Honors Colloquia - Fall 2019

Click on a course name to read a description.

All course materials can be purchased at Shakespeare & Co. Booksellers, located at 939 Lexington Avenue.

Course Descriptions

Sexual-Textual Politics in Mozart's Operas: Women and Power

Professor Catherine Coppola (Music)

HONS 2011M
Tuesdays and Fridays; 2:10-3:25 p.m.
Room 405 HN
3 hours, 3 credits

Objectives:    
Close reading of the music and text of Mozart's operas in the context of the history of women and power. Drawing on the robust 18th-century debate about gender equality in a society where powerful men could freely inhabit 'polite' and 'impolite' worlds, we confront the relevance of that debate to our own time. We trace demeaning moments in these operas alongside woke ones. Just as Enlightenment progress was not made in a straight line, in fact, attitudes toward sexual violence spanned what is described as "a murky continuum of ambivalence and inconsistency." Through video and live productions we explore the convergence of anti- and pro-feminism in Mozart's operas. We interrogate heavy-handed interpretive decisions that perpetuate fallacies of context (that Mozart was oblivious to feminist and socially progressive ideas) and of change (that today we have supposedly made so much progress for women that we cannot bear to watch a demeaned 18^th-century woman).  To view 18th-century works from a morally superior 21^st-century perch only adds to the gulf between them and the audience. We will work with primary sources i.e. contemporaneous feminist writings, source plays and stories, librettos, court records, and others, showing that there was plenty of moral repugnance to go around in the 1700s.

Repertoire:    
We begin with The Abduction from the Seraglio, The Magic Flute, and Don Giovanni, then we set the stage for opera buffa with Piccinni's La buona figliuola, Paisiello's Nina, and Mozart's La finta giardiniera, influenced by Richardson's well-known epistolary novel, Pamela. We conclude with The Marriage of Figaro and Così fan tutte, both of which simmer with social issues beneath the layer of fun on the surface.

The course was selected for the Pedagogy Poster Session at the March 2019 conference of the American Society for Eighteenth Century Studies in Denver, CO; and at the same conference Prof. Coppola presented her paper "Fallacies of Context and Change: Why We Need Mozart's Women Now More than Ever" as part of the panel The Long Shadow of Sexism: Reading the Eighteenth Century in (the) Light of #MeToo. 

 Weekly readings, responses to operatic scenes in class as well as written and discussion assignments, and live performances whenever possible. Four tests and a 10-page paper.

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Porcelain: Collecting, Display, and Global Circulation

Professor Tara Zanardi (Art & Art History)

HONS 2012A
Mondays and Thursdays; 1:10-2:25 p.m.
Room 412 West
3 hours, 3 credits

First produced in China during the Han Dynasty (206 BC-220 AD), porcelain was made initially for the local market and the imperial court. Prized for its translucency and strength, porcelain was eventually exported on a global scale, reaching the Americas, Persia, Africa, and Europe, along with spices, silk, and lacquer. In order to accommodate the increasing desire for this ceramic and facilitate commercial trade, the Chinese established ports in various cities. By the sixteenth century, European nobility began actively collecting Chinese and Japanese porcelain, and attempted to replicate the production of porcelain, with no true success until the foundation of the Meissen Porcelain Factory in 1708-1710 under Augustus II, Elector of Saxony and King of Poland (1694-1733). With the manufacture of both hard- and soft-paste porcelain by Europeans, porcelain's circulation widened. As one of the most highly coveted luxury objects, porcelain played an important decorative role in interior displays in homes. Porcelain held vital artistic significance and cultural importance, especially as Europeans tested the limits of this ceramic for experimentation and innovation.

 In this course, we will evaluate porcelain's material properties, fabrication, use, and aesthetics, and tie these considerations to broader social practices of display, collecting, and consumption. We will look at key players and sites in the promotion and development of porcelain. We shall discuss porcelain in connection to the fascination with other materials, including lacquerware, fans, silks, and natural history objects and the ways in which these objects were collected and displayed in homes. We will address fundamental questions, such as how did porcelain, whether produced abroad or at home, contribute to the shaping of individual or collective identities? We will evaluate written and visual material in the classroom through lecture and discussion and arrange for a visit to a ceramic studio with contemporary artists who employ porcelain in their work.

Students are expected to attend class, have the readings completed, and participate in discussion. Each student will develop a research project based on a single object that the student can visit in a local museum. The research paper will include several assignments, such as a preliminary bibliography, a formal analysis, and a rough draft, due throughout the semester. The exam will cover the material from the reading and classroom discussions.

Evaluation Criteria:
Participation: 20%
Exam: 30%
Research Paper Assignments: 20%
Final Research Paper: 30%

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Water: Interdisciplinary Survey

Professor Allan Frei (Geography)

HONS 2012B
Mondays and Wednesdays; 5:35-6:50 p.m.
Room 412 West
3 hours, 3 credits

OVERALL THEME: What is water, how do humans interact with it, and how does it shape the natural world?

