HST 347: Sex, Race, and Science

Instructor: Dr. Brad D. Hume            Office: Humanities (HM) 433                    Phone: 93381
Email: brad.hume@notes.udayton.edu      Web: http://academic.udayton.edu/BradHume
Office Hours: Thurs. 2-4 and by appointment.

Objectives of the Course: During the modern era (1700 on) scientists looked to sex and race as key categories for understanding human qualities and human nature. At first the views of scientists reflected larger upheavals in modern society. By the 1810s, however, scientists’ "evidence" for the importance of race and sex were being used to justify denying the vote to women and minorities, imperialism, and a host of privileges for white men. These developments have had a lasting impact on Western society. In this course the student will become familiar with how sex, race, and science have been tied together from the start and how scientists’ views and roles have changed since the 1700s. In this way students will gain a critical perspective on the difficulties of assessing scientific theories in our own society as well as skills for evaluating those theories. We will examine how the scientists pursued their work and how men and women of different sectors of society responded to these influential views. The developments reveal an unfinished struggle in modern society concerning identity on all levels.

This syllabus is subject to change! (And will change)

This course provides credit in the Women and Culture Cluster as well as the Values Technology and Society Cluster.

Course Requirements: The course will be a mixture of discussion, lecture, and some in-class group work. Your grade will be based on participation (15%), three out of four take-home essay exams (45%) and papers (40%). See below for an explanation of the papers.

Participation: NOTE: If you do not participate verbally in class you will NOT receive an A in this course. Keeping up with readings and discussion are crucial to doing well in this course. I will regularly take attendance to monitor participation, because if you are not in class, you certainly cannot participate. I will provide you with a list of general questions to think about as well as providing you with things to look for in specific readings. In many cases we will divide into groups to consider questions and then discuss those same questions in general. I also reserve the possibility of using surprise quizzes to inspire your enthusiasm for reading. Any quizzes would be factored into your participation grade.

Take-home Essays: At the end of each unit I will provide two or three take-home essay questions. You are required to do the first essay exam after unit 1 and then two additional exams of your choice. If you wish, you may do all four essay exams and I will drop your worst grade. For each exam you will choose one question and write an essay, no less than 4 pages and no more than 7, in response. You will have one week to complete the question. The questions will require you to discuss readings covered in class. If you wish to use other sources, please consult with me beforehand. I have tried to make that unnecessary for these essays.

Papers: You will not have to do a traditional research paper in this class. The term “papers” is used casually to designate two options. The first option relates to a project I would like you to contribute to, a chronology of science for the web. If you prefer you may choose the second option of doing two book reviews.

Option 1 – The Science Chronology Project: Over the past two years students have been putting together web design projects for a chronology of the history of science. In the Fall of 2002 we moved to a new phase, the addition of primary source material to the chronology. Most of the original books and papers by scientists or about science are not available on line. Everything published before 1923 is now in the "public domain," which means it can be published on line without copyright issues. If you choose this project it will include three parts. For more detailed instructions see the Primary Source Science Chronology Project link.: 1) In consultation with me you will choose a book or group of important papers published by a scientist. You will read the material and look for sections that could be excerpted. You will be responsible for typing roughly 10 pages of single space material published by a scientist or about science written on or before 1923 that is not available on line already. YOU are responsible for looking (I will help out where I can). 2) You will read some supporting SCHOLARLY material about your scientist and his/her work. At the end of your primary source material, you will provide a 7-10 page synopsis of who the scientist is, what sort of research s/he did, how it fit with other research at the time, and what your text is about. 3) You will put both parts together as a web page for the history of chronology project. The preparation of the material (typing and design) is worth 35% of the project while the synopsis and analysis is worth 65%. My goal is to use those texts in class in the future (we are using one this semester).  In total you will be reading the equivalent of 3 books or 7 articles (making the work level equal to option two, below).

Option 2 – Two Book Reviews: For those uninterested in putting together web-ready material, you may do a similar assignment. Choose a topic from one of the first two units and from one of the second two units and find a recent history of that topic (a secondary source like a biography, history of a discovery, or history of a development in science). You will then write a review of that book which summarizes and critiques the value of the author’s presentation, use of evidence, argument, and thoroughness. Each review will be no less than five and no more than 8 pages. See the Book Review Guide for further instructions. The first book review is due no later than Thurs. 9 October and the second no later than Thurs. 4 December.

Grading:

Course Grades by percentage: All assignments except quizzes will be worth 100 points and grades will be based on a standard curve, as follows:

Final Grades will be computed based on points weighted for percentages. For example, if an assignment was worth 30% of your grade and you received an 86, the grade would be computed by taking 86 and multiplying it by .30, or 86 x .30 = 25.8. Grade points with decimals of .5 and above will be rounded to the next whole number. In the above example 25.8 would become 26. In other words 30% at the B level computes to 26 points out of 30 possible in that category and 30 out of 100 total points.

Course Policies:

NOTE: I do NOT give extra credit assignments. Please do NOT come to me at hoping to be able to bring up your grade with extra work. In addition to the Department of History policies, please note the following.

Objectives and General Understanding: This syllabus is designed to give you all the information you need to understand what will happen in this course. You are responsible for reading and understanding this syllabus. I am responsible for making sure that all your questions are answered. Unless you tell me otherwise, I will assume that you have read and understood what we will be doing and how your grade will be determined. You may ask questions at the start of each class, via email, or in my office hours. You are being advised as to major due dates from the very beginning, please be sure to budget your time so that you are not faced with doing last minute work.

