First-Year Seminars for the Class of 2004

 Trinity College

The Seminar Program for first-year students is a significant and innovative part of the Trinity curriculum. Since 1969, new students at Trinity have enjoyed the benefit of a small seminar class (seminars range from 12-15 students) and close contact with a faculty member in their first semester. The First-Year Seminars are academically rigorous, designed to introduce new students to the critical analysis, writing skills, and workload that Trinity demands from all of its students. Discussion and debate are a standard part of the First-Year Seminar, as are exploring similar topics from various disciplines. As first-year students acclimate themselves to Trinity's academic demands, they also learn to navigate Trinity's academic resources. Through their seminar, students are introduced to the Computing, Mathematics, and Writing Centers, and the research opportunities available in and through the library.

seminar2.jpg (37777 bytes)

 

SEMINARS

seminar1.jpg (29086 bytes)

 

DESCRIPTIONS OF FIRST-YEAR SEMINARS
FALL 2000

 

 FYSM-112-01 American Novels of the 1990’s: Fiction at the Turn of the Millennium              TR 9:55 - 11:10

For better or worse, few of us in America can escape the awareness that we have moved into "the new millennium," along with the heightened sense of both the past and the future that this collective experience has brought with it, if only for the moment. In this course, we will study American novels written in the last decade of the twentieth century in order to determine the ways in which writers have (or perhaps have not) responded to the impending advent of the millennium in their fiction. In this context, we will explore the following questions: how do writers represent history and historical events (both of the twentieth century and earlier) as the past century draws to a close? How are their representations of contemporary American culture influenced by the fact that they are writing at the century’s end? What have critical responses been to these novels, and will they affect whatever lifespan these novels will enjoy into the next century? How has the publishing industry itself, given its current configurations, determined the shape of American fiction in the last decade of the twentieth century? Why are some recent novels made into films that extend their audience and influence, while others are not?

In this seminar, we will be reading and discussing approximately a novel a week by authors such as Morrison, Cunningham, Cliff, Chabon, and Danticat, among others. Students will write weekly response journals, a number of short formal papers, a creative assignment, and a long final paper.

Sheila Fisher is an Associate Professor in the English Department, whose specialty is late medieval literature and who regularly offers courses on Chaucer, dream vision and romance, and medieval women writers. She has published on Chaucer and the Gawain-poet, and is currently working on a verse translation of The Canterbury Tales.

 

FYSM-127-01                                         The Legal History of Race Relations                                     T 7:15 – 9:45

This course provides an historical overview and analysis of the interrelationship between the American legal system and American race relations. Students will read Supreme Court civil rights cases in the areas of education and public accommodations, in addition to background material providing information on the historical and political climates in which the decisions were rendered. The emphasis of the course will be the legal analysis and classroom discussion of actual Supreme Court cases as well as a working knowledge of the scope and parameters of the rights protected under the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution. Some of the classes will be conducted by using the Socratic method. At the end of the course, students will have a working knowledge of the major constitutional and legislative provisions protecting equal rights in education and public accommodations. There will be three to four small writing assignments during the term and a final written take home examination.

Barry Stevens is a Visiting Professor at Trinity who has taught in the First-Year Seminar Program since 1980. He has practiced law in both public and private sectors, most notably as an Assistant United States Attorney for 8 years. He is presently serving as a Judge in the Supreme Court for the State of Connecticut.

 

FYSM-129-01                                                                 Transitions                                                                TR 2:40 - 3:55

The search for one’s identity and for one’s place in society is life-long, although the college years are of crucial importance to personal development as well as to integration of the self in any particular subculture in addition to the larger community. The seminar will focus on a number of transitions in the search related to chronological age, gender, race, and cultural differences through an examination of novels and non-fiction works. Students will read approximately ten books and will be expected to assume an active role in class discussion. Additionally, a minimum of four papers treating the concept of growth will be required.

David Winer is an Associate Professor of Psychology. His primary professional interests include the behavior and development of young adults.

