Spring 1999 Newsletter : Course Descriptions : Curriculum : Clark Honors College

Who: Spring, Summer and Fall 1999 graduates, their families and thesis advisers, HC faculty and staff
When: Friday, June 11, 1999 7:00 p.m.
Where: West lawn in front of Chapman Hall

We have scheduled the Honors College graduation reception for the evening before commencement to avoid conflicting with other ceremonies, in the hope that all 1999 HC graduates will be able to attend. This is a memorable occasion, so don’t miss it.

A number of awards, including several honorary fellowships, will be presented to outstanding graduating seniors. In addition, the Andrea Gellatly Memorial Honors College Scholarship will be awarded to the Honors College woman who, upon completing her junior year, best embodies the qualities that distinguished Andrea Gellatly, a 1979 graduate of the HC. The selection committee, comprised of HC faculty, will particularly look for the qualities of academic excellence, breadth of interest, and genuine social concern which characterized Ms. Gellatly. If you would like to be considered for this award, please drop by the office for more information.

You must complete the Final Thesis Information form at least three weeks before your defense date. See Matt or Janice in the HC Office.

Senior Thesis Seminar must be taken at least two terms before graduation. Therefore all students planning to graduate Spring 2000 should take Senior Seminar Fall Term. Those who wish to enroll in Senior Seminar must file the pink "Application for Enrollment in Senior Seminar" form with Matt, the HC Receptionist, before they can enroll or get on the wait list to enroll. Be forewarned that spaces may be limited.

Seniors should see their HC advisor for a formal graduation analysis as early as possible and then have Janice Marshall in the HC Office check their file to be sure that no other analysis will be needed. Seniors should also have a graduation analysis done in their major department.

Seniors need to see Janice Marshall, graduation and thesis coordinator, to reserve both an Honors College professor to be on their thesis committee and the week in which they can hold their oral defense. There is a limit of one oral per week for each HC professor, so don't delay--the weeks get booked quickly in some cases! Don't assume you can get the HC faculty member of your choice. Thesis assignments are allocated as equally as possible among professors.

No Oral Defense of Thesis will be scheduled during or after the final two weeks of the term (Dead Week and finals week) nor during the vacation breaks during the nine-month academic year.

New System: Once you have scheduled a week with Janice, students in the new system (having taken Senior Seminar Fall 1998 or thereafter), need to submit the purple "Final Thesis Information form" to Matt, HC Receptionist, no later than three weeks before their oral defense.

Old System: Those in the old system (either having orals scheduled for Winter 1999 or having taken Senior Seminar before Fall 1998) should see Janice and follow the yellow card system.

HC Senior Research Fellowships are available for 1998-99. Because the senior thesis and an oral examination are mandatory for graduation from the Honors College, it is very important--for some, essential--to be able to count on financial help with the expenses of producing a thesis. Typical expenses reimbursed are: costs of books required but unavailable in libraries, copying expenses, lab equipment and long distance phone calls connected with research.

In order to receive fellowship support, students must submit receipts and a form to the HC office after the final two copies of the thesis have been turned in. Emergency requests for funds in advance of completion of the thesis may be submitted for special review anytime after the senior thesis prospectus, signed by the faculty advisor, has been submitted to the HC.

The Honors College plans to award scholarships to continuing students during Spring Term for the 1999-2000 academic year. To qualify you must have been enrolled in the Honors College since at least Fall Term of this academic year, and be full-time (minimum of 12 credits per term) for the 1999-00 academic year. The criteria for selection are academic achievement and contributions to the HC community. Applications are available in the HC office. Deadline for submitting applications is Friday of Dead Week, March 12. Please note: scholarships cannot be carried over to the 2000-01 academic year.

1) Anyone who decides not to graduate from the HC needs to pay a visit to the Director of Composition in the English Department to discuss the University writing requirements. These requirements are fulfilled for HC students only upon completion of the thesis and all other HC requirements.

Students must have at least a 3.0 grade point average in order to graduate from the Honors College. Students whose GPA falls to a 2.7 or lower will be given two terms to raise their average. If this does not occur, students may then petition to remain with us. If no petition is filed, students' files will be made inactive, and their names removed from the roster.

This course will give students the basic tools of library research, including the Internet, electronic databases and primary sources, such as newspapers and periodicals of various time periods. Students will learn how to develop research strategies and practices.

