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Freshman Seminars: Dimensions of the Self

The freshman seminars explore dimensions of the self. They introduce the search for meaning that is conducted throughout the liberal arts and sciences seminar sequence by focusing on the individual, in particular the many sources of—and influences on—personal identity. Although the freshman seminars take a variety of approaches to this topic, all focus on these fundamental questions:

• What is "the self"?
• Is "the self" made? Inherited? Given? Discovered?
• What are the key influences on a person's physical, emotional, spiritual and intellectual development?
• How does "the self" interact with a community?

Your freshman seminar will introduce you to a wide range of materials from a variety of academic disciplines. Because the course is a seminar, you will be expected not just to "absorb" the materials presented but, working with others, to forge connections—to discover links among your own experiences, the experiences reported by other students and the experiences recorded in assigned texts. To foster intellectual development, you will be given many opportunities to write about what you learn and to share your discoveries, informally through class discussion and formally through class presentations.

All freshmen are required to take a freshman seminar in their first semester. In fact, your seminar professor will also serve as your academic advisor. The following seminars are open to most freshmen, space permitting. Click on any title for a description of the seminar.

• 150 America in Search of Itself
• 153 Faith and Life Today*
• 163 Shadows of the Self
• 164 Exploring the Creative Human Spirit
• 168 What's in a Name?
• 170 Doing That Thing You Do
• 171 Thinking for Oneself
• 175 New Horizons*
• 178 iAm My iPod
• 184 Through the Looking Glass
• 185 Same Self, Different Day?
• 186 Know Thyself!
• 187 Inner and Outer Realities
• 189 This I Believe
• 190 Reading on the Edge
• 191 The American Sense of Self
• 192 We Don't Need No education
• 193 Self Across the Life Course
• 194 The Invisible Self
• 195 Now I Become Myself

*These seminars will include off campus service hours.

The following seminars are open only to students admitted to the Honors Program.  Students admitted to the Honors Program may choose from the following seminars - all of which explore the theme of "Thoughts and Passions".

• HNSM 161 Beyond a Reasonable Doubt
• HNSM 163 Playing With the Passions
• HNSM 165 Grace, and Redemption
• HNSM 167 The Human Heart in Conflict with Itself

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Freshman Seminar Descriptions

150 America in Search of Itself
This course is about the “American Dream.” It explores what we mean by “having a good life”; whether there is an American identity; how our past, our politics, economics and rapidly changing population affect our prospect for a fulfilling future in the United States.

153 Faith and Life Today
This seminar is designed to help students mature by identifying questions of faith today and coming to understand them more fully in terms of moral principles of decision-making and some of the best prose literature: short stories of initiation. The course does not pre-suppose literary background or religious commitment, but both are most welcome. Students will develop skills in research and in critical reading, writing, speaking and listening through this exploration. This seminar will require off-campus service hours.

163 Shadows of the Self
In seeing live theatre, viewing videos and reading world-famous dramas, we enter a world of transformation. Plays capture characters in moments of crisis, self-awareness and decision which mirror our own conflicts and the ways we choose to resolve them. In high-voltage moments of choice in The Bacchae, Tartuffe, A Doll House, Prelude to a Kiss, and other plays, we can see the shadows of ourselves as each character moves toward deeper self-discovery.

164 Exploring the Creative Human Spirit
Everyone possesses a creative human spirit. Creative moments are vital to survival and growth. We will learn about how others have used creativity to discover new ideas and products. We will explore ways to encourage our own creative human spirit to surface more often. We will apply the new concepts of creative thought that we have learned to propose solutions to both personal and global problems. Get ready to fly!

168 What's in a Name?
How important are the race, ethnicity and language of one’s ancestors for determining one’s personal identity? How does this compare with the impact of one’s immediate surroundings? This seminar explores these and other questions by examining the experiences of “uprooted” and “ transplanted” people at different points in space and time as they search for a sense of self.

170 Doing That Thing You Do
This seminar will introduce students to an explanation of human behavior that is frequently used by economists and other social scientists. The rational self-interest model of who we are and why we do what we do will be examined in the context of other views of human behavior, as illustrated by parables, short stories, novels, plays and movies.

