Arts, Letters, and Science From the
Renaissance to the Age of Enlightenment
a version of the Austin College course
Heritage
of Western Culture (HWC) 101: The Early Western World
instructors:
Max Grober
VISION,
REFLECTION, DISCOVERY – Schedule of Meetings for 2006
All
lectures will be at 11 AM in Hoxie Thompson Auditorium. Discussions will be conducted in small
group classrooms at the times and places listed by section below..
All
reading assignments should be completed BEFORE class on the day specified.
Friday
Sept 1 Lecture: The Medieval Background Hoxie
Thompson
Monday Sept 4 Lecture:
ÒNature had more power than his intelligenceÓ Hoxie
Thompson Read: Boccaccio, The Decameron, pp. 3-49, 99-113,
165-79, 266-93, 419-25, 787-807
Wednesday
Sept 6 Discussion Small
Group
Unit 2: Leonardo da Vinci and the Marvels of Nature (Prof. Fontana)
Friday
Sept 8 Lecture: Introduction to Leonardo da
VinciÕs
Life, Art, and Writings Hoxie
Thompson
Read: Leonardo on Painting, pp. 1-46, 119-27
Monday
Sept 11 Lecture: Optics and Perspective Hoxie
Thompson
Read: Leonardo on Painting, pp. 49-68 and
excerpt from the Notebooks
(website)
Wednesday
Sept 13 Discussion Small
Group
Friday
Sept 15 Lecture: Anatomy and Scientific
Illustration Hoxie
Thompson
Read: Leonardo on Painting, pp. 130-32
Monday
Sept 18 Lecture: Depicting the Intentions of
the Mind:
Motion, Expression, and Physiognomy Hoxie
Thompson
Read: Leonardo on Painting, pp. 132-53
Wednesday
Sept 20 Discussion Small
Group
Unit 3: Thomas More and the Northern Renaissance (Prof. Grober)
Friday
Sept 22 Lecture: Renaissance Humanism and
Northern Europe Hoxie
Thompson
Monday
Sept 25 Lecture: Wise Fools Hoxie
Thompson
Read: More, Utopia, pp. vii-xxiii, 1-139
Wednesday
Sept 27 Discussion Small Group
Friday
Sept 29 MIDTERM EXAM #1 Hoxie
Thompson
Monday
Oct 2 Lecture: Galileo is the Starry
Messenger Hoxie
Thompson Read: "Introduction: First Part" and "The Starry
Messenger" pp.
1-58 in Discoveries and Opinions of
Galileo by
Galileo Galilei and Stillman Drake
Wednesday
Oct 4 Lecture: The Earth and the Sun Both
Move! Hoxie
Thompson
Read: "Introduction: Second
Part" and "Letters
on
Sunspots" pp.
59-144 in Discoveries and Opinions of
Galileo by
Galileo Galilei and Stillman Drake
Friday
Oct 6 FALL BREAK
Monday
Oct 9
Discussion Small
Group
Wednesday
Oct 11 Lecture: Who Can Read the Book of
Nature? Hoxie
Thompson
Read: "Introduction: Third Part"
and "Letter to the
Grand Duchess Christina" pp. 145-216 in Discoveries and
Opinions of Galileo by Galileo Galilei and Stillman Drake
Friday
Oct 13 Lecture: Worlds in Conflict Hoxie
Thompson
Read: "The First Day" pp. 42-121 in Dialogue Concerning
the Two Chief World Systems by Galileo Galilei and
Stillman Drake
Monday
Oct 16 Discussion Small
Group
Wednesday
Oct 18 Lecture: ShakespeareÕs Politics Hoxie
Thompson
Read: Shakespeare, The WinterÕs
Tale,
pp. vii-xi, xxvi-xxxvii
Friday
Oct 20 Lecture: Shakespearean Romance Hoxie
Thompson
Read: Shakespeare, The WinterÕs
Tale,
pp. 3-116, 171-83
Monday
Oct 23 Discussion Small
Group
Wednesday
Oct 25 Lecture: New Conceptions of Nature and
Space
(Fontana) Hoxie
Thompson
Read: Samuel Y. Edgerton, Jr.,
ÒGalileo,
Florentine ÔDisegno,Õ and the ÔStrange
SpottednesseÕ of the MoonÓ (website)
Friday
Oct 27 Lecture: Johannes Vermeer and the
Camera Obscura (Fontana) Hoxie
Thompson
Read: Charles Seymour, Jr., ÒDark
Chamber and
Light-Filled Room: Vermeer and the
Camera
ObscuraÓ
(website)
Monday
Oct 30 Discussion Small
Group
Wednesday Nov 1 Lecture: Theories of optics and the eye
(Salisbury) Hoxie
Thompson
Read: "Rays" pp.
