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Master of Liberal Arts Program
811 Anderson Hall
Temple University
Philadelphia, PA 19122
215-204-1644 (phone)
215-204-9611 (fax)
Jayne K. Drake
Director, MLA Program
mla@temple.edu
215-204-7743 (phone)
Michael Szekely
Assistant Director, MLA Program
mszekely@temple.edu
215-204-6704 (phone)
Colleen Knapp
Administrator
colleen.knapp@temple.edu
215-204-1644 (phone)
Alpha Walker
MLA Coordinator
alpha.walker@temple.edu
215-204-1644 (phone)
MLA courses are usually offered in small seminar settings (7 to 12 students) which provide opportunities for lively engagement and exchange of ideas among the students and the professor. As with most graduate courses, students are often expected to give oral presentations and to submit written assignments.
Most MLA courses are offered during the evening at Temple University’s Center City campus at 1515 Market Street. A typical course meets once a week, from 6:00 to 8:30 p.m. A number of other graduate courses across the College of Liberal Arts and the University are offered on the Main Campus during the day or early evening.
Please contact MLA Program Assistant Director, Michael Szekely at mszekely@temple.edu, for instructions on how to register.
Matriculated Master of Liberal Arts Students may begin to register for Spring 2010 courses on Monday, October 19th
Non-matriculating students may begin to register for courses on
Monday, November 2
Master of Liberal Arts
Spring 2010 Course Schedule
MLA 8011 Introduction to Interdisciplinary Studies: Tactics, Culture Jamming, and Everyday Life
TUCC
Section 401
Thursday, 6:00 – 8:30 p.m.
Michael Szekely
What do aspects associated with everyday life (and what does that mean, by the way?) have to do with theory? In what ways do we, as individuals, knowingly and unknowingly resist the forces of dominant social practices? Are we just sheep, buying and consuming—imagining that we are crafting some identity based on the kind of soda we buy? Or might some of our habits of consumption be perhaps less passive than we are often led to believe?
Through encounters with such work as Michel de Certeau’s The Practice of Everyday Life, the tactical media and “identity deconstruction” campaigns of the “Yes Men,” and the practice of “culture jamming” associated with publications like Adbusters, we will explore issues at the intersection of theory and practice, production and consumption, identity and difference, tactics and strategies, as well as discourses and practices of resistance.
Michael Szekely received his Ph.D. in Philosophy from Temple University. His primary research and teaching interests are in Cultural and Critical Theory, Aesthetics (especially the philosophy of music), and Contemporary Continental Philosophy, with more particular interests in French poststructuralism (especially Gilles Deleuze and Roland Barthes) and the Frankfurt School (especially Walter Benjamin). Michael is also a practicing musician and composer, with particular interests in collective improvisation and pop music.
MLA 8021 Foundations of Modern Thought, I: Jewish Philosophy and Italian Philosophy: Two Underappreciated Traditions
TUCC
Section 401
Thursday, 6:00 – 8:30 p.m.
Carlin Romano
While Jewish philosophy and Italian philosophy both loom large in their respective worlds, neither has been granted more than a rare presence in Anglo-American philosophy departments. Both traditions nonetheless boast thinkers of world-class importance (e.g., Dante and Vico/Maimonides and Buber), and both have historically confronted a shared central challenge: the reconciliation of religion with reason. With Jewish philosophy, the demand seems obvious, but many forget that Italian philosophy emerged over centuries in which the Vatican exercised enormous sway over present-day Italy as both a secular and theological power.
This course will serve as an introduction and exploration of both traditions, beginning in the past but weighted toward modern thinkers (Croce, Vattimo and Agamben, for instance, and Jewish philosophers such as Baeck, Rosenzweig, Buber, Kaplan and Jonas), who must inevitably wrestle with their forebears in engaging with eternal questions. No previous familiarity with either subject is presumed or required.
Carlin Romano, Critic-at-Large of The Chronicle of Higher Education and Literary Critic of The Philadelphia Inquirer for 25 years before leaving the paper in 2009, also teaches media theory and philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania. The first Eisenhower Fellow from the United States to Israel, he was a Visiting Associate Professor in the Temple Philosophy Department from 2000-2002 on a Dean's Appointment. In addition to his other activities, he has taught philosophy at Yale, Yeshiva University, Williams College, Bennington College and St. Petersburg State University in Russia, where he was a Fulbright professor. In 2006, he was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Criticism, cited by the Pulitzer Board for “bringing new vitality to the classic essay across a formidable array of topics.”
MLA 8230 Topics in International Studies: U.S. Foreign Policy and the World
TUCC
Section 401
Wednesday, 6:00 – 8:30 p.m.