 

FYSM-131-01                       Curiosity and Madness in English Literature                                      TR 11:20 - 12:35

What do the stories of Pandora, Eve, and Alice in Wonderland have in common? Is curiosity a virtue or a sin in Western culture? When does curiosity turn into "madness," however we define that? In this seminar, as well as seeing some films, we will read English literature from all genres and all centuries about "curious" and mad people in order to explore what makes people "curious," what makes them "curiosities," and how these categories relate to "madness." Student will write weekly essays. Reading will include plays, novels, Gothic mysteries, detective stories, and poetry, including Shakespeare’s Hamlet and King Lear, Shelley’s Frankenstein, Henry James’ The Turn of the Screw, Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wall-Paper, and works by Swift, Conan Doyle, Edgar Allen Poe, Lewis Caroll, and John Fowles.

Barbara M. Benedict, Chair of the English Department, teaches eighteenth-century English literature. She has written on Jane Austen, early modern popular culture, poetry and fiction, and is the author of Framing Feeling: Sentiment and Style in English Prose Fiction, 1745-1800 and Making the Modern Reader: Cultural Mediation in Early Modern Literary Anthologies.

 

 FYSM 148-01                                  The Myth of Faust: Goethe’s Cosmic Drama                              TR 2:40 - 3:55

The legend of the scholar who makes a pact with the devil has long appealed to artists and writers as the archetypal search for mastery and self-fulfillment. It is the story of the conflict between good and evil, man and woman, life and death, self and community, education and experience, science and alchemy, and faith and reality. Using Goethe’s Faust, parts one and two, as well as Faust tales from England, Russia, and the United States, this course will investigate Faust’s quest both as a masterpiece of world literature and as metaphor for the battle between good and evil. The myth will be studied as psychology and symbol, and as legendary inspiration for the operas, paintings, illustrations, songs, and films that will also be experienced and investigated in the class sessions.

Nancy Birch Wagner is Associate Academic Dean, Director of Graduate Studies, and Lecturer of German in the Department of Modern Languages and Literature. Her area of specialization is the Age of Goethe and German Literature of the Nineteenth Century.

 

FYSM-174-01                  Highlanders: Peoples and Cultures of the Himalayas                           MWF 10:00 - 10:50

Heinrich Harrer’s Seven Years in Tibet, Martin Scorsese’s Kundun, and David Breashear’s film on the ill-fated Everest expeditions of 1996 are contributions to a body of work related to Tibet and Nepal built around the experiences of Western adventurers, amateur religious investigators, and mountain climbers. The Himalayan rim exists in the American imagination as a set of dramatic pictures and impressions. We equate the Himalayas with forbidding landscapes, exotic forms of Buddhism, and harrowing ascents of Mount Everest. However, only a fragment of the historical and cultural experience of this complex region is captured in its record as conveyed by swashbuckling foreign visitors. Throughout their history, the lands of the Himalayan highlands were a fascinating area of interaction between peoples and cultures. Nepal, Tibet, Bhutan, and Sikkim, with their mountains and high plains, were a natural barrier separating India and China but also constituted a territorial band through which cultural transmission and linkages of these two larger Asian civilizations regularly occurred. In their own right, these remote lands were extraordinarily creative as they produced great religious, artistic, and philosophical traditions that profoundly influenced the entire south and east Asian world. This seminar will focus on the ethnographic map of the Himalayan rim and introduce the peoples, Tibetan, Newar, Gurung, Magar, Tharu, Satar, Sherpa, and Lhomi among others, who produced its distinctive cultures. An optional trek in Nepal is likely to be offered to interested members of the seminar in January 2000.

Michael Lestz is Associate Professor of History and Chairman of the History Department. He specializes in the history of China and Japan. He is also a devoted amateur mountain climber with many ascents of European and American peaks and experience as a trekker in the Anapurna himal.