51-87 in The Fire Within the Eye
by David Park (website)
Friday
Nov 3 MIDTERM EXAM #2 Hoxie
Thompson
Monday Nov 6 Lecture: The Lincean Academy and the
Microscope Hoxie
Thompson
Read: "The Lynxes" pp. 65-77, "The Chastity of Bees"
and "The Microscope and the Vernacular" pp. 151-194
in The Eye of the Lynx
by David Freedberg (website)
Wednesday Nov 8 Discussion Small
Group
Friday Nov 10 Lecture: Scientific Societies Hoxie
Thompson
Read: "The Accademia del Cimento" pp. 127-140
In In the Wake of
Galileo by Michael Segre and
"Sharing" pp. 74-94 in Servants of Nature by
Lewis
Pyenson and Susan Sheets-Pyensen (website)
*** WRITING
ASSIGNMENT DUE IN CLASS ON MONDAY, NOVEMBER 13
Monday Nov 13 Lecture: Robert Hooke and Microscopic
Discoveries Hoxie
Thompson
Read: Robert Hooke, F.R.S. (1635-1703), and
Selections from Micrographia by Robert Hooke
(website)
Wednesday Nov 15 Discussion Small
Group
Friday
Nov 17 Lecture: The Successful Enlightenment
Project Hoxie
Thompson
Monday
Nov 20 Lecture: Whose Nature, Whose Reason? Hoxie
Thompson
Read: Voltaire, Candide,
pp. vi-xiv, 15-101
Wednesday
Nov 22 Discussion Small
Group
Friday
Nov 24 THANKSGIVING BREAK
Unit 9: Neo-Classicism and the Purity of the Greeks (Prof. Fontana)
Monday
Nov 27 Lecture: Nature, the Ideal, and the
Virtuous Contour Hoxie
Thompson
Read: Johann Joachim Winckelmann,
excerpts
from Reflections on the Imitation of the Painting
and Sculpture of the Greeks and History of Ancient
Art (website)
Wednesday
Nov 29 Lecture: Architectural Logic and the
Primitive Hut Hoxie
Thompson
Read: Marc-Antoine Laugier, An Essay on
Architecture (website)
Friday
Dec 1 Discussion Small
Group
Monday
Dec 4 Review Day: No class meeting unless
announced
by your small group instructor
Thursday
Dec 7 FINAL EXAM (9 am) Hoxie
Thompson
IMPORTANT NOTE: The final exam will be held on Thursday, December 7, at 9 am. We will NOT use the special exam time for HWC and C/I courses. If you are taking C/I this semester, there will be no exam time conflict.
General rules for the course
BOOKS YOU NEED TO OWN AND USE IN THIS COURSE:
Giovanni Boccaccio, The Decameron (Signet)
Leonardo da Vinci, Leonardo on Painting (Yale)
Thomas More, Utopia (Yale)
Galileo Galilei, Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief
World Systems (Modern Library)
Galileo Galilei, Discoveries and Opinions of
Galileo (Anchor)
William Shakespeare, The WinterÕs Tale, Newly
Revised Edition (Signet)
Voltaire,
Candide, Zadig, and Selected Stories
(Signet)
Note: Additional required readings will be
made available to you through library reserve or on the course website: http://artemis.austincollege.edu/acad/hwc101vrd/vrd2004.htm
Meeting Patterns:
The full assembly of about 90 students will frequently
meet, as the Schedule indicates, from 11 AM to 12:20 in Hoxie Thompson Auditorium. Such meetings will include lectures for
which you are responsible on tests (so thoughtful note-taking and later
review-&-expansion-of-notes are wise). The style of meetings will vary with the instructor and with
the needs of the day.
