Spring 2008

HONS 3180 Special Topics: Religion and Society                                Stark

Topic is: "St. Augustine"

Augustine of Hippo is one of the pivotal figures standing at the end of the Roman period in the west and at the dawning of the Middle Ages.  He was largely responsible for introducing Platonic philosophy into Christianity as a way for “faith to seek understanding.” In this course we will read and discuss a number of the groundbreaking works of Augustine, including the Confessions, and excerpts from The City of God and The Trinity, and other works as well.  Some questions to be considered:  how does Augustine introduce the personal into philosophy; how does he struggle to understand the nature of God, free will, and the existence of evil; what are his views on sexuality, women, the body, and the material world?  There is much to value in Augustine’s writings and much to debate about in light of his tremendous influence in the west.

HONS 3193 Special Topics in 19th Century Literature                            Gevirtz

Topic is "The Victorian Novel"

Despite the image promoted by those giant hoop skirts, the nineteenth century in England was a time of tremendous energy and change. The global empire, the industrial revolution, technological innovations and significant ideological and aesthetic movements challenged the British to reconsider received notions, such as of identity (what does it mean to be a man, a woman, a Christian, a muslim? To be English, Indian, Australian? To be white, black, aboriginal?), of responsibility, or of morality. Students will read a variety of authors, including but not limited to Carlyle, Tennyson, both Brownings, both Rossettis, Dickens, Pater, and Hopkins.

HONS 3195  Special Topics: 19th Century History                                Knight

Topic is "Anna Karenina and 19th Century Russia"

Tolstoy’s novel Anna Karenina is an epic tale of passion, intrigue, tragedy and redemption.   It is also a penetrating portrayal of Russian life in the period following the great reforms of the 1860s.   In this course we will use Anna Karenina as the starting point for a multifaceted exploration of Russian culture.   Among the topics we will discuss are family life, social relations, modernization and industrialization, gender and sexuality, revolutionary movements and political power.   We will enhance our readings of Tolstoy with a wide range of supplementary materials including memoirs, documents, historical analysis, art, music and film.  The class will be organized in a seminar format with the main focus on class discussion.  Written work will likely include several short writing assignments, a mid-term exam and a longer paper due at the end of the semester.

HONS 3196 Special Topics: 19th Century Philosophy                            Liddy

Topic is "Newman and Lonergan"

James Joyce called John Henry Newman the best writer of prose in the English language. Newman wrote several classic works, including "The Idea of a University" and he was the major influence on the significant twentieth-century Canadian Catholic writer, Bernard Lonergan.  The University of Toronto Press is currently publishing the more than 27 volumes of Lonergan's "Collected Works." This course will examine the writings of both of these seminal figures, especially their shorter writings and essays.  We will especially focus on their writings on human inferiority and love. Both linked their work to faith and prepared the way for ecumenical and inter-religious dialogue in a global culture.

HONS 3198 Special Topics: Modern Social Science                                Quizon

Topic is "Peoples and Cultures of Southeast Asia"

The best known civilizations of Asia, China and India, are important contributors to the historical and cultural life of their neighbors, both far and near. Their dominance in the discourses of all that is associated with "Asia" tends to obscure equally significant segments of this populous continent: that Indonesia is the largest Muslim country in the world, that the Philippines is the largest Christian country in the East, that Thailand is one of the oldest Buddhist kingdoms and modern nation-states and never subjected to European colonial rule. The course provides the student with a solid overview of the peoples & cultures of Southeast Asia, emphasizing new ethnographies (such as that on the inner life of Balinese men and women) & classic works (such as that on the highland-lowland dynamics of peoples in Burma & Indo-China) that address characteristic social formations: upland-lowland dynamics; maritime vs. agricultural states; indigenous responses to early modern, colonial and post-colonial European/American expansion. The course will also pilot a digitally-enhanced Southeast Asian textile art module that will provide students hands-on experience in creating "digital stories" using new teaching technologies along with online museum & archival resources in order to enhance their understanding of how traditional textiles & related material culture shape & continue to animate Southeast Asian people's social and cultural worlds.

