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UNST 236A Section 001 CRN 44078: Interpreting the Past Cluster • Course description and poster Instructor: William B. Fischer, Ph.D., Department of World Languages & Literatures, Portland State University • website • email (fischerw@pdx.edu) • office: 451-D • tel: 503 725-5285 • weekly schedule SINQ Mentor: Lola Aminova (email: laminova@pdx.edu) Main Meeting: TR 14:00-15:15 CH (Cramer Hall) 103 Workshops (UNST 236B): T 1300-1350 (section 001 CRN 44079, location CH 159); R 1300-1350 (section 002 CRN 44080, location CH 159); T 1200-1250 (section 003 CRN 44081, location CH 159); Final exam: Tuesday, March 18, 1530-1720 Deadline for final assignments & projects: Friday, March 21, 1700, Pacific Time (paper or electronic) NOTE: This website is the ONE AND ONLY course website for this course. We do NOT us D2L. Subject of inquiry: The explorations, scientific research, sociological studies, and ethical thought of Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) established the principle of interconnectedness – of our planet, its life forms, its natural resources, and its societies. Humboldt was probably the most famous cultural figure of Nineteenth-Century Europe, and was widely known in the United States. After a century of obscurity, he is being rediscovered and recognized – and reinterpreted! – as both a heroic explorer and a giant in many fields of endeavor: climate research, plant and animal geography, environmental studies, anthropology, linguistics, and social justice. Humboldt’s work was a major factor in not only modern sustainable environmentalism, but also how the United States developed as an ecology and a society. Counties, towns, schools, universities, geographical features, biological species and, of course, the Humboldt Current, commemorate his name. Course Goals; • Trace the origins of sustainable environmentalism in the Nineteenth Century. Method: combination of academic study, hands-on (“experiential”) learning, service learning, and carefully structured team-based learning with individual responsibility. Campus-Wide Learning Outcomes addressed: Sustainability, Creative and Critical Thinking, Internationalization, Engagement, Communication (including quantitative), DiversityTopics: Week 1: Leaving home: pictures, visions, dreams Activities: In the classroom: 2/3 lecture and discussion, 1/3 hands-on learning & group projects The course meets 4 hours a week. The common principle is to study 2 hours outside class for each classroom hour. So you should budget 8 hours of study time per week, as a minimum. If the results are unsatisfactory, especially to you, be ready to add some additional study time, especially for consultation with the instructor and mentor. Reading. The main texts (link to details for getting them) are: 1) Humboldt's Cosmos: Alexander von Humboldt and the Latin American Journey That Changed the Way We See the World, by Gerard Helferich; 2) Jaguars and Electric Eels, a much shortened of Humboldt's own Personal Narrative of a Journey to the Equinoctial Regions of the New Continent; 3) Beyond the Hundredth Meridian: John Wesley Powell and the Second Opening of the West, by Wallace Stegner. You'll be reading Humboldt's Cosmos and Jaguars/Eels slowly but steadily during the first half of the course. You'll start Beyond the Hundredth Meridian a few weeks into the course. Additional assigned reading will include short articles, background information for your individual and group projects, and, for your book report, a book that relates both to Humboldt and to a special interest of your own. Readings are NOT stocked at the PSU bookstore. You will acquire them by ordering print-on-paper texts, by using PSU access to journal and library resources, or by downloading electronic versions, including some at no cost. Why these texts? Humboldt's Cosmos provides the "backbone" of the course: a narration of Humboldt's life and discussion of his work in sufficient depth that you can then understand his significance and join in the discussion of what he and his work mean for us in the present: interpreting the past. Jaguars and Electric Eels gives us the sense of immediacy, the feeling of being right there with Humboldt, that we need to grasp how different, how dangerous, and how heroic his travels and research were. Beyond the Hundredth Meridian is your chief (but not only) means to explore a particular dimension of Humboldt as it relates to our own time and its environmental and cultural issues: land and water allocation and use in the American West. Lastly, the book about which you will write a review (not just the usual "book report") will be selected to exploit and strengthen one of your own particular interests (travel, arts, an area of science, cooking, ?). Grading proportions: 20% weekly writing assignments and questionnaires Grading is based on scoring guides with objective standards and performance descriptors, including an "on-time" factor. There is NO CURVE. There is no separate penalty for missed meetings of the main class, but no credit will be given for activities conducted during those meetings. The SINQ mentor may assess a penalty for missing meetings of the workshops. Requests for makeups and extensions must include documentation of reasons and proposal for how and when the work will be completed. Access policy: standard PSU provisions. Unless announced otherwise, all assignments, except the group project, may be revised for regrading. Revisions must be turned in a week after you receive the original version back from instructor/mentor. An improved grade is likely but is not guarant |