This course was designed especially for HC students and is highly recommended as an adjunct to the literature and history sequences as well as preparation for the senior thesis.

In this course we will focus on how extreme behavior is characterized and constructed as appropriate or inappropriate in selected writings from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. We will ask such questions as how extreme behavior is defined and portrayed within a work, a time, a cultural (especially gendered or racial) role. Is madness seen as an illness, as an evil, or perhaps even as the only "sane" response to a given situation? Is it creative or destructive? We will also examine whether and how the boundaries between madness and sanity can be blurred or even completely reversed. In other words, under what conditions might individuals, groups, or societies condone or redefine madness? Can mad behavior ever contribute positively to societies? Can entire societies be mad?

Focus will be on close reading and discussion. Writing assignments will include papers, a journal, and a final exam. Texts will include Charlotte Perkins Gilman, "The Yellow Wallpaper;" Franz Kafka, The Trial; Anna Seghers, The Seventh Cross; Christa Wolf, Cassandra; and Toni Morrison, Beloved; as well as a selection of poems. Videos of several works will be shown or placed on reserve.

CRN 32998: MWF 9:00-9:50 307 CHA
CRN 32999: MWF 11:00-11:50 307 CHA
Prof. Jan Emerson

The texts are Goethe's Faust, Keats's "The Eve of St. Agnes," Eliot's Adam Bede, Dostoevsky's "The Grand Inquisitor," Tolstoy's "The Death of Ivan Ilych," Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway, and a collection of verse.

We will be studying the breakdown of the old heroic model (Goethe) and the rise of a new one, which applies to both men and women (Eliot, Woolf). In addition, there will be an emphasis on the invention of new tragic forms (Tolstoy, Woolf), new epic forms (Goethe, Keats, and Eliot), with a look at Adam, Eve, Satan, and Ulysses (Eliot, Goethe, Dostoevsky and Tennyson) in their new nineteenth- and twentieth-century embodiments. Approximately half the course will be given to two novels, Adam Bede and Mrs. Dalloway.

Writing assignments will continue to emphasize the close reading of fiction and poetry. There will be short papers, a research paper, and a journal. Once again, we will have in-class debates, including one concerning censorship.

From the flamboyant wilds of European Romanticism to the minimalism and surrealism of modernism and postmodernism, this course will continue the theme of identity from fall term. How do we know who we are, and how do romanticism, modernism, and postmodernism define the individual? How does literature of the last two centuries define what is human? How has literature met the challenges of revolution, Darwin, science, colonialism, fascism, and nihilism? And where do we go from here in the next millennium?

We’ll be reading Goethe, George Eliot, Franz Kafka, Chinua Achebe, Arundhati Roy, and Tom Stoppard. Requirements will include class presentations, reaction papers, a term paper, and a final exam.

CRN 33001: UH 9:30-10:50 307 CHA
CRN 33002: UH 14:00-15:20 307 CHA
Prof. Louise Bishop

This term we will explore the theme of "Individual versus Society" as it is reflected primarily in fiction (novels, novellas, and short stories). We will study various elements of fiction, such as character, setting, plot, and point of view, and how different authors of different nationalities, races, and genders manipulate each of these elements to achieve particular effects and enhance the argument for either individual rights or society's rights. We will also analyze some drama and romantic poetry. Works studied will include: Cyrano de Bergerac (Rostand); All Quiet on the Western Front (Remarque); My Life and Hard Times (Thurber); Count of Monte Cristo (Dumas, père); The Color Purple (Walker); Woman Warrior (Kingston); My Brilliant Career (Franklin).

Instruction will also be given in the selection, evaluation, and use of sources, as well as in the framing of research questions, the uses of quoted material in papers, and methods of documentation. We will be using the Bedford Handbook, 4th edition.

The final exam will be a take-home essay. Papers will count for 60% of the final grade; final exam 30%; research skills 10%. Class format is lecture combined with guided group discussion.

This term we will cover European history from the French Revolution through the collapse of the Soviet Union and the reorganization of Eastern Europe. The first half of this course will focus on the rise of a new bourgeois society in the age of the Industrial Revolution. We will study the social and economic reforms that bound this new society together, as well as the political ideologies and cultural revolts that resisted its development. In this context we will discuss Conservatism, Liberalism, Feminism, Romanticism, and Europe’s growing Nationalism. We will also explore Europe’s continued Imperialism and read accounts of this encroachment from non-European perspectives. The second half of this course will begin with the rise of Fascism, World War II, and the Holocaust. It will end with the re-unification of Europe in 1989. Our discussions will include how these events have transformed our perceptions of human rights, religious tolerance/intolerance, and racism. The reading will include a packet of primary and secondary sources, two novels and a play.

