Reed College
Reed College

Humanities 110

Introduction to the Humanities

Syllabus - Spring 2025

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Coming Up

Week 1

Origins and Survivals
Mon 27 Jan

In-Person lecture: 9:00-9:50am in Vollum Lecture Hall

Assignment

  • Information
  • Camilla Townsend, “Introduction,” and “A Note on Terminology, Translation, and Pronunciation,” in The Fifth Sun; A New History of the Aztecs (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019), 1-12, xi-xii.
  • Selections from The Universal History of the Things of New Spain [La historia general de las cosas de Nueva España], Book 8 = Bernadino de Sahagún, Florentine Codex. General History of the Things of New Spain, vol. 9, eds. Arthur Anderson and Charles Dibble (Santa Fe: University of Utah Press, 2012), 1-5, 41-5, 61-5, with plates 1-17, 66-71, 93-4.

Lecture: “The Many Mexicos in Historical Context.”
Christian Kroll

  • Lecture recording
Wed 29 Jan

Assignment

Lecture: “Mexica (Aztec) Philosophy at the Time of the Conquest.”
James Maffie (University of Maryland, guest lecturer)

Fri 31 Jan

Assignment

Lecture: TBD
Shivani Sud

Week 2

Mon 3 Feb

Assignment

  • Gallery: Tira de la peregrinación / Boturini Codex (c. 1530)
  • Selections from the Codex Mendoza, in The Essential Codex Mendoza, ed. Frances F. Berdan and Patricia Rieff Anawalt (Berkeley: University of California Press, 19927), folio 2r, and pp.7-9, 118-27.

Lecture: “We Walked a Long Time to Get Here; We Have Been Here Forever."
Nathalia King

Wed 5 Feb

Assignment

Lecture: “Reading Mexica Imperialism through the Codex Mendoza.”
David Garrett

Fri 7 Feb

Assignment

  • Selections from The Universal History of the Things of New Spain [La historia general de las cosas de Nueva España], Book 12 = We People Here: Nahuatl Accounts of the Conquest of Mexico, ed. and trans. James Lockhart (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992), 48-9, 126-163, 301, 306-7.

  •  Bernal Díaz, The Conquest of New Spain [Historia verdadera de la conquista de la Nueva España], trans. J. M. Cohen  (London: Penguin, 1963), 284-307.

Lecture: “Telling the Story of New Spain.”
Nigel Nicholson

Full Schedule

Week 1

Origins and Survivals
Mon 27 Jan

In-Person lecture: 9:00-9:50am in Vollum Lecture Hall

Assignment

  • Information
  • Camilla Townsend, “Introduction,” and “A Note on Terminology, Translation, and Pronunciation,” in The Fifth Sun; A New History of the Aztecs (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019), 1-12, xi-xii.
  • Selections from The Universal History of the Things of New Spain [La historia general de las cosas de Nueva España], Book 8 = Bernadino de Sahagún, Florentine Codex. General History of the Things of New Spain, vol. 9, eds. Arthur Anderson and Charles Dibble (Santa Fe: University of Utah Press, 2012), 1-5, 41-5, 61-5, with plates 1-17, 66-71, 93-4.

Lecture: “The Many Mexicos in Historical Context.”
Christian Kroll

  • Lecture recording
Wed 29 Jan

Assignment

Lecture: “Mexica (Aztec) Philosophy at the Time of the Conquest.”
James Maffie (University of Maryland, guest lecturer)

Fri 31 Jan

Assignment

Lecture: TBD
Shivani Sud

Week 2

Mon 3 Feb

Assignment

  • Gallery: Tira de la peregrinación / Boturini Codex (c. 1530)
  • Selections from the Codex Mendoza, in The Essential Codex Mendoza, ed. Frances F. Berdan and Patricia Rieff Anawalt (Berkeley: University of California Press, 19927), folio 2r, and pp.7-9, 118-27.

Lecture: “We Walked a Long Time to Get Here; We Have Been Here Forever."
Nathalia King

Wed 5 Feb

Assignment

Lecture: “Reading Mexica Imperialism through the Codex Mendoza.”
David Garrett

Fri 7 Feb

Assignment

  • Selections from The Universal History of the Things of New Spain [La historia general de las cosas de Nueva España], Book 12 = We People Here: Nahuatl Accounts of the Conquest of Mexico, ed. and trans. James Lockhart (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992), 48-9, 126-163, 301, 306-7.

  •  Bernal Díaz, The Conquest of New Spain [Historia verdadera de la conquista de la Nueva España], trans. J. M. Cohen  (London: Penguin, 1963), 284-307.

