English 401
American Enlightenment
Wed. 1:00-3:52
Bucknell Hall 011
Paul Gilmore
Vaughan 116
577-3638
Office hours: W 10:00-12:00; TuTh 11:00-12:00 and by appointment.
I will also be in my office most afternoons, but make an appointment to be safe.
Texts
Henry Louis Gates, Jr., and William Andrews, eds., Pioneers of the Black Atlantic: Five Slave Narratives from the Enlightenment
Isaac Kramnick, ed., The Portable Enlightenment Reader
J. Hector St. John de Crèvecoeur, Letters From an American Farmer
Benjamin Franklin, The Autobiography and Other Writings
Charles Brockden Brown, Wieland
Hannah Foster, The Coquette
Merrill D. Peterson, ed., The Portable Thomas Jefferson
In addition, there are a number of texts on electronic reserve; please print out each reading and bring it to class on the appropriate day.
Description: This course aims to provide a capstone experience through its interdisciplinary focus on the philosophy, art, and political works of Revolutionary era America. Focusing on the centrality of Enlightenment ideas concerning human perfectibility, human nature, and human reason to the founding of the nation, the course will investigate how these ideas changed in the context of North America and the American Revolution. At the center of the course will be our examination of the quintessential texts that defined Revolutionary ideology not simply in terms of political philosophy, but in terms of ideas about race, gender, economics, ethics, and art. Attending not just to European influences, we will also investigate voices critical of the Revolution and the Enlightenment and their dominant ideological assumptions, including selections from early feminists, anti-Federalists, abolitionists.
Objectives: You should take away from the course a broader understanding of the influence of European Enlightenment thought on the establishment of the United States, a more complex appreciation of the relationship among aesthetic, political, ethical, economic, and scientific questions in the country's founding thought, and a sense of the role race, gender, and nature played in Enlightenment thought both in Europe and America. Through the course, you should gain some knowledge of the major topics and controversies in interpreting this period in American critical and historical thought, expertise in discussing political, philosophical, and literary texts as both historical and artistic artifacts, and experience in constructing a lengthy argument concerning such texts.
General Requirements: Come to class prepared, having read all assignments closely and carefully. Participate in class discussions. Turn in all assignments on time, typed and edited for clarity and mechanics.
Specific Requirements:
Response Papers: For each class meeting, you will prepare one-page, single-spaced, typed responses to that day's reading. These responses may be fairly informal in terms of grammar, style, etc., and should be exploratory in nature, taking risks, asking questions, giving voice to visceral responses. I do, however, expect these responses to present a fairly in-depth engagement with one or more of the texts, considering its central themes or arguments, possible contradictions or paradoxes, and its place in the course as a whole. You should end your weekly response papers with one or more genuine questions that you would like the class to pursue. These questions will serve as a starting point for our discussions. Such questions can range from matters of comprehension for more complex texts to locating influences or finding significant differences from similar texts, inferring political, social, cultural implications, interpreting historical importance, etc. You will revise three of the thirteen response papers (of your own choice) into short argumentative essays (3-4 pages, double-spaced). I will announce due dates for each of these revisions well in advance.
Final Papers: For your final project, you will produce a longer (10-12 page) final paper that will probably be more comprehensive. I expect papers to be not simply descriptive, but analytical. You should make an argument about the historical topics or texts we are dealing with, using evidence derived from our readings and placing your argument within a larger critical/interpretive context (thus, in consultation with me, you will need to do some outside reading of secondary sources). While I will be most concerned with the ingenuity and persuasiveness of the papers' arguments, I expect the papers to be grammatically and mechanically error-free. We will discuss the papers at more length as we move into the semester. I am more than happy to discuss paper ideas or look at drafts.
Participation and Attendance: This is a seminar, which means that you, the students, should do most of the talking, raising points of interest and concern, coming to class well-prepared to address central issues. The response papers should help you to organize some of your ideas, questions, concerns before class, and will serve as a starting point for our discussions. I expect all of you to participate actively and fully; one of the central components of a seminar experience is improving your skills in discussing your ideas, responding to others' ideas, etc. Therefore, class participation will account for 20% of the grade.
Attendance is, of course, of great importance. Missing more than two classes (almost 15% of the course) for whatever reason- absences from other commitments (athletic, etc.) or illness do count-will lower your grade. Each absence after your second will drop your final grade by a letter grade. If you know you will have to miss some classes, please come talk to me at the beginning of the semester.
Grading: Final paper 30%
Revised response papers (3) 30%
Response papers (10) 20%
Class participation 20%
Academic Honesty: All forms of cheating will be turned over to the dean. Please be especially aware of plagiarism, the use of another's words or ideas without acknowledgment. If you ever have any questions as to what constitutes plagiarism, please ask me.
