Course Syllabus

HUMA 1301.501: Exploration of the Humanities – Intersections of Science and Literature

Spring 2011
Mondays / Wednesdays 5:30-6:45pm JO 4.614

Instructor: Patrick Dennis

Phone: 972-883-6398
Email: pdennis@utdallas.edu
Office: JO 4.622
Office Hours: Wednesdays 4:30-5:30 and by appointment.

Course Pre-requisites, Co-requisites, and/or Other Restrictions

N/A

Course Description

Students in the various academic disciplines feel the overwhelming impulse to deem important only the knowledge they acquire
as part of their majors. What often falls by the wayside is their consideration of the larger contexts (philosophical, historical,
and social, to name just three) into which their knowledge fits. Nowhere is this tendency more palpable than in the natural
sciences. When students are asked about physics and astronomy, their first instincts are not to discuss the history of those
sciences through the work of Kepler, Galileo, and Newton; instead, students quote the formulas and laws for which the
scientists are famous. In this Humanities course, we will explore the growth of the sciences from the beginning of the
nineteenth century up to the modern day. More specifically, we will examine how the arts over that span represent the
responses of society not only to the important ideas that have shaped the history of science but also to the larger social, moral,
and ethical concerns that arise in the course of pursuing those sciences. In works ranging from the works of H.G. Wells, to
Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, to the popular medical drama House, we will consider
such concerns, including, but not limited to the place of ethics in science, the relationship between science and society, and
issues surrounding scientific methodology. From such an examination, we will approach a greater understanding of the
relationship between the humanities and the sciences.

Student Learning Objectives/Outcomes

In this course, students will develop an understanding of critical approaches taken in humanities towards a variety of source
material, including literature, philosophy, history, and art. Without abandoning contemporary source materials, students will
learn to expand their sources for understanding a historical period to include products of popular culture.

Required Textbooks and Materials

H.G. Wells. The Time Machine. [978-0141439976]

H.G. Wells. The War of the Worlds. [978-0141441030]
Mary Shelley. Frankenstein. [978-0141439471]
Robert Louis Stevenson. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. [978-0199536221]
Aldous Huxley. Brave New World. [978-0061767647]
Course Packet available at Off Campus Books
Assignments & Academic Calendar

Week 1
10 January – Introduction to the Course
12 January – The Influences on Nineteenth-Century Science and the Origins of Science Fiction

Week 2
17 January – Martin Luther King Day (NO CLASS)
19 January – The Time Machine: (I) “Introduction” – (VIII)”Explanation”

Week 3
24 January – The Time Machine: (IX)”The Morlocks” – “Epilogue”
Quiz #1 (The Time Machine)
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26 January – H.G. Wells “Cancelled Episode: The Return of the Time Traveller” (127-132)
Edwin Ray Lankester “From Degeneration: A Chapter in Darwinism” (157-163)
Benjamin Kidd “From Social Evolution” (169-173)

Week 4
31 January – The Time Machine (1960): begin
2 February – The Time Machine (1960): finish and discuss

Week 5
7 February – The War of the Worlds (Book 1, Chapters 1-11)
9 February – The War of the Worlds (Book 1, Chapters 12-end)

Week 6
14 February – The War of the Worlds (Book 2, Chapters 1-6)
16 February – The War of the Worlds (Book 2, Chapters 7-end)
Quiz #2 (War of the Worlds)

Week 7
21 February – Frankenstein (Volume I)
23 February – Frankenstein (Volume II)

Week 8
28 February – Frankenstein (Volume III)
Response Paper #1 (H.G. Wells) Due!
2 March – Mary Shelley’s Introduction to Third Edition of Frankenstein (169-173)
Barbara Johnson “My Monster/ My Self” (241-251)
Marilyn Butler “Frankenstein and Radical Science” (302-313)

Week 9
7 March – Review for Midterm Examination
9 March – Midterm Examination
Week 10
14 March – SPRING BREAK (NO CLASS)
16 March – SPRING BREAK (NO CLASS)

Week 11
21 March – The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (“Story of the Door” – “The Last Night”)
23 March – The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (“The Last Night” – end)
Quiz #3 (Stevenson)

Week 12
28 March – Stephen Jay Gould “Post-Darwinian Theories and the Ape Within” (132-134)
Frederic W.H. Myers “Multiplex Personality” (134-136)
Norman Kerr “Abject Slaves to the Narcotic” (136-138)
John Addington Symonds “This Aberrant Inclination in Myself” (138-140)
30 March – Judith R. Walkowitz “London in the 1880s” (141-144)
Walter Houghton “Hypocrisy” (146-149)

Week 13
4 April – Brave New World (Chapters 1-3)
Response Paper #2 (Shelley/Stevenson) Due!
6 April – Brave New World (Chapters 4-6)

Week 14
11 April – Brave New World (Chapters 7-11)
13 April – Brave New World (Chapters 12-15)

Week 15
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18 April – Brave New World (Chapters 16-end)
Quiz #4 (Huxley)
20 April – Paul Smethurst “’O brave new world that has no poets in it’: Shakespeare and Scientific Utopia in Brave New
World” (96-106)

Week 16
25 April – “To Intubate or Not to Intubate: House’s Principles and Priorities” (137-149)
“If the End Doesn’t Justify the Means, Then What Does?” (164-173)
27 April – House (episode to be determined)

Week 17
2 May – House (episode to be determined)

Week 18
11 May – Final Examination (5:00 pm)
Response Paper #3 Due (House)!

This schedule is tentative and is subject to change at the professor’s discretion. Any changes made to the schedule will be
announced in class as earlier as possible.

Grading Policy

Attendance/Participation: 10%
Quizzes (a total of four): 20%
Response Paper #1: 10%
Response Paper #2: 10%
Response Paper #3: 10%
Midterm Exam: 20%
Final Exam: 20%

Course & Instructor Policies

Students are responsible for turning in assignments on the dates indicated on the syllabus; in addition, students are expected to
take exams on the specified dates. Therefore, I will only grant a make-up exam in the case of a medical emergency documented
by the original copy of a doctor’s note. I will not accept a copy.

Before turning in assignments, a student’s paper must be stapled, in 12-pt. font (not courier), and with page numbers. If any of
these requirements are not met, I will not accept the assignment.

For information on the policies of the university regarding Academic Integrity, Scholastic Discipline, et al., please visit the
following website:

http://go.utdallas.edu/syllabus-policies

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