COURSE DESCRIPTION:
In this course students will learn about water from a variety of perspectives, including physical science, social science, and humanities. Such a course is by nature interdisciplinary, and lends itself to a wide range of possibilities in terms of student inquiry. The course is structured in five sections, beginning with a discussion of the interdisciplinary nature of water, and water in antiquity and mythology. The second section will focus on water in the natural world, including the chemistry and physics of water as well as water in the earth's climate system. Section three focuses on the role of water in human control of nature and of other humans, including water security, water supply, and case studies from different places. Section four focuses on visual aspects of water including optical effects in the atmosphere, and on visualizations of water in art, science, and society. The course ends with an interdisciplinary case study of the Hudson River, combining many of the issues discussed in earlier sections of the course.

The course will be taught using a combination of activities including lecture by the instructor, seminar style discussions on required readings which will sometimes be led by students, as well as group and individual presentations. Students are required to read assigned articles, and submit written responses, for many class meetings. Thus, student participation is critical.
There will hopefully be one or more field trips.

ASSIGNMENTS:

1. Weekly reading summaries and responses. Some readings will be read by the entire class; others will be read by individual students and shared with the class
2. Presentations, both individual and group (details to be determined)
3. One book review (or possibly literature review) due at the end of the semester on a book (or topic) approved by the instructor

One or two exams on selected subjects.

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Seminar on Caribbean Philosopher and Political Militant Frantz Fanon

Professor Jeremy Glick (English)
Professor Robyn Marasco (Political Science)

HONS 3011P
Mondays and Thursdays; 11:10-12:25 p.m.
Room 412HW
3 hours, 3 credits

This course will offer an intensive study of the life and work of Frantz Fanon, a philosopher, psychologist, revolutionary militant and among the most significant voices in the black radical tradition.  We will explore his early life in Martinique, his encounter with the negritude movement and the influence of Aimé Césaire on his first major work, Black Skin/White Masks. We will read this work both for the substance of its arguments about racism, the construction of identity, and the effects of an "epidermalized" domination and for its experiments in poetic form.  We will look at Fanon's training in Paris and explore the mutual influence on thinkers like Maurice Mealeau-Ponty, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Simone de Beauvoir.  And, finally, we will follow Fanon to Algeria, to the hospital at Blida-Joinville where he was appointed lead psychiatrist and to the FLN and his participation in the struggle to defeat European colonialism.  We will study Fanon's masterpiece, The Wretched of the Earth, for how it advances a critique of colonialism and what it contributes to a political theory of liberation.  We will also examine some of his other political writings from this period, on the family and gender relations, on matters of political education and organization, and the role of religion and tradition in a revolutionary movement. Our semester will conclude with reflections on Fanon's influence on generations of revolutionary writers and thinkers and the lasting significance of his work for contemporary political struggles.

Course Requirements:
Weekly writing assignments in the form of response papers/reading memos and one final essay 12-15 pages in length.

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Poverty in the United States: Sociological and Psychological Dimensions

Professor Anthony Browne (Africana & Puerto Rican/Latino Studies)
Professor Roseanne Flores (Psychology)

HONS 3048
Tuesdays and Fridays; 11:10-12:25 p.m.
Room 412 West 
3 hours, 3 credits

This interdisciplinary course explores how sociology and psychology explain persistent poverty and the attendant effects on individuals, communities and American society. Theories and concepts from both disciplines are utilized to examine the nature and extent of poverty in the U.S., its myriad causes and consequences, as well as government programs and policies. Emphasis will be placed on understanding the intersectionality of class, race/ethnicity and gender.  Questions to be addressed include: What is poverty?  Why is U.S. poverty higher than other industrialized nations? What are the perceptions of the poor by the non-poor? What is the effect of poverty on children and families? What are individual and structural explanations of poverty? And what is the psychological impact of being poor in an affluent society? Emphasis will be placed on urban poverty and the role of the state and civil society its amelioration.

Readings:

• Mark Rank, One Nation Underprivileged - Required
• David Shipler, The Working Poor

Grading for this course is based primarily on a research paper, midterm and final exam, and class participation.

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Interdisciplinary Independent Study

HONS 30199
3 hours, 3 credits
Hours to be arranged

Students wishing to take this course will need two readers, from different disciplines, one of whom generally should be a member of the Council on Honors.  In principle, the Council must approve the subject matter of such a paper before the student can register for the course.  This course may be taken only once.

HONS 30199 cannot replace any of the three required Honors Colloquia.

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Advanced Interdisciplinary Study

HONS 49151
6 hours, 6 credits
Hours to be arranged

Upon completion of 90 credits, certified Honors Program students may be admitted by the Council on Honors to Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, with the opportunity of engaging in advanced independent study under the Council's supervision. A project for a thesis or other appropriate report of the results of the student's research is presented to the Council, which must approve it the semester previous to registration. Three sponsors, from at least two departments, one of whom must be a member of the Council on Honors, will supervise the work. The final product must be approved by all three sponsors and the Council.

HONS 49151 cannot replace any of the three required Honors Colloquia.

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