5th period, spring term

Dinner Party Civics: Democracy, Leadership and Amendment One

Thinkers since Plato have questioned the proper role of intellectuals in society. In this class, we will continue that investigation by considering our role in the current fight against North Carolina’s proposed Amendment One. First, we will take an adapted version of Marshall Ganz’s Moral Leadership course, a mainstay of Harvard’s undergraduate curriculum, in order to question what it means to be called to serve as moral leaders in a fragmented world. Second, we will brief ourselves on the techniques of grassroots activism to address the following question: How can we use our limited powers to affect the greatest possible positive change? Third, our intellectual work will culminate in the fun-loving creation of a Civic Dinner Party Troupe, a nonprofit, for-hire group inspired by the Murder Mystery Dinner Theater genre. Our group will work to master the arguments of particular thinkers throughout history, both level-headed and bigoted, from Gandhi to Rush Limbaugh, to offer our characters, and murder-mystery plots, to willing dinner party hosts. Our hosts will have the opportunity to debate against, and amidst, famous thinkers in the comfort of their own dining rooms. Proceeds from our theatrical escapades will go to Equality NC’s Amendment One campaign.

For tomorrow -- Monday 1/30

Please read (sorry for the late notice but it is short):
The passages from the Bible (study of the Prophets) in dropbox.

Questions to think about:
Who speaks for the marginalized in a society?
What if the speech (or what they have to say) goes against the status quo or is otherwise unacceptable?
How do you make people recognize that what these people have to say is relevant?
To what extent do we need history and tradition to inform our action?
If the prophet is one who delivers an unpopular message, how do people listen?

As you are pondering your notions of the marketplace of ideas and the public sphere, an acknowledgment of these questions is essential to move forward. Another way to think about it would be to find the spaces within for social justice.

Also, please read your email (I sent you something to read) and come to class with panelists in hand. We will go to 2:15 with our guest speaker on Monday.

For next week (1/23)

For Monday (1/23) -- Read Nietzsche from Beyond Good and Evil (aphorisms: 44, 202, 203, 204, 212, 219, 242, 265) -- in dropbox
Read carefully (take notes while you read!)
Eric Downing will join class today. Class will go until 2:15

For Tuesday (1/24) -- No new reading, catch up with Foucault, Nietzsche, Sartre from the past few days (lingering questions?)

For Wednesday (1/25) -- Jamie will join us. If no lingering questions we will begin the process of review and recap.

For Friday (1/26) -- Read Fanon from The Wretched of the Earth (not in dropbox yet, but will be soon)

Remember: Names of panelists are due on Monday (1/30) and thesis statements must be on the blog by next Friday (2/3)

Important dates!

Final Paper – Due, Monday, February 13, 2012
IN FOLDERS – WHICH CONTAIN EVERY OTHER ASSIGNMENT!
Length: 10 + pages (don’t go over 15)
Must include: Cited reference to Plato, Kant, Marx, Hegel, Nietzsche
May include: Any other philosopher or thinker discussed this year
Footnotes or parenthetical citations are fine

Thesis statement – Due, Friday, February 3, 2012 ON THE BLOG
One sentence is fine, but the more of your first paragraph you have the better

Comments to thesis – Due, Tuesday, February 7, 2012 ON THE BLOG
You must comment on your group, you may comment on any others
Jamie and I will comment to the best of our abilities

Names of panelists – Due, Monday, January 30, 2012
In class, you must give Elise the names and email addresses for your panelists

The social contract... another perspective

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOyDR2b71ag

This video (less than 2 minutes long, find the time to watch it) is Elizabeth Warren, professor at Harvard Law School and democratic candidate for Senate (Massachusetts, 2012) speaking at an event. She raises a different view of social contract theory. You will find this interesting, even if you don't agree with her. (ps and bonus point -- Which philosopher whom we have read would most agree with Warren? Why?)

Next week (1/16-1/20)

For Tuesday:
Continued discussion of "The Ballot or the Bullet"
Please listen to at least part of:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRNciryImqg

For Wednesday:
Please read Sartre "Colonialism is a System" (in dropbox)
What does Sartre mean by the "system" of colonialism? Where do you see links to Fanon? To Malcolm X? To your evolving ideas about nationalism and the marketplace of ideas?

For Friday:
Please read Foucault "Body/Power" (in dropbox)
Jamie will teach class today!

Reading for Friday 1/13

For Friday (1/13), please read the speech by Malcolm X titled "The Ballot or the Bullet." Think about the ways in which Malcolm constructs citizenship and nationalism. What are the options he gives to citizens to express their opinions? What would he think about your public sphere marketplace of ideas? How would Malcolm X respond to King? To Fanon?

One more thought on MLK

In the Letter, King remarks that NOW is the appropriate time for this type of action.

In the "I Have a Dream" speech (August 28, 1963), King revisits his Letter response to the eight clergymen's "untimely" argument: "We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now."

Just FYI, the new Carolina Friends School inclusivity brochure is titled: "The Fierce Urgency of Now" (What began as an issue that could be described in terms of black and white, has moved well beyond just a matter of color.)

French Translations of Fanon

Hey guys, here are the translations of the French parts of the Fanon thing in dropbox.
As Jamie said to our Romanticism class, "translations are like women: either faithful or beautiful, but not both." Hopefully these are at least comprehensible.
Anyway, I numbered them on here and on the actual PDF... enjoy

1. Our aim is to help blacks to free themselves from the complex struggles that have grown from Colonialism.

2. Discovering how wrong and unjust his alienation is, he who has been made to feel inferior (the black man) returns to his original traditions. He engages, with passion, in this culture that has been abandoned, rejected, misrepresented, etc.

3. The indigenous’ struggles/inner conflict with his culture is too solemn and abrupt to allow for any faults or vulnerabilities. This total immersion in the chasm of the past and of past cultures is the source of his liberty.

4. The mobilization of the masses introduces into every mind/consciousness the idea of the communal cause, the national destiny, and the collective history.

5. In a true collective stance, families that were previously enemies can put their differences behind them (literally, erase and forget everything). The reconciliations multiply; old buried hatreds are again awoken only to be even more surely eradicated. Everything becomes simultaneously mystical, a brotherhood, and a church.

6. Nationalism is not a political doctrine. If an individual truly wants to spare country these setbacks and faults (I’m assuming, this ‘period of bourgeois rule in new states’), it is necessary to move from the national conscious to the political and social conscious.