Self and Community
Tatiana Zavodny

This course explores what it means to stay connected to others - and to ourselves - when things get difficult, uncertain, or overwhelming. Using Against Breaking: On the Power of Poetry by Limon, The Plague by Camus, Sister Outsider by Lorde, and Antigone by Sophocles, we explore how individuals and communities respond when the conditions of life become difficult to sustain. Across these works, we ask what it means to develop forms of resilience that are not about avoiding fracture, but about learning how to live with pressure and care for ourselves and our community.  

In the process, we will examine questions like: What does 'breaking' look like - a dramatic collapse, or exhaustion, or isolation, or being worn down? How should we respond when our personal values are at odds with those of our larger society? What happens when the pressure of living starts to exceed what feels manageable? What does resilience actually look like - 'bouncing back,' persevering, or even changing course? And how do we know which path to choose?

 Self and Community
Jonathan Martin

In examining how individuals function within communities, it is almost intrinsic to place ourselves in that role. Who are you? How do you interact with society? What kind of society do you interact with? What kind of society would you like to interact with?

This class is going to be a journey from the mythological past to the hypothetical future through the genre of creation stories. Two of these are more traditional versions of the genre, like the Babylonian creation myth called the Enuma Elish or John Milton’s Paradise Lost, a retelling of the tale of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. Others will appear more like cautionary tales. Director Isao Takahata’s film Grave of the Fireflies tells the story of a brother and sister as they overcome tragedy during the firebombing of their city in the final days of World War II. Lastly, taking place in Earth's distant future, Ursula Le Guin’s novella “Paradises Lost” gives the first hand account of one person aboard a spaceship of thousands as they head towards their possible doom. Must all prophecies be self-fulfilling? Or can we change our future? Let’s find out!

Self and Community
Matthew Crum

What do we owe a rebel? What happens when a person comes into conflict with the society that has shaped them? Who gets to decide whether that person is a hero, a savior, a monster, or a threat? What do we owe those who challenge our sense of tradition, self, or certainty; who frighten us; who have wronged us, or threaten to; whom we do not understand? To what extent did we cause the rebel to be?

Each of our readings this quarter invites us to encounter a different kind of rebel. Our authors may present their dissent as troubling, even disagreeable, but as perspectives that we must nevertheless take seriously. Together, these readings ask us to consider whether dissent carries a social responsibility, why we might be obligated to empathize with those deemed rebellious, how the figure of the rebel is shaped by society, and, ultimately, what we owe a rebel. 

In this course, we will read Plato's Apology, The Autobiography of Malcolm X, Sallust's The Conspiracy of Catiline, and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. 

Self and Community
Geoff West

This course explores what it means to live an examined life within the constraints of society. From Socrates’ defense of moral integrity in Plato’s Apology to the social pressures of The Crucible, the inherited violence of Seamus Heaney’s North, and the utopian ambitions of Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Dispossessed, students examine how individuals navigate the tension between private conscience and public order. Through close reading, analytical writing, and comparative discussion, the course asks whether justice and truth can survive the demands of conformity and the fear of dissent.