The Curriculum
Each semester, members lead 50 to 60 courses. All courses have weekly reading assignments but do not have exams, papers, or grades. Each member participates in one to three courses during each of the two semesters. They may also take lecture courses during the January and June intersessions.
Classes are offered once a week for two hours, 10 am to noon or 1 to 3 pm, with a short coffee break. The semesters are 12 to 13 weeks, from mid-September to mid-December, and mid-February to mid-May. Some courses run for only six or seven weeks, providing flexibility for members’ schedules. Courses cover a range of liberal arts disciplines—history, politics, literature and poetry, art and architecture, music, science, and technology—and change each semester. Following is a selection of typical courses.
Sample Course Offerings
Cognitive Linguistics
Readings: Ronald W. Langacker, Foundations of Cognitive Grammar, Volume I: Theoretical Prerequisites (Stanford University Press, 1987) $27
Cognitive linguistics is a widely recognized approach to understanding the nature of language—what it is, how it works. Cognitive linguists see language as deriving from general mental abilities such as categorizing and generalizing, not from a special-purpose language capacity. Detailed analysis of language therefore reveals a good deal about how thought is structured and how the mind works. We will study a text by a leader of the cognitive linguistics school, Ronald Langacker. Prior knowledge of linguistics is not essential, but the ability to absorb a large amount of technical information is. Assignments will average 40 pages of very close reading per week.
Chicago: City of the Millennium
Readings: Jay Pridmore and George A. Larson, Chicago Architecture and Design, rev.ed. (Harry N. Abrams Inc., 2005) $34.65. The study group leaders will also provide relevant handouts and offer PowerPoint presentations in class.
Architect Helmut Jahn describes Chicago as a “city of sleek towers and big shoulders, a city that loves elegance but needs to be gritty and real.” Its bold structures represent a Who’s Who of celebrity architects and leading design firms. This course will explore Chicago’s extraordinary architecture from the late nineteenth century to the present: the early classical skyscrapers that arose from the ashes of the Great Fire of 1871, the organic Prairie style of Frank Lloyd Wright, the Arts and Crafts and Deco period, the great steel and glass towers of Mies van der Rohe, the iconoclastic I.T.T. Campus Center of Rem Koolhaas and Frank Gehry’s spectacular music pavilion at Millennium Park. A trip to Chicago the weekend of October 19–21 will provide class members the opportunity to view a city that reveres its architectural heritage yet fosters new technologies and inventive design. Readings will require approximately three hours per week.
China’s Rise and What It Means to Asia
Readings: David Shambaugh, ed., Power Shift: China And Asia’s New Dynamics, 1st ed. (University of California Press, 2005) $23.70, pbk; Robert G. Sutter, China’s Rise: Implications for US Leadership in Asia, 1st ed. (Rowman & Littlefield, 2005) $10, pbk
This course will look at present-day China and how its surrounding neighbors are affected by China’s tremendous economic and military growth, rising political influence, and increasing involvement in regional multilateral institutions. We will also examine how China’s rise will impact America and the world. The course is essentially a repeat of “China: The Rise of the Next Superpower,” offered in the fall of 2006, but with the new focus of its relationship to the surrounding countries of Asia. Readings will be about three hours a week and presentations are expected. A guest speaker will address the class at the end of the course.
Orhan Pamuk and his Turkey
Readings: Orhan Pamuk, Snow (Faber & Faber, 2005) $15; Istanbul: Memories And The City (Vintage International, 2006) $15
Orhan Pamuk, the 2006 Nobel Prize winner in literature, evokes his native Turkey in both his novels and essays. We shall read his novel Snow and his collection of essays Istanbul, Memories and the City and augment our understanding of Turkish political, social, and cultural life through selected handouts. Class members should expect to spend four hours reading each week and to participate in class discussion.
Hablemos Español
Readings: In lieu of a text, course materials will be provided by the study group leaders.
Esta es una clase de conversacion en español, que requiere a los estudiantes un conocimiento del idioma a un nivel intermedio. El curso incluye la lectura y discusion de poemas, cuentos cortos, repaso de la gramatica y tambien las noticias corrientes ,que presentaremos en video o por presentaciones individuales. De vez en cuando escucharemos musica hispana en CD e invitaremos personas de habla española de Espana y Latinoamerica para conversar con nosotros. Nuestro objetivo es de facilitar conversacion en español mediante la participacion de todos los estudiantes, creando un ambiente animado.
