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Literature Humanities
Sing, Muse. Literature Humanities is popularly
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Community portal known as Lit Hum . Officially, it's called
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Random article Masterpieces of Western Literature and
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Philosophy.
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What links here The course is a central part of the Core
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Special pages Curriculum and is taken by all Columbia College Lit Hum books
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Permanent link first years. The first semester covers mainly
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Greek literature, with some Bible-stuff at the end. The second semester
starts with Virgil and ends with Virginia Woolf. For your convenience, we
have prepared a "lite" guide to the course (see below). That said, you
probably won't get most of it until you've actually done the reading.
Contents [hide]
1 History
2 Syllabus
2.1 First semester
2.2 Second semester
3 See also
4 External links
History
Although the experience of receiving one's free copy of Iliad, a gift from
the Columbia College Alumni Association, and meeting one's freshman
classmates in the first Lit Hum class is marketed as one of the central
experiences of an education at Columbia College, Lit Hum historically
played poor cousin to its Core Curriculum counterpart in philosophy and
politics, Contemporary Civilization. While the latter course began under its
current name as early as 1919, Lit Hum developed out of a series of later
course concepts.
The first was John Erskine's General Honors course, first proposed in
1917, but not meeting for the first time until 1921. This was the first
expression of that educator's philosophy that students should engage in
reading the "Great Books" of Western Civilization. This course was later
co-taught by Mortimer Adler and Mark Van Doren. Van Doren went on to
create General Honors' successor, Humanities A, which he himself taught
for 17 years. Adler would go on to become a popularizer of the Great
Books movement, taking the Gospel of the Core to some school in the
Second City. During the 1930s, another class, the Colloquium on
Important Books, co-taught by Jacques Barzun and Lionel Trilling, would
embrace the Great Books philosophy and help shape modern Lit Hum.
Syllabus
Although the Lit Hum syllabus is among the most ironclad in all the Core
Curriculum, parts are subject to change and modification due to instructor
discretion, grad student strikes, and other unforseen circumstances. In
Fall 2006, for example, the standard first semester syllabus, normally all
Greek and Biblical texts, was altered to include a modern play by Vaclav
Havel, who was on campus at the time as artist in residence. Still,
modifications are often minor - a different Greek play substituted for the
Medea, an additional Shakespeare play, another Homeric poem, etc.
Such changes can mean that one becomes lost when your friend from
another section begins discussing an anomalous inclusion, like The
Baccahe, but the majority of the curriculum is fairly standard. A greater
schism may open with a much older alumnus of Columbia College, who
might remember a time when Milton, Voltaire, and/or Goethe appeared on
the syllabus. The following table is intended to include all works in current
use (either this year or in the past two or three years):
First semester
Online
Author Title "Lite" study guide
versions
Homer Iliad [1] [2] Achilles is a whiny momma's boy
Only Zeus Knows Has to do with fertility, in every sense of the word.
Hymn to Demeter [3]
(probably Homer) Heh.
Homer Odyssey [4] [5] Odysseus has crazy sex appeal
Herodotus likes to think he's a real historian, but he
Herodotus Histories [6]
makes stuff up
[7]
Aeschylus The Oresteia (trilogy) Clytemnestra is a stone cold bitch
[8] /[9] /[10]
Sophocles Oedipus [11] Oedipus loved his Mother, more than his eyes
Euripides Medea [12] Medea is a psycho femi-nazi
History of the Thucydides likes to think he's a real historian, but he
Thucydides [13] [14]
Peloponnesian War makes up "quotes"
Aristophanes Lysistrata [15] Women on strike... no sex!
The greeks had sex with little boys; oh, and Socrates
Plato Symposium [16]
makes stuff up
Buy one get one free! That's right, get two of
God (via Moses) Book of Genesis [17] [18]
everything!
God? Book of Job [19] [20] The old testament God is schizophrenic
God (via Luke) Gospel of Luke [21] Uh, I didn't get this far with my reading
God (via John) Gospel of John [22] Hey Jews, here's why you should become Christian
Second semester
Online
Author Title "Lite" study guide
versions
Aeneas the pussy from Trojan does an Odyssey-load of
Virgil Aeneid [23]
travelling and an Illiad-load of fighting
Augustine Confessions [24] [25] Babies are evil!
Dante Inferno [26] [27] Which circle of hell will your i-banker and lawyer parents go to?
The
Boccaccio [28] Ten people had an orgy in the countryside
Decameron
Montaigne Essays [29] Find out all about my medieval eating and shitting schedule
A dozen characters get seriously fucked up when the king
Shakespeare King Lear [30]
stupidly decides to retire. Lesson: work till you drop.
[31] [32]
Cervantes Don Quixote Meet a fucked-up Spanish wannabe knight
[33]
Shakespeare Hamlet [34] The protagonist is deep down just a poor emo kid
Pride and [35] [36] A woman's place is in marriage... and in the kitchen, so make
Jane Austen
Prejudice [37] [[38] me a sandwich, Barnard girl! Also, don't elope.
Crime and
Dostoevsky [39] [40] Murder!
Punishment
To the Time passes. There's a window. More time passes. There's a
Woolf
Lighthouse painting. More time passes.
See also
Lit Hum exam leak
James Robert Russell, who created an imitation "Literature Humanities"
seminar at Harvard
Core Curriculum texts
Contemporary Civilization
External links
Official Lit Hum home page
Category: Core Curriculum
This page was last edited on 1 December 2013, at 17:09.
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