ANCIENT HUMANITIES | HUM 2210
as taught at Tyler Junior College
A survey of the art, architecture, literature, music, religion, and philosophy of the ancient and medieval world, from the first cities of Mesopotamia (ca. 3500 BCE) to Renaissance Florence (ca. 1500 CE). This is not a History course. A history course asks what happened. This one asks what each people made out of what happened to them, and why. Start with Why the Humanities Matter.
MODULE I – Early Civilizations
Sec 1 • In the Beginning
1.1 Why the Humanities Matter
1.2 How to Read a Civilization
1.3 Before Writing
1.4 A Revolution in Food
1.5 What is Civilization?
1.6 The Bronze & Iron Ages
Sec 2 • Ancient Mesopotamia
2.1 History & Politics • Between the Rivers
2.2 Sacred Life • Temple & Priest-King
2.3 Art & Architecture • The Ziggurat of Ur
2.4 Music • The Lyres of Ur
2.5 Literature & Drama • Gilgamesh
2.6 Wisdom • An Eye for an Eye
Sec 3 • Ancient Egypt
3.1 History & Politics • The Gift of the Nile
3.2 Sacred Life • Ra, Osiris, & Isis
3.3 Music • Hathor & the Sistrum
3.4 Art & Architecture • The Pyramids of Giza
3.5 Literature & Drama • The Book of the Dead
3.6 Wisdom • Weighing the Heart
Sec 4 • Ancient India
4.1 History & Politics • The Indus Valley
4.2 Music • Singing the Vedas
4.3 Sacred Life • Dharma
4.4 Philosophy • The Middle Way
4.5 Literature & Drama • The Mahabharata & the Gita
4.6 Art & Architecture • Stupas & the Buddha
Sec 5 • Ancient China
5.1 History & Politics • The Mandate of Heaven
5.2 Sacred Life • Daoism & the Ancestors
5.3 Literature & Drama • The Daodejing
5.4 Music • Bronze Bells & Confucius
5.5 Philosophy • Confucianism
5.6 Art & Architecture • The Army & the Wall
MODULE II – The Greco-Roman Traditions
Sec 6 • Early Greece
6.1 History & Politics • The Polis & Democracy
6.2 Literature & Drama • The Iliad & Odyssey
6.3 Sacred Life • The Olympians & Athena
6.4 Music • The Doctrine of Ethos
6.5 Philosophy • The Presocratics
6.6 Art & Architecture • Geometry to the Kritios Boy
Sec 7 • Classical Greece
7.1 History & Politics • The Peloponnesian War & Alexander
7.2 Art & Architecture • The Acropolis & the Parthenon
7.3 Sacred Life • Delphi, Dionysus, & the Mysteries
7.4 Music • The Tragic Chorus & the Greek Modes
7.5 Literature & Drama • Tragedy, Comedy, & Thucydides
7.6 Philosophy • Socrates, Plato, & Aristotle
Sec 8 • The Romans
8.1 History & Politics • From Republic to Empire
8.2 Religion • Household Gods & the Imperial Cult
8.3 Literature & Drama • The Aeneid & Roman Satire
8.4 Art & Architecture • Aqueducts & Arches
8.5 Music • The Water Organ & the Arena
8.6 Philosophy • Stoicism & Roman Law
MODULE III – The Abrahamic Traditions
Sec 9 • Ancient Israel
9.1 History & Politics • The Promised Land & David
9.2 Religion • Covenant, Shabbat, & Mitzvot
9.3 Art & Architecture • The Ark & Temple
9.4 Music • The Psalms
9.5 Literature & Drama • The Torah & Talmud
9.6 Wisdom • Justice, Lovingkindness, & Repentance
Sec 10 • Early Christendom
10.1 History & Politics • Apostles to Constantine
10.2 Literature & Drama • Gospels & Epistles
10.3 Religion • Nicaea & the Creed
10.4 Music • Hymns of the Early Church
10.5 Philosophy • St. Augustine
10.6 Art & Architecture • Catacombs & the Hagia Sophia
Sec 11 • Early Islam
11.1 History & Politics • The Caliphate
11.2 Literature & Drama • The Qur’an & Hadith
11.3 Philosophy • The House of Wisdom
11.4 Religion • The Five Pillars
11.5 Music • The Call & Qur’anic Recitation
11.6 Art & Architecture • Mosque, Calligraphy, & Arabesque
MODULE IV – The Rise of Europe
Sec 12 • The Holy Roman Empire
12.1 History & Politics • Charlemagne & Feudal Europe
12.2 Literature & Drama • Beowulf & the Heroic Code
12.3 Religion • Monks, Popes, & Canon Law
12.4 Philosophy • The Trivium & the Carolingians
12.5 Art & Architecture • Romanesque & the Book of Kells
12.6 Music • Gregorian Chant