The Late String Quartets of Beethoven
Readings: Robert Winter and Robert Martin, eds., The Beethoven Quartet Companion (University of California Press, 1994) $22; Beethoven, The Late String Quartets and the Gross Fuge (Dover Miniature Scores, 1998) $7. Also recommended: Lewis Lockwood, Beethoven. The Music and the Life (W.W. Norton, 2003) $20.
During the final years of his life Beethoven focused almost exclusively on the composition of six string quartets that to many represent his greatest creative achievement. Sharply differentiated from one another yet closely interrelated, they belong to a rarified sphere far removed from the “heroic” Beethoven of the more public symphonies and concertos. We will study the late quartets against the background of his own earlier works in this genre and in the context of his time and ours. Ability to read music is helpful but not required. Two to three hours of reading and focused listening per week.
This is Your Life!: Memoir Writing
Have you always wanted to write your story? Procrastinate no longer. The events of your life are unique. Memoir writing is a remarkable genre, allowing for great freedom of expression. We will discuss how to quell your inner censors; determine the form of your personal story; discover your writer’s voice and style; develop vivid vignettes through language choice and sensory memory; and experience the joy (and discipline) of writing and rewriting. Four members’ stories, each ranging from a few pages to a completed chapter, will be critiqued each week. Multimedia presentations (photos, drawings, scrap-booking, audio, video) will be encouraged. Class size limited to 12.
Salon Français: La Belle Epoque
Readings: Handouts to be distributed weekly by the co-leaders
Dans ce cours en français avancé nous étudierons la Belle Epoque (1890–1918) et le Modernisme. Nous parlerons d’abord de la politique et de l’histoire, qui rappellent celles que nous vivons actuellement. Il y avait à cette époque une floraison de tous les arts. Pensez à Picasso et Matisse, à Stravinsky et Satie, à Proust et Gide. Chaque membre du groupe sera responsable d’au moins une heure de classe consacrée à un sujet choisi par lui (elle) ou proposé par les “leaders.” Une ou deux heures de lecture chaque semaine.
Karen Armstrong and A History of God
Readings: Karen Armstrong, A History of God (Ballantine Books, 1994), $16, pbk
This course will carefully consider Karen Armstrong’s 1993 book A History of God. We begin with the premise that throughout recorded history mankind has demonstrated a sense of wonder and mystery as part of the human experience, often expressed as a search for something “other.” Her book traces the ever-changing and often contradictory ways in which men and women have conceived and defined God in the three monotheistic religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam with some material on the religions of Asia. Is compassion the sine qua non of religion? Are we now in a new axial age, as she posits, to change these religions to better work for their adherents? There will be a lively discussion. The course will require two to three hours of reading per week.
Caesar and the Last Days of the Roman Republic
Readings: Adrian Goldsworthy, Caesar, Life of a Colossus (Yale UP, 2006) $15, pbk; Tom Holland, Rubicon: The Last Years of the Roman Republic (Anchor Books, 2005) $12, pbk
In January 49 BC, Caesar’s 13th Legion crossed the Rubicon, violating Rome’s sacrosanct boundaries. A civil war ensued which brought about chaos and the end of nearly 500 years of the Roman republic. These were tumultuous days marked by corruption, violence, bitter partisanship, and personal vendettas. Centuries of tradition, customs, and laws were bypassed or repealed. Established checks and balances failed. For more than nine years Caesar’s legions fought and eventually pacified all of Gaul, bringing wealth, peace, and respect to Caesar and to Rome. Nevertheless, political instability and Caesar’s own ambition would bring him to a Hobson’s choice. Reading will be approximately 50 pages per week. Presentations not required but strongly encouraged.
Theory of Relativity, Quantum Mechanics, and the Nature of Reality
Readings: Martin Gardner, Relativity Simply Explained (Dover Publications, 1997) $12, pbk; David Lindley, Where Does the Weirdness Go? Why Quantum Mechanics is Strange, but Not as Strange as You Think (Basic Books, 1996) $18, pbk
Few revolutions in science have had greater influence on our perception of the physical universe than the theories of relativity and quantum mechanics. Without the use of mathematical equations, Martin Gardner and David Lindley have provided lucid and entertaining explanations of both, which the class will study under the guidance of the group leader. We will then discuss and debate the philosophical implications of these theories. About 30 pages of reading per class will be required.