Honors Humanities seminar

ALHN 13950-04, T/TH 3:55-5:10, Fall 2020

Professor Eileen Hunt

Department of Political Science, University of Notre Dame

Online course. All learning and reading materials are linked to this public site and viewable on a phone, tablet, or computer, usually for free or nominal cost. See "Schedule" tab for syllabus with links to required texts. The Notre Dame Hammes bookstore will be selling required books for the course, but you are free to use any edition you prefer.

Class overview

This Honors Humanities seminar will treat the politics, philosophy, and literature of plagues and pandemics from ancient Greece to Covid-19. At the center of the course will be a close reading of the first major modern post-apocalyptic pandemic novel, Mary Shelley's The Last Man. Bookending it will be readings of its major sources and legacies, from Sophocles' Oedipus Rex to Margaret Atwood's MaddAddam Trilogy. The goal of this seminar is to think through the relevance of literature for theorizing the political causes and symptoms of, as well as solutions for, pandemics such as Covid-19.

political science fiction

from Sophocles to Atwood

About me

Professor Hunt is a mild-mannered political theorist and former athlete of some renown. Follow her on Twitter @EileenMHunt to see what she really thinks.

Resources

All required readings for this course are available for free or nominal cost online and hyperlinked in the "Schedule" tab above. General online resources will be posted below during the semester.

Literature of Plagues and Pandemics

Covid-19 News

Political Science and Philosophy of Covid-19

Online Course Expectations:

Each 75-minute online session will typically have the following format. Sessions will not be recorded *unless* there is a need to do so to help students who are in quarantine or isolation and cannot Zoom in.

10 minutes. Each Zoom session will begin with an informal group face-to-face meeting where we get to know each other and chat about the readings and news of the day. Students can ask or submit questions (aloud or via chat) to consider during the session.
10-15 minutes. Then students will turn off their video/audio on Zoom and watch/listen to Prof. Botting's short podcast-style mini-lecture/slides on the readings of the day. This segment is pre-recorded for students (and others beyond Notre Dame) to use as a resource beyond our class sessions. They are marked as "YouTube mini-lectures" on the syllabus (in the "Schedule" tab). There is no need to watch them prior to class.
- 1. While listening to the mini-lecture in class, students should raise questions for full seminar discussion via group chat.
  2. Sometimes we will have a guest speaker, followed by Q&A, in lieu of a mini-lecture.
45-50 minutes. Students will turn video and audio back on & return to a full seminar discussion of the day's readings and mini-lecture with Prof. Botting, using our group's questions from chat as a guide.
5 minutes. Announcements, reminders & and guidance for preparing for next session.

Assessment:

20% each. 3 "Pandemoir" essays (1000 words). Each essay should respond to the most recent section(s) of the course, by integrating your analysis of 2 required texts and 1 optional text with your own literary, political, and philosophical reflections on the COVID-19 pandemic.
1. Submit each essay on its due date (see syllabus on "Schedule" tab) via google docs with an "invitation to edit" to Eileen Botting.
2. After receiving comments in tracked changes from Botting, please incorporate necessary revisions. Then share the essay with the student whom she has assigned to you as a peer editor. You should lightly peer-edit each other's essays in google docs, with tracked changes, to confirm that they are ready for publication in our monthly online literary-political journal, NEWS FROM THE MOON (see "Newsletter" tab).
3. Students can opt-out of publication of any particular essay if they prefer, but they must submit the final, peer-edited, publication-ready version to Botting for final assessment on time (see "Schedule" tab).
20%. Final Pandemoir (2000 words). Integrate into your final (personal, political, literary, philosophical, and/or creative) essay 3-5 sources drawn from the final section of the course on Atwood. Due one week after classes end.

4. 20%. Regular, engaged, and enthusiastic participation in Zoom seminar sessions. Although not mandatory, Prof. Botting's online office hours will be regularly available on Zoom on Mondays and Fridays 2pm-3:30pm during the semester. If students cannot attend a Zoom seminar session, please email Prof. Botting (see footer of this site for contact info) to let her know in advance if possible. Make time to listen to the recorded mini-lecture and plan to visit Zoom office hours at your convenience to catch up on anything you feel you missed. Stay safe!

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