Craig Eisendrath
The purpose of this course is to understand the present foreign policy of the United States and how we got there. The course will explore how our foreign policy is conducted, including inside pictures of the work of the State Department, intelligence system and United Nations, the background for our present policy, and the immediate crises facing the country. This is a course in which you will be doing a fair amount of independent work.
Six books will be required:
The Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission, Weapons of Terror (2006)
Craig R. Eisendrath and Melvin A. Goodman, Bush League Diplomacy: How the Neoconservatives Are Putting the World at Risk (Prometheus, 2004)
Michael T. Klare, Blood and Oil: The Dangers and Consequences of America’s GrowingDependency on Imported Petroleum (Metropolitan Books, 2004)
Jeffrey D. Sachs, The End of Poverty: Economic Possibilities for Our Time (PenguinPress, 2005)
Michael Krepon, Better Safe Than Sorry: The Ironies of Living with the Bomb (Sanford Securities Studies, 2008)
Helen Caldicott and Craig Eisendrath, War in Heaven: The Arms Race in Outer Space (New Press, 2007)
The course will also require daily reading of foreign affairs items in the New York Times, Washington Post, or Philadelphia Inquirer. The world will probably not hold still while we are having this class. Students will be required to open a class with a minute or two on something in the news which seems particularly important, and we will discuss it for the first ten minutes.
In addition, you may wish to supplement your reading by Foreign Affairs, the leading foreign policy journal. More adventuresome students may wish to make use of the Web in checking out additional sources.
Craig Eisendrath has his Ph.D. from Harvard University. He worked for a number of years as a diplomat with the U.S. Department of State, founded an experimental college, directed the Pennsylvania Humanities Council, and co-founded the National Constitution Center; he is presently Chairman of the Project for Nuclear Awareness, a Senior Fellow at the Center for International Policy, and an adjunct professor at Temple University. He is the author of a number of books on foreign affairs, and The Unifying Moment: The Psychological Philosophy of William James and Alfred North Whitehead, At War with Time: The Wisdom of the West, and several novels and plays.
MLA 8120 Topics in Cultural Studies: Sports and Its Importance in Society, Its View of History, and the Psychology of a Team
TUCC
Section 401
Tuesday, 6:00 – 8:30 p.m.
Gayle R. Smith
Sports is a very important part of life. Whether it's living our hopes and dreams through our teams, learning self-discipline, politics, immigration, or civil rights, sports says it all.
Using film as a medium, the class will tackle issues including but not limited to:
1. What is more important for a player -- the mental aspect or physical conditioning?
2. Does a team's treatment of civil rights mirror society's?
3. Does the behavior of the fans have an effect on the players' performance?
4. What are the roles of everyone involved in the team -- coach, player and others?
5. How is sports similar to acting and ballet?
The course is writing intensive. Students will be encouraged to write and do research into some areas of their choice. For instance, the movie Sugar concerns baseball players from the Dominican Republican. Students may focus on sports and the stress on players of moving from home and living in unfamiliar surroundings.
Or students might look into the civil rights movement and its effect on a particular sport.
Sports film will be the springboard to lively discussion.
Gayle Rosenwald Smith is a Philadelphia Barrymore judge. In addition, Ms. Smith is a practicing attorney, a published author of two non-fiction books, essays, and opinion pieces, which have appeared in such periodicals as The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia Magazine, The Chicago Tribune, and on-line publications. She appears on television and radio. Smith has always been passionate about theater, film, literature, and the arts and enjoys teaching.
MLA 8150 Topics in Gender Studies: Gender, Race, Ethnicity, and Personality
TUCC
Section 401
Monday, 6:00 – 8:30 p.m.
Gayle R. Smith
This class will look at identity from an individual view point to a societal viewpoint. Amongst the issues that will be addressed:
1. Who is a person? What affects an individual -- physical attributes? mental attributes? For example, in Lisa Genovese's Still Alice, how does Altzheimer's change an individual? Or Diving Bell and Butterfly, how does locked in syndrome affect the essence of a human being? How does society react to changes?
2. In Boys Don't Cry and Laramie Project, what do we learn about how being gay or lesbian affects how society reacts?
3. Are we in a post racial world or is race still front and center?
Gayle Rosenwald Smith is a Philadelphia Barrymore judge. In addition, Ms. Smith is a practicing attorney, a published author of two non-fiction books, essays, and opinion pieces, which have appeared in such periodicals as The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia Magazine, The Chicago Tribune, and on-line publications. She appears on television and radio. Smith has always been passionate about theater, film, literature, and the arts and enjoys teaching.
MLA 8180 Ways of Seeing: The Art of Persuasion
TUCC
Section 401
Tuesday, 6:00 – 8:30 p.m.