 

FYSM-188-01        When All Roads lead to the Sea:  A Venetian Journey through Space and Time                                                                                                                                        MF 2:40 - 3:55

From the Orient Express to espresso, the city of Venice conjures images of mystery, intrigue, romance and passion. For 1,000 years, this unique island city was the main crossroad between East and West and one of the richest centers of commerce in the world. This seminar takes an interdisciplinary approach in examining a wide range of questions including: How did Venice’s commerce with the East and its control of the Mediterranean influence its art and architecture? What projects are currently underway to save the city from the sea? What are the religious and political implications of the famous carnival? How was the Jewish ghetto formed and what role did it play in Venetian society? How did Venice manage to maintain an independent republic for nearly 1,000 years? These and many other questions will be answered as we journey through Venice’s past reading the private journal of Fra Mauro (a 16th century monk and Venetian map maker), visiting museums in Boston and New York, reading the poems of a 16th century Venetian courtesan and poetess, working with a Venetian mask-maker, listening to Venetian music, and exploring resources on the Internet. The seminar will emphasize the development of analytical reading, discussion, and writing skills. Conditions permitting, the seminar will culminate in a trip to Venice in spring 2001. (Not a requirement for participating in the seminar.)

Diane Zannoni is Professor of Economics, has taught numerous first-year seminars, and fell in love with Venice when she first visited there in high school. Her teaching and research interests are in macroeconomics.

 

FYSM-208-01                     Body Politics: The Power of Ancient Greek Athletics                          W 1:15 - 3:55

An ancient Greek writer reports that a man continuously flogged the statue of a famous Olympic victor. The statue of the dead athlete fell upon and killed its abuser, and subsequently was thrown into the sea. The townspeople only averted the resulting famine by recovering the statue and worshipping it as a god. This story points to the immense power accorded to athletes in Greek society. In this seminar, we will explore the relationships between athletic competition and religion, politics, education, literature, and art in the ancient Greek world. We will ask what these connections tell us about ancient Greek culture. We will address issues of class, gender, ethnicity, and the mechanics of competition, including that burning question: were Greek athletes really nude? We will draw on primary sources ranging from literary texts and historical documents to artistic representations and material artifacts. This seminar also will consider the impact of ancient Greek athletics on modern culture, from the nineteenth-century "revival" of the Olympic Games up to the present day. To what extent does the modern Olympic movement rely on myths about ancient Greek athletics? Are there real connections between the role of athletic competition in ancient Greek and modern societies? We will explore these questions through film, Internet resources, and media coverage of the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, Australia (September 15-October 1).

Students will be required to participate in classroom discussion, write several short essays and a longer research paper, and complete a final project. Field trips may include a visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and attendance of an athletic event.

Sarah Harrell is an Assistant Professor of Classics. While not much of an athlete herself, her research interests involve the poems and monuments commissioned to honor Greek athletic victories.

 

 FYSM-209-01                                         Making It in America                                                     W 1:15 - 3:55

Everywhere we turn we are confronted with news of a booming economy and of the increased opportunities available to "make it" in world dominated by global corporations, e-business, and Internet start-up companies. We hear less about the poverty, economic inequality, and the class, racial, gender, and sexual cleavages that are also features of American society at the beginning of the new century. This seminar will consider these developments by taking us on a journey up the class ladder of American society. Through the use of film, journalism, sociology, anthropology, guest speakers and field work, we will examine the ways in which one’s class standing affects opportunities, resources and power at the start of the twenty-first century, and how this relationship is affected by race, ethnicity, gender and sexuality. This journey from top to bottom will also involve the many episodes of collective action by groups resisting their unequal positions in American society.

Stephen Valocchi is an Associate Professor of Sociology. He teaches courses on inequality in America, Social Movements, and Sexuality and Society. His current research is on the gay liberation movement in the United States.

 

 FYSM-210-01 Cooperation, Conflict and Conformity:  Explorations in the Economics of Social Life                                                                                                                                             WF 1:15 - 3:15

This seminar will explore various aspects of social life such as:

Andrew Gold is an Associate Professor and current Chair of the Economics Department. He has taught about social issues using an economic lens in a wide variety of public policy and economics courses. Professor Gold has worked in city government, and is a member of the Hartford City Planning Commission.