171 Thinking for Oneself
Some say that enlightenment means having the courage to think for oneself, rather than being lazy or cowardly while following the herd and letting others tell us what to believe or do. Others say that life is inevitably lived within a tension between freedom’s open possibilities and destiny's imposing limitations. We’ll pursue this problematic through writings religious and philosophical, literary and psychological, Eastern and Western.

175 New Horizons
“Leadership is the quality which enables people to stand up and pull the rest of us over the horizon, ” according to James L. Fisher. This course will explore the question “How does one become a leader?” by looking at psychological, emotional and spiritual aspects of the developing and changing self. We will examine the phenomena of personal development and growth, peer pressure, hero worship, changed/changing relationships, and the experience of moving from the “top of the heap” to the bottom in relationship to addressing personal and social issues of leading and following. Students will study and experience the intimate connection between self-development, leadership and community. This seminar will require off-campus service hours.

178 iAm My iPod
This course examines the interplay between technology and identity development, particularly in today’s culture. Whether it is the iPod and what your music collection has to say about who you are and what you find meaningful, email, IM, the personal computer, cell phones, video games, or applications like mySpace and Facebook, technology plays an important role in how we define ourselves and how we relate to others. This class also looks at the popular culture of various decades, as captured through technological media as well as written sources, and examines the influence these media and writings have exerted on the “collective identity development” of each affected generation.

184 Through the Looking Glass
Like Alice in Wonderland, we meet people, have amazing, often improbable, experiences, and hear stories that shape us, challenge us and lead us on an adventure in self-discovery. Through story, text, film and creative play, this seminar will explore those things and people that have helped us to discover our authentic lives.

185 Same Self, Different Day?
Am I the same person I was last year? Five years ago? Will I be the same person in five years time? In 10 years? We will examine the ways that selves are constructed through narratives, with a particular attention paid to the possibilities of changing ourselves.

186 Know Thyself!
This seminar takes as its starting point the famous Greek maxim, Gnothi sauton (Know thyself), and it assumes that self-knowledge comes only by reaching beyond oneself to engage an ever-wider world. Through challenging readings, discussion, written exercises, and even some “brain teasers,” this seminar will aid a process of self-discovery and self-appropriation that in various ways keeps coming back to an overriding question: “What does it mean for me to live an authentic human life—intellectually, morally, religiously?”

187 Inner and Outer Realities
Perhaps one of the most compelling questions any of us can ask is, "Who am I?"  Going far beyond the superficial list of likes and dislikes, we shall explore some of the essential and non-negotiable ingredients of the self, those inner and outer realities that form our personalities and, perhaps, even our soulfulness.  Of course, outer realities like race, gender, class, physical and intellectual capacity play important roles. But what about those invisible yet real inner dimensions that transcend yet include what others see?

189 This I Believe
“I” is in the middle—your “I.”  This seminar explores the influences coalescing to produce your “I” by contemplating the life stories of others in relation to your own. We will be exploring various streets taken by book and movie characters.  On what street did they grow up?  How far did they travel from that street? When did they venture forth and why?  Whom did they meet in their travels?  What beliefs guided their way? There are many streets or paths in life. Which path will lead to happiness, holiness, and effectiveness?  Where is your own street leading? What do you believe? The reading, conversing, and writing of this seminar will help focus and form the essential foundation of your life, so you may better articulate to yourself and others, “This I believe.”

190 Reading on the Edge
Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man is about a man in search of himself, but he is searching from the edge, from the margins of society.  What insight can we gain from this?  When exploring the question "Who am I"? is there any advantage to being on the edge?  Is alienation sometimes a good thing?  Dostoevsky explored the same question in Notes from the Underground, which will be another one of the readings for this course.  Does being on the edge add an element of freedom to our discovery of the self?

191 The American Sense of Self
Is there a distinctive American sense of self? If so, what factors have shaped and influenced it? In what ways is our personally developed sense of self related to our socially constructed identity as Americans? Has our American sense of self changed over the years as we have transformed ourselves as a nation? What impact does our nation’s global image have on our self-image? In this seminar, students will discuss these kinds of questions in the light of our American political and cultural history. Taking an “American studies” approach to issues of self, self-identity, and the interaction of self and society, we will read and discuss a variety of American sources, beginning with “America’s theologian,” Jonathan Edwards, and culminating in a discussion of Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man.