Lecture: “Telling the Story of New Spain.”
Nigel Nicholson

Week 3

Colonial Hierarchies, Hybridity and Resistance
Mon 10 Feb

In-Person lecture: 9:00-9:50am in Vollum Lecture Hall

Assignment

Lecture: “‘She is Ours, All Ours’: The Virgin of Guadalupe as a Political Symbol.”
Jenny Sakai

Wed 12 Feb

Assignment

  • Information
  • Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, “Loa to Narcissus,” in Poems, Protest, and a Dream, 195-239.
  • Diana Taylor, “Performance and/as History,” The Drama Review 50 (2006): 67-86.
  • Selection from “The Relacion,” in Tepoztlan: A Mexican Village (University of Chicago Press: 1973. 224-234. [This text provides a translation of the speech delivered by the actor representing El Tepozteco as part of Tepoztlan's annual fiesta. For a description of the full performance, see Taylor's article and the lecture.]

Lecture: “Dramas of Conversion: Sor Juana's Loa to the Divine Narcissus and the Reto of Tepoztlán.”
Simone Waller

  • Lecture recording
Fri 14 Feb

No reading or lecture

Sat 15 Feb

Fifth paper due

Due Saturday, February 15, at 5:00 PM to your conference leader.

Week 4

Mon 17 Feb

Assignment

  • Information
  • Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, “Reply to Sor Filotea,” in Poems, Protest, and a Dream, 1-75. 
  • Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, Redondilla 92 (“A Philosophical Satire”); Decimas 130 and 132; Sonnet 161, in Poems, Protest, and a Dream, 148-51, 165, 179. 

Lecture: "On Knowledge and Epistemic Injustice in Sor Juana's Reply"
Ann Delehanty/Meg Scharle

Wed 19 Feb

Assignment

Lecture: TBD
Jenny Sakai

Fri 21 Feb

Assignment

Note: The lecturer recommends watching the lecture before beginning the reading.

  • Information & Resources
  • Selections from The Mexico Reader: History, Culture, Politics, ed. Gilbert M. Joseph and Timothy J. Henderson (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 2002):
    • José Maria Morelos, “Sentiments of the Nation” (1813), 189-191.
    • Agustín de Iturbide, “Plan of Iguala” (1821), 192-195.
    • Editors of El Tiempo, “A Conservative Profession of Faith” (1846), 220-225.
    • Mariano Otero, “Considerations Relating to the Political and Social Situation of the Mexican Republic in the Year 1847” (1847), 226-238.   
  • Gallery: Diego Rivera, National Palace mural (c. 1929-1935).

Lecture: “Turning Points: Mexico in the Nineteenth Century.”
Margot Minardi

Week 5

Envisioning the Modern Nation
Mon 24 Feb

In-Person lecture: 9:00-9:50am in Vollum Lecture Hall

Assignment

Lecture: “Modernity and the Mexican Revolution.”
David Garrett

Wed 26 Feb

Assignment

Lecture: “State-Sponsored Art.”
Nigel Nicholson

Fri 28 Feb

Assignment

  • Information
  • Los Olvidados (The Young and the Damned), directed by Luis Buñuel (1950).
  • Cesare Zavattini, “Some Ideas on the Cinema,” Sight and Sound 23.2 (1953): 64-69.
  • Luis Buñuel, “Cinema as an Instrument of Poetry,” in An Unspeakable Betrayal: Selected Writings of Luis Buñuel, trans. Garrett White (Oakland: University of California Press, 1995), 136-141.

Lecture: TBD
Marat Grinberg

Week 6

Mon 3 Mar

Assignment

  • Information
  • Jose Emilio Pacheco, Battles in the Desert, trans. Katherine Silver (New York: New Directions, 2021), 9-71 (= 81-117 in the 1987 edition).
  • Gallery: Juan O’Gorman, “Landscape of the City of Mexico.”

Lecture: “All Roads Lead to ‘Roma.’”
Libby Drumm

Wed 5 Mar

Assignment

Lecture: TBD
Jan Mieszkowski

Fri 7 Mar

Assignment

Lecture: “The Inconvenience of Revolution: Zapatismo, Cynicism, Dignity, and Memory.”
Christian Kroll

  • Lecture recording
  • Lecture handout Word PDF

Week 7

Propaganda, History and Power
Mon 10 Mar

In-Person lecture: 9:00-9:50am in Vollum Lecture Hall

Assignment

  • Information
  • W.E.B. Du Bois, “The Talented Tenth,” Souls of Black Folk, 189-205.
  • Aida Overton Walker, “Colored Men and Women on the Stage,” The Colored American Magazine 9 (1905): 571-5.
  •  W.E.B. Du Bois, three short essays: “Criteria of Negro Art,” Crisis (1926): 290-7; “Negro Art,” Crisis (1921): 55-6; “The Social Origins of American Negro Art,” The Modern Quarterly 3 (1925): 53-6.

