Realisms: Currents and Crosscurrents in 19th-Century Thought

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The term “realism” enjoyed an unprecedented vogue in 19th-century Europe. All manner of doctrines and ideologies prided themselves on their “realistic” understanding of the human predicament and the structure of the universe while disdaining rival doctrines as captive to illusions and prejudices. Students in this course will read and discuss texts illustrating influential forms of 19th-century European realism in philosophy, ethics, and politics. They will also consider realism in literature and painting. We will try to identify what exactly realism meant to each of these philosophical and artistic tendencies and to discover why 19th-century Europeans found the concept of realism so irresistible. Since the schools of thought to be investigated often conceived “reality” in diametrically opposed ways, the course will provide an introduction to a number of the most significant intellectual debates of the 19th century. Thinkers to be discussed include Malthus, Hegel, Marx, Darwin, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Weber, and Freud; creative artists studied will include Turgenev, Strindberg, Courbet, Manet, and Degas. THE CURRICULUM 80 Public Stories, Private Lives: Methods of Oral History HIST 3664 Mary Dillard Sophomore and Above, Seminar—Fall | 5 credits This course will introduce students to the best practices of oral history interviewing, theory, and methodology. Around the world, oral history has been used to uncover the perspectives of marginalized groups and to challenge “official” historical narratives. Oral history is a mainstay of social history, helping researchers uncover voices that might otherwise be ignored and giving people the opportunity to “speak back” to the past. In this regard, oral history is a crucial method in a historian’s toolkit. Life histories enable us to focus on individual experiences and consider the historical significance of one person’s life.…