Sec 13 • The High Middle Ages
13.1 History & Politics • The Great Schism & Crusades
13.2 Literature & Drama • Song of Roland & Troubadours
13.3 Religion • Monastic Reform & St. Francis
13.4 Music • Hildegard & Notre Dame
13.5 Art & Architecture • The Gothic Cathedral
13.6 Philosophy • Aquinas, Maimonides, & Scholasticism
Sec 14 • The Late Middle Ages
14.1 History & Politics • Famine, War, & Black Death
14.2 Religion • Avignon & the Great Western Schism
14.3 Philosophy • William of Ockham
14.4 Music • Ars Nova & Machaut
14.5 Art & Architecture • Giotto & the Dance of Death
14.6 Literature & Drama • Dante, Boccaccio, & Chaucer
Sec 15 • The Renaissance
15.1 History & Politics • Florence & the Medici
15.2 Philosophy • Pico, Erasmus, & Humanism
15.3 Art & Architecture • Brunelleschi, Leonardo, & Raphael
15.4 Music • Josquin & the Art of Polyphony
15.5 Literature & Drama • Petrarch, Castiglione, & Machiavelli
15.6 Religion • Savonarola & the Eve of Reform
MODERN HUMANITIES | HUM 2230
as taught at Florida State University
A survey of the art, architecture, literature, music, religion, and philosophy of the modern world, from Gutenberg’s press in Mainz (ca. 1454) to the postmodern critique and the age of AI. Humanities I ends in Renaissance Florence; Humanities II begins with the printing press and asks how the modern West came to trust reason, progress, and the individual, and what that trust has cost.
MODULE I – The Rebirth (1454–1603)
Sec 1 • Defining the Modern
1.1 Philosophy • Modus & Modo: Method & the Way
1.2 History & Politics • Four Ages & the Promise of Progress
1.3 Literature & Drama • The First Information Age
1.4 Art & Architecture • From Duccio to Dürer
1.5 Music • Petrucci & the First Printed Music
1.6 Religion • Faith, Reason, & the Individual
Sec 2 • The Reformation
2.1 History & Politics • Luther & the Fracturing of Christendom
2.2 Literature & Drama • 95 Theses & the German Bible
2.3 Music • “Ein feste Burg” & the Chorale
2.4 Art & Architecture • Dürer’s Prints & the Image of Reform
2.5 Philosophy • Conscience & Authority at Worms
2.6 Religion • Trent & the Counter-Reformation
Sec 3 • Elizabeth & the New Heavens
3.1 History & Politics • England’s Golden Age
3.2 Religion • The Book of Common Prayer
3.3 Art & Architecture • Holbein’s The Ambassadors
3.4 Philosophy • Copernicus & the De-Centered Cosmos
3.5 Literature & Drama • Hamlet’s Modern Mind
3.6 Music • Dowland’s “Flow, My Tears”
MODULE II – Early Modern Philosophy (1604–1775)
Sec 4 • Baroque & the New Science
4.1 History & Politics • The Dutch Republic & the Market
4.2 Art & Architecture • Rembrandt’s Anatomy Lesson & Vermeer’s Astronomer
4.3 Religion • Splendor & Shadow: Caravaggio, Bernini, & Rome
4.4 Literature & Drama • Galileo’s Starry Messenger & the Trial of 1633
4.5 Philosophy • Newton’s Clockwork: The Mechanical Cosmos
4.6 Music • Bach & Handel
Sec 5 • Leviathan: The State & Social Contract
5.1 History & Politics • From Civil War to the Glorious Revolution
5.2 Religion • Puritans, Quakers, & the Search for Toleration
5.3 Literature & Drama • Milton’s Paradise Lost
5.4 Philosophy • Hobbes, Locke, & Rousseau: The Social Contract
5.5 Art & Architecture • Versailles & Rigaud’s Louis XIV: Absolutism as Theatre
5.6 Music • Lully at Versailles & Purcell in London
Sec 6 • The Enlightenment & Its Shadows
6.1 Philosophy • Sapere Aude: Kant, the Philosophes, & the Encyclopédie
6.2 Literature & Drama • Candide: Voltaire Against Optimism
6.3 Religion • The Great Awakening: Wesley, Whitefield, & the Heart
6.4 History & Politics • First Nations: The Templo Mayor & Enlightenment’s Others
6.5 Art & Architecture • Chardin’s Saying Grace & the Aztec Codices
6.6 Music • The Classical Style: Mozart, Haydn, & Figaro
MODULE III – Nationalism & Industry (1776–1913)
Sec 7 • The Age of Revolutions
7.1 History & Politics • 1776 & 1789: Two Revolutions