This course will look at culture, politics, and society from 1789 to the present in Europe and North America as well as European colonial contact with India and Africa. Our theme will be "self and society": we will study individuals who "unmask" the cultural, political, social, and/or economic oppression of the modern world and raise the question of what kind of community we want to live in. Focusing on this theme, we will be able to shed light on the following historical topics: the significance of the French Revolution, challenging the Industrial Revolution, the crisis of morality in Europe, European feminism, the Holocaust, the Cold War, anti-colonialism, the native-American and African-American struggles in late 20^th century America, and being Chicana and lesbian in late 20^th-century America.

Readings will be selections from Alexis de Tocqueville’s The Old Regime and the French Revolution, Karl Marx, Friedrich Nietzsche’s The Genealogy of Morals, Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own, the short stories of Ida Fink in A Scrap of Time, Milan Kundera’s novel, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting, the Sioux Lame Deer’s Lame Deer: Seeker of Visions, The Autobiography of Malcolm X, and Cherrie Moraga’s Loving in the War Years.

CRN 33005: MWF 14:00-14:50 307 CHA
CRN 33006: MWF 15:00-15:50 307 CHA
Prof. Paul Petrequin

"Social Change, Political Theories, and Cultural Forms Since the French Revolution"

This course will focus on the social upheavals that accompanied the rise of industrial capitalism and on the political theories and cultural forms that arose in response to them. The first part of the course will focus on the evolution of bourgeois society and on its social and gender conflicts. We will study the political theories of liberal and radical democracy, conservatism, early socialism, and liberal and socialist feminism; and we will look at bourgeois cultural forms and the critiques of them by Romantic and modernist artists and writers. We will also follow the course, and analyze the consequences, of the imperialist expansion of Western nations. We will attempt to gain an understanding of the character of Western civilization by analyzing Western conquest of the non-Western world, the culture of imperialism, and the effects of imperialism on the society and culture of conquered people.

The second part of the course will begin with an analysis of the European "civil wars" of 1914-1945. This section will begin with a brief study of World War I. Then we will focus on the Russian Revolution and the emergence of Soviet Communism and on the rise of fascism, especially Nazism in Germany. We will conclude this section with the self-destruction of Europe and the emergence of the United States and the Soviet Union as "superpowers."

The final part of the course, on the period since World War II, will cover such themes: "Cold-Warism;" theories of social engineering, technocracy, and the end of ideology; theories of anti-colonial revolution including Franz Fanon and liberation theology; the New Left of the 1960s; and the upheavals in the Soviet Union and the Eastern block in the 1980's.

CRN 33007: UH 11:00-12:20 307 CHA
CRN 33008: UH 14:00-15:20 203 CHA
Prof. Joseph Fracchia

This course covers the political, cultural, social and intellectual history of Europe from the French Revolution to the end of the twentieth century. We will focus on the continuing development of the West’s role on the world stage and the momentous changes Western culture and civilization have undergone in the past two hundred years, with an eye to exploring the power of ideas and their effect on individual lives. Topics to be covered will include industrialization and the growth of social movements and ideologies, the waxing and waning of Western colonialism, the rise of automated warfare and ethnic conflict, the aesthetics of modernism, the structures of totalitarianism and the Cold War, and the emergence of a new Europe at the close of the twentieth century. While presenting a variety of texts, readings will highlight the ability of literary accounts to explore historical issues and problems. Assignments will include a mid-term, a research paper, and a final exam.

Most of us live in a common-sense reality You know your bed is still in your apartment even though you can’t see it, you know you are alive and rocks are not, and you know what time is. But science says that common sense is an illusion, that reality is far more mysterious than it seems.

In this course, taught by Dennis Todd, biologist, and Robert L. Zimmerman, physicist, we will concentrate on our fundamental assumptions about time, reality, and life. We will ask: What is life? Is there life elsewhere in the Universe? Will extraterrestrial life be like us? What is real? Does your bed really exist? What is time? Quantum physics, relativity and molecular biology will give us answers that are profoundly different from the everyday beliefs that most of us hold.