 

FYSM-211-01                                                 Sense and Nonsense                                             MWF 11:00 - 11:50

Human knowledge comes from information we can gather through our senses --eyes, ears, etc. Indeed, we commonly refer to understanding as "making sense." Yet people (and other creatures) in other times and places use their senses quite differently than us 21st century Americans. This course will be a multidisciplinary approach to the senses and perception, drawing on biology, history, anthropology, and the humanities. The course will be divided into three parts:

1) The loss of the senses: How do people who have lost a sense experience the world differently than us? We will discuss some about blindness, and focus primarily on deafness. We will explore how the loss of hearing has wide-ranging influences on language, education, and even politics.

2) The history and anthropology of the senses: How has technology expanded the range of our senses and shifted which senses we tend to rely on? We live in a culture dominated by vision, but olfaction is very important to many tribes in New Guinea, and audition was more prominent in ancient Greece.

3) The zoology of the senses: How do animals perceive the world differently than humans? How do their unique capacities and limitations help determine the lifestyle they lead? We humans have incredibly sophisticated senses. But for every thing we can sense, there is an animal out there that can do it far better than us. In addition, we will discuss about some sensory modalities that are completely foreign to humans: e.g., electroreception in fish, echolocation in bats and dolphins, magnetic detection in birds.

Kent Dunlap, Assistant Professor of Biology, teaches courses in animal physiology and sensory biology. His research focuses on animal communication, and, in particular, fish that use weak electric signals for communication.

 

 FYSM-212-01                                                  Hip Hop America                                                     MWF 9:00 - 9:50

This seminar will explore the cultural phenomenon known as hip hop. At once a way of life for countless urban and suburban youth and a multimillion-dollar business, hip hop is the most dominant expressive culture since the jazz age. From Puff Daddy, to the multiracial images in Vibe magazine, to the essays in The New Republic, hip hop is omnipresent in the United States.

We will use rap critic Nelson George’s book Hip Hop America (1999), after which this seminar is named, as the springboard for our discussions of hip hop’s social, political and economic significance in the United States. We will trace hip hop’s development and explore links between rap and other Afrodiasporic vernacular expressions as we read a cross-section of books, articles, and novels by a range of authors, among them Tricia Rose, Henry Louis Gates, Houston Baker, Sanyika Shakur, Nathan McCall, and Jon Pareles. We will also view documentaries about hip hop and view films by Spike Lee and John Singleton.

An integral component of the seminar will be our relationship with the young men of Hartford’s Benjamin E. Mays Institute. An all-male school-within-a-school that is part of Fox Middle School, the Mays was founded five years ago to help combat the high attrition of Hartford’s black and Hispanic 7th and 8th grade boys. We will visit the Mays three times during the semester and meet with some of the boys at Trinity on selected Saturday mornings throughout the semester. The final seminar project will be a videotaped documentary of our shared discussions on hip hop culture.

Gail Hilson Woldu is Assistant Professor of Music. Her interests in music scholarship range from French composer and theorist Vincent d’Indy to Lil’ Kim and Eve. She is writing a book on d’Indy.

 

FYSM-213-01                              Computerization and Personal Privacy                                         WF 1:15 - 2:40

In this seminar, we will explore the many ways in which the computerization of our society is eroding our personal privacy. Large corporations and various state and local governments are accumulating vast amounts of personal information about us. This information ranges from data about our health, our wealth, our buying habits, our communication and travel patterns, and just about every other aspect of our lives. Much of the information gathering is done under the guise of providing us with better and more convenient services. We want to examine whether the increase in service and convenience is worth the loss of privacy. We will explore how computers are used to gather and store personal data and try to identify exactly what information is gathered about us and what we can do to control our personal information. We will also look at how computers might be used to protect our privacy.

Ralph Morelli is an Associate Professor of Computer Science. He has been teaching computer science at Trinity since 1985. His interests include artificial intelligence, the Internet, and object oriented programming.

