FSM BC 1203 THE CRISIS OF AUTHORITY
Fall 1998
Professor Richard Pious
Course description: The goals of the seminar are to improve your ability to read and analyze important texts, to give you an opportunity to discuss themes central to the human experience, and to help you to learn how to write coherent college-level essays based on the readings and class discussions. In this section of the seminar our theme is authority: How it is gained and maintained, confronted and reconstituted.
Course requirements: All readings are required, and may be obtained in the Barnard Reserve Room or the Columbia University Book Store. Many are also available at the Barnard Bookstore. You should be prepared to discuss the readings on the dates assigned. Class participation will count one-quarter toward the final grade and each of the five papers will count 15 percent. You are expected to attend all class sessions (attendance will be taken) and if you accumulate more than four unexcused absences (excused absences include ill health, a family emergency and religious observances), your grade for the course will be lowered accordingly.
I. Language and Authority
September 9
Course Orientation, first reading, and initial writing assignment: critical review of Mark Edmundson, "On the Uses of a Liberal Education," Harpers, September 1997.
September 14
Plato, "Apology" and "Crito" in The Trial and Death of Socrates (Hackett edition)
Martha Nussbaum, Cultivating Humanity: A Classical Defense of Reform in Liberal Education, (Intro. and ch.1)
September 16
George Orwell, 1984 (Signet Edition), pp. 1-147
September 2
George Orwell, 1984, pp. 148 - end.
September 23
George Orwell, "Politics and the English Language" ed. S. Orwell and I. Angus
Collected Essays of George Orwell, (Harcourt).
William Lutz, Doublespeak (Harper and Row), any two chapters.
September 28
Discussion of writing techniques.
Selections from The New York Times Book Review of September 27.
September 30
First paper due in class. (Topics handed out September 23.) Class will be held.
No reading assignment is due.
II. Knowledge as Authority
October 5
Plato, The Republic (Penguin edition) Parts 1, 2, 3, 4
October 7
Plato, The Republic, Parts 5, 6
October 12
Plato, The Republic, Parts 7, 8
October 14
Plato, The Republic, Parts 9, 10, 11
October 19
Discussion of writing techniques: Selections from The New York Review of Books (preceding week's edition.)
October 21
Second paper due in class. (Topics handed out October 14.) Class will be held.
No reading assignment is due.
III. True Lies
October 26
Machiavelli, The Prince (Penguin edition) pp. 44-73, 90-128
October 28
Sissela Bok, Lying: Moral Choice in Public and Private Life, (Vintage edition), chs. 1-3
November 4
Sissela Bok, chs. 8-10, 12
November 9
Discussion of writing techniques: Selections from The Atlantic Monthly (current issue)
November 11
Third paper due in class. (Topics handed out November 4)
Class will be held. No reading assignment is due.
IV. Powerlessness
November 16
Thoreau, "On the Duty of Civil Disobedience"
M.L. King, Jr., "Letter From a Birmingham Jail" in Why We Can't Wait (Collier edition)
November 18
Adam Michnik, Letters From Prison (University of California) Forward, Introduction, "The Polish Way," "On Resistance," "Why You are Not Signing," and "Letter from Gdansk Prison"
November 23
Aung Kyi, Freedom From Fear (Penguin edition), (title essay) "Freedom from Fear"
November 30
Discussion of writing techniques: selections from The New Yorker (any November issue)
December 2
Fourth paper due in class. (Topics handed out November 18)
Class will be held. No reading assignment is due.
V. Freedom of Thought
December 7
J. and H. Mill, On Liberty, (Library of Liberal Arts) "Introductory" "Of the Liberty of Thought and Discussion" "Of Individuality"
December 9
Martha Nussbaum, Cultivating Humanity: A Classical Defense of Reform in Liberal Education (choose any one chapter from 2-7)
December 14
No class session. Fifth paper due at my office. (Topics handed out December 7)
