Time Schedule:
Phillip S Thurtle
HUM 201
Seattle Campus
Focuses on the interdisciplinary nature of the humanities with an emphasis on writing. Team-taught lectures and discussion sections for freshmen. Offered: A.
Class description
This class will ponder occasions when everydayness gives way to oddity, strangeness, and unfamiliarity. More specifically, we will examine scenarios in which people deliberately venture beyond their comfort zone, to risk vulnerability in quest of novelty. What modes of knowing and feeling, what forms of danger accompany the uneasy encounter with the truly unforeseen? Because movement through space serves as a paradigm for leaving behind the familiar, travel will figure centrally in our discussions. But we will also discuss how the creative process itself can serve as a model for “making one's home strange,” a means of doffing habit to perceive anew the world around us. Finally, we will explore the interpersonal dimension of these voyages into the unknown. What kinds of relationship—of trust, of fear, of rivalry, of welcome, of longing—characterize interchange between “strangers”? Can one truly learn to see (or see oneself) through another's eyes?
Student learning goals
General method of instruction
Recommended preparation
Class assignments and grading