We will probe the limits of science’s ability to investigate questions that appear to border on science fiction. We will discuss the implications, both scientific and social, of these cutting edge technologies and theories and the questions they raise: Is there a limit to cloning? What are the promises and pitfalls of genetic engineering? What is the difference between living and non-living things? Do we create our own realities through our observations and beliefs? Can quantum mechanics lead to ultimate computers? Can Einstein’s theory be used to make machines that allow time travel?

This three-term course is designed for non-science majors. No background in physics, chemistry, biology, or mathematics is required. The terms need not be taken in sequence. Students will write two papers and give one oral presentation. Open book exams. There will be two hour-and-a-half lectures and one lab period per week.

The spring section examines the individual in the social world--the development of personality and social relations, the regularities of social perception and social interaction, and psychopathology. The focus is on an empirical approach to understanding human behavior. Students work on a term project and participate in discussions in the lab, keep a weekly electronic journal, write two short reaction papers, and complete several short quizzes. Readings from the text (Westin, 1996) are supplemented with primary journal articles.

This course will examine Victorian theories of crime as presented in novels of the period 1830-1900. We will study such arcane subjects as Victorian criminal anthropology, theories of reform, penology, and "moral insanity," as well as the "types" of criminals (instinctive, habitual, professional, and occasional.) We will also explore, briefly, advances in the sciences of detection, including the use of body measurement and fingerprinting.

While studying criminal anthropology and assorted other subjects, we will investigate the way in which such theories play a strategic role in the nineteenth century novel. We will study the Newgate novel, the 19th-century "detective novel," the social romance, the novel of psychological realism, and the naturalistic novella. Authors and works covered will include: Oliver Twist (Dickens), Les Misérables (Hugo), Crime and Punishment (Dostoievski), Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (Stevenson), Sherlock Holmes (Doyle), and Maggie (Crane).

Requirements: two medium length critical papers (5-7 pages) and an essay final examination. An oral report on a work of outside reading may substitute for one paper. The course will be run in modified seminar style, with some lecture and frequent discussion. Reading will be approximately 100 pages per week.

HC 312H CRN 35484 4 Credits
18^TH-CENTURY NOVELS EAST AND WEST:
THE DREAM OF THE RED CHAMBER AND CLARISSA

A comparative study of two of the greatest eighteenth-century novels, each written at roughly the same time, but emerging from very different cultural milieux. It is hoped that, by reading these novels side by side, we will become particularly alert to the distinctive traits of each novel and each tradition. We will pay careful attention to questions of literary genre and style; to the novelists’ extraordinary understanding of human psychology, to the central importance of women in both novels; and to religion, especially in regard to how fiction conveys an experiential—as opposed to a rigidly doctrinal—understanding of Buddhism, in the case of The Dream of the Red Chamber, and of Christianity, in the case of Clarissa.

Weekly response papers (one page), of a comparative nature; a midterm paper (5-7 pages); final paper (10-15 pages).

THE FOLLOWING NON-HC COURSE WILL SATISFY PART OF THE ARTS AND LETTERS REQUIREMENT FOR HC STUDENTS. IT IS OPEN ONLY TO STUDENTS WITH JUNIOR STANDING OR ABOVE. THE ENGLISH DEPARTMENT GIVES US 7 PLACES IN THE CLASS. IF YOU WISH TO RESERVE ONE OF THOSE SPACES, COME TO THE HC OFFICE. YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BE AN ENGLISH MAJOR.

Many critics have argued that concrete though reality may be, the process through which we apprehend it is informed by language and discursive constructs. The implication here is that it is pre-constituted (and constantly re-constituted) assumptions and conceptual horizons which shape and give the authority of "truth" and "concreteness" to what we cannot but take to be reality. In this seminar, we shall explore the bearing this idea may have on the way we read literary texts (and perhaps also the way we lead our lives), by examining works that deal with the reality we know as Africa. We will begin with Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and the debate about it between Chinua Achebe (a Nigerian novelist) and Wilson Harris (a West Indian writer and critic); thereafter, the rest of our reading list will be drawn from texts by African, African-American, and Afro-Caribbean authors. Closely following the various rhetorical devices used to figure Africa in our chosen texts, we shall discuss the roles Africa is made to play and the divergencies or incompatibilities between the different "Africas’ thus imagined. Throughout students will be pressed to think carefully and intensively about representation (that is, how the material world enters or is given shape in literature), its possible limitations, and its capabilities.

