Meeting Times, Location, & Course Delivery Details
Spring GL 320H M4 Topic: Being Human
What does it mean to be human? Is there such a thing as human nature? If so, what is it? This course will explore these questions by surveying global perspectives on philosophical anthropology. We will study how various religions, philosophers, and scientists from around the world have defined the human condition. Our exploration of these theories will be framed around three fundamental practical questions: 1.) Are human beings inherently good and compassionate or are they naturally selfish and violent? 2.) Is there a fundamental difference between humans and other animals? 3.) How is modern technology changing our experience of what it means to be human?
Course Format:
This course will meet in person on T/TH from 2:40-4:10PM at College Hall 201. The class will be taught and approached as an interactive seminar. This means that there will be no formal lecture. Instead, the instructor and an assigned student co-instructor will lead and facilitate an interactive conversion through small groups and circle work that all students are expected to actively participate in.
Contact Information
Required Texts:
- Bregman, Rutger. Humankind: A Hopeful History. Little, Brown and Company: New York, 2019.
- Rosen, Christine. The Extinction of Experience: Being Human In A Disembodied World. W.W. Norton: New York, 2024.
- Stevenson, Leslie, David Haberman, Peter Matthews Wright, and Charlotte Witt (Eds). Thirteen Theories of Human Nature. Seventh Edition. Oxford University Press: New York, 2018.
- Webb, Christine. The Arrogant Ape, The Myth Of Human Exceptionalism And Why It Matters. Avery: New York, 2025.
Course Goals
This course will:
- Survey and explore how various world religions (Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Confucianism, etc.) have defined human nature and the human condition.
- Survey and explore how various philosophers (ancient, modern, and post-modern) have defined human nature and the human condition.
- Survey and explore how various biologists, anthropologists, and psychologists have defined human nature and the human condition.
- Comparatively analyze these theories of human nature and constructively apply them to contemporary experience and social problems (economics, environmental issues, technology, etc.).
Learning Outcomes
By the end of this course, you should be able to:
- Summarize and critically evaluate the major religious, philosophical, and scientific theories of human nature.
- Articulate and defend your own personal theory of human nature and account of what it means to be human.
- Critically reflect on the human/animal distinction, the impact of technology on human existence, and whether you think human beings are inherently altruistic or selfish.
- Use these theories and insights about human nature to reflect on your college experience and Wilmington’s core values.
Global Education Goals
With reference to Wilmington College’s mission, vision, core values, and queries, students will gain a greater understanding of:
1. the perspectives of cultures other than their own;
2. global issues, especially as they relate to peace, social justice, and/or ecology;
3. and the interconnectedness of the world and their own roles as engaged members of a global community.
August 25th: Welcome, Introductions, Syllabus.
CLASSICAL THEORIES OF HUMAN NATURE
August 27th: Confucianism: The Way of The Sages.
September 1st: Hinduism: Quest for Ultimate Knowledge.
September 3rd: Buddhism: In The Footsteps of the Buddha.
September 8th: Plato: The Rule of Reason.
September 10th: The Bible: Humanity In Relation to God.
September 15th: Homo Liturgicus: You are What you Love (Augustine).
September 17th: Rene Rirard: Mimetic Desire.
September 22nd: Marx: The Economic Basis of Human Societies.
September 24th: Freud: The Unconscious Basis of Mind.
September 29th: Sartre, Kierkegaard, and Existentialism: Radical Freedom.
CONTEMPORARY ISSUES 1: THE ROUSSEAU VS. HOBBES DEBATE
October 1st: Hobbes, Rousseau, and Lord of the Flies.
October 6th: The State of Nature 1.
October 8th: The State of Nature 2.
October 13th: Zimbardo and Milgram.
October 15th: Why Good People Turn Bad.
October 20th: Play and Homo Ludens.
October 22nd: Turning the Other Cheek.
CONTEMPORARY ISSUES 2: DARWIN AND THE HUMAN/ANIMAL DISTINCTION
October 27th: Anthropocentrism and Human Exceptionalism.
October 29th: The Compulsion to Contrast.
November 3rd: The Pride That Blinds.
November 5th: The Mismeasurement of All Things.
November 10th: Thinking Otherwise.
November 12th: Relationships and The Entangled Bank.
November 17th: Our Indigenous Inheritance.
CONTEMPORARY ISSUES 3: BEING HUMAN IN A TECHNOLOGICAL AGE
November 19th: The Extinction of Direct Experience.
November 24th: Embodied Experience and Face to Face Interactions.
November 26th: NO CLASS: THANKSGIVING BREAK
December 1st: In Defense of Handwriting.
December 3rd: Boredom and the Need to Wait.
December 8th: Place and Space.
December 11th: Final Papers Due.
Subject to change during the semester. Adequate notice of changes will be given.