FALL 2007

HONS 3180       Special Topics: Religion and Society                              Eichman

Topic is “Buddhist World of Thought & Culture”

This course is intended as an introduction to Buddhist traditions in South and Southeast Asia, East Asia, and the West.  Progressing both chronologically and thematically, we will begin with the earliest known strata of Buddhist ideas created in India some twenty-five hundred years ago. Throughout this course we will ask a number of questions relevant to understanding how religious traditions come to define themselves. What role did/does religion play in people's lives?  What is the relationship between doctrine and practice? Who has the authority to set the parameters of a religious practice? What ritual routines did Buddhists incorporate in their daily lives?  What influence does religion have on material culture? We will follow the subsequent spread of Buddhism southward to Sri Lanka and Thailand and northward to Tibet, China, Japan, and Korea.  The course will culminate in a brief overview of Buddhist practices in America.

HONS 3194       Spec Top:  20^th Century Literature                                 Stark

Topic is “Feminist Theories”

This course introduces students to the broad range of theories that make up the ever-growing body of scholarship and research we refer to as "feminist theories."  Together we will explore the fundamental questions these theories raise about the origins of gender differences, the nature and order of patriarchy, the relationships between and among gender, race, class and sexual orientation as categories of analysis and as the bases of both oppression and empowerment.

As students of Women's Studies and Philosophy, we engage these theories and topics with openness as well as with critical scrutiny.  Many of the issues that we read about and discuss are deeply personal and they raise political, social and spiritual questions of enormous and far-reaching importance.  In our time together we will work to uphold the highest standards of openness, honesty, respect, civility, rigor and careful analysis of presuppositions, claims and arguments.

Previous Semesters:

Spring 2007

HONS 3192        Special Topics: Twentieth Century Art (Political Economy of the Mass Media)

 Instructor:                  Dr. Christopher Sharrett, Dept. of Communication

Course Description: 
In this course we examine the major mass media as large profit-making corporations, and interrogate the ways by which the profit motive affects these media as purveyors of information and entertainment.  Questions of bias, misinformation, and disinformation will be studied as the course scrutinizes the media’s ability to present news objectively given their history as business entities.  Issues of “popular” culture will also be examined as the course studies the media’s ability to manufacture and perpetuate trends, fads, and consumer tendencies within society.  Issues of media “liberalism” will be examined against the backdrop of corporate history of the media.  The social, political, economic, moral, and philosophical implications of information sources governed by the profit motive will be a key concern. 

HONS 3194        Special Topics: Twentieth Century Literature (Existentialism in Literature)

 Instructor:                              Dr. Judith Stark

Course Description: 
Does the world look more and more absurd with each passing day?  Do you wonder what the Department of Motor Vehicles has to do with philosophy?  Do you ever think that you are the only one having these strange ideas (you are, by the way)?  Come and read works of philosophy, novels, and drama that address the issues of freedom, the individual, the absurd, despair, angst and other upbeat themes in a classroom environment that can only be described as, yes, absurd!

Some authors whose works we consider are:  Nietzsche, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Kafka, Camus, Sartre, De Beauvoir, Beckett, and Vaclav Havel (and others, by popular demand).

HONS 3196        Special Topics: Twentieth Century History (Arab Israeli Conflict)

 Instructor:                  Dr. Howard Eissenstat, Department of History
 

Course Description: 
This class explores the development of two competing nationalism movements, Israeli and Palestinian, from their roots in the nineteenth century to the present day.  Beyond gaining an understanding of the development of “the conflict,” this course will pay particular attention to the development of both Israeli and Palestinian identities and societies. Other key considerations will be the interaction between politics and history and an examination of some of the key historiographical debates in the field, including the wars of 1948 and 1967, the “authenticity” of national constructions, and the nature of the peace process.

HONS 3198        Special Topics: Modern Social Science (Civil Liberties)

Instructor:                  Dr. King Mott, Department of Political Science

Course Description: 
In this course we shall examine the history and development of civil liberties as they have been understood by the United States Supreme Court.  Our case work shall include case law involving speech and association, obscenity, religious guarantees, criminal procedure, racial equality, sexual equality and substantive equal protection.  Our work is directed by the Court itself: an institution that defines and redefines these notions as they are encountered in each age.  Considerable time will be spent upon the review and briefing of these cases as we become more familiar with the concepts and their evolution.  There is a mid-term and a final examination and a research paper.  Seniors may opt out of the final examination through an expansion of their research topic.

