The evaluation for the course
will be based on these items, out of a semester total of 200 points:
For those opting out of the Perusall platform (and who’d therefore prefer to
purchase/rent their own physical or electronic versions of the books that
others will be renting from Perusall), the semester
total will be 170 points. So whereas for those using Perusall
the final exam will count as 15% of the semester grade (30 out of 200), for
those opting out of Perusall, the final will count it
bit more (18% = 30/170).
Work due on a given class day is due at the start of class time, unless
otherwise noted. Missing a tutorial costs one full grade. Late (even barely
late) work loses the point equivalent of one full grade (=10%), and a further
grade for each additional twenty-four hours of lateness. (Except for the
assignment due during finals week, for which no late submission is allowed.)
Keep in mind this cost when deliberating about taking more time in which to
complete a paper.
Final letter grades for the course will correspond to the
following percentages:
A- 90–92 A
93–100 A+ **
B- 80–82
B 83–86 B+
87–89
C- 70–72 C
73–76 C+ 77–79
D- ** D
60–66 D+ 67–69
F 0–59 ** = doesn’t exist at SMCM
Perusall
Students can expect the Engaged Learning element
of this course to consist of using the Perusall
platform to comment on the texts, as well as on other students’ annotations.
These will be discussed in class.
In order to access, pay the rental fee for, and
annotate the readings on Perusall, you will need to
create a Perusall
account, and after registering there, enter this course code for Phil 300: TABER-AVX6D
Those opting out of Perusall will be responsible for getting the
books on their own. For the Campus Store won’t stock books where the default
value for the course is the use of a platform like Perusall.
Why might
someone opt out of using the Perusall platform? I can
think of various reasons, such as: a preference for a paper copy of the
readings that can be marked up, perhaps even replete with colorful sticky notes
to aid in finding passages later for a future paper assignment; some people
find extensive screen reading aesthetically displeasing, or even harder to
focus on; others might want their own copies in perpetuity, whereas Perusall’s copies are merely rented.
It's your
call, and we can talk about this as a group in class if anyone would like to,
or we can talk one-on-one.
Attendance
policy
Executive summary: don’t hit the two-week mark!
You have sensibly chosen a small college. If you had
wanted to be facelessly anonymous, you could have chosen to enroll at Enormous
U. Directly relating to each other about matters of (I’m sure you’ll come to
agree) great importance to us as individuals and as members of communities is
the best of college experiences.
This course is structured as a seminar. That means we
use real-time, in-person discussions to explore, understand, and even disagree
about the text assigned. Even though I have guideposts for the discussions, the
presence or absence of individuals in a class on a given day will shape how
that day’s conversation unfolds and what new understandings we develop as a
class. Missing class isn’t just about missing the content. In this course, it’s
not just about “what we go over,” but “HOW” we go over it that’s critical for
your learning. That’s why showing up matters.
For at least this reason, regular attendance at, and
participation in, class are required. (Furthermore, it is impossible to do well
in this course without regular attendance, and difficult without regular
participation.)
For this course, everyone is allowed five absences
(excused or unexcused) per semester. Having a sixth absence—excused or
unexcused—will result in failing the course, despite the quality of the rest of
the student’s work. (The College
policy’s minimum is to allow two—thus, I am out of the gates already 150% more
generous than the College requires!)
(Students using an approved ADA accommodation for
“modified attendance policy” will be granted one extra absence; so the grade
wouldn’t be affected even with six absences, but would automatically become an
F upon the seventh.)
So because this is a MWF class, you get one shy of two
weeks’ worth of absences. And you fail the course if you hit the two weeks’
worth. (Or if you hit your seventh class, if you have an approved ADA
accommodation for modified attendance policy.)
The one exception to the preceding paragraph is for
students who are forced by quarantine rules to stay away from classes. In such
cases, the student should contact the instructor ASAP—and in any case, prior
to the first class missed due to quarantine.
The first recourse students should use for catching up
when absent—for any reason—is to look for a communication from their Back-Up
Buddy, a system to be explained and signed up for in class. Students can
also contact the instructor for added assistance, of course.
As I hope is obvious—or soon will be once the semester
starts—the fact that you are allowed
these absences without any automatic loss of grade should not be interpreted as
a recommendation to actually use said absences. Not only do you want to avoid
imprudently and prematurely emptying your bank account only to find out that
you’re getting walloped with some virus near the end of the semester, but your
ability to make sense of the material, your ability to become fluent in
philosophically informed ways of thinking, and your ability to succeed in your
assignments would be unhappily compromised in proportion to your number of
absences.
Tutorials
The tutorial papers will be run as paired
tutorials. You will be scheduled in pairs to read your paper to me and to the
other student. We will discuss your paper with you, interrupting you more than
once. Then the other student will read their paper in the same way. So that we
may follow along as you read, ensure that the other student has access to your
paper. Realize that it is your paper which will be graded, not your reading of
it or your answering any questions which I or the other student may bring up.
