Politics and the Humanities

Melvin Rogers and Jack Turner are the editors of African American Political Thought: A Collected History , a major new anthology of essays on key thinkers of the African American political tradition. Tom and Sarah talk to Rogers and Turner about why American political thought is essentially bound up with African American political thought; about the politics of forming and reforming canons; and about David Walker's Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World and Audre Lord on the master's tools and the master's house. We also talked about how to bring texts of the African American tradition into general education and Rogers and Turner recommended texts for us to read with our students.

African-American Political Thought: A Collected History (Chicago, 2021).

Melvin Rogers's website.

Jack Turner's website.

What's working and what's not working in efforts to teach antiracism on college campuses today? Amna Khalid, the author of a recent article in the Chronicle of Higher Education, "How Students Are Furthering Academe's Corporatization," joins Tom and Sarah to discuss pitfalls and dangers in some recent approaches to antiracism on college campuses. Are corporate training models displacing university classes? Can liberal education offer a path forward for colleges and universities who want to get their students to talk about race without falling into a training model? Can colleges and universities flourish without getting faculty more involved than they have been?

Amna Khalid's essay in the Chronicle of Higher Education.

Amna's website, with other essays of interest.

Amna's book recommendation: Walter Benn Michael's The Trouble with Diversity: How We Learned To Love Identity and Ignore Inequality.

Lise van Boxel's remarkable study of Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morals, Warspeak: Nietzsche's Victory over Nihilism, was published soon after her untimely death. Michael Grenke, Lise's close friend and collaborator, joins Tom Merrill to talk about Lise's book and reading the Genealogy of Morals.

You can buy Warspeak: Nietzsche's Victory over Nihilism here.

Here is Chelsea Adam's "On Losing a Mentor," a reflection on Lise Van Boxel.

You can hear Lise van Boxel in action on past episodes of the podcast Combat and Classics.

Here is the website for Political Animal Press, the publisher of Warspeak.

Michael Grenke's translations of Nietzsche can be found here and here.

Leon Kass of the University of Chicago and Shalem College talks with Tom and Sarah about his new book Founding God's Nation: Reading Exodus. We discuss the difference between Egypt and Israel and the meaning of the plagues. We also talk about the seminar as a ritual or form and the meaning of the seminar table. We conclude with a discussion of why the Hebrew Bible should be part of a program of liberal education.

Founding God's Nation: Reading Exodus.

The Beginning of Wisdom: Reading Genesis.

Nick Buccola joins Tom and Sarah to talk about his book, The Fire Is Upon Us: James Baldwin, William F. Buckley, Jr, and the Debate over Race in America. We talk about Buckley's opposition to civil rights legislation in the 1950s and 60s, the role of Christianity in Buckley and Baldwin's thought, and Baldwin's views of Western civilization and the canon. We discuss Baldwin's books The Fire Next Time and Notes of a Native Son.

Links for the episode:

Sarah Marsh and Tom Merrill are joined by Michael Weinman of Bard College, Berlin to talk about why "great books" are not only for conservatives. Note: This episode has a few glitches--just keep listening.

Michael Weinman's writings mentioned in this episode:

Essays at Public Seminar:

Books:

Michael's essay "Twilight of American Idols" will soon be available in _Amerikastudien/American Studies_.

Michael's essay "Living Well and the Promise of Cosmopolitan Identity is available in On Civic Republicanism: Ancient Lessons, Global Politics.

What did the New York Times's 1619 Project get wrong, and what did it get right? Sarah Marsh and Tom Merrill review the controversies about the 1619 Project and talk about the real complexities around slavery and race in the American founding.

Links mentioned in the podcast:

In the early years of the Peloponnesian War, the city of Athens experienced a devastating plague which Thucydides described memorably in his history of the war. What do we learn about the Athenians from Thucydides' famous account? Why does Thucydides juxtapose his account of the plague with Pericles' famous Funeral Oration? Does Thucydides mean to undercut Pericles' beautiful speech?

Borden Flanagan of American University (@Blahbliptyblah) discusses this questions in conversation with Tom Merrill (@w_merrill) and Sarah Marsh.

Here is a good edition of Thucydides' Peloponnesian War.

The Funeral Oration: Book 2, para. 35-46

Higher education is in crisis. Majors in the humanities have been in decline for many years, and universities are often criticized for being dominated by political correctness and student activism. But are these two things related? Are students responding to a longstanding technocratic and vocational ethos in universities that ignores moral agency? Could it be that student activism reveals an understandable need for moral and even religious reflection overlooked in academia?

Ross Douthat of the New York Times joins Tom Merrill of American University to discuss the roots of the current situation of academia and the prospects for a renewal of the humanities.

Aristophanes' Clouds is an irreverent look at Socrates and a parable about how liberal education can go bad. Strepsiades wants to study with Socrates in order to get out of paying his debts, but isn't really ready for what Socrates has to teach him. The play makes us ask questions like: does Socrates deserve to get punished? What is the connection between philosophy and father-beating? How should the academy think about its relationship to the world outside of the academy? And why are fart jokes so funny?

Paul Ludwig of St. John's College, Annapolis, joins Tom Merrill and Sarah Marsh to talk about The Clouds. Ludwig's new book is Rediscovering Political Friendship: Aristotle, Modern Identity, Community, and Equality. His first book was Eros and Polis: Desire and Community in Greek Political Thought.

Here are some English translations of The Clouds:

Four Texts on Socrates, ed. and trans by West and West.

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