World Views: War and Its Alternatives - Syllabus

Home | Syllabus | Schedule

Course Description

World Views Required Texts:

1. Terkel, Studs. The Good War: An Oral History of World War II. New York: The New Press,1984.
2. Hacker, Diana. Pocket Style Manual, 4th edition. St. Martin's Press, 2004.
3. Barker, Pat. Regeneration. New York: Plume, 1991.
4. Ward, Candace. World War One British Poets. Mineola, N.Y.: Dover, 1997.
5. Elshtain, Jean Bethke, et. al. But Was It Just?: Reflections On The Morality Of The Persian Gulf War. New York : Doubleday, 1992
6. Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War in On Justice, Power, and Human Nature. Translated by Paul Woodruff. Indianapolis, Indiana: Hackett Publishing, 1998.
7. Holmes, Robert L. and Barry Gan, eds. Nonviolence In Theory And Practice. Prospect Heights, Ill. : Waveland Press, 2004.
8. Dorfman, Ariel. Death and the Maiden. New York: Penguin Plays, 1994.

World Views Course Description:

World Views Course Description: The World Views first-year seminar is a program unique to Willamette University. The primary motivation of the faculty who developed the course in 1987 was to provide a common experience for all first-year students that would serve as an introduction to the rigorous goals of the liberal arts tradition in which Willamette University is firmly rooted. The course is built around the skills of critical reading, informed discussion, and cogent writing, the same skills that are the foundation for most academic programs on campus.

World Views faculty come from a wide variety of disciplines and departments. They teach in the program because they believe in its overall goals, and because they realize that they can enrich their teaching and learning by moving outside of the areas in which they are experts and joining the students in a community of learners. In the World Views classroom, the teacher is more a facilitator than an expert.

In order to encourage students to read carefully, think critically, speak articulately, and write coherently, we have assembled a set of interesting and demanding readings on war and its alternatives. It is our belief that such readings provide an excellent introduction to the critical skills that students will draw upon during their years at Willamette, and a coherent framework in which to exercise these skills. Moreover, by engaging these materials, we hope that we will all come to a better understanding of ourselves and our place in society, and we will achieve a deeper appreciation of the rich cultural differences which characterize our world.

At most moments in history, large numbers of people have been directly involved in destructive wars. At the end of the nineteenth century, many believed that there would never again be an "all-out" war among nations. Many were optimistic that civilization was advancing in ways that would make wars of all kinds less likely. Beginning with World War I, however, the twentieth century witnessed impressive advances in the technology of war, adding immensely to the damage that war can do. From our vantage point today, the optimism of the late nineteenth century seems naïve.

The major goals of this World Views topic are to study the origins and causes of wars, and to discuss their ethical and social consequences. We will examine case studies that will illuminate and bring to life the experiences of war. We also will examine whether past wars could have been avoided and whether future wars need not occur if nations and individuals learn more about the causes of war, how to better conduct war, and how to make peace. We will explore ethical questions about the decision to go to war, conduct during and after the conflict, and what we can do to encourage nonviolent resolution to conflict.

The texts we will read and discuss this semester raise provocative questions about how nations decide to engage in warfare, what weapons to use, the effect war has on nations and individuals, and whether alternative to war exist. The texts also challenge us to review how we remember and reconstruct wars in our personal and national histories.

Evaluation: Your grade in the course will result from your class participation and from written work. Participation includes attendance at regular class sessions and mass lecture sessions. In addition, it includes your active and thoughtful role in class discussions. The writing component of the semester includes three formal essays in which you will synthesize readings, discussion and your own creative insights. Additionally, you will have short in-class and out-of-class writing assignments. Your instructor will provide specific information regarding the criteria and weight of each aspect of evaluation.

Unit I: Human Experiences of War

Texts

Terkel, Studs. The Good War: An Oral History of World War II. New York: The New Press,1984.

Hacker, Diana. Pocket Style Manual, 4th edition. St. Martin's Press, 2004.

Barker, Pat. Regeneration. New York: Plume, 1991.

Ward, Candace. World War One British Poets. Mineola, N.Y.: Dover, 1997.

Description

Studs Terkel, The Good War

Many Americans describe World War II as the "good war," fought for the right reasons with the right results. Not all wars in which America has participated have received such strong support during and after the conflict. The Vietnam War, for example, evokes quite different responses. Terkel's Pulitzer Prize winning oral history of World War II contains more than a hundred testimonials from a broad array of politicians, soldiers, scientists, journalists, factory workers, housewives, economists, laborers, and other Americans from diverse races, classes, and political persuasions. The Good War also contains interviews with survivors of the atomic bomb, and Germans, British, and Russians who experienced the war from a different perspective.

All the testimonials in The Good War are first-person accounts that transmit to us the urgency of the message. In reading these testimonials, you will see that, for many people of the era, World War II was the formative event of their lives. Terkel concludes that the war "changed the psyche as well as the face of the United States and the world." (3) Terkel's oral history raises questions about how we justify the weapons of war; how war equalizes the participants while nonetheless reflecting racial, gender, and class divisions; and how winners and losers are changed by how the history of the war is told.

Pat Barker, Regeneration and World War One British Poets, Candace Ward, editor

Inasmuch as war and conflict are constants in human history, we must not overlook the impact they have on individual lives. We will explore the personal experience of war through literature, because literature gives us an unadorned forum where ideas and experiences are presented without self-censorship, coyness, or shame. The language of art makes us aware that war affects each of us in different ways.

The First World War was a modern war in which more than 8 million people lost their lives. This war saw the development of great improvements to expedite human annihilation: air bombardment, chemical weapons, machine guns, and the tank. All these innovations and technological advances, however, reversed the idea of Progress and challenged humanity's trust and belief in the power of reason and of European civilization. In their place the war brought about an open questioning, an on-going doubt about the meanings and values that had been constants shaping society, art and religion.