Course Assignment Overview:
- Participation (15% of final grade)
- Student Co-instructing (5% of final grade)
- Weekly Writing Assignments (25% of final grade)
- Midterm Exam (15% of final grade)
- Human Nature Project (15% of final grade)
- Final Research Paper (25% of final grade)
This course requires a substantial amount of reading. It is an Honors Course built around a critical engagement with texts. Learning how to read complex texts and analyze difficult ideas/arguments is one of the most important skills you will learn in this class.
The required reading assignment for each day will be around 25-35 pages. A minimum of two hours of out-of-class student work is expected for each hour of in-class time. However, this is not mere reading for reading's sake. All of the graded work you will be turning in is directly related to these readings. As a result, if you do the readings, and do them well, you will inevitably be setting yourself up to succeed in each of the following course assignments (participation, weekly writing assignments, midterm exam, and the final paper). This class is intentionally set up so that every assignment you do is in some way a reflection on, or direct response to, the required readings. I do not assign meaningless busy work. This means that if you stay up with the readings, all of the following assignments will come quite easily and naturally to you. It’s simple: Do the readings and you will do well.
I am available to meet with you personally at any time throughout the semester to provide specific assistance and feedback on any of these assignments. Whether you want to discuss your grades, get feedback on a paper you are writing, or merely discuss any of the course content, please feel free to come to office hours or reach out to set up an appointment.
All assignments are to be turned in and submitted electronically via Blackboard.
Assignment Breakdown: Late assignments will be accepted but they will drop 5 points for each day they are late beyond the initial deadline (unless otherwise specified).
Participation (15%): This course will be taught as a seminar where the majority of each class will be spent in interactive conversation with each other discussing that day’s reading assignment. In-class participation is thereby an essential and mandatory part of this course. You are expected to show up to class having carefully read the material and fully prepared to engage in substantial and quality conversation about it. Weekly writing assignments (discussion posts and reflection papers) will assist you in being prepared for active participation. Student co-instruction, small groups, and circle work will be strategically utilized to ensure that each student has the opportunity to speak and participate.
Student Co-Instruction (5%): Each class will have an assigned student co-instructor to assist in facilitating that day’s interactive discussion. The co-instructor is NOT expected to teach the class or lead the discussion. They are simply expected to be the primary point-person that the instructor looks to for input, questions, and conversation topics. A successful co-instructor will show up extra familiar with that day’s content and ready to help guide our discussion with thoughtful questions and insights.
Weekly Writing Assignments (25%): As required of all upper level G/W courses, you will be asked to complete one 500 word written assignment each week. These assignments will either be discussion posts in preparation for class or response papers reflecting on course content. If the assignment is a discussion post, you must include your own initial post (300 words) and a thoughtful response to one of your classmate’s posts (200 words). These posts are designed to be critical reflections on the required reading assignments. A successful post will: 1.) summarize a main idea you found most interesting/important, 2.) critically evaluate or engage with this idea, and 3.) ask a thoughtful question related to it.
Initial discussion posts must be posted before we discuss that particular reading assignment in class. Response posts will be due Friday by midnight. These posts need to be formal, organized, and professionally written. Points will be deducted for grammatical mistakes and typos. Late weekly writing assignments will NOT be accepted (apart from outstanding circumstances).
Midterm Exam (15%): An in-class exam made up of multiple choice, true/false, fill-in-the-blank, and short essay questions covering the big ideas discussed in the course readings and lectures throughout the first half of the semester. Study materials/guides will be provided but attention in class and careful readings of the required assignments are critical in preparation for this exam.
Human Nature Project (15%): As required of all GL320 courses, you will be required to complete a 1,750 (7-page) Human Nature Project. There are two options for this assignment. You only need to choose and complete one.
- Personal Statement on Human Nature: A 1,750 word (7-page) essay thoughtfully answering the following question: What does it mean to be human? This paper is your chance to present your own personal statement on philosophical anthropology. It should be done in active conversation with course content as well as with Wilmington’s core values. The assignment will be scaffolded - you will turn in, and receive written feedback on, a first draft before submitting the final project.
- Human Nature Cultural Analysis: A 1,750 word (7-page) essay outlining, analyzing, and critiquing a cultural artifact’s operative theory of human nature. This cultural artifact could be a song, movie, book, or cultural phenomenon. The purpose of this assignment is to demonstrate your comprehension of a particular theory of human nature and ability to use it to critically analyze contemporary culture. The assignment will be scaffolded - you will turn in, and receive written feedback on, a first draft before submitting the final project.
Final Paper (25%): A formal 8 page academic research paper on a topic of your choice. The purpose of this paper is to further develop and dive into a specific question, figure, or idea covered during the semester that you found particularly interesting. The topic of this paper is intentionally left open so that you can find an issue that is particularly meaningful to you. The paper must critically engage with at least three academic sources beyond the course textbooks.
