Great Books Seminar Offered

Area residents are invited to enroll in Great Books, a seminar course offered by Urbana University during the Fall Semester.

Fourteen Urbana University professors will co-facilitate the seminar course called Honors 350 that will include 28 readings from classic world literature.

Great Books will convene Monday evenings from 7 to 9 p.m. in the Citizens National Bank room in the Urbana University Student Center. Classes will be held Aug. 20 through Nov. 26. The seminar course can be taken for University credit, audit, or at the senior citizens’ rate. Those who would like to register for the class are asked to visit the Urbana University Registrar office in North Hall on the main campus.

Claudia Stolz, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Humanities and Director of Honors College at Urbana University, said two readings will be discussed during each class time. The readings that will be discussed are from the Great Books anthology titled “Citizens of the World: Readings in Human Rights,” which is currently available in the Urbana University Bookstore located in the student center.

Examples of the readings include “Harlem” by Langston Hughes, “My Forbidden Face” by Latifa, an Afghan woman, and “The United States vs. Susan B. Anthony.”

“We will be utilizing the Shared Inquiry method when discussing these works,” Dr. Stolz commented. “The Shared Inquiry method is Socratic in style and is a group activity that focuses on discussing and interpreting selected great writings in a manner that helps participants read actively, pose productive questions of their own about the ideas and meanings of the text, and listen and respond effectively to others in dialogue.”

Fourteen Urbana University faculty members, representing a variety of academic disciplines, will co-facilitate the course. Each of the following professors will lead two seminar classes: Karen Basinger, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology; Karen Benton, Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice; Steven Cooley, Ph.D., Professor of History and Religion; Ann Corfman, Associate Professor of Education; Jacob Daniel, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Mathematics and Computer Science; James Daniel, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Education; Judy Donegan, Associate Professor of Nursing; Thomas Fauquet, Ph.D., Vice President for Academic Affairs and Professor of Education; Carrie James, Assistant Professor of Humanities; J. Scott Lewis, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Social and Behavioral Sciences; Elizabeth Paul, Ph.D., Professor of Science; Thomas Smith, Associate Professor of English; Dr. Stolz; and Jack Wood, Adjunct Professor of Social and Behavioral Sciences.

For more information about registering for the class, contact the Office of the Registrar at 937-484-1353.