 

FYSM-214-01              Mapping Communities: Trinity, Hartford, and Beyond                     TR 2:40 - 3:55

Maps use symbols and drawings to describe physical and political landscapes. Maps represent worldviews: monsters live at map edges, the United States is on top, and China is red. This class will explore how maps and mapping techniques can create and represent visions of community. We will learn how maps communicate meaning, and how people describe the content and boundaries of community. While this will not be a class in cartography, we will experiment with mapping techniques such as participatory mapping, mental maps, and geographic information systems. Our readings will range from Tufte’s Envisioning Information to Monmonier’s How to Lie with Maps.

Students will make maps based on their observations in multiethnic communities, and will keep a journal and write short essays. One of the major goals of the class will be to create a map of part of Hartford, representing components of community as diverse as billboards, stores, graffiti, computer connections, cable television lines, vacant lots, holiday decorations, and children’s playsites.

Jim Trostle, Associate Professor of Anthropology, is interested in health and disease, research methods, and community-based learning. He learned to use and respect maps when he taught for Outward Bound. He learned to suspect maps when he consulted for international health agencies.

 

FYSM-215-01                                The Public and Science Policy                                                 TR 8:30 - 9:45

Michael J. Fox, Richard Pryor, and Christopher Reeves: what do these celebrities have in common? Each has tragically sustained an injury to the Central Nervous System. And as a result of their high public profiles, research into the afflictions of each individual - Parkinson’s disease, multiple sclerosis, and spinal chord injury, respectively - has seen increased publicity, analyses, and funding. This seminar will explore the role that public opinion plays in the allocation of public funds for scientific inquiry. We will study how events outside of science lead to advances in science, for example the formation of the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, and the National Laboratories. Associated with this is increased funding of particular research fields with public money. We will emphasize the importance of scientific literacy in the formulation of science policy and allocation of tax money, and see it in action by visits to local and state governmental meetings.

Bill Church is an Associate Professor of Chemistry and Neuroscience. His professional interests include research into the chemical cause(s) of Parkinson’s disease and the role of scientific literacy in legislative decision making.

 

FYSM-216-01         Sex, Guns, Life, and Death: Moral Debates and Conflicts of Rights             TR 1:15 - 2:30

Some of the most controversial moral debates we have in our society center around the rights we think people do or don’t have, such as the right to life, the right to die, the right to defend ourselves, and the right to choose what we do with our bodies. But what does it mean to say we have or don’t have such rights? Do our decisions about which rights we do or don’t have commit us to a view about what humans essentially are and what they require? In this course we will examine the philosophical underpinnings of several human rights debates, in order to help us answer these questions. The debates we’ll focus on will include debates about abortion, euthanasia, cloning, guns, sexual orientation and identity, and sex-work.

Jessica Spector is a Visiting Assistant Professor of Philosophy. Her specialties are early modern philosophy and ethics. Her current research projects are on Enlightenment conceptions of personal identity and on the philosophical implications of current debates about the sex-industry.

 

 FYSM-217-01 Resistance and Rebellion: Student Protest in American Higher Education        TR 1:15 - 2:30

Why have student protests periodically erupted on college campuses over the past two hundred years? How have the methods, motivations, and broader meanings behind these movements changed, or remained the same, over time? During the first half of the seminar, we will probe these issues while reading accounts of rebellion at Princeton University in the early 1800s, Fisk University in the 1920s, UC-Berkeley in the 1960s, and others. In the second half, we will research the 1968 Trinity student protest for African-American student scholarships by examining archival evidence and conducting oral history interviews with participants. In addition to writing research papers and making oral presentations, our seminar will produce a public history exhibit on the events of 1968 for the Trinity campus community.

Jack Dougherty is Assistant Professor and Director of the Educational Studies Program, and is finishing a book on the history of race and school reform in the urban North. Last year his students conducted oral histories and designed an exhibit which examined the past thirty years of coeducation at Trinity.