7.2 Literature & Drama • Paine’s Common Sense & the Rights of Man
7.3 Religion • Religious Liberty & the First Amendment
7.4 Art & Architecture • David’s Horatii & Athens on the Potomac
7.5 Music • “La Marseillaise” & Beethoven’s Eroica
7.6 Philosophy • Goya, Napoleon, & the Birth of Nationalism
Sec 8 • Romanticism & Modern Science
8.1 Philosophy • Sturm und Drang: Goethe & the Romantic Self
8.2 Art & Architecture • The Sublime: Friedrich’s Wanderer & Turner’s Storms
8.3 Music • Schubert’s Erlkönig, Beethoven’s Fifth, & Berlioz
8.4 Literature & Drama • Frankenstein: The Modern Prometheus
8.5 History & Politics • Questioning Progress: Romanticism Against the Machine
8.6 Religion • The Second Great Awakening
Sec 9 • Industry & Empire
9.1 History & Politics • The Machine Age: From the Crystal Palace to Metropolis
9.2 Philosophy • The Colonizer’s Model: Mudimbe & The Idea of Africa
9.3 Art & Architecture • Turner’s Slave Ship & the Camera in the Colonies
9.4 Religion • Abolition: Faith Against Slavery
9.5 Literature & Drama • Uncle Tom’s Cabin & Hard Times
9.6 Music • Spirituals: “Go Down, Moses”
Sec 10 • Marx & the Age of Oil
10.1 Philosophy • 1848: Marx’s Manifesto & the Specter of Revolution
10.2 Literature & Drama • “Our Ford”: Alienation from Brave New World to Modern Times
10.3 Religion • The Salvation Army & the Social Gospel
10.4 Art & Architecture • Realism: Courbet, Daumier, & Painting the Poor
10.5 History & Politics • The Prize: Rockefeller & the Age of Oil
10.6 Music • Joplin’s Ragtime: Music for a Mass Age
Sec 11 • Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, & the Fin de Siècle
11.1 History & Politics • The Nervous Age: Darwin, Freud, & the Fin de Siècle
11.2 Religion • The Present Age: Kierkegaard Against the Crowd
11.3 Literature & Drama • Dostoevsky’s Grand Inquisitor
11.4 Philosophy • Zarathustra: Nietzsche’s “Death of God”
11.5 Art & Architecture • The Painted Moment: Monet, Van Gogh, & Japonisme
11.6 Music • Debussy’s Faun & Mahler’s Hammer
MODULE IV – The End of Modernity (1914–1960s)
Sec 12 • The World at War
12.1 History & Politics • 1914: Machine Guns, Mustard Gas, & All Quiet
12.2 Music • Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring & Shostakovich’s Fifth
12.3 Art & Architecture • The Modernist Rupture: Dada, Duchamp, & Guernica
12.4 Philosophy • Freud’s Civilization & Its Discontents
12.5 Literature & Drama • The Grapes of Wrath & Lange’s Migrant Mother
12.6 Religion • Night: Wiesel & the Break in Civilization
Sec 13 • Aftermath: The Bomb & the Absurd
13.1 History & Politics • By the Bomb’s Early Light: Hiroshima & the Atomic Imagination
13.2 Religion • Bonhoeffer’s Letters & Papers from Prison
13.3 Philosophy • Existentialism: Sartre, Beauvoir, & Freedom After Auschwitz
13.4 Literature & Drama • The Stranger: Camus & the Colonial Absurd
13.5 Art & Architecture • New York Steals Modern Art: Pollock & Rothko
13.6 Music • Parker’s Bebop & Cage’s 4′33″
Sec 14 • The Culture Industry & the Cold War
14.1 History & Politics • Levittown & Madison Avenue: Suburbia & the Cold War
14.2 Philosophy • The Culture Industry: Adorno & Marcuse’s One-Dimensional Man
14.3 Art & Architecture • Pop Art: Warhol’s Soup Cans & Lichtenstein
14.4 Literature & Drama • Dr. Strangelove & the End of Victory Culture
14.5 Religion • King’s Letter from Birmingham Jail
14.6 Music • From “Strange Fruit” to Selma: Holiday, Dylan, & Hendrix
Sec 15 • The Postmodern Critique
15.1 Philosophy • Lyotard, Baudrillard, & the Postmodern Condition
15.2 Art & Architecture • After Modernism: Venturi, Gehry, & Nam June Paik
15.3 Music • Minimalism to Sampling: Glass, Reich, & Kraftwerk
15.4 History & Politics • The 21st Century & Its Discontents
15.5 Religion • The Desecularization of the World
15.6 Literature & Drama • Do Androids Dream?: Blade Runner, AI, & the Inhuman
