Person and Social Responsibility Linda S. Riviere

PL/TH 088 06 MWF 2 Office Hours: MF 1-2

Discussion Group W 11 or W 1 Office: Carney 273

Fall 2001 Office Phone: 552-3848

This two-semester, twelve-credit course fulfills all core requirements in Philosophy and Theology. This course consists of two components: the classroom and the city. The city component entails a significant yearlong commitment to one of the community service programs sponsored by the PULSE program. Your performance at this placement will constitute 40% of your final grade. The remaining 60% of your grade will be determined by your classroom performance (see below requirements). This also includes your regular participation in a weekly discussion group.

The PULSE program operates under the assumption that what we read can alter our experiences and that what we experience can shed light on what we read. Together we will embark on a journey which will involve trying to understand the ‘stories’ of those we meet at our placement as well as our own ‘stories’ in the process. Who have we become? Why do we believe what we believe? Where are we going? We will then take these experiences back to the classroom where we will read texts written by some of the most influential thinkers of the western tradition. The stories and ideas we will encounter in these texts and/or the questions raised in them may be used as guides in our discussions to help us reflect our experiences both in our placements and outside of them. In other words, this class is an attempt to make intellectual reflection a practical endeavor, one which allows the great books of philosophy and theology to speak directly to those issues which shape not only ourselves but the society in which we live.

Always keep in mind that we are reading some the greatest works ever written, but reading is not a passive activity. The brain is a muscle, not a sponge, and so the idea here is not to absorb what these thinkers are telling us. Rather, we need to challenge the texts, engage in a dialogue with them, and thereby attempt to articulate our own intelligent responses to the ideas they present.

"The whole point of stories is not ‘solutions’ or ‘resolutions’ but a broadening and even a heightening of our struggles - with new protagonists and antagonists introduced, with new sources of concern or apprehension or hope, as one’s mental life accommodates itself to a series of arrivals: guests who have a way staying, but not necessarily staying put." Robert Coles, The Call of Stories

Alan Arkin, The Lemming Condition

Robert Coles, The Call of Service

Jean-Paul Sartre, "Existentialism is a Humanism" (handout)

Jonathan Kozol, Amazing Grace

Plato, The Trial and Death of Socrates

Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics

Leo Tolstoy, The Death of Ivan Ilyich (handout)

The Bible

Albert Camus, The Plague

Michael J. Himes, Doing the Truth in Love

1. Written Midterm Examination
2. Oral Final Examination
3. Full participation in your field assignment at a PULSE sponsored community service organization: Students are responsible for taking an active role in the selection of their placement through a process facilitated by the PULSE program staff. The details of this process will be discussed in class. If you are not present for that explanation or if you are encountering difficulties in the placement process, it is up to you to be sure that you speak with me or seek assistance and information at the PULSE office.

1. Participation in class and the weekly discussion group is essential and will receive a grade at the end of the semester. You are expected to ask questions (especially when you do not understand something), make comments about the readings, share connections to your placements and, in general, support your classmates by being prepared to discuss issues raised during discussion/class. Further, you will be responsible for preparing a discussion topic during assigned meetings of our discussion group. I may also ask you to prepare written questions on the reading and present them to the rest of the class.
2. Regular class attendance, with that day’s reading assignment completed, is expected. Consistent lack of preparation and/or regular absence will result in a reduction of the grade at the instructor’s discretion.

Person and Social Responsibility Linda S. Riviere

PL/TH 089 06 MWF Office Hours: MF 1-2

Discussion Group W 11 or W 1 Office: Carney 273

Spring 2002 Office Phone: 552-3848

This is the continuation of the two-semester, twelve-credit course offered through the PULSE Program and fulfilling all core requirements in philosophy and theology. Discussion groups will resume on Wednesday, January 30 and will follow a similar format to that of last semester. Placement work should begin immediately according to the schedule you have arranged for the first semester, unless you have agreed to a new schedule with your supervisor. If, in light of your first semester placement evaluation, you want to renegotiate your learning work agreement, or redefine the goals on which you will be evaluated, you should take this up with your supervisor as soon as possible. This semester you will again be doing a number of journals and one paper. And being that this is the second semester, my expectations concerning the fulfillment of many of the requirements below will be higher than they were first semester. In other words, I expect greater participation in both the discussion groups and class. In addition, I expect your journals and papers to achieve a deeper level of thought and understanding.

St. Augustine, Confessions

Bible, Luke

Robert Coles, The Call of Service

Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Grand Inquisitor

Raphael Ezekiel, The Racist Mind

Himes, Doing the Truth in Love

Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan

Jane Jacobs, The Death and Life of Great American Cities

Franz Kafka, The Metamorphosis

Martin Luther King, Jr., ‘Letter from a Birmingham Jail’ (Handout)

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Basic Political Writings

Charles Taylor, The Ethics of Authenticity

Patricia Williams, Seeing a Color-Blind Future

1. Written Midterm Examination.
2. Oral Final Examination.

1. Participation in class and the weekly discussion group is essential. You are expected to accept the obligation to ask questions (especially when you do not understand something) and support your classmates by being prepared to discuss issues raised during class. Class participation will raise or reduce your final grade at the instructor’s discretion.