Herb Simon
This course deals with the “Gray Areas” of persuasion, where intent to persuade is not so clear. Its aim is to heighten student awareness of non-obvious forms of persuasion, including subtle forms of deception. Topics include: Impression Management, Rhetoric and Illness,Scientists as Persuaders, Propagandistic Reporting, and Classroom Indoctrination, Students should become more discriminating message recipients and perhaps more effective persuaders. More importantly, the course should provoke thought on some basic questions worth thinking about. For example: What’s real, what’s inauthentic? What’s real, what’s socially constructed? When if at all should professors take and defend controversial issues in class?
Herbert W. Simons (Ph.D., Purdue University, 1961) taught persuasion and related subject matter (e.g., political communication, rhetoric of science) at Temple University from 1960 until his retirement in December 2007. Recipient of the National Communication Association’s Distinguished Scholar Award, he has authored or edited eight books, including Persuasion in Society (Sage). He has also received four “Best Article” awards. A frequent media commentator, visiting professor, and guest lecturer, he has also directed Temple’s London Study Abroad program in communication, lectured at Peking University and elsewhere in China, and served as a Fulbright Senior Specialist in Hong Kong and Jakarta.
MLA 8110 Topics in the Art and American Culture: The Future of the Past
TUCC
Section 401
Wednesday, 6:00 – 8:30 p.m.
Kenneth Finkel
Our cultural assets are everywhere and they are threatened every day. Not just in our museums, libraries and archives, they are also along our streets and in our parks. They are in our homes and in our very memories. The challenge of responsible stewardship of our cultural assets falls to all of us in many ways: as taxpayers, engaged citizens and as professionals in our communities. In this course, we’ll examine the larger issues of cultural stewardship through the lens Philadelphia's cultural community, which is among the nation's largest and most complex. We’ll explore the intersecting roles of the collecting institutions, philanthropy, and less traditional trends (such as preserving memory) yet to emerge in full form.
Kenneth Finkel brings a range of experience from throughout Philadelphia’s cultural community. As longtime Curator of Prints and Photographs at the Library Company of Philadelphia, Finkel’s books, catalogues, and exhibitions focused on popular graphics. As Executive Director of Arts & Culture Service at WHYY, he worked across additional media platforms sharing stories from the 18th and 19th centuries, as well as from the city’s vibrant creative community.
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MLA 8011, 8021, 8031, and 8041 form the core of the MLA degree and provide a foundation for the students individualized course of study. Generally students take at least two of these courses fairly early in their program of study.
MLA 8011 Introduction to Interdisciplinary Studies
This course introduces students to interdisciplinary graduate studies and to cultural analysis by looking at the kinds of questions that can best be answered through an interdisciplinary approach and with various available methodologies. Taking American culture as its primary focus, students read texts in areas such as Visual Culture, American Studies, Women's Studies, and the Arts and Society. Topics include, for example: cultural representations of gender and sexualities, and of race and "whiteness"; the social construction of space and place; technology and its construction of identity; boundaries of culture and consumption (high, low, middlebrow); museums and cultural memory.
MLA 8021 Foundations of Modern Thought, I
This course explores the foundations of modern thought by examining the essential elements of the intellectual and literary traditions of world cultures, from ancient times to the Enlightenment. Representative readings will be drawn from literature, philosophy, and psychology, from Western traditions (e.g., Greeks, Hebrews, and Romans) as well as non-Western. Sample topics include: The Old Testament world view; the classical ideal of the hero; the Platonic ideal; the medieval religious synthesis; the Renaissance and statecraft; Cartesian method; the morality of the Enlightenment; the beginnings of alienation. Sample texts: The Book of Job; Psalms, Homer, The Iliad; the Koran; the Sundiata; Gilgamesh; African Folktales; Sophocles, Oedipus Rex; Plato, The Dialogues; Ovid, The Metamorphosis; Augustine, Confessions; Dante, The Divine Comedy; Machiavelli, The Prince; Descartes, Discourse on Method; Moliere, Tartuffe; Voltaire, Candide.
MLA 8031 Foundations of Modern Thought, II
This course examines the foundations of contemporary thought, moving from the Romantic and Victorian world views to Modernism and Postmodernism. Students explore the new paradigms which have come about from breakthroughs in science and social thought, and from the traumatic events of the twentieth century. Readings are drawn from literature, history, science, and philosophy. Sample topics include: Evolution and its impact on social thought; Communism; the Freudian Revolution; Einstein and the new Physics; the Modernist Revolution; Existentialism; Structuralism and Post-Structuralism; Cybertechnology and the Digital Age. Sample authors include: Marx; Darwin; Einstein; Whitehead; Nietzsche; Freud; Woolf; Beckett; Joyce; Le Corbusier; W. Benjamin; Sartre; Ellul; Baudrillard; Barthes; Viktor Frankl; Norbert Wiener; Pynchon; Marquez; Kuhn; Foucault.