Assignments: Unless I specifically say that you may work with others on your assignments, you should assume that all assignments are to be done by you alone. The student handbook has all the definitions of plagiarism and other infractions against the academic code. Be sure to read and understand them so that you do not make any accidental mistakes. If you have any confusion about an assignment be sure to ask me – not another student! – long enough in advance that I will have time to give you a response. I am happy to answer all questions and provide any guidance that I can to help you produce quality work.

Due Dates: All assignments are due in class on the date assigned. Late papers will be docked 5 points (roughly one-half grade) for each day late (e.g., 3 days late = 15 points off the total points for the assignment; e.g., an 84 would become a 69). Weekend days count.

Attendance: I will be taking attendance, but even if you regularly attend without contributing to class your grade will suffer. This is an upper level class and I expect you to attend because it is important and because you cannot participate if you are not in class. But I also understand that you are upper level students. Please do not feel that you need to explain any particular absence. We will both know if you have been attending regularly and participating regularly.

Class Materials and Communications: Many materials for this course will be available at my web site but most of it will be found at our  You will be asked for a username and password -- your standard Lotus Notes username and password should work. If you have problems accessing the site, please let me know. Each semester I receive an email address that is really a distribution list (all I see is 03_FA_HST_347_01). I will be using that email address to communicate with you. If you do not use Lotus Notes regularly you will need to have your mail forwarded to your preferred address. Go to notes.udayton.edu and follow the instructions at the web site.

Readings:

Bernasconi = Robert Bernasconi (Editor), Tommy Lee Lott (Editor) The Idea of Race (Hackett Publishing Co., March 2000) ISBN: 0872204588 

Foucault = Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality (NY: Vintage, 1990) ISBN: 0679724699

Laqueur = Tom Laqueur. Making Sex: Body and Gender from the Greeks to Freud. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1990). ISBN: 0674543556  $19

Malik = Kenan Malik. The Meaning of Race: Race, History, and Culture in Western Society. (Washington Square, N.Y.: New York Univ. Press, 1996). ISBN: 0814755534 

Paul = Diane B. Paul, Controlling Human Heredity, 1865-Present (Humanity Books, 1995) ISBN: 1573923435

* Materials available on-line or the quickplace (http://quickplace1.udayton.edu/science) site for the class.

Unit 1: Before Sex and Race

W 1 8/25-8/29

Laqueur, Chap. 1
* Galen, from On Hippocrates On The Nature of Man (quickplace)
* Aristotle, from On the Generation of Animals (quickplace)

W 2 9/1-9/5

Laqueur, Ch. 2
* Nancy F. Partner, "No Sex, No Gender," Speculum, Vol. 68, No. 2. (Apr., 1993), pp. 419-443 (available at the JSTOR site accessible from Roesch Library databases).

W 3 9/8-9/12

Laqueur, Ch. 3
* Mary E. Fissell, "Hairy Women and Naked Truths: Gender and the Politics of Knowledge in Aristotle's Masterpiece," William and Mary Quarterly, Vol. 60, No. 1 (Jan. 2003) (quickplace)

Unit 2: Inventing Sex and Race

W 4 9/15-9/19

Laqueur, Ch. 4; Bernasconi, Reading #1 (from the numbers in the table of contents)

W 5 9/22-9/26

Laqueur, 150-175; Bernasconi, #2
* Londa Schiebinger, "Why Mammals are Called Mammals: Gender Politics in Eighteenth-Century Natural History," The American Historical Review, Vol. 98, No. 2. (Apr., 1993), pp. 382-411 (also at JSTOR).
All students should have consulted about the chronology project and emailed Dr. Hume with their final topic by Thurs. 9/18

W 6 9/29-10/3

Bernasconi, #3 & 5
* Londa Schiebinger, "The Anatomy of Difference: Race and Sex in Eighteenth-Century Science," Eighteenth-Century Studies, Vol. 23, No. 4, Special Issue: The Politics of Difference. (Summer, 1990), pp. 387-405 (also at JSTOR).

W 7 10/6-10/10

Malik, Ch. 2; Laqueur, 193-207;  Bernasconi, #4 
* Mary Wollstonecraft, Vindication of the Rights of Women [1792] (quickplace)
Book Review 1 is due 10/9 in class

Unit 3: Sex and Race Triumphant

W 8 10/13-10/17

Laqueur, 175-192; Foucault 1-49; Malik, 71-100; Bernasconi, #6 & 7

W 9 10/20-10/24

Laqueur, 207-243; Foucault 53-73; Malik, 101-123 & Ch. 5; Bernasconi #8

W 10 10/27-10/31

Foucault, 77-102; Paul, Chs. 1 & 2; Bernasconi #9
Annotated Bibliography and project summary for the Chronology Project are due in class 10/30

W 11 11/3-11/7

Foucault, 103-131; Paul, Chs. 3 & 4
* From Henry Herbert Goddard.  The Kallikak Family:  A Study In The Heredity of Feeble-Mindedness (1912) (quickplace)
* Cesare Lombroso, The Criminal Type (quickplace)

W 12 11/10-11/14

Foucault, 135-159; Paul, Chs. 5 & 6; Malik, 123-127
* Karl Pearson: National Life From the Standpoint of Science, 1900 (quickplace)

Unit 4: Modern Debates

W 13 11/17-11/21

Malik, Chs. 6 & 7 ; Bernasconi # 10 & 11

W 14 11/24-11/28

Paul, Ch. 7; Bernasconi # 12 
Chronology Projects are due 11/27 in class

W 15 12/1-12/5

Malik, Chs. 8 & 9; Bernasconi # 13 and 16
Book Review 2 is due 12/4 in class

W 16 12/8-12/12
Final Class: 12/9

Examinations 12/11-12/17 (No in class final for this class)