Tartuffe perfectly represents the French neo-classical period, and this lesson places particular emphasis on the play’s plot, language style, characterizations and central theme. What is the play about? Why is Orgon so blind to Tartuffe’s true nature? Is the character of Tartuffe comic or macabre? Is Orgon “mad,” as Dorine claims? What does “madness” mean in the context of this play? What is the significance of the “deus ex machina” ending of the play? Featured interview: Dr. David Raybin (Eastern Illinois University)
Producers: Governors State University
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Improving Family Communication: Instruction and Therapy
Provides an introduction to the wide range of approaches used to improve family communication. The various theoretical approaches to these strategies are discussed as are the strengths and weakness of particular approaches, such as Marriage Encounter. Students review some of the common denominators that exist between disparate approaches. A discussion outlines the differences between therapy models that focus on the individual and those that involve the entire family as a system. Featured interviews: Professor Mary Anne Fitzpatrick (University of Wisconsin – Madison) and Professor Dr. William Pinsof (Northwestern University), President and CEO of The Family Institute at Northwestern University.
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Optimal Family Communication Patterns
Provides a course review that recaps the ways in which individuals, partners and family members communicate in order to enhance everyday interaction. Particularly optimal communication techniques such as emotion coaching, storytelling and reading, listening are reviewed and future trends in family communication are discussed. Students are coached through a summary of the key course concepts. Featured interviews: Professor Rives Collins of (Northwestern University), Professor John Gottman (University of Washington), and Dr. Charles Wilkinson, Marriage and Family Therapist.
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Genesis, Chapters 1, 2, and 3
Lesson 1 examines the creation stories of Chapters 1 and 2, with special emphasis on their differences of language and style, the concept of “deity”, the purpose of the text, and the significance of being “made in the image of God”. The discussion of Chapter 3 focuses on the enduring vitality of the Adam and Eve story and the Myth of the Fall. Do Adam and Eve assert their basic human dignity in their defiance? What does it mean to be fully human according to the Adam and Eve myth? Why should the gaining of knowledge/experience and the loss of innocence/simplicity require a connection with Sin, Error, and Pain? Featured interview: Dr. Wil Gaylin, author of Adam and Eve and Pinocchio: On Being and Becoming Human
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The Book of Job
When innocent people suffer difficult circumstances, does that deny the concept of a just God? Discussion focuses on the knotty philosophical question of theodicy and on Job’s personal evolution from despair to faith. How does orthodoxy, in whatever form, keep one from an authentic pursuit of meaning? Featured interviews: Rabbi Harold Kushner, the author of When Bad Things Happen to Good People, and Professor David Clines (University of Sheffield), who authored a critical text on the Book of Job
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Homer, Iliad (Part 1)
Discussion in these two lessons focuses on the nature of epics, the tragedy of Achilles, the nature of the Homeric hero, the relation between humans and gods, and the nature of honor as a motivating principle. Discussion also explores the Iliad as both a celebration of and a protest against war.
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Homer, Iliad (Part 2)
Discussion in these two lessons focuses on the nature of epics, the tragedy of Achilles, the nature of the Homeric hero, the relation between humans and gods, and the nature of honor as a motivating principle. Discussion also explores the Iliad as both a celebration of and a protest against war.
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Sophocles, Oedipus the King
The range of discussion topics in this lesson includes the nature of tragedy, the concept of “moira” (fate) vs. “tuche” (chance), the religious conservatism practiced by Sophocles, and some general speculations about human nature. What besides his own destruction does Oedipus gain? What does it mean to be human? How should one live? Does Oedipus suffer justly? Is the play a celebration of the tragic hero?
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Sophocles, Antigone
Antigone sparks a debate on the subject of duty: Is a citizen’s first duty is to the law of the state or to the law of religion? Who is the tragic protagonist of the play? Who “owns” the tragedy? Are Creon and Antigone equally right and equally wrong? Does Sophocles favor one over the other? The lesson turns to a discussion on how the play might have contemporary applications. Featured interview: Justice Seymour Simon, Former Justice of the Illinois State Supreme Court
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Virgil, Aeneid (Part 1)
Over the course of the three lessons, students focus on four questions: What makes Aeneas a distinctly Roman hero? What was Virgil’s purpose behind writing the epic? What debt does Virgil owe to Homer? How does Virgil betray his own ambivalence in this epic vision, which both celebrates Rome’s greatness and measures its staggering cost? The classes focus particularly on Books II (The Fall of Troy), IV (The Tragedy of Dido), and VI (The Symbolic Death and Resurrection of the Hero). Featured interviews: Professor Maynard Mack (Yale University), editor for the Norton Anthology of Classical Literature, and Professor A. D. Nuttall (New College-Oxford)