"The psyche is distinctly more complicated and inaccessible than the body. It is, so to speak, the half of the world which comes into existence only when we become conscious of it. For that reason the psyche is not only a personal but a world problem, and the psychiatrist has to deal with an entire world." - Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961)

"Insanity in individuals is rare--but in groups, parties, nations, and epochs, it is the rule." - Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900)

A child bounces around the classroom, unable to sit still and learn the day’s lessons. He is diagnosed with attention deficit disorder. Another child sits without moving, seemingly deaf and blind to her surroundings--the diagnosis is autism. A woman with obsessive-compulsive disorder washes her hands a hundred times a day. A man, after suffering a stroke, can vividly remember events that happened decades ago but cannot remember what happened a minute ago. An elderly woman with Alzheimer’s disease gradually loses her ability to recognize loved ones and to care for herself. Members of the Fore tribe of Papua New Guinea suffer from progressive dementia after ingesting the brains of their deceased relatives; the infectious agent is a protein, also known from mad cow disease. A troop of soldiers, reasonable and responsible when acting as individuals, go berserk and slaughter a village of Vietnamese peasants. Nations go to war, at the cost of millions of lives, over issues that seem trivial in hindsight. Are there common threads that tie these mental maladies and social illnesses together? Or are their causes distinct, their manifestations unrelated?

In this course, we will examine mental health and psychopathology, on the level of the individual and the society, from the perspective of neurobiology, evolutionary biology, and psychology. Guest speakers, student presentations, and class discussions will provide a variety of perspectives on the nature of health and illness, the promises and challenges of treatment, and the techniques used in therapy and prevention.

Students will write weekly summaries of and responses to breaking medical news, give an oral presentation, and write one term paper. There will be no exams but attendance and punctuality are mandatory. The course is open to all HC students and may be repeated. There are no prerequisites except sophomore standing or above.

HC 415H CRN 33017 4 Credits
ISRAELIS AND PALESTINIANS:
NARRATIVES OF CONFLICT AND PEACE

In Israel/Palestine, Arabs and Jews live in close proximity and share an intertwined history. During this century, their relationship has been marked by conflict as each of them claims a common land. In this course, we will examine the Israeli-Palestinian conflict—its origins, evolution, and current status. In order to do so, we will explore both Palestinian and Israeli cultures. Our topics will include ethnicity and identity; ethnic, religious, and ideational conflict and cooperation; culture contact, stability and change, political ideology and the development of nationalism, and gender, power, and inequality. We will see the ways in which each side narrates its history and how these narrations tend to delegitimize and dehumanize the other. We will also look at alternative narratives—those that may led to a resolution to this emotion-charged conflict.

The course will consist of lectures and large and small group discussions. Our readings will include short stories, excerpts from novels, and poetry in addition to academic articles. We will also see several films. Grades will be based on class participation and on papers. Students have their choice of writing one 12-14 page paper or two shorter (6-7 page) papers.

THIS COURSE FULFILLS PART OF THE UO MULTICULTURAL REQUIREMENT IN THE CATEGORY OF INTERNATIONAL CULTURES.

All courses listed in this section may be taken only by making special arrangements with an HC faculty member prior to registering through Duck Call. First get a form from the HC office. Then fill in the necessary information after consulting with your instructor on the number of credits, grading option, and title of course to show on transcript. The form must be signed by the instructor. Submit this form to Matt or Carol in the HC office and we will enter your name and Social Security number in Banner, and you will then be able to register for the course through Duck Call. PLEASE DO NOT WAIT TILL THE LAST MINUTE TO DO THIS. Also remember that this is a 3-step process: instructor permission, pre-authorization by HC office, phone registration by student.

We will be studying representative authors from each of the four decades, 1960-1990: Kesey (1960’s), Baldwin (1970’s), Walker (1980’s), Leavitt (1980’s), and Morrison (1990’s).

The course will define recent literary trends in our country, some of them as they are happening now. There will be discussion, some lecture, along with assigned papers. Pre-requisite: sophomore standing or above.

FULFILLS MODERN BRITISH AND AMERICAN LITERATURE REQUIREMENT FOR ENGLISH MAJORS

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