POL 102 Public Myth

Texts:  Glenn Tinder, Political Thinking:  The Perennial Questions (HarperCollins, Pearson Classics)
Roy C. Macridis & Mark L. Hulliung, Contemporary Political Ideologies (HC)
Both texts provide reading lists with each chapter.  Also read these articles:
Paul Hollander, “The Resilience of the Adversary Culture,” The National Interest, Summer 2002, pp. 101-112.
Bjorn Wittrock, “Modernity: One, None, or Many?” in Daedalus, Multiple Modernities, Winter 2000, pp. 31-60.  Pace Library electronic reserve, under quest, password saturday

Full-Semester Version

Intensive Weekend Version

 Grading

Projects are due on the dates indicated.  On one or two occasions, an in-class report on the project might be done in lieu of turning in the project.  To count, projects (or in-class reports) must be on time.  Of the four assigned, three will constitute the written-work portion of the course and will count equally.  This allows for omitting the lowest grade if all items are done or for omitting one item without penalty.  To count fully, graded papers must be picked up when returned to class.  If fewer than three projects are done, the course grade will be reduced proportionately.  Other factors in grading include being there, being on time, being conscious, being prepared (paper, writing stick, knowing assignment).  There is no extra extra credit.  Keep all papers during the course and, at least, for six months afterward.

 Content Objectives

· Know rhetoric and hallmarks of doctrinal advocates, appeals by which adherents are drawn into movements.  Recognize concepts and collective behaviors related to ideas, beliefs, and experiences of:  Choice. Ambiguity. Humane Uncertainty. Paradox, dilemma, contradiction, conundrum..  Nature|Convention. . Leadership, gregariousness, divergence.  Representation. Transformation. Authenticity as a human being. Universe.  Intelligibility.  Microcosm, Fractal.  Id.  Noble lie | Big lie.  Living within the truth | Living within the lie.  Doctrines and ideologies (isms) used to rally groups and masses, themes and icons, tales of heroes, martyrs, epics, masterplots, fables, legends.

· Do various techniques of systematic comparative analysis, select techniques appropriate to stated purposes or problems and to available resources, production of coherent, complete, concise, on-time political-science projects.  Do separate facts from opinions, actualities from speculations.

· Develop habits of mind of thinking and questioning generic to all political science courses, ideas specific to Public Myth, inquiry and analysis related to any major, career objective, recreational interest.

Consider aspects shown in the captions and correlations under them regarding what to do and tips for thinking about problems in relating to the captions.

Background Sources

Afshar, Haleh, ed., Women and Politics in the Third World (London: Routledge, 1996).
Bluhm, William T., Ideologies and Attitudes:  Modern Political Culture (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1974).
Carson, Rachel, Silent Spring (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1962).
Christenson, Reo M., Alan S. Engel, Dan N. Jacobs, Mostafa Rejai, and Herbert Waltzer, Ideologies and Modern Politics (3^rd ed.; New York: Harper & Row, 1981).
Club of Rome, The Limits to Growth (New York: Universe Books, 1972).
Commoner, Barry, The Closing Circle:  Nature, Man, and Technology (New York: Knopf, 1971).
De Beauvoir, Simone, The Second Sex, trans. and ed. H. M. Parshley (New York: Knopf, 1952).
Fenn, Deane William (ed.), Third World Liberation Theologies:  A Reader (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1986).
Funderburk, Charles, and Robert G. Thobaden, Political Ideologies:  Left, Center, Right (New York: Harper & Row, 1989).
Goodin, R. E., Green Political Theory (Oxford: Polity, 1992).
Hennelly, Alfred T., S.J., ed., Liberation Theology:  A Documentary History (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1990).
Hirsch, Marianne, and Evelyn Fox Keller (eds.), Conflicts in Feminism (New York: Routledge, 1990).
Hoover, Kenneth R., Ideology and Political Life  (Monterey, CA: Brooks/Cole, 1987).
Lane, Robert E., Political Ideology:  Why the American Common Man Believes What He Does (New York: Free Press, 1962).
Lewis, Bernard, The Political Language of Islam (Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1988).
Lippman, Thomas W., Understanding Islam:  An Introduction to the Muslim World (New York: Meridian, 1995).
McGovern, Arthur F., Liberation Theology and Its Critics: Toward an Assessment (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1989).
Milbrath, Lester W., Envisioning a Sustainable Society:  Learning Our Way Out (Albany: State Univ. of New York Press, 1989).
Millett, Kate, Sexual Politics (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1970).
Rejai, Mostafa, Comparative Political Ideologies (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1984).
Okin, S. M., Women in Western Political Thought (Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press, 1979).
Rawls, John, The Theory of Justice (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press, 1971).
Sagoff, M., The Economy of the Earth (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1988).
Shanley, M. L., and C. Pateman (eds.), Feminist Interpretations and Political Theory (University Park, PA: Penn State Press, 1991).
Sigmund, Paul E., Liberation Theology at the Crossroads:  Democracy or Revolution (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1990).
Wall, Derek, Green History:  A Reader in Environmental Literature, Philosophy and Politics (London: Routledge, 1994).
Watt, W. Montgomery, Islamic Political Thought:  The Basic Concepts (Edinburgh: Edinburgh Univ. Press, 1968).
Yeatman, A., Postmodern Revisionings of the Political (New York: Routledge, 1994).