EXPECTATIONS:

Students and instructor will arrive on time, neatly dressed, in a cheerful mood, anxious to learn, desirous of participating in ongoing intellectual discussion as part of  a community of scholars.   All assigned reading will be read by the day assigned; if it has not been, students will not come to class (on the other hand they need not be on time, neat, cheerful etc).  Once in class students and instructor will conduct themselves according to the standards of civilized behavior.   We are engaged in a serious intellectual pursuit.  You are expected to submit all work on time.  Make-up examinations, late papers, grades of Incomplete will be allowed (if at all) only after much begging and pleading.  If an Incomplete is assigned at the end of the semester, it will be made up in one month's time, or not at all.

As we work our way down the corridors of time we will also be looking at six intersecting themes which transcend time.  The first is on the value of history to people of the past and present.  The second relates to the advantages and disadvantages of democracy.  The third is on the origin of law, especially that which we call "just law."  The fourth is whether and why there are those who suffer injustice even within a democracy.  Fifth is the conflict and continuity between branches of government in democracies, or at least in proto-democracies.  Last is the question of what to do in democracy when justice does not prevail.

What follows is how I hope the semester will procede.  Assume that it will, even if I fall behind. (Truth be known, I don't think I've ever kept with a pre-arranged syllabus, but I'll catch up and don't want to find that you are not with me.)

Sept 1 Shout Across Time Preface and Chapter 1

Sept 3 Survey of ancient history Shout Across Time, chapter 2

Sept 6 No school (Labor Day)

Sept 8 Founders and Classics (Classical Conditioning)

Sept 10 Founders and Classics (Symbolism)

Sept 13 Founders and Classics (Models)

Sept 15 Founders and Classics (Anti-Models)

Sept 17 Founders and Classics (Mixed Government and Classical Pastorialism)

Sept 20 No Class (Yom Kippur. Other Roger Williams sections are in session)

Sept 22 Founders and Classics (Philosophy)

Sept 24 Euripides--Democracy and Despotism

Sept 27 EXAM I

Sept 29 Thucydides:  "Pericles' Funeral Oration" from The Peloponnesian War (B/D pp. 19ff).  Does the democracy described by Pericles sound like ours?  How is it different, how the same? Does Pericles have a hidden agenda?  If so, what do you think it might be, and what does this tell you about politicians then (and now)? ((Electronic Commonplace books due--part 1)

Oct 1 Thucydides: "The Melian Dialogue" (supplemental reading); Euripides:  The Trojan Women (supplemental reading).  Was Athenian democracy corrupted by war?  (Read both pieces before answering.)

Oct 4 "The Old Oligarch" (supplemental reading) Another view of democracy--this time a negative.

Oct 6  Comparison of the governments of Sparta and Athens

Oct 8 Aristotle: "Democratic Judgment and the middling' constitution."  From The Politics (B/D pp. 24ff).  Which of the several types of democracy described comes closest to our own?

Oct 11 No school, but . . .

Oct 12 Livy on the early Roman Republic, Mellor pp 148-246

Oct 13 Livy (continued)

Oct 15 Appian (on The Gracchi) Mellor pp. 61-75

Oct 18 Sallust (on the Catilinarian conspiracy) Mellor pp 78-111

Oct 20 Cicero on Government (supplemental reading)

Oct 22 EXAM II