History/Overview
Great Books at Auburn is not a true "Great Books" program but a two-term world literature sequence required of all Auburn undergraduates as part of the core curriculum. In fact, the name of the sequence will be changed to “World Literature,” starting in Fall 2004.
History
Near the end of the 1980s, the Auburn University Board of Trustees, together with the faculty and administration, set out to rethink its undergraduate curriculum. Working through the University Senate Core Curriculum Commission, they considered what Auburn students would need in order to become well-educated men and women: the citizens, leaders, problem solvers, and creative minds of the future.
The University experience, the Commission reasoned, should equip all students with some essential skills and a braod, shared understanding of their world in its diversity. To achieve this, students would need a knowledge of the past and an appreciation for the arts. They would need an understanding of ethical issues and of how ethical and political decisions are made. They would need some understanding of science and mathematics. They would need some understanding of how individuals and societies work. They would need to read and talk together about important works of literature, philosophy, and history. They would need to be able to reason well and communicate effectively. The Core Curriculum, including a two-term sequence in literature, World Literature, was established to help students achieve these goals.
Overview
World Literature is intended to foster literacy in both senses of the term: (1) to develop students' ability to read and write with facility and effectiveness; and (2) to acquaint students with a selection of significant and valuable texts. Although discussion takes into account historical and cultural contexts that are essential to an understanding of the texts studied, emphasis is on reading, analyzing, and interpreting the texts themselves. Teachers are free to select texts which both are firmly established as part of the canon of world literature, texts with which our culture has deemed it worthwhile to carry on a dialogue, as well as important, but less traditionally canonical works: in fact, all instructors are encouraged to construct syllabi that contain a balanced representation of traditionally canonical works as well as works by women, by minority writers within Western culture and by non-western writers in each section of World Literature that they teach. World Literature I moves from the ancient world to c. 1650; World Literature II from c. 1650 to the present.
The courses are taught in sections of 30 students, mainly by professorial faculty members and Instructors, but with some participation by PhD-level Graduate Teaching Assistants. While World Literature is staffed primarily by members of the English Department, some sections are occasionally taught by members of the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures.
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Last updated April 9, 2004