Lecture: “‘True Life’: Propaganda, Leadership, and the Politics of Black Art.”
Mark Burford

  • Lecture recording
  • Lecture handout Word PDF
Wed 12 Mar

Assignment

  • Information
  • W.E.B. Du Bois, “The Propaganda of History,” in Black Reconstruction in America (New Brunswick: Transaction, 2013), 635-51.
  • Ida B. Wells, Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases, in Southern Horrors and Other Writings: The Anti-Lynching Campaign of Ida B. Wells, 1892-1900, 2nd ed., ed. Jacqueline Jones Royster (Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2016), 46-68.

Lecture: "Reconstructing History, Reconstructing Freedom: Ida B. Wells and W.E.B. Du Bois."
Paddy Riley

Fri 14 Mar

Lecture: No Reading or Lecture

Sat 15 Mar

Sixth Paper Due

Due Saturday, March 15, at 5:00 PM to your conference leader.

Week 8

Mon 17 Mar

In-Person panel lecture: 9:00-9:50 a.m. in Vollum Lecture Hall

Assignment

Lecture: “The Veil, Second Sight, and Double Consciousness,” and “Whiteness is the Ownership of the Earth forever and ever, Amen!”
Nathalia King and Troy Cross

Wed 19 Mar

Assignment

Lecture: “The Pain, Pleasures, and Possibilities of Learning.”
Margot Minardi and Dustin Simpson

Fri 21 Mar

Assignment

Lecture: “Who, How and Why Not? Questioning African American Spirituals.”
Mark Burford

Sat 22 Mar

Spring Break

March 22 – March 30

Week 9

Collectivity and Identities
Mon 31 Mar

In-Person lecture: 9:00-9:50am in Vollum Lecture Hall

Assignment

  • Information
  • James Weldon Johnson, "The Making of Harlem," in Survey Graphic 6 (1925): 635-639.
  • Saidiya Hartman, “A Note on Method,” “Mistah Beauty: the Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Woman, Select Scenes from a Film Never Cast by Oscar Micheaux, Harlem, 1920s,” “Revolution in a Minor Key,” “Wayward: A Short Entry on the Possible,” and “The Anarchy of Colored Girls Assembled in a Riotous Manner,” in Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments: Intimate Histories of Social Upheaval (New York: Norton, 2019),  xiii-xvi, 192-202, 216-256.

Lecture: “Harlem, New York: City within a City.”
Margot Minardi

Wed 2 Apr

Assignment

  • Information
    • The lecturer recommends watching the lecture before beginning the reading.
  • Universal Negro Improvement Association, “Declaration of the Rights of the Negro Peoples of the World” (1920).
  • Marcus Garvey, “Africa for the Africans” and “Liberty Hall Emancipation Day Speech,” in The Portable Harlem Renaissance Reader, ed. Lewis, 17-28.
  • Claude McKay, excerpt from “Banjo,” in The Portable Harlem Renaissance Reader, ed. Lewis, 389-95.
  • W.E.B. Du Bois, excerpts from “Dark Princess,” in The Portable Harlem Renaissance Reader, ed. Lewis, 511-36.
  • Langston Hughes, “Letter from Spain,” in The Collected Works of Langston Hughes, Volume 1: The Poems 1921-40, ed. Arnold Rampersad (Columbia, MO: University of Missouri, 2001), 252-3.

Lecture: "Harlem in the World: Race, Diaspora, and Black Internationalism"
Kritish Rajbhandari

Fri 4 Apr

Assignment

  • Information & Resources
  • Sterling Brown, "Our Literary Audience"
  • Selections from The Portable Harlem Renaissance Reader, ed.Lewis
    • Countee Cullen, “Yet Do I Marvel” and “Heritage,” 244-247
    • Claude McKay, “If We Must Die,” “The White House,” and “The Harlem Dancer,” 290-291, 296
    • Langston Hughes, “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” “The Weary Blues,” “Red Silk Stockings,” “Goodbye, Christ,” “Advertisement for the Waldorf-Astoria,” 257-267
    • Sterling Brown, “Southern Road,” “Odyssey of Big Boy,” and “Ma Rainey,” 227-232
    • James Weldon Johnson, “Creation,” 286-288
    • Gwendolyn Bennet, “Hatred,” 223
    • Helene Johnson (all the poems), 276-278