The purpose of having you read the paper to me is that I can give you most
comments directly and suggest ways to improve your future work. This is much
easier for me to do and much more helpful to you than having you read my
comments in dried ink on a dead piece of paper. Because I will have to schedule
many tutorial sessions, I am canceling class for the days during which the
tutorials will be held.
You will have the opportunity to submit a
substantive re-write (that is, not only correcting mechanical errors—see next
paragraph) of the first substantive paper (the one on Socrates, King, and
Malcolm X), and the grade recorded will be the average of the grade on the
first submission and on the second submission.
Writing
Since writing is central to the course, both in
reading others' and in creating your own, respect for writing will manifest
itself even at the level of writing mechanics. You will be expected to take
stylistic and mechanical concerns most seriously in your three papers. As a
motivational aid to this end, you will be allowed two grammatical, spelling, or
punctuation mistakes per page (partial pages counting as full), after which you
will lose one point for each mistake. For example, if you have a 24-point paper
of five pages, and you have made thirteen mechanical errors, then you will
receive a 21 for the paper. N.B.: the same mistake (not just similar) repeated
will count as one mistake. You will be allowed to submit a revised version with
the mechanical errors corrected, and in these cases you will be assigned the
average of your original and revised grade.
You might consider spending a bit of time at my writing site.
Few would fail to benefit.
Hellenistic Week
journal
As we wrap up our
discussions of the three main Hellenistic (323-31 BCE) schools of thought
(Cynicism, Epicureanism, and Stoicism), you are to choose one of these schools
and keep a daily, reflective journal as if you were a follower of your chosen
“ism,” though alive today. You will try living as a proponent of that
worldview, and keep a journal of your reflections of where that “ism” seemed
easy to adopt, where the challenges were, what this tells us about your chosen
school, or what this tells you about you.
(You might even want to use these four headings for each day’s entry,
together with any other headings you find useful.)
If you already
consider yourself a member of one of these traditions, then the only added work
of this assignment is the writing.
Bear in mind that
keeping a reflective journal is not the same as a keeping a mere diary.
You might reflect
on ways in which you behaved in keeping with your tradition, and where this was
for the good. Or where it turned out poorly. Or ways in which you didn’t
measure up as a follower, but where your actual, alternative course of action
was the better choice.
Distinguishing journals will incorporate passages from our reading (with page
citation) into their reflections.
Personal electronics
This seminar requires
a free-flowing exchange of ideas, between you and the authors, as well as among
us. The presence of electronic devices, replete with their glowing
notifications, creates a barrier to this flow. Therefore, the use of
electronics is allowed in class only in order to access the readings online or
by those with documented needs of which I’ve been notified by official
channels.
Because in
class you will need to have access to the readings, and because, for most of
our books, this will be on the Perusall site, you
will need to have a tablet or laptop in class—to be used, of course, only for
class-related activities.
Cell phones should be stowed away in any case, and not simply on the table—even
if turned upside down—even if powered completely off. “Why,” you ask? Well,
recent studies indicate the distracting effect of even a cell phone not one’s own,
laying on a nearby table. In fact, of even a drawing or a thought
of a cell phone. So I hereby prohibit
you during class even to think of a
cell phone! (I’ll keep mine away, too.)
(If a phone
is the only way you have of accessing the readings in class, fine…just give me
a heads-up so I know not to bark at you.)
As for note-taking, consult this study,
which found superior recall in students who took notes by hand compared to
those who took them by typing, and this recent article
sums up some of the research findings.
Students with documented disabilities
“Following the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), Section 504 of the
Rehabilitation Act of 1973, as amended, and applicable state law, St. Mary’s
College of Maryland (SMCM) does not discriminate against any individual on the
basis of handicap or disability. As a result, SMCM will consider requests for
reasonable accommodations for students who self-disclose a disability or
disabling health conditions. Accessibility Services works with students,
faculty, and staff to promote access on our campus.”
The SMCM Office
of Accessibility Services
Academic integrity
Of sickness makes
sickness,
Contagion of
trust can make trust.
--Marianne
Moore, American poet
from “In Distrust of Merits” (1943)
Academic
integrity: The College’s definitions and policies on this matter are laid out here. Ignorance of such matters is no excuse.
Good (and short!)
tutorials on topics like samples of acceptable and unacceptable paraphrases can
be found at a page put up by Indiana University: https://plagiarism.iu.edu/
Cornell has a
quiz you can take to see how well you understand what sorts of material needs
to be sourced: http://plagiarism.arts.cornell.edu/tutorial/exercises.cfm (Click on
“Introduction” on the left-hand side if you want to see their discussion
leading up to the quiz.)
Send me mail: mstaber at smcm dot edu
Go to the home page for this course.
Go to Michael Taber's home page.
Go to the SMCM home page.