Courses

• KHC UC 103: Anger
  If Homer's Iliad is the first work of Western literature, as it well may be, then the first word of Western literature is "anger." Homer begins his epic with a particular word for anger, "mênis"--it is but one of several ancient Greek words for this emotion, and means something like righteous anger, righteous indignation. That word, and Homer's famous portrayal of its meaning and effects, will inaugurate our seminar. Our topic is, in short, just this: anger. What is it? How to understand it? Is it a good thing to feel, or is it to be suppressed on grounds of irrationality, of its destructiveness, of its connection with possibly flawed quasi-moral notions such as honor? We have all felt anger, to the point that it seems to be an emotion intimately familiar to us. And yet we have all wondered at his power and nature, and about its morality. Anger certainly seems to be an extraordinarily prevalent and influential emotion at all levels of human life.
• KHC VA 101: Art for the City
  Visual Art is a universal language where diverse areas of professional specialization can intersect and find a new voice and way of speaking to many people instead of an esoteric and isolated few. Significant social, political, and moral issues of our time require the ability to think from multiple points of view. This ability can be developed into a visionary skill, which in turn can be embodied in enduring and powerful forms of artistic communication. In this course students will examine the ways that visual art embodies contemporary issues and how these issues relate to content found in the liberal arts study disciplines including The Social Sciences, The Natural Sciences, and Life Sciences. This course will include a diverse range of contemporary practices in many art forms that we will discuss as a group through frank discourse. We will investigate the impact of visual arts on diverse domains of 'real world' industries and communities locally in the Boston Area and compare these with projects made worldwide. We will do this through lecture presentations, peer to peer dialogue, student to professional dialogue and research. The course will culminate with individual illustrated reports in the form of online portfolios.
• KHC XL 101: Global Shakespeares
  A Kuwaiti playwright, in the aftermath of 9/11, casts Hamlet as a jihadi terrorist and Ophelia as a suicide bomber. Hollywood directors set Othello and Taming of the Shrew adaptations in American high schools. The College Board, as it does almost every year, includes a Shakespeare essay on the AP English Literature exam. What can these diverse events tell us about the cultures that produce them and the plays that inspire them? Why do contemporary writers feel the need to parrot and parody "Shakespeare," and how much of this activity is about Shakespeare at all? This seminar provides an introduction to reading and writing about Shakespeare's plays. But it also takes a step back to consider Shakespeare as a phenomenon. Among others we'll look at feminist Shakespeare, postcolonial and nationalist Shakespeare, and sci-fi Shakespeare. Beyond learning about particular offshoots and adaptations, the deeper point is to make sure you never read a "Great Book" the same way again.

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