The Weirdest Courses You Can Take in College

By Ian Donnelly

When it’s time to choose your courses for the semester, it seems like everyone has the same advice to offer: be sure to try new things, broaden your horizons, explore new interests, yada, yada, yada. Of course, everyone wants to have a unique college experience, but how special can you get with a traditional course curriculum?

Surprisingly enough, the answer is pretty darn special. There are credited college courses that get downright zany, and it’s not just obscure and/or experimental universities pushing the boundaries of class topics—some of the oddest courses available for enrollment are offered at top notch, Ivy-league schools. Interested in seeing the strangest ways you can get a diploma? Then check out our list of the weirdest courses you can take in college!

Sex, Rugs, Salt & Coal at Cornell University

This course’s snarky name can make things a little awkward if you head to class expecting to head-bang your way through the semester. Despite the unusualness of its name, Sex, Rugs, Salt & Coal is not a Siri auto-correct mishap—it’s a survey class that examines “Commodification and Consumerism in Historical Perspective.”

So, basically, this class covers anything and everything. Students tackle all those weird questions that are indicative of the Google era including why “oriental” rugs are considered collector’s items, why it is socially acceptable to keep salt shakers on dinner tables, and whether or not prostitution really is “the oldest profession.” It’s more of an in-depth debate than it is an all-out, rock and roll mosh pit, so expect to get your mind blown by off-the-wall lectures instead of sick guitar solos.

It’s the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine) at Alfred University

We all hope the world won’t be ending anytime soon, but the topic is one that sure gets a lot of attention. From books and plays to movies and TV shows, popular culture is full of Armageddon scenarios, and in the age of a Trump Presidency, they might be a little more realistic and plausible.

This course explores the wide range of doomsday stories that humanity has come up with and why we’re so obsessed with the end of it all. If you haven’t already guessed, this class isn’t exactly what you would call a feel-good grade, but it does make the dismal subject more fun with a “Design Your Own Apocalypse” final project where students write their own end-of-the-world story or present a scientifically-based disaster scenario to their peers. If you think you need to put your teetering GPA into perspective while you earn some college credit, the speculation of catastrophic events both real and imaginary might be exactly what you need.

Learning from YouTube at Pitzer College

Ah, New Media studies. This fledgling field is still finding its footing in the world of academia, and there’s no better example of its shaky legs than this class offered at Pitzer College. You can go right ahead and judge this book by its cover: Learning from YouTube consists of students watching YouTube videos and then discussing them.

So, if you feel like the only Gen-Zer alive who can’t figure out how to watch a video and learn from it, never fear—this course will teach you how. And who knows, you may learn some valuable insights from the videos you watch—there are just as many educational how-to’s as there are dogs jumping on trampolines in YouTube’s video labyrinth. Just try not to get roped into a semester-long comment war.

American Soap Operas at Massachusetts Institute of Technology

You may expect academics to turn their noses up at soap operas, but not at MIT. That’s right, the school that makes just about every “Top 5” college list in existence also offers a critical studies class on one of America’s biggest clichés.

Students are expected to take the topic as seriously as a heart attack, like the one you might get after learning your foster mother is actually your lover’s sister. But all jokes aside, the soap opera is one of television’s oldest show formats with programs airing for over fifty years, and this course dives into what makes it such a unique storytelling form. The network ratings don’t lie, so there’s got to be some kind of science to the soap opera’s success. Plus, you might finally understand why Grandma can’t go a day without watching her “stories.”

Xtreme Lit at Northern Illinois University

Let’s just say this course title is a recipe for disaster. Students who enroll in this course with high hopes for an “Xtreme” syllabus full of skydiving assignments and parkour group projects are in for a letdown. On the other hand, the library-dwelling grammar nerds who were thoughtful enough to grab their red pen and correct this class name in their Course Catalog will be shocked to learn that it’s the real deal.

Once the surprise wears off, this course can be the highlight of any student’s college experience. Xtreme Lit is a summer semester class that covers the works of nature-loving authors such as Emerson, Thoreau, Muir, and others while immersing students in the topics they read. The entire class is taught while backpacking, mountain climbing, and fly fishing in the heart of the Colorado Rockies—without a classroom in sight. While it may not be totally “lit,” this adventurous course will get you out of your comfort zone and into the right state of mind for these adventurous literary classics—both in their innovative style and action-packed topics.

Share this article: