MASON SPEAKERS
Connecting the University with the Community |
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Community Relations | 4400 University Dr. | Mail Stop 2D5 | Fairfax, VA 22030-4444
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Lectures by
Rose Cherubin
Ancient Greek Philosophy A general introduction to Greek philosophy, discussing major figures and their ideas, questions, concerns, and writings.Specific philosophers and issues could be presented, including Plato, Aristotle, and Pythagoras. Areas of discussion include foundations of science, ethics, political theory, cosmology, justice. minimum lecture time: 45 A/V requirements: OP/S Origins of Philosophy in Ancient Greece In seventh century B.C.E. Greece, an investigation arose that was so unusual that a new word, philosophic, was invented. This talk focuses on how philosophia differed from other ways of thinking, how it was similar, and the importance of its influence. The influences of neighboring civilizations such as Egypt, Persia, and Babylon are explored. minimum lecture time: 45 A/V requirements: OP/S Sex and Gender in Ancient Greece: Philosophy, Poetry, Drama What if the leaders in politics, business, science, and the military had spent their youth as Playboy bunnies or car- show models? What if the second most powerful person in the country, the top advisor and speechwriter to the President, could not vote and had no right to own property or bring a legal case? This was the situation in ancient Athens in the fifth and fourth centuries BCE, and we can trace aspects of this back to Homer three centuries earlier. Today we might find some features of this picture paradoxical: the fact that a person was expected to be cute and dumb at first and then was supposed to become an intelligent and responsible leader; the fact that a community would think it acceptable for a person to be a top political advisor yet prohibit this person from voting and bringing a legal case. Indeed, even at the time some people found these inconsistencies troubling, and suggested alternatives - some of which influenced modern political and social thought. By reflecting on the peculiarities of the ancient Greeks’ ideas about sex and gender, we can gain some perspective on our own. minimum lecture time: 50 A/V requirements: LCD/S The Beautiful and the Just: Inquiry, Justice, and Value in Alain Locke and Aristotle Alain Locke was a 20th-century African American philosopher, Chair of the Philosophy Department at Howard University, and the guiding force behind the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920's. His work in philosophy, politics, education, and arts criticism was guided by the notion of culture as a goal. To see this we must look to his roots in classical Greek philosophy. “Culture,” in Locke’s sense, is an engagement of self-expression and intellect, valuable for its own sake and for the sake of understanding. This recalls Aristotle’s account of theoria (contemplation) and its objects, the kala (beautiful or noble things). Culture for Locke can transform both lives and social orders. It is not aimed solely at gains within the status quo, and is always self-critical and investigative. Self-expression for Locke requires an interrogation of presuppositions about the world, one’s place in it, and what should be. This reintroduces the question of what a life and a society should be for. Locke’s conception of culture thus addresses deficiencies in current discussions of the relationships between education, democracy, and social justice. minimum lecture time: 30 A/V requirements: LCD/S
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