Regeneration is part of a trilogy on World War I (sometimes called the "Great War"). Barker depicts the dilemmas experienced by the poet and war hero Siegfried Sassoon, a victim of "shell shock" or Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome, as we would call it today, and his doctor, the brilliant psychologist Dr. William Rivers. Both characters have to confront moral, personal, and social predicaments associated with World War I, and their roles in that war. They must answer questions about the futility of war before they can go on with their lives as soldier and healer.

Barker's historical novel also provides glimpses of the poet Wilfred Owen. Owen, a patient of Rivers, befriended Sassoon during their stay at a mental hospital. Owen died in action in 1918 at the age of 25. We will read and discuss the writings of Owen and other World War I poets in the collection, World War One British Poets. These writers found poetry an effective way to express their war experiences, some intellectualizing the events and others giving sentimental accounts. All plowed new artistic ground by describing their feelings in an open and passionate manner. This anthology provides a variety of genuine responses to the Great War, from patriotism to outrage.

Further Information

Unit II: Ethics of War

Texts

Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War in On Justice, Power, and Human Nature. Translated by Paul Woodruff. Indianapolis, Indiana: Hackett Publishing, 1998.

Elshtain, Jean Bethke, et. al. But Was It Just?: Reflections On The Morality Of The Persian Gulf War. New York : Doubleday, 1992.

Description

Thucydides, The History of the Peloponnesian War (translated by Paul Woodruff)

The Peloponnesian War (431-404 BCE) marks both the apogee and the end of Athenian hegemony in Greece. By this point, the Athenians had reduced the more than 400 independent member states of the Delian Sea League (a defense alliance to ward off the threat of another Persian invasion) to the status of mere tribute-paying vassals of Athens. Disgruntled members were prevented from leaving the league, and others were forced to join it. Threatened by the increasingly expansionist policies of Athens, Sparta and Sparta's allies in the Peloponnesian League finally declared war.

The Peloponnesian War raged for 27 years. Virtually the entire Greek-speaking world became involved. Cities were destroyed, and their populations killed or enslaved. Athens itself was almost constantly under siege, while Sparta's armies devastated Athens' hinterland and destroyed its crops. In the third year of the war, a plague killed a third of the Athenian population, including Pericles, the author of Athens' past successes. Nonetheless, it often appeared as though Athens would get the better of Sparta. In the end, however, bad strategy, ruthless treachery, and Persian support for Sparta resulted in the complete defeat of Athens. The Spartans razed the walls of the city and installed a puppet government. The days of Athenian greatness were over.

This devastating defeat severely challenged the Athenians' view of themselves. In his history of the war, Thucydides (ca 460-400 BCE), himself a former Athenian general, attempted to identify the causes of the war and the downfall of Athens. His account provides keen insights into the Greek psyche, the arrogance and hunger for power that often lead to war, and descriptions of what war does to a nation and its citizens. Historians and other scholars have always looked to Thucydides' account of the Peloponnesian War in their efforts to understand the causes and consequences of other wars.

Elshtain, Jean Bethke, et. al. But Was It Just?: Reflections On The Morality Of The Persian Gulf War.

But Was it Just? is an anthology put out in 1992, just after the Persian Gulf War. It sets up a rich conversation about the ethics of the U.S. declaration and prosecution of the war, all centering on the "just war theory." Roman Catholic thought, out of which that perspective developed, is represented by two articles, one supporting the war, the other questioning it. A similar dichotomy is clear in the essays of two Protestant ethicists. The volume is rounded out with an essay from a secular Jewish viewpoint and one by a Palestinian author in the West Bank. Though focused on a particular conflict, the discussion raises implications for the analysis of other wars investigated during the semester. It also begins an interesting debate on the usefulness of just war theory, given modern military technology and tactics.

Further Information

Unit III: Alternatives to War

Texts

Holmes, Robert L. Nonviolence In Theory And Practice. Prospect Heights, Ill. : Waveland Press, c1990, 2001.

Dorfman, Ariel. Death and the Maiden. New York: Penguin Plays, 1994.

Description

Ariel Dorfman, Death and the Maiden

On September 11, 1973, the government of Chile's democratically elected Salvador Allende was overthrown in a military coup supported by the U.S. government. For the next 17 years, the authoritarian dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet waged internecine war against its own citizens. Those who questioned the military, supported Allende, or were perceived as an "enemy" of Pinochet incurred the wrath and persecution of the repressive regime. Thousands were killed, tortured, exiled, or "disappeared".

Dorfman's play takes place in 1990, after President Patricio Aylwin has been democratically elected and has established a Human Rights and Truth Commission to uncover the truth regarding the human rights abuses under Pinochet, and to lay the foundation for a process of reconciliation among the Chilean people. The Commission was instructed to reconstruct a silenced history by making public the atrocities and the victims. However, for political, economic, and legal reasons, the Commission was not authorized to name or punish the perpetrators of Pinochet's horrors. Dorfman's play addresses the issues confronting Chile in the aftermath of the Pinochet dictatorship. The lead character, Paulina, discovers that she might have the opportunity to impose punishment on her torturer. She must consider the consequences of her actions on her husband, a promising politician of the newly elected democracy, on the politics of her country, and on herself. Will revenge dehumanized her as it did her torturer? Will revenge satiate her thirst for justice? Can she forgive the man who hurt her irreparably? Through Paulina's struggles, we confront universal questions about forgiveness, memory, and the constitution of our own humanity.

Further Information

Unit IV: Optional Units for Individual Sections