Fall 2006:

HONS3180        Special Topics Religion and Society (Christianity and Democracy and the Common Good)

Professor K. C. Choi, Department of Religious Studies

 Course Description:  Since the onset of the war on terrorism and the war in Iraq, the idea that the “best” society is a democratic one has taken center stage in recent political discourse.  Significantly, many Christians have endorsed this idea, arguing for a robust expansion of democratic freedom around the world.  This course seeks to evaluate such arguments by exploring questions such as: What is democracy?  Is democratic freedom/politics compatible with Christianity?  Must a good Christian be a good democrat?  To address these questions, we will explore the public theology and philosophy of classic Protestant and Catholic Christian thinkers such as Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, and Martin Luther as well as more contemporary thinkers such as Reinhold Niebuhr, John Courtney Murray, S.J., Stanley Hauerwas, Alasdair MacIntrye, John Rawls, and Richard Rorty.  We will also explore a number of Roman Catholic documents from Vatican Council II and Pope John Paul II such as Gaudium et Spes, Declaration on Religious Freedom, Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, and Centesimus Annus.  In exploring these authors and texts, our task will be to explore how their positions on sin, law, human rights, virtue, moral absolutes, truth, racial and cultural pluralism, and the common good shape their views on politics.       

HONS 3194       Special Topics: Twentieth Century Literature (Late 19th & 20th Century Literature of "Our America")

Professor Jeffrey Gray, Department of English

Course Description:  This course examines the relations between North American and Latin American literature, principally poetry and novels, of the past 150 years.  (The "Our America" of the course subtitle comes from the phrase "Nuestra America" from Jose Marti.)  Tather than offering a broad survey, the course looks at a few key canonical works that explore representations of North & South, works that embody a broad "American" concern, vision, or style; and, most importantly, works from one hemisphere that have influences those of the other.  One focus, then, will be that of literary (structural, thematic, and stylistic) influences back and forth.  To this end, we will often pair works where such influence is evident:  for example, Whiteman and Neruda, Faulkner and Marquez, Marquez and Morrison.  The class, which may be seen as a comparative literature course, will allow students to understand and re-evaluate American literature in a more global sense.  (Spanish is not required, but Spanish speakers are encouraged to enroll).   

The bulk of the course work consists of reading attentively, enjoying, and taking notes.  The research component may be minimal, depending on your course paper topic and direction.  Writers will include Walt Whitman, Pablo Neruda, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Jose Marti, William Faulkner, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Toni Morrison, Alejo Carpentier, Ernest Hemingway, Gabriel Cabrera Infante.

HONS3197        Special Topics Modern Science (Environmental Ethics)

Dr. Judith Stark

 Course Description:  In this course we will examine a broad range of environmental topics, problems and theories.  Then we will subject these to ethical analysis in the effort to come to some understanding and, if possible, some resolutions of environmental problems both in North American and around the world.  Some of the problems that will be addressed are:  population, obligations to future generations, human relationships to the rest of nature, animal rights, pollution, global climate control, uses and exploitation of resources, and local land use issues.  Readings include theories, environmental case studies, and review of environmental organizations around the globe.  One or two field trips will be organized in conjunction with the course (to be arranged at a time convenient to participants).

Some other seminars from previous years:

The Search for Identity: Conflicts Between African and French Cultures

Dr. Anne Mullen-Hohl

The focus of this course, taught in English, will be to examine the diverse literatures and cultures of African and Caribbean French-speaking nations and to study the inherent quest for identity manifest in the differences and conflicts between the underlying cultures of origin, transplanted from West Africa, and the acquired French culture superimposed during the process of colonization. The course will seek to identify ideas, structures and themes common to all Francophone literature and to foster an appreciation of the characteristic aspects of African and Caribbean Francophone cultures through close study of literature and film.

PHIL 2110AA/WMST 2110AA/HONS3194AA Feminist Theories

Dr. Judith Stark

This course introduces students to the broad range of theories that make up the ever-growing body of scholarship and research we refer to as "feminist theories."  Together we will explore the fundamental questions these theories raise about the origins of gender differences, the nature and order of patriarchy, the relationships between and among gender, race, class and sexual orientation as categories of analysis and as the bases of both oppression and empowerment.

As students of Women's Studies and Philosophy, we engage these theories and topics with openness as well as with critical scrutiny.  Many of the issues that we read about and discuss are both deeply personal and also raise political, social and spiritual questions of enormous and far-reaching importance.  In our time together let us hold one another to high standards of openness, honesty, respect, civility, rigor and careful analysis of presuppositions, claims and arguments.

