAM 4000Affirmative Action and the American Dream4
AFAM 4650Social Welfare and Society4
AFAM 4896Feeling the Funk4
AMCS 3535Building the Ideal City: Ethics and Economics Foundations of Realizable Utopias4
ANTH 2620The Anthropology of Cities4
ANTH 3006Arab-Americans and the Diasporic Experience4
ANTH 3180Ethnographic Methods4
ANTH 3340Anthropological Perspectives on Race and Ethnicity4
ANTH 3343Ghettos and Gated Communities4
ANTH 3353Anthropology of Globalization4
ANTH 3354Race, Identity, and Globalization4
ANTH 3510Museums: Representing / Engaging Culture(s)4
ANTH 4341Race, Sex, and Science4
ANTH 4600Global South Megacities4
ARHI 3100Museum Methods4
BISC 1002Ecology: A Human Approach3
BISC 4035Ecology and Economics of Food Systems4
CISC 2500Information and Data Management4
COLI 3450The City in Literature and Art4
COLI 3451The City in Literature4
COLI 3535Building the Ideal City: Ethics and Economics Foundations of Realizable Utopias4
COMC 2234Media and the Arts4
COMC 3232Class, Taste, and Popular Culture4
COMC 3235Popular Music as Communication4
COMC 4241Communication, Popular Culture, and Philosophy4
COMC 4360Communication Ethics and the Public Sphere4
ECON 2140Statistics I4
ECON 3240World Poverty4
ECON 3244International Economic Policy4
ECON 3346International Trade4
ECON 3430ST: Sustainable Business4
ECON 3570Labor Market and Diversity4
ECON 3580Economics of Diversity4
ECON 3850Environmental Economics4
ECON 3870Public Finance4
ECON 3971Urban Economics4
ECON 4025Bronx Urban Economic Development4
ECON 4110Ethics and Economics4
ENGL 3450The City in Literature and Art4
ENGL 3652New Wave Immigrant Literature4
ENGL 4121New York City in Fiction4
ENST 3070Green Architecture4
HIST 3001African American History I4
HIST 3002African American History II4
HIST 3565History of New York4
HIST 3619World's Fair4
HIST 3624European Cities4
HIST 3626Social History of Architecture4
HIST 3806U.S. Immigration/Ethnicity4
HIST 3807The U.S in the 1920s and 1930s: From the Jazz Age to Hard Times4
HIST 3808New York City Politics4
HIST 3862History of New York City4
HIST 3922East Asian Cities4
HIST 3950Latino History4
HIST 3990North American Environmental History4
HIST 4031Rise of the American Suburb4
HIST 4858Seminar: Modern European City4
HIST 6540Global Urban History4
HUST 4001The Humanitarian System: Past, Present, and Future4
ITAL 2700Filming the City Inside and Out: A Cinematic Journey Through Italy4
LALS 3343Crime and Minority Rights4
LALS 3427Hispanics/Latinos in the USA4
LALS 3670Hispanic Women4
LALS 3950Latino History4
MLAL 3035From Rust Belt to Green Belt: Germany's Ruhr Area4
MLAL 3050Becoming Germany—German Literature, Film, and Popular Culture after World War II4
MLAL 3535Building the Ideal City: Ethics and Economics Foundations of Realizable Utopias4
MUSC 2014Jazz: A History in Sound4
MVST 3535Building the Ideal City: Ethics and Economics Foundations of Realizable Utopias4
MVST 4040Exploring Medieval New York4
NMDD 3880Designing Smart Cities for Social Justice4
NSCI 1040People and the Living Environment3
NSCI 2060Environment: Science, Law, and Policy3
PHIL 3109Environmental Ethics4
PHYS 1203Environmental Physics3
PJST 3200Environmental Justice4
PMMA 6212Digital Media and Advocacy3
POSC 2102Introduction to Urban Politics4
POSC 3120New York City Internship4
POSC 3121New York City Politics4
POSC 3131Politics, Urban Health, and Environment4
POSC 3307Environmental Politics4
POSC 3507International Human Rights4
POSC 3610Political Economy of Development4
POSC 3645Politics of Immigration4
POSC 3915International Political Economy4
POSC 4015American Economic Policymaking4
POSC 4020Place, Space, and Immigrant Cities4
POSC 4025Youth and Politics4
POSC 4400Seminar: Global Justice4
PSYC 2600Social Psychology4
PSYC 3340Urban Psychology4
PSYC 3600Multicultural Psychology4
PSYC 4820Community Psychology5
PSYC 4920Youth, Values, and Society4
SOCI 2410Inequality: Class, Race, and Ethnicity4
SOCI 2420Social Problems of Race and Ethnicity4
SOCI 2606Social Science Statistics4
SOCI 2607Social Science Research and Statistics4
SOCI 2650Basic Research Methods4
SOCI 2701Introduction to Criminal Justice4
SOCI 2703Social Deviance4
SOCI 2845Drugs, Law, and Society4
SOCI 2850Methods Social Research I4
SOCI 2851Methods Social Research II4
SOCI 2925Media, Crime, Sex, and Violence4
SOCI 2960Popular Culture4
SOCI 3000Latinx Images in Media4
SOCI 3017Inequality in America4
SOCI 3021Sociology of Medicine4
SOCI 3046International Sociology4
SOCI 3070The City and Its Neighborhoods4
SOCI 3136Inequality-Why/Effects4
SOCI 3142Environmental Sociology4
SOCI 3148Population and Economic Development Issues4
SOCI 3325America Divided: Economic Inequality and Political Polarization in the 21st Century4
SOCI 3405Gender, Race, and Class4
SOCI 3406Race/Social Construct4
SOCI 3415Development and Globalization4
SOCI 3418Contemporary Immigration in Global Perspective4
SOCI 3427Hispanics/Latinos in the USA4
SOCI 3502Work, Inequality, and Society in 21st Century America4
SOCI 3601Urban Poverty4
SOCI 3602Urban Sociology4
SOCI 3606The Global City4
SOCI 3670Hispanic Women4
SOCI 3711American Criminal Justice4
SOCI 3713Criminology4
SOCI 3720Mass Incarceration4
SOCI 4020Place, Space, and Immigrant Cities4
SOCI 4408Diversity in American Society4
SOCI 4902Internship Seminar: Community Organizations4
SOCI 4961Urban Issues and Policies4
SOCI 4970Community Service/Social Action4
THEA 4050Arts, Social Justice, and Human Rights: Foundations4
VART 1101Urbanism3
VART 1160Architectural Language4
VART 2050Designing the City4
VART 2055Environmental Design4
VART 2070Architectural Design I4
VART 3055Ecology for Designers4
VART 3060Visual Justice: Enacting Change Through Image-Based Storytelling4
VART 3267Urban Film Video Production4
VART 3333Art Making in Hell's Kitchen4
VART 4090Senior Project Architecture4
WGSS 4341Race, Sex, and Science4