Philosophy 446                                                                                                                                                     Fall 2003

ADVANCED SOCIAL & POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
or
"With Justice and Liberty for All?"

Course Information and Syllabus

Instructor:           Dr. David Shoemaker (Dave)

Office Hours:      Mon., 2:45-4:15 p.m.; Wed./Fri., 10:00-10:50 a.m. (or by appointment); Sierra Tower, 502

Office Phone:     677-7501 (you can leave a message on my voice mail)

e-mail:                david.shoemaker@csun.edu (I check 4-5 times every day during the week)

Website:             www.csun.edu/~ds56723/index.htm

REQUIRED TEXTS:

                Social & Political Philosophy: Contemporary Readings, edited by Sher and Brody

COURSE OBJECTIVES:

  1.       To come to an understanding of the type of work being done in contemporary social and political philosophy on the topics of justice, liberty, and equality.

2.         To learn how to read, digest, summarize, and critique such work.

3.         To engage in detailed discussion of the issues of justice, liberty, and equality in a philosophically sophisticated way.

4.         To put together a long, sustained, original argument on a relevant topic, an argument one will also present and defend publicly.

COURSE REQUIREMENTS:

1.          Attendance:  Quite simply, I expect you to be here at every weekly meeting ON TIME, and if you're not here, I expect a reasonable excuse.  This class is going to be more like a seminar: part of what we're going to be learning is how to discuss these topics in detail with each other, trying to construct a model of philosophical discourse, but you've got to be here to make that happen.  I will not take attendance, but I’ll know who’s here and who isn’t, and if you miss more than two class meetings (without reasonable excuse), I reserve the right to fail you for that reason alone, no matter how well you do on the assignments.

2.          Exams: There will be NO exams.  Your understanding of the material will be evidenced by your reading summaries, your class presentation, your in-class participation, and your paper (see below).

3.         Reading Summaries: For every single reading to be discussed after the very first Mill article (11 are scheduled from that point on), you are to turn in a Reading Summary containing two elements: (a) a summary of what you take to be the central idea(s) of the article, along with a summary of the main line(s) of argument for that idea; and (b) at least one detailed question you have about the reading that you would like discussed in class.  I will let you know in class when these are due, but typically they will be due no later than 9 a.m. on the Mondays we have class.  You can either e-mail them to me or slide them under my office door, but the deadline will be firm (no late summaries will be accepted).  I will structure the classes as follows: I will first spend some time by going over with you detailed outlines/notes I have on the reading, covering the main issues of the assigned article (via handouts I will provide for you), and then I will offer the more interesting questions you have raised in your summaries as fodder for discussion.  I will assign each of these summaries a number grade (from 0-5, 5 being the best), determined by a combination of your accuracy, clarity, and succinctness in getting across the main idea, in addition to the value of your discussion question(s).  Failing to include such a question will constitute at least a one point deduction.  At the end of the semester, I will add 47 to your total points to get a number on a 100 point scale.  For example, if you do all of the summaries and get 4s across the board, that would be 44 points.  I'll then add 47 to that to get your final number, a 91 (A-).  Threes across the board would yield a final tally of 80 (B-).  And so on.  A grade of 5 will be rare at first, although I'd like to see several of them as we get closer to the end, simply because by then you should have learned how to summarize an article properly.  The summaries themselves should not be much longer than a single typed page.  Your total points on these will be worth 50% of your overall grade, and as you can tell, missing even one of these summaries will lose you some significant points.  All grading will be done on the plus/minus system.

4.         Class Presentation: You will be required to do a presentation for the class summarizing and defending the ideas contained in your long papers.  All of these will take place during the last two meetings of the semester.  By then we will have covered all the reading material, so we will be doing only student presentations during that time.  I will say more about these when we get closer to the time for them, but you are expected to give a clear and coherent presentation, and then attempt to respond to questions the other students (or I) might have.  You MUST do a presentation in order to get anything other than an F for the course.  Don't be nervous about these; I'll help you, and your classmates will support you (after all, they'll each have to go through it too).  Your total presentation time (including questions) will be 25 minutes, so plan on 15 minutes for your actual presentation, plus 10 minutes for questions.  Think of these as being like a reading summary, where the paper being summarized by you is your own.  I will grade them accordingly as one extra reading summary, and your grade on it will be compiled along with your other reading summary grades (where I grade you on the question portion based on how you conduct the Q&A session of your presentation).  Attendance by all students is mandatory during the presentation weeks, and if you miss either day in those final two weeks (without reasonable excuse), that alone will be sufficient grounds for your receiving an F in the course.

5.         Paper: The main point of the class is for you to put together a long (12-20 page) paper arguing for, and defending, an original idea on the topics of justice, liberty, or equality.  Think of this as a true semester-long project, one you should be thinking about constantly as we discuss our various authors.  I will spend at least one hour in class (sometime in the middle of the semester) going over what I'm looking for, what topics are eligible, what the structure of your paper should look like, etc.  But for now, here are some firm facts.  First, before you write a thing, you will have to submit to me a proposed topic.  This will be due somewhere around the 8th or 9th week of class.  Your topic may change as we cover other material you feel more "in tune" with, but if it does, you need to talk to me first.  Indeed, you're going to need to talk with me throughout this process.  If you do not schedule times to see me in my office about these matters, I will schedule it for you.  Second, you are required to turn in at least one rough draft, due date to be announced (probably around the 12th or 13th week).  I'll be happy to look at more than one, but it is this first rough draft where I will do a ton of work on your behalf, writing up detailed comments that I hope will make your paper that much better.  The idea is for you to have a truly polished version ready to turn in on Monday, December 8 (the day they have scheduled our non-existent final exam), which is the FIRM due date (I will announce the exact time in class).  These should be papers you are proud of, something you will have worked extremely hard on.  If you do indeed work hard on these (as well as on your presentations of their main ideas), I see no reason why you can't get an A.  They will be worth 50% of your overall grade.

6.         Extra Credit: Occasionally during the semester, opportunities will arise for you to do some extra credit writing.  I will announce these as they occur.

7.         Discussion: I hope that you will take this class seriously, and that you will think hard about the issues raised herein.  Having the attitude that you're just here to fulfill your requirements just won't cut it.  Consequently, I expect you each to participate regularly in class discussions, and I also hope to have conversations with each of you outside the classroom about these topics, either in my office, at Acapulco’s on the occasional Friday evening, or via e-mail.  At any rate, your participation in the class is actually quantifiable, and I will add up to 2 points to your overall grade for that regular participation.  But please make it a qualitative participation: be conscious not to dominate discussion, and don’t talk just for the sake of talking.  We're going to be very informal in here, but I know from my own days in college and graduate school how irritating some class participants could be.  So let's try and keep the irritation factor low.  In addition, I will not tolerate any derisive or ridiculing remarks directed at other students (or at me, for that matter!): the idea is for us to create an environment in which people feel safe enough to try out new ideas without fear of ridicule, an environment in which it is genuinely philosophical discussion that is our sole focus, and an environment in which we are all striving for the same thing together, viz., the truth (if I may wax grandiose for a moment), so no one should feel like they aren’t an equal party in that communal task.

8.         The deadline this semester for dropping a course with only the instructor's signature is Friday, September 12.  After that date, withdrawals will require additional approvals and can only be obtained for "serious and compelling reasons".  See Schedule of Classes, pp. 14-15.

PROVISIONAL SYLLABUS

All page numbers refer to the main text (Sher & Brody)