Our Relationship with Nature

Fiction

Powers, Richard – The Overstory

Nonfiction

Stafford, Fiona – A Long, Long Life of Trees

Films

Deliverance – Borman, John, Director

Aguirre: The Wrath of God – Herzog, Werner, Director

           1. The ego as unique to humans (as separate from nature)

           2. The human need to “conquer” nature

Okja – Joon-ho, Bong, Director

Princess Mononoke – Miyazaki, Hayao, Director

           1. Human violence as the antithesis to the natural harmony found in nature

           2. Violence (against nature and other humans) as the result of greed

Walkabout – Roeg, Nicholas, Director

           1. How our relationship with nature informs our worldview (see also:

                       Companion piece: Stormboy (film, 1976 – Safran, Henri, Director

On Authority

Fiction

Kafka, Franz – The Trial

            Companion piece – The Trial (film, 1962 – Welles, Orson, Director)

Mueller, Herta – The Land of Green Plums

Mueller, Herta – The Appointment

Nonfiction

Chomsky, Noam – Manufacturing Consent

Fromm, Erich

Hobbes, Thomas – Leviathan

Newton, Huey P. –

Film

On Revolution

Fiction

Nonfiction

Lenin, V.I. – State and Revolution

Luxembourg, Rosa – Reform or Revolution

Reed, John – 10 Days That Shook the World

Film

Reds – Beatty, Warren, Director

Racism in the United States

Fiction

Baldwin, William – If Beale Street Could Talk

           Companion piece: If Beale Street Could Talk (film, 2018 – Jenkins, Barry, Director)

Gaines, Earnest, J. – A Gathering of Old Men

Nunez, Elizabeth – Beyond the Limbo Silence

           1. Understanding the identity of place

Nonfiction

Baldwin, William – The Fire Next Time

Cleaver, Eldridge – “Post-Prison Writings and Speeches”

           1. Race relations in the 1970’s, i.e. race relations post MLK and Malcolm X; the continuing fight for equality in a “new” era

Cruse, Harold – “Rebellion or Revolution”

Kendi, Ibram X – How To Be Antiracist

Kylte, Ethan J. & Roberts, Blain – Denmark Vesey’s Garden

Poetry

Giovanni, Nikki – “Black Feeling, Black Talk, Black Judgment”

Smith, Danez – “Homie”

Walcott, Derek –

Theater

Nottage, Lynn – Intimate Apparel

           Companion Piece: Fabulation (Nottage, Lynn)

Wilson, August – Jitney

Wilson, August – Fences

Tempest

Film

Do The Right Thing – Lee, Spike

Music

Scott Heron, Gil

Economics & Economic Inequality

Fiction

A side-by-side comparison of:

Dreiser, Theodore – An American Tragedy

Tolstoy, Leo – Crime and Punishment

            1. How economic inequality and class differences drive desperation, and subsequent violence

            2. An exploration of the phrase “at any cost” in terms of survival in a capitalist society

Nonfiction (General)

Orwell, George – The Road to Wigan Pier

           1. The working class, how it has changed

           2. The continued fight against the “old men” in charge

Orwell, George – Down and Out in Paris and London

Marx, Karl – Capital, 1&2

Marx, Karl & Engers, Karl – The Communist Manifesto

German History

The Holocaust – what we have learned (and what we have not) from the rise and fall of the Third Reich:

Note: These are texts, etc. that deal specifically with the historical event, and not the philosophy or works of those who lived in/around that time, which have been sorted into their respective sections throughout the Syllabus.

Fiction

Isherwood, Christopher – The Berlin Stories

Nonfiction

Frank, Anne – The Diary of Anne Frank

Frankl, Viktor – Man’s Search for Meaning

The Death of Democracy

Larson, Eric – In the Garden of Beasts

Wiesel, Elie – Night

Philosophy (Moral)

Fiction

Nonfiction

Smith, Adam – A Theory of Moral Sentiments

Weisel, Elie – Dawn

Film

Apocalypse Now – Coppola, Francis Ford (director)

Theater

Goethe, Johann – Faust

           1. Discussion of a/the “soul” as a/the basis for morality

Poetry

Gibran, Khalil – The Prophet

Philosophy (Political)

Fiction

Nonfiction

Paine, Thomas – “Common Sense”

Parenti, Michael – Black Shirts and Reds

Philosophy (Existential)

Fiction

Camus, Albert – The Plague

The Existentialist’s Cafe

Nonfiction

Camus, Albert – “The Myth of Sisyphus”

Film

Postmodernism

Fiction

Miller, Henry – Tropic of Cancer

Irvine, John – The 158 Pound Marriage

            1. The unreliable narrator role in shaping the sympathies of the reader

Nonfiction

Jameson, Fredric – Postmodernism, or,

Film

8 1/2 – Fellini, Federico (director)

Symbiopsychotaxiplasm, Take 2 – Greaves, William, Director

            Companion piece: Symbiopsychotaxiplasm, Take One – Greaves, William, Director

Taxi Driver – Scorsese, Martin, Director

           1. The city as a character; “place” as a living thing

Music – Part One (early)

Glass, Phillip

Cage, John

Music – Part Two (recent)

Food and Culture

Fiction

Nonfiction

Bourdain, Anthony – Kitchen Confidential

            Companion piece – Parts Unknown, No Reservations (television series)

Fischer, M.F.K. –

Notes of a Young Black Chef

Film

Babette’s Feast

Like Water for Chocolate

A Cook, A Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover – Greenaway, Peter, Director

            1. Food at the center of life

            2. The relationship between food and sex

            3. The notion of “manners” – i.e. social etiquette – and dining in public: the performance vs. the clandestine and happens behind closed doors

• What we choose to show in full display and in secret; how does the film break these barriers through nudity,
• Discussion of role reversal – man and woman, food and sex

Moonstruck – Jewison, Norman (director)

Spirited Away – Miyazaki, Hayao, Director

Indigenous History & Culture in the United States

Fiction

Orange, Tommy – There, There

Nonfiction

Film

Smoke Signals

Reservation Dogs (television series)

Land Back & the Struggle for Indigenous Rights