University Studies 210 (3cr)
Section #92270
THE GREAT CONVERSATION
T 5:05-7:35
HSS 215
Fall, 1999
Instructors: Bruce MacLennan, Ph.D., Alvin Burstein, Ph.D.
The purpose of this two course sequence is to engage students in the "Great Conversation," the ongoing exploration of key ideas in the Western tradition. Team taught and discussion rather than lecture based with enrollment limited to twenty-five, the course will explore some of the polarities that characterize the assumptions underlying the Western world view:
Students will be responsible for active participation in the discussion of assigned readings. This is a writing emphasis course. Students will be expected to make weekly posts to a course web page of at least 100 words commenting on the readings and answering questions posed by other students and the faculty. Students will also complete a 2000-word paper during each semester on topics approved by the faculty.
By petition, the sequence can satisfy Part I of the Arts and Sciences Humanities requirement (two course package in literature or philosophical perspectives).
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CLASS SCHEDULE:
Aug 31: The canon dilemma
Sept 7: Homer, Iliad (Books 1-3, 5-6, 9-10, 16-18, 22-24)
Sept 14: Aeschylus, Agamemnon, Choephoroi, Eumenides
Sept 21,28: Herodotus, Histories (50-57,75-79,132-138,234-239,443-445,460-477)
Oct 5,12: Sophocles, The Oedipus Cycle
Oct 19 Practice Forum
Oct 26,27: Euripides, Bacchae
Nov 2,9: Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War (Book Six and Seven)
Nov 16: Aristophanes, The Birds, The Clouds
Nov 23,30: Plato, Symposium
Dec 7: Final Forum
Return to MacLennan's US210 page
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