知识基础
知识基础 is a core course, taken during the fall or spring semester of a student’s freshman year. The goal of 知识基础 is to introduce students to a true liberal arts education. 在21人或更少的班级里, 新生读, 讨论, and write about key texts from antiquity to the modern world.
The course is taught collaboratively by faculty from academic departments and programs across disciplines.
Encompassing, interconnected themes
知识基础 aims to provide students with a sense of what a liberal arts education is and why it matters. The course is organized with three guiding themes:
〇神与神话 What is above or beyond human existence
〇自然与技术 The non-human world around us and how we interact with it
〇正义与社会 How humans interact with each other and how they should do so
As students come to see that these broad themes are interconnected, they can begin to see the ways knowledge across many different fields and disciplines is interconnected.
例如, 在阅读神和神话的时候, students will see accounts of how the world came into existence. These accounts differ from one another not only in their explanation of how the material world came to be created, but also in their explanations of human beings, what the character of human life is, and what can and should be expected of humans. To accept or reject a given account of creation is to accept or reject the vision of human life that goes with it.
Of course, a student might not accept any account of creation with a divine component. But what, then, is the material world? Is it meaningless matter that humans may do with as they see fit as they develop their capacities and make new things for themselves? Or does Nature deserve something from humans? And can Nature be a kind of guide for a happy life?
The answers to these questions are inextricably bound up with questions of how humans should live with each other. If humans focus their energies on innovation and enhancing their material lives, it seems that they must do so within the bounds of justice. But what do humans owe each other as their technology and wealth advance? 换句话说，什么是正义? And can humans find happiness if they focus only on advancing technology and gaining wealth? If not, and if there is more to life than our material existence, what is it? And can our reason be as reliable in the discovery of justice and happiness as it is in making discoveries about the material world? Or do we need to look above and beyond ourselves?
在本课程中, students begin to see a variety of answers to such questions that have been offered around the world and across time. It might be that no answer is fully satisfying, that every answer leads to further thinking. Yet students will see that the questions posed in this course must be addressed, 要过充实的生活, we need to continue to pursue answers to them.
基本的材料
The materials studied in 知识基础 are intriguing and rich, and they have been influential and remain illuminating. 有些作品是文学作品, 有些是圣经, 有些是哲学上的, and some are difficult to categorize.
所需的工作是:
神与神话
- “Enuma Elish”(巴比伦创世纪)
- “创世纪”
自然与科技
- “Discourse on the Origin of Inequality,” Jean-Jacques Rousseau
- “Hayy ibn Yaqzan,” Ibn Tufayl (starting in fall 2024)
正义与社会
- “Communist Manifesto,” Marx and Engels
- 《全球十大赌钱软件app》，托尼·莫里森
坚实的基础
The 知识基础 program at Carthage provides students with a level of competency that will aid them in all of their classes at Carthage, 在他们未来的职业生涯中, 事实上, 在他们的生活中. Students develop critical reading, writing, cultural literacy, and oral communication skills.
This course aims to build foundations in the intellects of students, showing them how to engage in close and careful reading and how to communicate clearly and reasonably in writing and in speech. 在课堂上, students and their instructor often read together, short passages and even individual sentences, to unpack what is written and to find how carefully a writer can attempt to convey meaning. Students think through what is conveyed and work on expressing themselves to capture exactly what they mean and to make it clear to others. And they engage in multiple kinds of speaking and writing — in open-ended class 讨论ions as well as in formal presentations, 在课堂上自由写作, 在正式的论文中.
Students will see their progress throughout the semester and will feel their confidence grow as well. And they will find that just as thinking and inquiring are necessary and on-going in the class and in life, so they will see that while they sharpen their abilities in 知识基础, they will continue that work throughout their lives.