The soul prefers to imagine." Myths express principles and values, clothed rather than bare. We find this pleasing, memorable, enriching. My favorite student comment: "Thank you. This course gave me back my imagination." To the words and images of myth we apply the methods of liberal arts: to categorize, analyze, and evaluate.
Greek Civilization – AR 223 Paula Saffire
The “liberal” of “liberal arts” is connected to the word “liberty.” Liberal arts studies are studies fitting for the free mind, and they fit the mind to be free. There is a commitment to truth, to logic, to the use of the mind to discover, analyze, and evaluate. The speakers of ancient Greek produced an amazing number of free thinkers and deep thinkers. (Are the two the same?) You could say they fell in love with the mind. In appreciating their thinking, we sharpen our own. In these chancy times, who knows what the future holds? If this course makes you more of a free thinker and / or a deep thinker, you will have something that no one can take away.
Topics in Latin – LT 360 Tiberiu Popa
The study of classical languages and civilizations has been traditionally one of the pillars of the liberal arts. This is an upper level class and its nature assumes that you have already been exposed to a number of chiefly literary Latin texts. Our course focuses massively on philosophical texts – selections from Lucretius, Cicero and Seneca. The sometimes (charmingly) daunting complexity of their philosophical arguments, however, does not exclude or obscure the sheer beauty of their texts, which are meant, among other things, to enhance your command of Latin. Whether you take this to be primarily a course on Roman philosophy or an exercise in translation from Latin into English, you will get a chance both to get acquainted with several pretty respectable and influential philosophical views and to further ponder the intricacies of the Latin syntax and the nuances of the Latin vocabulary. At the same time, I hope that this course will encourage you to think about common points between such philosophical (especially ethical) theories and some of your own concerns, as well as about the possible connections (and significant differences) between the literary styles of the aforementioned authors and the ways in which we tend to express ourselves in English. Just try not to formulate your email messages in Ciceronian style.