Lecture: “Harlem Renaissance Poetry.”
Dustin Simpson

Week 10

Mon 7 Apr

Assignment

Lecture: “Flaming Youth.”
Jay Dickson

Wed 9 Apr

Assignment

  • Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God, chapters 1-3 (pp.1-25).
  • Zora Neale Hurston, “What White Publishers Won’t Print,” in I Love Myself When I Am Laughing...And Then Again When I Am Looking Mean and Impressive: A Zora Neale Hurston Reader, ed. Alice Walker (Old Westbury, N.Y.: Feminist Press, 1979), 169-173. 
  • Langston Hughes, “The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain,” in The Portable Harlem Renaissance Reader, ed. Lewis, 91–95.
  • George S. Schuyler, “The Negro-Art Hokum,” in The Portable Harlem Renaissance Reader, ed. Lewis, 96–99.

Lecture: TBD
Dustin Simpson

Fri 11 Apr

Assignment

Lecture: “Hungry Listening.”
Libby Drumm

  • Lecture recording

Week 11

Mon 14 Apr

In-Person lecture: 9:00-9:50am in Vollum Lecture Hall

Assignment

  • Information
  • Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God, chapters 14-20 (pp.129-193).

Lecture: “From Mules to Men: Animals in Their Eyes were Watching God.”
Kritish Rajbhandari

Wed 16 Apr

Assignment

  • Information
  • Jacob Lawrence, Migration Series (1940-1941), Phillips Collection. [Browse the thumbnails, including the titles; titles are visible if you hover the mouse over an image. Then, explore the full series of 60 panels, panel by panel, starting with panel 1. You can advance to the next panel by clicking the down arrow below “panel 1” at the upper right.]
  • Gallery: W.E.B. Du Bois data portraits.

Lecture: “Moving the Color Line: Jacob Lawrence’s ‘Migration Series.’”
Nathalia King

Fri 18 Apr

Assignment

  • Information
  • Listening guide
  • Listening assignment. The song list is visible if you click on “Hovda Blues.”
    • W.C. Handy, “St. Louis Blues.”
    • Bessie Smith, Louis Armstrong, “St. Louis Blues.”
    • Ida Cox, “Wild Women Don’t Have the Blues.”
    • Ida Cox, “Graveyard Dream Blues.”
    • Ma Rainey, “Runaway Blues.”
    • Blind Willie Johnson, “Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground.”
    • Blind Willie Johnson, Willie B. Richardson, “The Soul of a Man.”
    • Skip James, “Devil Got My Woman.”
    • Count Basie, “Boogie Woogie Blues.”
    • Sister Rosetta Tharpe, “Strange Things Happening Every Day.”
    • Chuck Berry, “Roll Over Beethoven."
    • Duke Ellington, "Happy Go Lucky Local." 
  •  Langston Hughes, “The Weary Blues,” “Jazzonia,” and “The Blues I'm Playing,” in The Portable Harlem Renaissance Reader, ed. Lewis, 260-1, 619-627.

Lecture: “The Many-Sided Blues.”
Paul Hovda

  • Lecture Recording
Sat 19 Apr

Seventh paper due

Due Saturday, April 19, at 5:00 PM to your conference leader.

Week 12

Visibility and Invisibility
Mon 21 Apr

In-Person lecture: 9:00-9:50am in Vollum Lecture Hall

Assignment

  • Information
  • Ellison, Invisible Man, prologue, chapters 1-4 (pp.1-108).

Lecture: “Master Meter: The Poetics of Ralph Ellison.”
Peter Miller

  • Lecture recording
Wed 23 Apr

Assignment

  • Ellison, Invisible Man, chapters 5-10 (pp.109-230).

Lecture: TBD
Kritish Rajbhandari

Fri 25 Apr

Assignment

  • Ellison, Invisible Man, chapters 11-16 (pp.231-355).

Lecture: TBD
Nigel Nicholson

  • Lecture recording

Week 13

Mon 28 Apr

Assignment

  • Ellison, Invisible Man, chapters 17-22 (pp.356-478).

Lecture: “Modernity.”
Peter Steinberger

  • Lecture recording
Wed 30 Apr

Assignment

  • Ellison, Invisible Man, chapters 23-epilogue (pp.479-581).  