Class Schedule
Many texts are on E Reserve. I will give precise page assignments for later on in the semester. We will likely juggle the schedule some, so check with me or with the class webpage at my website (www.facstaff.bucknell.edu/gilmore) if you miss class.
week one
August 30
Introduction- What is the Enlightenment?
competing answers and responses
Pope, "Essay on Man"
Wordsworth, "Expostulation and Reply," "The Tables Turned"
Franklin, letter to Joseph Priestly, excerpt from Information for Those Who Would Remove to America
Burke, excerpt from Reflections on the Revolution in France
(all hand-outs)
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week two
September 6
What is Enlightenment? continued
European backgrounds, overview
relationships among religion, government (power), science, tradition, art in European Enlightenment thought
possible contradictions, paradoxes, conflicts in that thought
connections with American ideology
Kant, "What is Enlightenment?" (Kramnick 1-7)
Diderot, "Encyclopédie" (Kramnick 17-21)
Beaumarchais, Le mariage de Figaro (Kramnick 23-25)
Condorcet, "The Future Progress of the Human Mind" (Kramnick 26-38)
Bacon, "The New Science" (Kramnick 39-43)
Freneau, "On the Emigration to America and Peopling the Western Country" (hand-out)
Berkeley, "On the Prospect of Planting Arts and Learning in America" (hand-out)
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week three
September 13
American roots and religion
Puritan roots in America, possible conflicts with Enlightenment (but also possible intersections), religion in Enlightenment thought
Winthrop, "Modell of Christian Charity"
Edwards, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God"
Paine, Age of Reason (Kramnick 174-181)
Voltaire, Reflections on Religion [selections only] (Kramnick 115-134)
Ferguson, "Religious Voices," The American Enlightenment , 1750-1820, 44-79 (e reserve)
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week four
September 20
Benjamin Franklin as American embodiment of the Enlightenment
Franklin and the role of/ relationships among/ tensions between writing, science, experience, religion, politics, art
Franklin, The Autobiography
Condorcet, "The Utility of Science" (Kramnick 64-69)
Priestly, "The Organization of Scientific Research" (Kramnick 69-73)
Locke, "An Essay Concerning Human Understanding" (Kramnick 185-188)
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week five
September 27
the Revolution 1
leading up to the revolution- pamphlets and political and historical backgrounds
issues involved and relationship to Enlightenment ideas; possible mixed message of that Enlightenment background; religion, God, nature, emotions, reason in Revolutionary rhetoric as compared/contrasted to European Enlightenment
Reid, "The Philosophy of Common Sense" (Kramnick 213-220)
Locke, The Second Treatise of Civil Government (Kramnick 395-405)
Jefferson, A Summary View of the Rights of British America (Jefferson 1-22)
Franklin, "An Edict by the King of Prussia" ( Franklin 226-332)
Paine, Common Sense (selections, [introduction, first pages of "Origin and Design," "Thoughts on America," "Present Ability of America" on e reserve, not Kramnick)
historical overview of the Revolution
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week six
October 4
the Revolution 2
Revolutionizing, limiting, interpreting the Revolution
liberalism, republicanism, exclusion
Jefferson, Declaration of Independence (Jefferson 235-242)
Bailyn, The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution (e reserve)
Greene, "The Social Origins of the American Revolution" (e reserve)
Wood, The Radicalism of the American Revolution (e reserve)
Appleby, "The Social Origins of American Revolutionary Ideology" (e reserve)
Holton, epilogue, Forced Founders (e reserve)
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week seven
October 11
problematizing the Enlightenment, the Enlightenment and economics, exploitation, capitalism, and discipline
Adorno and Horkheimer, introduction, The Dialectic of Enlightenment (e reserve)
Foucault, from Discipline and Punish, in The Foucault Reader (e reserve)
Smith, Wealth of Nations (Kramnick, 378-380, 505-515)
Hamilton, "Report on Manufactures"
(continuation of discussion on interpreting the Revolution)
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week eight
October 18
Constitution 1
Federalist Papers #1, 10, 37 (#1 and # 37 on e reserve; #10 Kramnick 459-466)
Montesqieu, Spirit of the Laws (Kramnick 405-416)
Warner, "Textuality and Legitimacy in the Printed Constitution" (e reserve)
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week nine
October 25
Constitution 2
Brackenridge, Modern Chivalry, volume 1, book 1 (e reserve)
Anti-Federalist papers #1, 9 (e reserve)
Wood, "Interests and Disinterestedness in the Making of the Constitution" (e reserve)
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week ten
November 1
Yeoman ideal in the American Enlightenment
Crèvecoeur, Letters (selections-letters 1, 2, 3, 9, and 12)
Jefferson, Notes (queries 1 [29-31], 2 [32-45], 8 [122-128], 17 [208-213], 19 [216-217]), Letters (383-386, 390-392, 395-398, 497-499, 533-540, 547-550)
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week eleven
November 8
Enlightenment and Race 1
Wheatley, poems selections listed below
Preface
Copy of a letter sent by the Author's Master to the Publisher
To the Publick
To the University of Cambridge, in New England
On being brought from Africa
On the Rev. Mr. George Whitefield
To the Right Hon. William, Earl of Dartmouth
Gates, "Literary Theory and the Black Tradition," 1-24 (e reserve)
Hume, Kant, Paine on race- (Kramnick 629-630, 637-639, 645-649)
Jefferson, Notes (queries 6 [73-111], 11 [133-150], 14, [177-199], 18 [214-215]), Letters (386-388, 454-455, 517, 544-547)
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week twelve
November 15
Enlightenment and Race 2
Equiano (Gates, chapters 8 and 9 optional)
Cugoano (Gates, selections 83-113, 142-145, 152-156, 161-180)
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week thirteen
November 29
Sentimental and Feminist Responses
Foster, The Coquette
Murray [Constantia], "On the Equality of the Sexes" (Kramnick 601-609)
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week fourteen
December 6
art, tradition, the Gothic-a challenge to Enlightenment?
Brown, Wieland
Burke, "The Sublime" (Kramnick 329-333)
Rousseau, "On Theater and Morals" (Kramnick 333-336)
Kant, "The Beautiful and Sublime" (Kramnick 339-342)