Section meetings (small group discussion) with each
studentÕs instructor are opportunities to follow up and explore matters that
have been raised in lectures and the reading assignments; the three
instructors will have the same general
aim to deepen your understandings and help prepare you for tests
and writings, but we feel free to vary the specific activities or emphases
of a meeting in order to fit what each of us does best. These meetings
will take place in smaller classrooms at 10 or 11 AM.
Room assignments for small group meetings are listed
below. (All of the small group
rooms are in the basement of Hopkins.
The stairs to the basement are at the north and south ends of the
building, not in the center. The
elevator is by the north stairs.)
Section A (Fontana) 10
AM Hopkins
3
Section B (Grober) 10
AM Hopkins
10
Section C (Salisbury) 10
AM Hopkins
1
Section D (Fontana) 11
AM Hopkins
3
Section E (Grober) 11
AM Hopkins
10
Section F (Salisbury) 11
AM Hopkins
1
Grade Policy:
The grade for the course will be based on three exams,
one writing assignment, and additional work assigned by your small group
instructor:
Midterm Exam #1 (Sept
29) 20% (100 points)
Midterm Exam #2 (Nov
3) 20%. (100
points)
Writing Assignment (Nov
13) 20% (100 points)
Final Exam (Dec
7)
20%.
(100 points)
Small group work 20% (100 points)
Final grades for the course will be based on the
following scale:
465-500 A
450-464 A-
435-449 B+
415-434 B
400-414 B-
385-399 C+
365-384 C
350-364 C-
335-349 D+
315-334 D
300-314 D-
0-299 F
All of your work will be graded by your small group
instructor. He will total your
scores for all assignments and award your final grade.
Exams:
Exams will be non-cumulative. Each exam will last one hour.
Within the limits of that fast-writing task, you will be expected
to show a memory of representative parts of the readings and lectures as
well as an ability to think it all over, put pieces together, and express
your judgment about the topics presented in the course. The format of each exam will be
announced prior to your final study for it; generally, all exams will have a
similar format. All exams will be closed-book and closed-note, and
assisting or receiving assistance from other students is forbidden.
Writing Assignment:
The paper is due to be handed in to your small
group instructor on the date specified in the syllabus. The topics will be announced two weeks
before the due date.
Small
Group Work:
20%
of your course grade will be based on special small group activities and/or
assignments. These will be
announced by your small group instructor.
They will vary somewhat from instructor to instructor, so be sure to do
the assignment(s) for your own group.
Academic Integrity:
We
place a high value on academic integrity and will not tolerate abuse of the
academic process. Cheating and
plagiarism are primary violations of academic integrity. Helping another student to cheat or
plagiarize is also a violation.
Cheating means purposely using or receiving assistance from another
student or source on an assignment where such help is not permitted.
Examples include copying from or using bought papers and using "crib
sheets" or electronic devices (e.g., a cell phone) on an exam. Plagiarism means using someone else's
work and attempting to pass it off as your own. This may be the work of
another student or information obtained from a book, journal, faculty member,
or internet source. In written
work, if you use or are dependent in any way on any words or ideas beyond
comments made in these class meetings, you must clearly acknowledge and
cite that dependence. Words that
you take from any source must be in quotation marks and clearly
attributed. Information or ideas
that you have adapted or paraphrased from any source must also be clearly
acknowledged, even if you do not quote directly. Paraphrasing someone elseÕs ideas does not make them your
own. The consequences for academic
integrity violations will be at our discretion, and may include a failing grade
in the course. We will also report
the violation to the Vice President for Academic Affairs for possible further
disciplinary action.
The
mission of the Heritage of Western Culture Program is to ensure that every
graduate of Austin College has the skills necessary to enjoy lifelong
participation in community life as an informed citizen.
Goal/expected student outcome #1:
Provide
opportunities for interdisciplinary inquiry and reflection about the multiple
factors involved in explaining from where our society has come.
Goal/expected student outcome #2:
Create
arenas for the intentional exercise of critical listening, thinking, reading
and writing.
Goal/expected student outcome #3:
Systematically
explore the premodern and modern eras.