Columbia Reading List, Contemporary Civilization, 1991-1992

Fall Semester

Section I: The Greek and Roman World

• Thucydides. The History of the Peloponnesian War (selections).
• Plato. The Republic.
• Aristotle. The Politics.
  The Nicomachean Ethics
• Cicero. On the Good Life.

Section II: The Sources of the Judeo-Christian Tradition

• The Bible. Old Testament: Genesis, Exodus, Isaiah.
  New Testament: Matthew, Acts, Romans, James, Revelation

Section III: The Middle Ages

• Augustine. City of God (selections).
• Aquinas. Aquinas on Politics and Ethics.
• Pizan. The Book of the City of Ladies.

Section IV: Renaissance and Reformation

• Machiavelli. The Prince.
  The Discourses (selections)
• The Protestant Reformation. Hillerbrand, ed.
• Calvin. The Institutes.

Section V: The New Science

• Descartes. Discourse on Method.
• Galileo. Discoveries and Opinions.

Section VI: New Philosophy and the Polity

• Hobbes. Leviathan (selections).
• Locke. Second Treatise on Government.

Spring Semester

Section I: The Enlightenment and the French Revolution

• Rousseau. Discourse on the Origin of Inequality.
  The Social Contract
• Hume. An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals.
• Kant. Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals.
  "What is Enlightenment?"
• Madison et al. Federalist Papers (selections) (optional).

Section II: Economy, Society, and the State

• Smith. The Wealth of Nations (selections).
• Hegel. The Philosophy of History, Introduction.
  The Philosophy of Right, Appendix (optional)
  The Phenomenology of Mind, "Lordship and Bondage" (optional)
• Marx. The Marx-Engels Reader (selections).
• Mill. On Liberty.
• Wollstonecraft. Vindication of the Rights of Woman.

Section III: Darwin, Nietzsche, Freud

• Darwin. Darwin (selections).
• Nietzsche. On the Genealogy of Morals.
• Freud. The Freud Reader (selections).

Section IV: Modernity and its Discontents

Instructor chooses at least one book from both A and B

A. Science and Revolution in the Twentieth Century

• Weber. From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology.
• Gramsci. The Modern Prince and Other Writings.
• Arendt. On Violence.
  The Origins of Totalitarianism (selections)
• Lenin. Imperialism.
  State and Revolution
• Habermas. Transformation of the Public Sphere.

B. The Ambiguities of Integration: Class, Race, and Gender

• Beauvoir. The Second Sex (selections).
• MacKinnon. Feminism Unmodified.
• Feminist Frameworks. Jaggar and Strahl, eds.
• Rawls. A Theory of Justice.
• Fanon. The Wretched of the Earth.
• Malcolm X. Autobiography.
• West. Prophesy Deliverance!
• Foucault. Discipline and Punish.
• United States Supreme Court. Decisions.

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Source: Denby, David. Great Books: My Adventures with Homer, Rousseau, Woolf, and Other Indestructible Writers of the Western World. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996. © 1996 by David Denby

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