192 We Don't Need No Education
In this seminar, we will consider the role that education, particularly college education, plays in shaping the self. We will examine this theme by reading biographies and novels from men and women as diverse as St. Augustine, Ralph Ellison, Barack Obama, and the first woman to attend the University of Michigan. In most cases, we will see that while education plays a pivotal role, it is not an uncontested one. Most of our authors actually reject the lessons of their formal schooling, at least initially. As we think about the development of the self for these interesting and important people, we will also think about our own paths and what we are doing at Dominican University.

193 Self Across the Life Course
This seminar will explore the dimensions of the self from the viewpoint of social gerentology. How does an individual's identity - the self that we all are at birth, that we develop through our lifetimes, and, hopefully, come to truly understand when we're old - become as unique as we all are? What roles do social structure, family, religion, education, politics, the economy and one's own culture and society play in who we are? And, given all of the outside forces at work on us from birth, what part do we as individuals with our unique personalities, biologies and psychologies play in determining our own identities? Course materials will include readings that span a lifetime, focusing on rich histories that older people reveal as they recount their very own records of Self Across the Life Course.

194 The Invisible Self
The great French writer Marcel Proust observed that the self of today is often unable to recognize the self of yesterday and unable to accurately envision the self of tomorrow. Does our life include a multiple collection of selves (10-year old David in a baseball uniform, 17-year old David in a jail cell, 25-year old David in a cyclone in Japan, and an older David teaching a university course on the different Davids)?Or do we have one true self that always remains invisible to us, just around the corner, just out of reach? Who the H-E-Double Hockey Sticks am I, was I always this person, will I always be this person? This class will discuss how different people, places, events, and decisions (made and unmade) influence the self. We will explore through writings, films, and discussion how every moment could be the one that defines us to ourselves or others and how in the next moment that can all change.

195 Now I Become Myself
What does the poet May Sarton mean when she writes, "Now I become myself"? How do I know my true self? Why is it important to know myself? Philosophers, theologians, psychologists, and poets have reflected on these questions for centuries. As we explore these questions through through fiction, memoir, film and poetry, we will pay particular attention to what helps and what hinders becoming our true self.

The seminars below are only open to students admitted to the Honors Program.

HNSM 161 Beyond A Reasonable Doubt
Core Text:  Dostoevsky’s Brothers Karamazov
In a court of law, a defendant's life hangs upon guilt "beyond a reasonable doubt." But in the journey from doubt to certainty (and the likelihood of a roundtrip!), what is the role of faith? With the help of Dostoevsky, Camus, Freud, Kierkegaard, Augustine and others, this seminar will grapple with questions of faith and reason, doubt and certainty, and the restless search of the self for truth.

HNSM 163 Playing With the Passions
Our passions can play on our reason—are we awake or are we dreaming? Can we see the truth or only what our passions want us to see? On the other hand, reason is often used to play on the passions—will we betray principles for love? Or will we convince ourselves that our principles and our love agree? We see examples of the power of reason and of passion in Brothers Karamazov. What is the nature of the being whose passions can be played on by reason? (Plato) Even the seemingly most rational of our activities—science—was established by playing on the passions, as we see in Descartes, and we will explore current attempts of science to use our passions. What part should the passions play in our understanding of ourselves, our actions, and our choices?

HNSM 165 Grace and Redemption
Flannery O'Connor once stated that "there is no suffering greater than what is caused by the doubts of those who want to believe." In this Freshman Honors seminar students will read, think, speak, and write about what it means to suffer toward understanding--one's own faith or non-faith, as well as one's societal, familial, or intellectual place in society, in general. Students will be challenged to read carefully and to think deliberately about our common course text, Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov, as well as works from various authors, including O'Connor, C.S. Lewis, Mark Twain and others.

HNSM 167 The Human Heart in Conflict with Itself
Sometimes we can merge thought and passion, achieving harmony, wisdom, and wholeness in our lives. This is a goal of maturity, not the way in which we most often live our lives. Western literature speaks to this bifurcation of ourselves and the conflicts we negotiate between passion and reason to control our desires and find approaches to harmony. We shall explore these themes in classic works: Dostoevsky's Brothers Karamazov and Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice. We will also read selections from Irish poets and Bernard MacLaverty'sCal, a novel set in the midst of sectarian conflicts.  Other texts include a memoir and excerpts from the writings and speeches of Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert Kennedy.