Mysticism East and West

Dr. Gisela Webb

 In every major religious tradition, we find individuals and communities that speak of the possibility of experiencing, not only adherence to a set of religious or moral precepts, but, a direct interior experience of the Eternal. In Religious Studies, this experience is called "mysticism," or "spirituality," and we see this phenomenon in religions both "East" (Asian religions) and "West" (Abrahamic religions).

In this course, we will begin by studying the phenomenon of "mysticism" (what philosophers, psychologists, and theologians say about this class of experience). We will then we will focus on particular expressions of beliefs and practices (including stories of ‘the journey’ and forms of meditation), and art (visual and aural) that have been used to cultivate the spiritual and psychological transformation of the individual and, ultimately, the "unitive experience." We will look at Kabbalah (Judaism), Christian mysticism, Sufism (Islam), Zen and Tibetan Buddhism.

Anth 2243/Honors 3198/Soc 2013  Peoples and Cultures of Latin America

Instructor: Baron Pineda



The purpose of this course is to introduce students to the culture and history of Latin America. Latin America is the product of the confrontation between the peoples and cultures of three areas - the Americas, Europe and Africa. In this course we will examine the nature and consequences of this confrontation within an historical perspective. We will study issues such as colonialism, slavery, race relations, state formation, dictatorship, foreign intervention, revolution, dependency and development as these apply to Latin America from before the Spanish Conquest to the 20th century. Students will carefully examine both modern works on Latin America as well as primary documents.

 

HONS 3201 AA:  NATURE AND CULTURE IN THE HUDSON VALLEY

Instructors: Dr. Marian Glenn, Dr. Judith Stark

Course description:  Cultural responses to the natural grandeur of the Hudson Valley will be studied through readings, field trips, internet sites and discussion of paintings, literature and natural history as an expression of the interplay of the environment and human action.  Issues of science, development, aesthetics, land use and environmental conflicts in this extraordinary location will be explored in theory, in the field and on the internet. 
 

Topics in 20th Century Literature:  Literature and History in the Hispanic Countries

Instructor:  Diana Alvarez-Amell  

Course description:  In this course we shall analyze how major historical events in Spanish speaking countries in the Twentieth Century have been represented in their literature.  Events such as the Mexican Revolution, the Spanish Civil War, the Cuban Revolution and Argentina’s “Dirty War” have had impact not only in those countries, but also in a wider cultural sphere outside these countries. The course is meant to include written texts, films and other cultural manifestations in “high” and “low” culture from these countries.  We’ll analyze how these events have been represented and reevaluated.  For non- Spanish speaking students, we’ll use English translations and the Spanish majors are to read in Spanish.  Part of the class discussion is going to be on-line, as I have done in previous Spanish literature courses.        

Topics in Modern Science:  Technology at Its Limits, from Icarus to the Internet

Instructor:  David Alan Black  

Course description:  This seminar will explore important themes, moments, and trends in the history of technology (the Daedalus/Icarus myth, Luddism, the Titanic, World’s Fairs, the Challenger, the Internet, etc.), focusing on questions of technological determinism.  Does technology dictate history, or does history control technology?  What is the relationship between technology and progress – and how has that relationship been understood, from various perspectives and at different times? Texts and case studies will be drawn from scholarly essays, primary sources, films, and other relevant materials.  
  

    Topics in Modern Social Science: Sociology of Knowledge

Instructor:  Prof. Philip M. Kayal      

The Sociology of Knowledge looks at the source of knowledge (information, fact, truth, beliefs, ideas, etc.) sociologically, that is, as rooted in social structure.  Knowledge (what we know and how we know things) is critiqued from a Marxist perspective.  What the course essentially deals with is the social construction of reality or the social sources of knowledge.    

Women in World Religions

Instructor: Dr. Gisela Webb 

Course description: Students will study a variety of the world’s religious traditions—Hinduism, Buddhism, Chinese religion, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and some indigenous religions-- in terms of the following questions: 

1. How have the major world religions defined the nature and role of woman? 
2. How have religions provided meaning, affirmation, and agency/power for women in various cultures and historical eras?  
3. In what ways have religions legitimated societal oppression or subordination of women? What part does contemporary religion play in addressing issues of women’s inequality or oppression?