 

FYSM-218-01          Sports in Society: Victory vs. Values- "Who’s Winning the Game?"              TR 8:30 - 9:45

The love of sports is deeply embedded in the consciousness of our nation. Since millions of people are participants and spectators, their values are directly and dramatically influenced by the values conveyed by organized sports. We will focus on today’s contemporary sports issues beginning with a historical perspective. The class will investigate the connections among race and gender stereotypes, opportunities, and equality in sports. We will explore the relationships between character and sports ethics, the personal and social effects of violence and aggression on and off the playing fields, and the conflict between peak performances and personal health. Seminar topics will also include discussion on sports journalism, examining the media, and the explosion of organized youth sports. In this process we will establish an understanding of why sports is such a major force in shaping the quality and character of American culture and how we might enhance the framework.

Robin Sheppard is a Professor of Physical Education. She coached field hockey and lacrosse at Trinity since 1974, having just retired from the sidelines a year ago. She currently serves as the Associate Athletic Director.

 

FYSM-219-01                                             Crime and Punishment                                                         TR 11:20 - 12:35

The concepts of crime and punishment--transgression and retribution--are so widespread and taken for granted that we often lose sight of the questions of how they originate and have evolved. Through study of important literary, philosophical, and social science texts, we shall be considering, in addition to these historical questions, the issues also of the relation between crime and punishment as well their connection to such related concepts as freedom and responsibility, revenge and forgiveness.

Contemporary views of the function of punishment and the causes of crime will be addressed against the background of the classical views discussed. Readings will include selections from Genesis and works by Aeschylus, Dostoyevsky, Nietzsche, Kafka, Christopher Browning, and Mary Douglas. Class assignments will include a journal, short essays, and class presentations.

Berel Lang is Professor of Humanities; his writings include books on the Holocaust, literary theory, and the history of ideas.

 

 FYSM-221-01      Political Violence, Conflict Resolution, and Negotiated Settlements            M 1:15 - 3:55

What does the concept "political violence" mean? What motivates it? What are the goals of the participants? When is political violence justified? When and how should democratic governments respond? What is needed for lasting peace? These questions will be reviewed within the context of the United States and Northern Ireland.

This will be a synergistic seminar in which students will be expected to do independent research, work in teams, and engage in role-playing as decision-makers. Special attention will be given to improving skills in critical analysis, writing, speaking, information technology, and improving habits of efficiency/effectiveness. Enrollment limited to 13 students.

Professor Clyde McKee is a Professor of Political Science. He has taught and done research on political violence in Italy and Northern Ireland.

 

FYSM-222-01                                 International Racism                                        MWF 11:00 - 11:50   

Racism is on the march, whether it’s Austria, Jasper (Texas), Davos (Switzerland). The aggressive postures of programmatic racists are guided by the silent work of pragmatic racists. Things look ugly for social justice. But in corners, in small pockets, the foes of racism gather themselves. Anti-racist movements across the world take comfort in the fact that most people hold liberal views even if they so rarely enact them. The willing executioners of racism and intolerance feel somewhat hemmed in by the affirmative acts of courage from a few anti-racists.

This seminar will explore the development of racism in the world, from the origin of the idea of race in the late 17th Century to the present. We will see how people adopt ideas of race passively, and how these ideas are mobilized into political action. Most importantly, we will study what sorts of impact race has on the lives of those who feel its sharp edge, a reading of W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk, will help us with this. We will explore the meaning of race in everyday life and how race is structured into public policy and private enterprise. Albert Memmi’s, Racism will be the main text here. Finally, a look at the methods used by various people to fight against racism will close out the course.

Vijay Prashad is Director of International Studies and author of Untouchable Freedom: A Social History of a Dalit Community, Oxford, January 2000 and Karma of Brown Folk, University of Minnesota, February 2000. His values are formed around social justice and anti-racism.

 

FYSM-223-01                                         Experiencing the Human Face                                             TR 8:30 - 9:45

Analyzing the experience of the human face across ages and cultures offers a rich excuse for interdisciplinary work.. This course will look at the special place of the human face as a pattern in psychology (what makes a face attractive? How and why do facial expressions convey emotions?), biology (Why do babies look cute? Are there special places in the brain sensitive to "face" patterns? Why did Charles Darwin write a whole book on facial expression?), anthropology (In what ways do facial expressions differ across cultures?), fine arts (How and why have western artists’ depictions of faces changed so much over hundreds of years?), computer science (What must we know to get computers to recognize faces and facial expressions?), and the criminal justice system (To what extent can we trust eyewitness identification from "mugshots" and "lineups?"). In addition to books and articles, students will be introduced to extensive data and demonstrations in the area available on the World Wide Web.

