SIDNEY HOOK
203
If it were not for this reorientation towards race, sex, and class,
the claim that changes in the basic curriculum were "sweeping" or
"monumental" would be transparently disingenuous . For in the
natural course of events changes in the core curriculum of Western
Culture have been made from time to time . Without changing the
structure of the course in Western Culture, great works by women
and people of color could easily have been incorporated. Indeed, in
many courses in Western Culture on other campuses this is actually
the case or about to be done.
I cite as an example of this the curriculum of the proposed
Humanities Core Curriculum: "The Making of the Modern World"
of Boston University, in which at key points
The Analects oj Conjucius,
the
Tao Te Ching
of Lao Tzu, the
Bhagavadgftif,
the
Koran,
the place of
women in Greek and Roman society are examined. Many other il–
lustrations from the recent past in the curriculum of American col–
leges can be cited. It required no great revolution in the curriculum
of Stanford's Western Culture course to incorporate any educa–
tionally reasonable proposal for readings from different cultures at
points of intersection or diffusion between them.
For the current year (1988-89) at Stanford, only one track out
of eight tracks, "Europe and the Americas," presages the changes
that are to be introduced in the fall of 1989. Although all the tracks
will gradually be modified along the lines mandated by the change
from the old Western Culture program to the new CIV program
(Culture, Ideas, Values), only the "Europe and the Americas" track
has been described as departing "fairly significantly from the prevail–
ing pattern" of the past.
It
mayor may not be a reliable indication of
how the other tracks will evolve. Since it is the only one available, it
may be instructive to look more closely at this particular track as a
possible guide to what to adopt or to avoid in constructing curricula.
I list the required readings of the Fall quarter of 1988 in the
order in which they were scheduled to be studied:
Augustine's
Confessions
Son of Old Man Hat: A Navaho Autobiography
Freud,
The Psychopathology of Everyday Life
Marx,
Communist Manifesto
Weber:
The Protestant Ethic
Melville :
Bartleby
Selections
from
the
Old Testament (Genesis)
and
New (Revelations)
Hurston,
Their Eyes Were Watching God