To help you succeed, this paper will be written and developed in mandatory stages. You will receive graded feedback from the instructor at each stage of the process:
- Thesis and bibliography
- Outline
- First Draft
- Final Draft
Grading Scale
A 94-100
A- 90-93
B 83-86
B- 80-82
C+ 77-79
C 73-76
C- 70-72
D+ 65-69
D 60-64
F 59 and below
GL320H Grading Rubrics
Participation Grading Rubric
A: The student pays attention and is actively engaged in class lectures, discussions, and activities. They constructively contribute to class conversations with specific ideas from the text and ask thoughtful and specific questions.
B: The student is present in class and moderately engaged in lectures, discussions, and activities. They contribute to the conversation but tend to focus on more general ideas rather than specific concepts from the reading.
C-F: The student is present in class but appears distracted, disinterested, and disengaged. They do not participate in discussions or class activities.
Reflection Paper Grading Rubric
A: The paper explicitly addresses the prompt and meets the required word count. It demonstrates a careful reading of the text, comprehensive mastery of the relevant concepts/figures, and ability to summarize them in the student’s own words. The paper has a constructive component where the student critically evaluates and thoughtfully reflects on these ideas. The paper is organized, professional, and well-written with no grammatical/stylistic mistakes.
B: The paper successfully addresses the prompt and meets the required word count. It demonstrates a broad familiarity with the text, its general ideas, and provides a critical evaluation of them. While theoretically correct, the descriptive and constructive portions of the paper could be developed in a more specific, technical, and thorough manner. The paper is organized, professional, and well-written with minimal grammatical/stylistic mistakes.
C-D: The paper does not fully address the prompt and/or does not meet the required word count. Its analysis is incomplete/incorrect, problematically generic, and does not demonstrate a careful reading of the text and comprehension of main ideas. There is little to no critical analysis of key ideas or an analysis that lacks thoughtfulness. The paper is disorganized, unprofessional, and has multiple grammatical/stylistic mistakes.
F: The paper does not address the prompt. The paper addresses ideas not covered in the assigned readings. The paper uses AI or is plagiarized. The paper’s engagement with key ideas is fundamentally incorrect, demonstrating that the student did not read the text or understand basic ideas. The paper is disorganized, unprofessional, and full of grammatical/stylistic mistakes.
Instructor Course Policies
Given its heavy emphasis on active participation as an interactive seminar, attendance is absolutely essential to success in this course. Attendance will be taken every day. Students will be allowed two excused absences. Every absence outside of these excused absences will result in the final grade being dropped one point for every session missed.
The pursuit of truth demands high standards of personal honesty. Academic and professional life requires a trust based upon integrity of the written and spoken word. Accordingly, violations of certain standards of ethical behavior will not be tolerated at Wilmington College. These include theft, cheating, plagiarism, unauthorized assistance in assignments and tests, unauthorized copying of computer software, the falsification of results and material submitted in reports or admission and registration documents, the falsification of any academic record including letters of recommendation, or use of artificial intelligence (such as ChatGPT). Artificial Intelligence is not to be used or referenced for any assignment. For purposes of this class, any use of this technology is considered plagiarism/cheating and will be penalized accordingly.
All work submitted for academic evaluation must be the student's own. Students cannot work together on assignments unless explicitly given permission from the instructor. Certainly, the activities of other scholars will influence all students. However, the direct and unattributed use of another's efforts is prohibited, as is the use of any work untruthfully submitted as one's own.
Penalties for violations of this policy may include a zero for that assignment/test or an “F” in the course. Your instructor may use plagiarism detecting software, such as Turn-It-In, to review your written assignments. See the current Student Handbook for the college's Academic Integrity policies as they pertain to examinations, plagiarism, classroom behavior, and the process for handling academic misconduct charges.
Institutional and Program-Level Policies
All exams will follow the Final Exam Schedule. Students scheduled to take three or more final examinations on one day may request to arrange their examination schedule, so no more than two exams occur on one day.
Requests for early or late exams are considered only under extreme circumstances. Prior to the exam period, the student must file a written request on the Early/Late Exam Form available in the Student One Stop Center, Academic Records, and on the WC portal. The form must be signed by the Instructor and the Academic Dean, approving the alternate exam time. This process must be completed prior to the scheduled exam period.
Undergraduate: FA26 Final Exam Schedule
Out-of-class Work Expectation A minimum of 2 hours of out-of-class student work is expected for each hour of in-class time for traditional face-to-face courses. For online and hybrid courses, the combination of face-to-face time and out-of-class work should be equal to 3 hours per credit hour per week. |
Instructional Course Delivery Definition of Courses |
Academic Integrity Policy The use of generative AI is prohibited except where expressly allowed in assignment instructions. Academic Integrity Policy |
Class Attendance Policy Institutional Class Attendance Policy |