William Mace began teaching at Trinity in 1971. Since 1992, he also has been a member of the Neuroscience Program. His areas of research interest are visual perception and biomechanics. In recent years he has taught Visual Perception, History of Psychology, Psychology of Art, and

General Psychology. He is Editor of the professional journal, Ecological Psychology, and is Director of the International Society for Ecological Psychology.

 

 FYSM-225-01                                          Sex, Greed, and Power                                             WF 1:15 - 2:30

Three of the most powerful forces in human life are sexuality, greed, and the lust for power. One important function religions perform is helping people bring these forces under some kind of moral control. Different religions do this in different ways and for different reasons. We will explore some of the ways in which three of the world’s major religions, Judaism, Buddhism, and Christianity confront these forces through moral understanding and evaluation. Among the topics we will explore are: sexuality in its multiple forms, the beginning and ending of life, war and the use of violence to settle human conflicts, human rights, the quest for material success, the ethics of business and the economic order, and the use and regulation of political power in the creation and maintenance of human societies. We will explore both commonalties and differences among and between the moral traditions of these three religions, and explore what makes for different moral evaluations in all these areas. In the process, we will discover the importance religion has to many peoples throughout history and around the world.

Frank Kirkpatrick is Professor of Religion and Dean of the First Year Program at Trinity. He has taught in the Department of Religion for 30 years. His specialties are social ethics, religion in American society, the philosophy of religion, and the history of western religious thought. His scholarly work is in the fields of philosophy of religion and the ethics of community.

 

 FYSM-226-01                                     Radical Christian Poverty                                              MWF 10:00 - 10:50

"Go sell everything you have and give it to the poor and you will have treasure in Heaven. Then come follow me." (Luke 18:22)

The exact role of poverty in Christian thought has been a vexing and unresolved problem for the past two millenia. The seemingly clear sense of a number of New Testament passages needed to be balanced against the practical exigencies of life in community, and beginning shortly after the apostolic period these passages were often idealized, spiritualized or even ignored. However, at various times since, a number of men and women have embraced a near literal interpretation of the gospel call to poverty. In this seminar, we will examine the lives and thought of three such: St. Francis of Assisi (1185-1226), Dorothy Day (1897-1980), and Mother Teresa of Calcutta (1910-1997). Our goal is not to determine whether their interpretation of the gospels is correct, but simply to understand their understanding of the gospels and to analyze its ramifications in their lives and thought.

The heart of the seminar will be a close reading and analysis (in both discussion and writing) of original source material and critical biographies. Where possible, this will be supplemented by meetings with members of the groups each of these people founded: the Franciscan Friars, the Catholic Worker movement, and the Daughters of Charity. Further, because of the centrality of personal contact with the poor in the thinking of all three, seminar participants will be working regularly as a group at community homeless shelters or soup kitchens.

David Cruz-Uribe, SFO, is an Assistant Professor of Mathematics who concentrates on classical harmonic analysis. He is also a brother in the Secular Franciscan Order, a lay Catholic order founded by St. Francis of Assisi.

 

FYSM-227-01                            Genocide, Collective Identity, and Human Rights                         TR 9:55 - 11:10

Universal recognition of human rights presupposes universal recognition of basic human sameness. Yet, our differences, especially differences of race, ethnicity, tribe, and the like, have often prevented this. Consider the many genocides to which the twentieth century has been witness, including the Holocaust, the genocides in Turkey, Cambodia, Tibet, and Bosnia, and the killing of the Tutsi in Rwanda. Some argue that these horrors would not happen if we would give up our various collective identities in favor of our shared humanity. Must collective identity lead to the genocidal tragedies that we have witnessed in the twentieth century? Does effective universal recognition of human rights require the demise of our group identities? Can we value and express our racial, ethnic, tribal, and other identities without eclipsing our common humanity? These and related questions will be this seminar’s central concerns.

