Time: T/Th 1 hour at 1:00-2:00 PM
Website: http://liveoakacademy.org/faculty/~jrose/civ
Mr. DePangher: http://liveoakacademy.org/faculty/~sdepangher
Class forum: http://rooms.liveoakacademy.org
Difficulty: college preparatory, 50-100 pages of reading per week
Students must obtain the following texts (especially the first two) before the first class meeting:
The Amazon links are provided as an example, and to make clear which edition is required. (Note that the links include the ISBN number.) There are three reasons it is important to get the specified edition. We will routinely refer to passages by page number. Also, some translations have been specifically selected by the teachers. Most importantly, students will be encouraged throughout the course to make notes directly in their books.
Students must also complete the initial reading assignment http://liveoakacademy.org/faculty/~jrose/civ/Week01.html before class. The teachers will post weekly assignments into this folder.
This class is planned for four semesters, starting in Fall 2006. We will survey the great conversation among history’s most eminent thinkers and writers, from Moses and Plato to Nietzsche and beyond modernism. Unlike many similar classes, the heart of our survey is the Incarnation of the Son of God, and the immediate cultural and intellectual effects of Christianity as it both confronted and integrated pre-Christian culture. Branching backward from there, we survey the Jewish and Greek roots of European thought. We then trace forward through the high-medieval synthesis of Christianity with the requirements of worldly rule. In the second year we will consider the transformative controversies of the Renaissance and Reformation, and finally the multiple revolutions of the modern period.
Most of our reading is in primary sources, written by many of the most eminent and admired (or hated) thinkers of all time. Our goal is first to understand each thinker on his own terms, as he would have understood himself, second to understand his thinking as an element in the centuries-long controversy and dialogue of great ideas, and third to let that Great Conversation illuminate our own world view in the present day. We will take this respectful approach this even in cases where the thinker in question is an enemy our Christian faith, in part for moral reasons, but also because we wish to test and refine our own stand by a candid examination of our philosophical opponents.
Grades in this class will depend fundamentally on your demonstrated comprehension of the readings. You, the student, are expected to participate in class discussions (in-person and on-line), to write weekly responses and journalings of your reading assignments, to produce occasional formal papers and presentations, including an end-of-year thesis, and to pass written tests (multiple-choice and mini-essay). Grading will depend about one third on participation, and two thirds on major tests and presentations, including semester finals. Further details may be found in a file named EvaluationRubric.
This class is introductory in nature. We will be reading some of the most profound books ever written, at a rapid pace. We do not expect students to fully master these books; we would not expect even adults to master them. However, we hope that students will come away with a sense of familiarity with these great writers, and of their helpfulness in understanding the human nature and condition. We intend that alumni of this class meet the great writers again, and greet them with pleased recognition, and a readiness to go deeper the second time. This has indeed been the experience of many alumni in college and afterwards.