Lecture: “Running and Dodging the Forces of History.”
Ann Delehanty

Fri 2 May

Lecture: NO READING OR LECTURE

Tue 6 May

Final exam TBD

Tuesday, May 6, 9:00 AM – 12:00 PM

Course Logistics

REQUIRED TEXTS

  • Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, Poems, Protest, and a Dream: Selected Writings, trans. Margaret Sayers Peden (New York: Penguin Books, 1997).
  • W.E.B. Du Bois, Souls of Black Folk (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009). Note: parts of this book are in the public domain, and are accessible via Project Gutenberg.
  • Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man (New York: Vintage International, 1995).
  • Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God (New York: Harper Perennial, 2006).
  • David Levering Lewis, ed., The Portable Harlem Renaissance Reader (New York: Penguin, 1995).
  • Jose Emilio Pacheco, Battles in the Desert, trans. Katherine Silver (New York: New Directions, 2021)

Additional assigned texts are available on e-reserves accessible via links embedded in the syllabus below. You will need your Reed username and password to access these texts. Please bring a copy of the day’s reading assignment to class each day. The library has on reserve a limited number of the required books.

​​LECTURES
On most Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays of the semester, a lecture is assigned. On the Mondays, a lot of these are in-person (weeks 1, 3, 5, 7, 8, 9, 11, 12), and for these lectures we will meet in Vollum Lecture Hall at 9:00 am. Please be on time; the moments when we all gather together as a unified class are important. In-person lecture days are flagged on the syllabus. The other lectures will be posted so they can be accessed online; you can review these when it is most convenient to do so, but, obviously, do so before your conference meeting. Some of these lectures have been reused from last year, but, of course, only when still relevant. Lectures are regularly updated.

CONFERENCE ASSIGNMENTS
Humanities 110 is a yearlong course, and students are expected to remain in the same conference throughout the year. In cases of absolutely unresolvable schedule conflicts, students may petition for a change of conference time. Petitions (in the form of an email) should be addressed to Nathalia King, including an explanation of the conflict and why it cannot be resolved. Students granted a change of conference time will be assigned to new sections based on available slots and the student’s schedule; requests to move into a particular conference generally cannot be honored.

PAPERS AND WRITING ASSIGNMENTS
Three course-wide papers will be assigned in the fall semester, due at the times designated on the syllabus. Individual conference leaders may assign additional writing. If the due date for an assignment conflicts with a religious holiday or obligation that you wish to observe, please consult with your conference leader. Over the course of the semester, students are also required to submit at least three conference discussion questions, in writing, to their conference leader. Due dates for these questions are determined by individual conference leaders.

DISABILITY ACCOMMODATIONS
If you have a documented disability requiring accommodations, please contact Disability Support Services. Notifications of accommodations on exams, papers, other writing assignments, or conferences should be directed to your conference leader. Notifications of accommodations regarding lectures can be directed to the chair of the course, Nigel Nicholson. You are advised to consult with your conference leader about how your accommodations might apply to specific assignments or circumstances in this course. 

RESOURCES FOR SUPPORT
Your conference leader is your first line of support for any questions you have about the course. Please also be sure to explore the Hum 110 website for additional information. The Course Resources entries provide brief introductions to upcoming readings and suggestions for how to approach them. The Writing in Hum 110 page provides tips on the writing process. 

The Writing Center is a particularly valuable resource for Hum 110 students working on papers. You can get help with all stages of the writing process from peer tutors at the Writing Center. Links to the Writing Center session are posted on the Drop-in hours for the Writing Center this semester are posted here. Extra hours in weeks when papers are due are also offered. In addition, students are eligible for one free hour of Hum. tutoring every week. For additional information about support resources available to you on the Reed campus, please see Student Life’s Key Support Resources for Students. If you have questions that aren’t answered here, please consult your conference leader or email Hum110@reed.edu.

General questions for semester

  • How is humanity defined? How are these definitions implicated in different social orders and movements?
  • How do forced encounters of colonial Mexico and the African diaspora produce new, hybrid identities and cultures? What continuities and differences are there in these formations?
  • How do colonized and formerly enslaved peoples retain their cultural heritage and communal identities when under pressure to assimilate or to adopt a dominant culture? What new cultural forms are created from these contacts and adaptations?
  • What kinds of questions and conflicts arise from forced encounters between hybrid cultures? How have various thinkers and practitioners across time responded to these questions?
  • How do the different narrative mediums (e.g. maps, architectural assemblages, catalogs, encyclopedias, novels, films, sonnets, murals, salon paintings, etc.) facilitate or promote particular understandings of their world?
  • How and why do artworks gain authority? What is or should be their relation to politics?