PHIL-2010 Unit I Project: Plato Dr. Ari Santas
Download Project Outline Form
(40 points)
Instructions: This is a group assignment—to be completed in a group of your own choosing, comprised of 3-5 students. The assignment will require you to go beyond the text and this classroom and reflect on life here at this institution and beyond. You may divide the labor any way you choose, but I encourage you to think very carefully about how you divide the labor--good planning is crucial to doing good work. I encourage you to talk to people on campus about the subject and get ideas from them. Here's the assignment:
Imagine Socrates landing in Georgia and strolling onto the grounds of VSU. What would he notice? What sorts of questions would he ask? Based on your reading of Plato and our class discussions, create a dialogue that involves a Socratic figure questioning people on campus: students, faculty, staff, and/or administrators. The discussion should:
1) focus on the kind of issue Socrates would most likely raise (although you are not limited to the sorts of specific issues found in your text);
2) relay the Socratic Method of examination and teaching by exhibiting several of the elements of the method:
· indirectness (he rarely says “You’re wrong” or challenges an idea directly)
· irony (the student, ironically, turns out to be the teacher)
· induction of perplexity (aporia) as a means of greater awareness
· focus on definitions of key concepts (how would you define ___?)
· use of examples and analogies (moves from abstract-to-concrete-to-abstract)
· reduction to the absurd (showing a self-contradiction in the speaker’s answers)
· intellectual midwifery (maieutics)—drawing out of ideas already there in the student to construct a well formed view
You may either perform this as a skit, performed live or as a video. Ideally you would base it on real encounters you have on campus, reconstructing it as a dialogue in written form or playacted; or you might take video footage or one or more encounters and edit it into a short video.
Live skits should be 5-8 minutes long; videos 4-5 minutes of content. Groups should have 3-5 members (if you need more, you must consult me for special permission). Consult the Unit Schedule (see Course Index) for deadlines for outline and final product. Review notes on Euthyphro, Apology, and Crito for clues on details of Socratic Method. You may also elect to use supplemental material, such as Aristotle’s Nicomachean. Ethics Book II and Books VIII & IX, which offer an analysis of the ancient Greek ideals of moral virtue and friendship.
Please remember that it is imperative that you work together closely. Come see me for help along the way—that's what I’m here for!
Videos should include a title and credits either at the beginning or the end. They should be uploaded to a site such as YouTube and submitted as a link prior to class time on deadline day.
Note: If you are performing a skit, everyone must perform in the skit to get credit. Video projects can divide labor differently (using someone for editing, for instance, instead of play-acting)