MLA 8041 Foundations of American Culture
This course looks at the foundations and traditions of American thought and culture, from the Protestant foundation to America's place in global culture and cyberculture. An effort is made to connect intellectual traditions with historical events, including the American Revolution, the rise of feminism and abolitionism in the nineteenth century, and the emerging industrial and technological world of the twentieth century. American traditions are placed in the contexts of European thought and the broader model of globalization. Readings are drawn from a variety of writers, from seventeenth-century Puritan ministers and eighteenth-century statesmen to Emerson and Frederick Douglass and then to William James, John Rawls, Cornel West, Kwame Appiah. Sample topics include: Protestant Foundation; American Enlightenment; Transcendentalism; Realism and Naturalism; Pragmatism; Technology; Feminism; Race and Ethnicity; the symbol of America in modern thought; globalization and its consequences.
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The content of these courses varies depending on the professor, so please be sure to check the course listings every semester. Students must take at least two courses from these listings.
MLA 8110 Topics in the Arts and American Culture
This course explores the relationship between the arts and American culture, with an emphasis on how music, literature, and visual arts have reflected social, political, and intellectual concerns. The levels of art, from high to middlebrow to popular, will also be considered, with attention to the cross influences from one to the other, and the question of audience.
MLA 8120 Topics in Cultural Studies
This course examines topics relating to popular culture, media, and advertising, with an emphasis on how cultural representations reflect social and political interests. The approach embraces various competing disciplines (e.g., literature, anthropology, philosophy) at the intersection of aesthetics and politics.
MLA 8130 Topics in Visual Culture
An exploration of photography, film, television, and other visual media, in terms of the ways they interpret the world. Some of the issues considered will be: What are the elements of the visual? How are race, ethnicity, gender, and sexuality represented in the media? How do visual media interact with one another?
MLA 8140 Topics in Performance Studies
Performance Studies encompasses dance, theater, and mixed media theatrical presentations, from street theater to happenings to public ritual. The course targets specific topics ranging from historical studies to the contemporary.
MLA 8150 Topics in Gender Studies
The changing constructions of gender are the subject of this course which will explore such topics as representations of masculinity; feminist theory and the academy; the sexual revolution; society and homosexuality.
MLA 8171 Intellectual Heritage, MLA
This course may focus on a number of diverse topics depending on the instructor: e.g., the Greek foundations of modern thought; the religious texts that provide an important underpinning for Western Civilization; the Enlightenment commitment to reason, science, and the essential goodness and individuality of man; Romanticism and its emphasis on feelings and the imagination; great thinkers of the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty first centuries.
MLA 8180 Ways of Seeing
Our educational system tends to neglect the visual world, despite our growing dependence on pictorial and visual information. Using methods from anthropology, psychology, communications theory, and art history, this course will explore nonverbal communication, the built environment, photography, film, and television as culturally conditioned symbolic systems.
MLA 8210 Topics in Political Culture
Public policy has often emerged out of a combination of legal struggle, political negotiation, private wealth, and public interest groups. This course focuses on American political culture, including such topics as civil rights, the conservative right vs. the left, government by plutocracy, national health care, the rights of the poor, and the fate of the middle class.
MLA 8220 Topics in Urban Studies
This course explores the way cities have been formed and continue to be formed in relation to parks and neighborhoods, suburbs, and regions. The emphasis is on the way urban culture is shaped through the design of space, architectural form, and through urban planning.
MLA 8250 Topics in Science, Technology, and Culture
The impact of science and technology on culture has been pervasive and can be measured in terms of social life and habits, the environment, the arts, and politics. Emphasizing the last hundred years, this course examines some of the more significant changes in science and technology, from the automobile to computers, and explores the ways the individual and society have been redefined.
MLA 8230 Topics in International Studies
After World War II, with the independence of formerly colonial nations, a new world of independent nation states evolved, torn between the pressures of ethnic culture, global communications, and international economies. This course explores issues of cultural identity and cultural conflict, as they surface in literature and film, in global tourism, in efforts at global cooperation and global competition.
MLA 9082 Independent Study
Students who wish to enroll for Independent Study must submit a proposal written under the direction of a faculty member who will supervise the student's work. This proposal must be submitted the semester before the Independent Study is to take place. The proposal should describe the project, indicate a) works to be read, b) frequency of student-instructor meetings, c) student writing to be produced, and d) means of student evaluation.
"Through the professors, students, and material, the MLA teaches us about what it it means to be human by allowing us to engage in life in a more meaningful way."
Mark Rice, MLA student