Fall Term 2009

(An ancient street map of the city of Rome, preserved on marble)

The City: Athens, Florence and Berlin

The Course: Cities have traditionally been the catalyst to political, cultural, scientific and economic development. In this course we will look at the experiences of three cities. Ancient Athens formed the model for the "golden age" that has become the model to measure the achievement of western cities; Renaissance Florence is our second model of a city that enjoyed a golden age; Berlin in the 20th century had a urban experience that was both distinctive in its own right and yet also characteristic of what many other European cities experienced. We will devote about a third of the course to each of these cities.

General Education Requirements: This course provides 4 credits toward the Group I (arts and letters) requirement.

Grading: Participation (30%), one short midterm (20%), one short paper (20%); final (30%).

Course books and readings:

• Otto Friedrich. Before the Deluge, A Portrait of Berlin
• Bruce Thornton. Greek Ways: How the Greeks Created Western Civilization
• Gene Brucker. Renaissance Florence

There is a great deal of overlap between the books in terms of their basic themes. Nonetheless, they follow somewhat different patterns, and you may find the differences more interesting than the similarities. Thornton attempts to relate the Greek/Athenian experience directly to contemporary US. You probably will not agree with everything he writes, but he does raise interesting issues. Brucker's book on Florence is more conventional, but he does address all the issues of contemporary urban life, the reasons for success and failure. Friedrich, who wrote his book at the height of the Cold War and when the city was the symbol of the East-West conflict, focuses cultural achievement in the context of political chaos.

Expectations: This course is designed as a "seminar" (the course has an enrollment cap). I do expect students to come prepared and ready to discuss the material; lectures are short and are designed to give some structure for that discussion. There will be a midterm, a final exam and a paper. Note too: we will be meeting for two sessions of about 100 minutes each/week.

Schedule and Assignments:

LiveAction in the City
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