Is there a Tomorrow? - Rapture, Extinction and Democracy
Thursday, April 7, 2005

Is There a Tomorrow?—Rapture, Extinction and Democracy was an interdisciplinary seminar sponsored by the James M. Johnston Center for Undergraduate Excellence in collaboration with the First Year Seminar and Honors programs. Students from three courses in three different disciplines—Political Science, English, and Religious Studies—joined for a lunchtime discussion of the political consequences of messianic movements in America and the possibilities of extinction of the human race.

Prior to the seminar, students were asked to read a common text, a piece by journalist Bill Moyers originally published in The Star Tribune, called "There is No Tomorrow" (The Star Tribune Sunday 30 January 2005), and consider the implications messianic sensibilities and the processes of extinction have for democratic politics today. Each class spent a class period discussing the text independently and then nominated a spokesperson to craft a summary of the class’s response to Moyer’s arguments. The interdisciplinary seminar began with reports from the spokespeople of the three courses detailing their class’s response to the text. Students, who were seated at tables that mixed the classes, then discussed and debated their responses to the test while they ate lunch. After lunch, a rigorous and enthusiastic discussion led by faculty engaged students in the critical issues created by a consideration of Moyer’s arguments from the perspectives offered by the different disciplines.

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Participating Courses and Faculty:

Honors 28 (English) "Imagining Extinctions: Science and Fictional Accounts of the Future of Humans," Professor Tyler Curtain.
This honors seminar will introduce students to the study of both science and fiction by examining how mid- to late-twentieth century novels and films depict the problem of extinction, human or otherwise. How have fictional texts imagined time and evolution? Ecological disaster? Language death? Species death? Why do computers figure centrally to a re-imagining of society and its devolution or end? How are contemporary social and political problems-from race to gender, sexuality to class-figured in these texts and to what end? We will read books such as Darwin's Radio, Cryptonomicon, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Wild Seed and Parable of the Sower. Among the films we will screen are "2001: A Space Odyssey," Katsuhiro Otomo's "Akira," Kubrick and Speilberg's "AI," "28 Days Later," and "Solaris" (Cameron and Soderbergh). To give our discussions both breadth and depth, we will read alongside our main texts contemporary biological, anthropological and cultural theorists. These thinkers attempt to give accounts of the impact of human culture on Earth's biosphere. Readings will be drawn from Richard Leakey and Roger Lewin's The Sixth Extinction: Patterns of Life and the Future of Humankind, Nettle and Romaine's Vanishing Voices: The Extinction of the World's Languages, Edward O. Wilson's The Future of Life, David Crystal's Language Death, among others.

This seminar was developed with the aid of a Morehead Alumni Course Development Grant.

POLI 006F Democracy and the Civic Ideal
Professor Stephen Leonard
"Democracy and the Civic Ideal" explores the development of modern democratic sentiments and values in the history of the civic ideal in the West. We begin by examining the theory and practice of classical Greek democracy, then moving through Roman republicanism, early modern republicanism, the liberal revolutions of the 17th and 18th centuries (England, US, and France), and finishing with contemporary American democratic politics. We will use a variety of approaches and resources:
simulations, films, re-enactments, panel discussions, and, of course, texts. Our goal will be to meet the challenge of marshalling good arguments and compelling evidence in political analysis. Students will put these skills to work by developing research projects on democratic politics.

This seminar was developed with the aid of a William C. Friday Award for Instruction in the Civic Arts.

RELI 006I Apocalypse Now?: Messianic Movements in America
Professor Yaakov Ariel
The arrival of the year 2000 made many people aware of the prevalence of messianic ideas and their influence on the American mind. Messianic hopes have been present in America since Colonial times, and new messianic groups have come about periodically. This course will explore messianic movements in American history and their influence on the nation. It will consider such questions as America as a messianic concept, and why America had been susceptible to messianic movements. The messianic groups we will examine will include the Puritans in seventeenth century New England, the Millerites and the Mormons in the nineteenth century, and premillenialist evangelicals in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. We will also look at the messianic components of the late twentieth century groups such as the Nation of Islam, Hasidic Judaism, UFO groups, and the Children of God. We will also pay attention to secular versions of the messianic faith. Special attention will be given to groups that have caused national crises in the 1990s, such as the Branch Davidians and the bombers of the Oklahoma City Federal building. In addition to reading book chapters and articles, we will also read an apocalyptic novel, watch movies on apocalyptic themes, and search the Internet for messianic group sites.