-
Tuesday, April 4
- : (no reading, first class).
-
Thursday, April 6
- : No class due to the first day of Passover.
-
Monday, April 10
- : 3:20–4:55pm, via Zoom only. Jonathan Edwards
(1703–1758), Dissertation Concerning the Nature of True Virtue
(published posthumously, 1765), selections.
-
Tuesday, April 11
- : Via Zoom only. Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826), the
Declaration of Independence; Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832), “Short
Review of the Declaration” (1776); Benjamin Banneker (1731–1806) (and
Thomas Jefferson), Copy of a Letter from Benjamin Banneker to the
Secretary of State, with his Answer (1792); William Apess (1798–1839),
short selection from Indian Nullification (1835); Harriet Martineau
(1802–1878), short selection from Society in America (1837); Margaret
Fuller (1810–1850), “The Fourth of July” (1845).
-
Thursday, April 13
- : No class, due to the eighth day of Passover.
-
Monday, April 17
- : 3:20–4:55pm, via Zoom only. Ralph Waldo Emerson
(1803–1882), “The American Scholar” (1837).
-
Tuesday, April 18
- : Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862), “Civil Disobedience”
(1849).
-
Thursday, April 20
- : Thoreau, Walden (1854), “Economy,” pp. 1–7 (through
“on that basis”), 10–13 (from “If I should attempt” to “of the earth”), 47–52
(from “But all this is very” through “like the cypress”); “Solitude” pp. 84–8
(from “There is commonly” through “friends sometimes”); “Visitors,”
pp. 93–100 (from “As for men” through “that race”); “The Village,”
pp. 108–12; “Baker Farm,” pp. 130–36; “Brute Neighbors,” pp. 148–50
(from “I was witness” through “Fugitive-Slave Bill”); “Conclusion,”
pp. 206–16.
-
Tuesday, April 25
- : Josiah Royce (1855–1916), Philosophy of Loyalty (1910),
ch. 2.
-
Thursday, April 27
- : Royce, Philosophy of Loyalty, ch.’s 3–5 (selections).
-
Tuesday, May 2
- : Jane Addams (1860–1935), Democracy and Social Ethics
(1902), ch. 1 and selections from ch.’s 2, 5, and 7. First writing
assignment due.
-
Thursday, May 4
- : Voltairine de Cleyre (1866–1912), “Anarchism” (1901);
“Anarchism and American Traditions” (1908/9); “The Dominant Idea”
(1910).
-
Tuesday, May 9
- : W.E.B. Du Bois (1868–1963), “The Conservation of Races”
(1897); from The Souls of Black Folk: Essays and Sketches (1903): “The
Forethought”; “Of Our Spiritual Strivings”; “Of the Wings of Atalanta”;
“Of the Faith of the Fathers”; “Of the Sorrow Songs”.
-
Thursday, May 11
- : Du Bois, from Darkwater: Voices from within the Veil
(1920): “Credo”; “The Souls of White Folk”; “The Riddle of the Sphinx”;
“Of the Ruling of Men”; “Beauty and Death”.
-
Tuesday, May 16
- : John Dewey (1859–1952), Individualism, Old and New
(1930), ch. 1–5 (pp. 5–49).
-
Thursday, May 18
- : Dewey, Individualism, Old and New, ch.’s 6–8
(pp. 50–93).
-
Tuesday, May 23
- : George Grant (1918–1988), Lament for a Nation: the
Defeat of Canadian Nationalism (1965), ch.’s 3–5 (pp. 26–66). For
background, you may want to look at the Wikipedia article on John
Diefenbaker, especially this section and this section.
-
Thursday, May 25
- : Via Zoom only (due to the first day of Shavuot).
Grant, Lament for a Nation, ch.’s 6–7, and Afterword (by Sheila Grant)
(pp. 67–99).
-
Tuesday, May 30
- : V.F. Cordova (1935–2002), How It Is: The Native
American Philosophy of V.F. Cordova, “Bridges” (pp. 11–45), “Windows
on Academics” and “Windows on Native American Philosophy”
(pp. 49–60); “They Have a Different Idea about That …” (pp. 69–75);
“Becoming Human” (pp. 165–70). Second writing assignment due.
-
Thursday, June 1
- : Ta-Nehisi Coates (1975–), Between the World and Me
(2015), beginning of part I (pp. 1–39, through “Perhaps we should return
to Mecca”).
-
Tuesday, June 6
- : Coates, Between the World and Me, end of part I and
beginning of part II (pp. 39–114, through “We were right”).
-
Thursday, June 8
- : Coates, Between the World and Me, end of part II and
part III (pp. 114–152).
-
Wednesday, June 14
- : Final paper due.