Assignments will include readings, films, and materials drawn from the World Wide Web. Students will also be given writing assignments ranging from short in-class essays to longer research essays. Each student will also be required to build, over the course of the semester; his/her own web site devoted to the topics of the seminar. (No prior experience in web site construction is required.)

Maurice L. Wade is Director of Public Policy Studies and Chairperson of the Philosophy Department. His research and teaching interests include political philosophy, race and racism, ethics and medical technology, and environmental philosophy.

 

FYSM-228-01             How Religion Drives Politics in Current World Events                                 MWF 9:00 - 9:50

This course will survey the history of spiritual ideas and practices which have sustained human beings in their various environments. When studying World Religions, "he who knows one, knows none." The non-confrontational, objective study of religion attempts to gather the relevant facts--the customs, rituals, and beliefs--and then offers theories to account for them.

In this course, the major World Religions will be considered in their doctrinal and philosophical, ethical and legal, social and institutional, and material dimensions. Students will cull the N.Y. Times every day for reports of how religion drives politics in various regions of our secular global village. By the end of the course, the student "will have to decide whether the various religions of the world are hyphens that unite, or dashes that divides, and in doing so will determine the grammar of religious discourse in times to come." (Sharma, Arvind, Our Religions, xi).

Michael Schub was Senior Fullbright Research Scholar, Saarbrucken, Germany from 1979-1980. From 1985-1989, he taught Arabic and Ethiopic at Yale University. Presently he is doing research at Trinity College in the field of Shi’ite Traditions.

 

FYSM-229-01                              Existentialism And Western Drama                                    TR 1:15 - 2: 30

This seminar is intended for students drawn to the crossroads of literature and philosophy: we will consider how what we have come to call "existentialism" has been a constant preoccupation of the Western literary tradition, and in particular how the theatre has lent itself to existential analysis of the human condition. Existentialism can broadly be defined as an attempt to answer the question "What does it mean to be?" and we will examine how various examples of Western drama have attempted to answer this question. Among authors to be considered will be Sophocles, Terence, Shakespeare, Molière, Racine, Goethe, Ibsen, Sartre, Miller and Beckett (among others), all of whom tackle in one way or another the problem of "the meaning of being." Students will be responsible for short weekly papers and a final term-paper, and for assuming the lead in class discussions. Intense class participation is thus a prerequisite for this seminar.

Professor Lloyd-Jones, who holds the McCook chair in Modern Languages, was educated in Wales and in France. He has published widely on how Greek and Latin literature and philosophy were reconceptualized and assimilated by the Humanists of the Renaissance, and has a special interest in the role of languages and of translation in this process.

 

FYSM-230-01                          Biography and Life History in the Middle East                                         M 1:15 - 3:55

Why do we read life histories -- biographies, autobiographies, and memoirs? We may be curious about how our predecessors lived and thought, about what they ate and how they dressed, and about their hopes and fears. We may look to their lives for moral guidance, as we face challenges and disappointments ourselves. Meanwhile, as historians, we may follow life histories to understand the roles and accomplishments of the great and the humble in places and times of the past.

In this class, we will study the social history of the modern Middle East through the lives of individual men and women. We will see how they responded to the sweeping social changes that occurred in the region in the past two centuries, as Western influence grew and tradition and modernity competed. These were turbulent times: relations between classes, men and women, and nations were decisively transformed. While examining the specifically "Middle Eastern" experiences that the readings recount, we will also discuss the human universals that they present, for example, in patterns of sibling rivalry, prejudice and discrimination, and self-doubt.

We will not only read life histories in this class, we will also write accounts of our own. Looking to Middle Eastern biographies for literary inspiration, we will evaluate our own places in history along with some of the changes that we have undergone or witnessed first-hand.

Heather J. Sharkey is an Assistant Professor in the History Department and International Studies Program, specializing in modern Middle Eastern and North African history. Her research concentrates on issues of colonialism and nationalism in the Nile Valley (Sudan and Egypt).

 

                                                                                       Top