Saturday Morning Sessions at 2223 Fulton Street 6th Floor, UCB
October 16, November 20, January 22, February 26, March 25

Led by Edan Dekel, Ph. D. Student, Classics Department, UC Berkeley
edan@uclink4.berkeley.edu

Our first unit is a general introduction to the relationship between history and literature.  This relationship is particularly clear in heroic stories which are prevalent throughout the written and oral literatures of the world.  The common urge to narrate the actions of a hero permits the construction of several different kinds of models for heroic literature.  We will particularly explore the model of Joseph Campbell as presented in his seminal work Hero With a Thousand Faces (1949).  A fairly close analysis of this model along with relevant examples will establish a basic framework within which to examine the cultural and historical significance of heroic tales throughout the various global regions in the curriculum.

  The second unit focuses on heroic literature in Africa, with specific emphasis on the West African cycle of legends concerning Sunjata.  We will examine one popular version of this myth (D.T. Niande, Sundiata: an Epic of Old Mali) with three specific topics for elucidation: (1) the relationship between the myth and actual historical events in the region; (2) how the myth fits the Campbell model; and (3) the world-view or ethos expressed by the myth.  We will also examine some other versions of the myth in order to highlight the variation that exists in both literary and historical narrative.  The overall goal of the unit is to establish a set of useful principles to guide the study of pre-colonial African history through an extensive body of heroic literature.

  In our third unit, we will turn our attention to the spread of Islam in the Middle Ages.  In order to understand the enormous influence of literature on Islamic history, we will begin with a brief introduction to certain key elements in Islamic philosophy and a general overview of the cultural consequences of the spread of Islam across Eurasia and Africa.  This will set the stage for a close analysis of the Andalusian Islamic literary tradition in Spain, which provide us with both a large body of traditional Arab heroic tales as well as a focal point for an examination of the powerful influence of Islam on Western Europe. The literary elaboration of the Spanish Islamic tradition can thus serve as a transmitter of a long heroic folktale tradition as well as a motivation for numerous innovations in European culture and literature.  Finally, we will briefly turn our attention to vibrant Islamic Swahili epic tradition with an eye toward identifying both familiar and unique traits in the heroic literature of a region deeply influence by the spread of Islam.

  Our fourth unit takes us to Japan, where we will examine the representation of feudalism and heroic ethos in the 13th century narrative Heike Monogatari, or Tale of the Heike.  We will attempt to explicate the world-view expressed by the text, and the same time examine brief episodes from several angles including the Campbell model, a coincidence with or divergence from historical records, and literary qualities.  This analysis will be supplemented by a general discussion of Japanese culture in the relevant period.  Finally, we will briefly examine another heroic tradition native to the Japanese islands, the oral epic narratives of the Ainu.  This will serve as both a contrast to the more literary Heike, and as another means of understanding the relationship between myth and history in this particular geographic region.

  The fifth unit examines the heroic tradition in medieval Western Europe.  In order to explore the development of the heroic ethos in European literature and its relationship with historical trends, we will consider three stages in the development of heroic myth as represented by three texts: Beowulf, The Song of Roland, and Chretien de Troyes' Erec and Enide.  Particular emphasis will be placed on the interplay between feudalism, kinship ties, and personal heroism. Other European traditions, such as the Spanish and Scandinavian, will be introduced for comparison, and an overall picture of the state of medieval European heroic narrative will be described in relation to its particular political and social context.

In the sixth unit, we will consider Mesoamerican culture and mythology.  Our particular emphasis will be on explicating the heroic values underlying a great part of the extant mythological corpus.  We will begin with an overview of the major mythologies of the region, with particular attention to the Aztec and Mayan cultures.  A closer examination of the narrative presented in the Mayan Popol Vuh, will provide us with a wide range of material to be explicated using the various models we will have developed throughout the previous units.  A discussion of the history of the transmission of these myths and the influence of European exploration will provide a further global context for the tradition.

Led by Erik Sahlin, Ph.D. Student, Department of History, UC Berkeley
sahlin@socrates.berkeley.edu
http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~sahlin/

    Our first computer workshop will begin with a general introduction to the Internet.  We will discuss the range of Internet resources which may be of use in classroom instruction and in the development of digital lesson plans.  Key terms will be introduced and grouped as they relate to:
  Internet communication tools, and
  Internet resources which resemble a library.

    Our first activity will be to set up email accounts, which we will use to subscribe to a "discussion list" on African history.  This will be followed by an introduction to various types of Internet "card catalogs", including search engines, directories and lists of links.  Once we have familiarized ourselves with the ways of locating information on the Internet, we will evaluate a collection of online materials related to Sunjata.
    Beginning with the second workshop and continuing through subsequent sessions, we will identify and evaluate online resources relevant to the current unit.  We will also continue to join discussion lists appropriate to the content of the morning sessions.  In addition, the second workshop will introduce more features of using email, as well as more sophisticated searching techniques.  In the third and fourth workshops, we will survey and critique various models of digital lesson plans.  Also during these sessions, a main activity will be to discuss the process of producing and publishing webpages, and to familiarize ourselves with a webpage-creation program.  Along the way, additional Internet communication tools will be introduced, including live chats and threaded discussions.  By the fifth session, we will be producing webpages which present our own digital lesson plans.
Back to History Through Literature 7th grade page.