AMHERST COLLEGE
First Year Seminar 6
FROM MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., TO. BARACK OBAMA
Fall 2010Professor David W. Wills
T,TH 11:30-12:50Chapin 112
September 7: Introduction to the Course
September 9:Hawaii and Indonesia
Barack Obama, Dreams From My Father, pp. vii-xvii, 1-52
September 14: Punahou, Occidental, and Columbia
Obama, Dreams, pp. 53-129
Paper Due in class
September 16: Chicago I
Obama, Dreams, pp. 133-206
September 21: Chicago II
Obama, Dreams, pp. 207-295.
Paper Due in class
September 23: Kenya I
Obama, Dreams, pp. 299-366
September 28: Kenya II
Obama, Dreams, 367-442
Paper Due in class
September 30:Montgomery and the Beginning of the Boycott
Martin Luther King, Jr., Stride Toward Freedom, preface, chs 1-4
October 5: Violence and Nonviolence
King, Stride, chs. 5-8
Paper Due in class
October 7: Desegregation and Beyond
King, Stride, chs. 9-11
FALL BREAK
October 14: King and the Civil Rights Movement: From Montgomery to Memphis
David Levering Lewis, “Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Promise of Nonviolent Populism,” in John Hope Franklin and August Meier, eds., Black Leaders of the
Twentieth Century, pp. 277-303 (packet)
October 19: King, Malcolm X, Black Power, and Black Theology
Malcolm X, “Twenty Million Black People in a Political, Economic, and Mental Prison,” in Bruce Perry, ed., Malcolm X: The Last Speeches, pp. 25-57 (packet).
Stokely Carmichael and Charles V. Hamilton, Black Power, ch. 2 (packet).
James Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, ch. 1 (packet).
October 21: King’s Response:
Martin Luther King, Jr., Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community, ch.2 (packet)
Paper Due in Class
October 26: Martin Luther King,Jr. : Sources of His Thought and Rhetoric
James Cone, “The Theology of Martin Luther King, Jr.,” Union Seminary Quarterly Review, XL, 4 (1986): 21-39 (e-reserve)).
Martin Luther King, Jr., “Autobiography of Religious Development,” in Clayborne Carson, The Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., Vol 1, pp. 359-363 (packet)
Martin Luther King, Jr., “MIA Mass Meeting,” C. Carson, King Papers, Vol. 3, pp. 71- 79 (packet).
Keith D. Miller, “Composing Martin Luther King, Jr., “ Publications of the Modern Language Association of America, Vol. 105, No. 1, pp. 70-82 (e-reserve).
October 28: Liberalism vs. Prophetic Realism
David Chappell, A Stone of Hope, introduction and chs 1-3 (purchase)
November 2: Niebuhr, King, and African American Religious Intellectuals
Reinhold Niebuhr, “The Ethic of Jesus and the Social Problem,” Religion in Life, 1932 (packet)
Reinhold Niebuhr, Moral Man and Immoral Society, chs. 7 & 9 (packet)
Martin Luther King, Jr., “Reinhold Niebuhr’s Ethical Dualism,” The Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., Vol. 2, pp.141-152 (packet)
Dennis Dickerson, “African American Religious Intellectuals and the Theological Foundations of the Civil Rights Movement, 1930-55,” Church History ,74:2 (June 2005): 217-2`35 (e-reserve)
November 4: The Civil Rights Movement as a Religious Revival
Chappell, Stone, chs. 4-5
November 9: Foundations of the Christian Right?
Chappell, Stone, ch 6 (pp. 105-123 only), ch 7 (pp.139-152 only), ch. 8 and conclusion.
Paper Due in class
November 11: Partisanship, Values, and the Constitution
Barack Obama, The Audacity of Hope, prologue, ch. 1 (pp. 15-21, 25-42 only), chs 2-3, and ch. 4 (pp 102-104, 109-115 only) (purchase).
November 16:Economics, Opportunity, and Foreign Relations
Obama, Hope, chs. 5 and 8
November 18: Religion, Race and Jeremiah Wright
Obama, Hope, chs. 6-7
Kelefa Sanneh, “Project Trinity: The Perilous Mission of Obama’s Church,” New Yorker, April 7, 2008, pp.30-36 (packet).
Jeremiah Wright, Jr., “Doing Black Theology in the Black Church,” in Linda E. Thomas, ed., Living Stones in the Household of God, pp. 13-23 (packet)
Barack Obama, “A More Perfect Union, (packet).
Michael Powell and Jodi Kantor, “A Strained Wright-Obama Bond Finally Snaps,”
New York Times, May 1, 2008 (packet)
November 19: Friday 4:00 P.M. Paper Due
THANKSGIVING VACATION
November 30: Getting Elected, Taking Charge
Jonathan Alter, The Promise: President Obama, Year One, preface, prologue, chapters 1- 6 (purchase).
Barack Obama, Election Night Remarks (packet)
December 2: First Months
J. Alter, Promise, chapters 7-8, 10-12, acknowledgments, note on sources
“Obama’s Inaugural Speech” (packet)
December 7: Method, Style, and Issues of Race
J. Alter, Promise, chapters 9, 13, 16-17, 19
December 9: Foreign Policy--Afghanistan
J. Alter, Promise, chapters 14, 20-21.
“Barack Obama Cairo Speech,” June 4, 2009 (packet)
“Obama’s Address on the War in Afghanistan” (packet)
“Obama’s Nobel Remarks” (packet)
December 14: Domestic Policy--Health Care, Wall Street, and Economic Recovery
J. Alter, Promise, chapters 15, 18, 22 and epilogue
December 17
Friday: 4:00 P.M. Final Paper Due
Books for Purchase (Jeffrey Amherst College Store)
Barack Obama, Dreams from My Father (Three Rivers)
Martin Luther King, Jr., Stride Toward Freedom (Harper)
David Chappell, A Stone of Hope: Prophetic Religion and the Death of Jim Crow(North Carolina)
Barack Obama, The Audacity of Hope (Three Rivers)
Jonathan Alter, The Promise: President Obama, Year One (Simon & Shuster)
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