Download The Journey to the Underworld In Greek Myth and Modern Film

The Journey to the Underworld
In Greek Myth and Modern Film
A Freshman Seminar
Freshman Seminar: Goals and
Objectives
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Intellectual Community
Participatory Learning
Collaboration
Communication
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WRITING
SPEAKING/ ORAL
LISTENING/ AURAL
VISUAL
MUSIC
BODY
COMMUNITY
• What factors build a successful community?
• What factors detract from such success?
• How does one know when one belongs to a
successful community?
• What is an “intellectual community” and why
is it important?
PARTICIPATORY LEARNING
• When was the last time that you experienced
“deep learning”? What were the
circumstances?
• What did you learn? What was learned?
Content? Perspective? Self-realization?
• How did learning change you?
• Did learning occur in a vacuum? What factors,
people, etc. enabled the learning process?
COLLABORATION
• Is collaborative performance more important
than individual performance? Why? Why not?
• What can be learned through collaboration
that can’t be learned otherwise?
• What does it mean to collaborate
productively?
• What is at stake for the individual?
• What is at stake for the group?
COMMUNICATION
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What are the elements of good writing?
What are the elements of good speaking?
What are the elements of good listening?
What can visual and musical communication
achieve that writing and speaking cannot?
• What is the value of research in terms of
communicating effectively?
• What is at stake?
The Journey to the Underworld:
Why???
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Persistent Meta-Myth
Text and Great Literary Works
Material Culture
Visual Culture
Stories
The Universal and the Human Imagination
Preliminary Research Questions: using
textual, material, and visual culture
• What were the burial practices of the ancient
Greeks?
• What are the Eleusinian Mysteries and what do
we know about them?
• What is Orphism, and what do we know about it?
Why is Orphism important to understanding
Greek notions about the Afterlife?
• What was Plato’s view of the Afterlife? How did
Plato’s view differ from the general beliefs of
Plato’s contemporaries?