HUMN
221: Western Humanities II Fall
2003 TR 2:00-3:40p.m. Welles 119
Dr. Beth
McCoy Office: Welles 232A Office phone: x5299
email: mccoy@geneseo.edu Home
phone: 224 0255 (no calls after 9
p.m., please)
website: www.geneseo.edu/~mccoy
Office
Hours: TR
11:30-12:30 and other times as
arranged between student and instructor. In all
cases, I strongly encourage you to make an appointment before dropping in. My office gets extraordinarily busy; it
is not unusual for students to show up and find six or seven people in front of
them. If you make an appointment,
I can reserve time for you.
Course
Description from the Undergraduate Bulletin: The Humanities Program is designed to be the center of the
college's Common Core of liberal education. The two courses which make up the Humanities Core
requirement approach the subject of moral and political values using the
methods of the three Humanities disciplines: literature, history, philosophy. The goal of these courses is to acquaint Geneseo students
with the major Western value systems by examining the basic readings from
philosophical and literary points of view, in a historical context. HUMN 221 is a search for moral, social,
and political alternatives and meaning embodied in the institutions, culture,
and literature of Western Civilization from 1600 to the present. The course is factual as well as
conceptual, including a narrative history of the period covered.
Learning
Outcomes: The Humanities Core
Committee, in consultation with Humanities faculty, has articulated the
following four learning outcomes:
1. Students
will demonstrate knowledge of the contributions of significant Western thinkers
to ongoing intellectual debate about moral, social, and political alternatives.
2. Students will demonstrate knowledge of the major
trends and movements that have shaped
and responded to this debate:
e.g., monotheism, humanism, etc.
3. Students
will demonstrate the ability to think critically about moral, social, and political
arguments in the Western intellectual tradition, evaluating the logic of
these arguments and relating them to the historical and cultural context.
4. Students
will consider moral, social, political issues from an interdisciplinary perspective.
If
you plan on indulging yourself in the normative culture of HUMN, you should
probably drop this particular section.
Texts: Available at Sundance or any outlet of
your choice. Many of these works
are in the public domain and thus are available for free via the web.
RenŽ Descartes, Discourse on Method.
Jean Jacques Rousseau, Discourse on Inequality.
Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels.
Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick
Douglass.
Karl Marx, Frederick Engels. The Communist Manifesto.
Sigmund Freud, Civilization and its Discontents.
Octavia Butler, The Parable of the Sower.
Marvin Perry, Western Civilization: A Brief History (Volume II). No whining about this one.
American History Documents (available at Sundance).
Via the
web, you will also obtain a copy of one section of John
Locke's Second Treatise.
Grading
Breakdown from the Undergraduate Bulletin: A range: excellent; B range: very good; C+/C: satisfactory; C-: minimal competence;
D: marginal; E: failure. In grading individual assignments, I
use splits (e.g., C+/B-) to calculate as closely as possible your grade (in almost
all cases, this only helps you). As you improve during the semester, expectations
for your work go up as well.
Assignments:
1. Exam I: A
blend of identification, short answer, and short essay. Exam will draw
upon lecture, discussion, primary reading, and
Perry. All exams will require YOUR
OWN ANALYSIS in
addition to showing evidence that you read the material and paid attention
during lecture and discussion.
2. Exam II: A
blend of identification, short answer, and short essay. Exam will draw upon
lecture, discussion, primary reading, and Perry. All exams will require YOUR OWN
ANALYSIS in
addition to showing evidence that
you read the material and paid attention during lecture and discussion.
3. Essay I: 5 pages. I will
provide you one or two prompts from which you will construct
a well-organized, thesis-driven essay. Summaries of works, lectures or class
notes are unacceptable. The essay
must demonstrate your critical thinking skills, your ability to communicate an
argument clearly, and a sense of the importance of your argument. In other words, YOU'LL HAVE TO
THINK.
4. Essay II: 5 pages. I will provide you one or two prompts from which you
will construct a
well-organized, thesis-driven essay. Summaries of works, lectures or class
notes are unacceptable. The essay
must demonstrate your critical thinking skills, your ability to communicate an
argument clearly, and a sense of the importance of your argument. In other words, YOU'LL HAVE TO
THINK.
5. Final exam: Two essays written during the
final exam period. Will cover
material from the final third of the semester and will have a cumulative
component as well.
***There
is no formal class participation grade per se; however, active participation in
class (which includes daily attendance) will definitely help me to determine final grades.
Daily
Schedule: Subject to change at
any time; your continued attendance is therefore crucial.
August
T 26 Introduction. Syllabus. Transition from HUMN I to HUMN II.
R 28 Perry,
Ch. 10. Transition from HUMN I to
HUMN II continued.
----------
September
T 2 Descartes
I-III. Essay 1 prompts
distributed.
R 4 Descartes
IV-VI.
----------
T 9 Bring
Locke to class today.
R 11 Bring
Locke to class today. For today, please hand
in a 1-page, single-spaced, informal response paper that proves you read The
Parable of the Sower.
----------
T 16
Catch-up
day.
R 18 Swift,
Book I.
----------
T 23 Swift,
Books II an d III.
R 25 Exam
I review.
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T 30 Exam
I.
October
R 2 Rousseau,
Dedication, Preface, and Part I.
----------
T 7 Rousseau,
Part I and II.
R 9 Please
bring your American history documents to class. Essay I due in class.
----------
T 14 No
class; Fall Break.
R 16 Video: The Terrible Transformation.
----------
T 21 Douglass,
prefaces by Garrison and Phillips, and the first four paragraphs of Chapter I.
R 23 Douglass
to end.
----------
T 28 Catch-up
day. Essay II prompts
distributed.
R 30 Marx/Engels,
Part I.
----------
November
T 4 Marx/Engels,
Part II.
R 6 Exam
II review.
----------
T 11 Exam
II.
R 13 Freud
and the greatest Freudian slip story ever told. Parts I and II.
----------
T 18 Freud,
III, IV, V. On this day, turn
in a 1-page, single-spaced response paper that reassesses your reading of
Butler now that you've come through HUMN II.
R 20 Freud,
VI-end.
----------
T 25 Butler,
all. Essay II due in class.
R 27 No
class; Thanksgiving Break.
----------
December
T 2 Butler,
continued. Your final exam prompts distributed.
R 4
Last
day of class. Final Words.
----------
Your final exam for this class: T 16 December, 12-3
p.m.