Tutorial 100

Evolution and Society

Fall 2006

Prof. Jonathan (Jackie) Brown
Office: Science 1204
Office phone: x3096; home phone: 236-7661 (No calls after 10 pm, please.)
Email: brownj (at) grinnell.edu

I generally read email at the beginning and the end of the workday and will try to reply as soon as possible. For urgent matters or to discuss something, please call or find me.

Prof. Brown's Web page

Office Hours:

Mondays 10 AM - noon
Tuesday 2-4 PM
Wednesday 8-10 AM
Thursdays 10-11 AM
Friday 4:30-5:00 PM

In addition, you may sign up (outside my office) for a 15-minute “writing appointment” on Thursday and Friday afternoons from 2:30-4:30 PM. If you do so, you are responsible for emailing me a copy of the text you are working on before noon on that day.

Class Links:

Syllabus (pdf)

Weekly assignment sheets (pdf): through Nov. 23

Links to online readings

Erik Simpson's Connections website

Class Meetings:

Class will meet from 8:15 AM until 9:50 AM on Tuesdays and Thursdays in JRC 202. Attendance and preparation for class is mandatory and will contribute to your participation grade for the course.

Course overview:

Evolution is perhaps both the most influential and the most controversial development in science in the last 200 years. The ideas Charles Darwin laid out in his landmark work, On the Origin of Species By Means of Natural Selection, have had a tumultuous history because they appear to confront culturally-embedded beliefs about the nature of humanity, as well as our relationship to other organisms. In this tutorial, we will consider what Darwin actually wrote about evolution and humanity, and compare that to how his ideas have been used, criticized, and adapted by others over the past 140 years. In particular, we will critically examine the influence of evolutionary ideas on four issues of enduring social importance: religious belief, race, gender and ethics.

An important note: My goal in this course is not to convince you that a certain view of evolution and humanity is correct. Since my research considers the evolution of organisms, I have strong views on how I think evolution has occurred. I am much less certain, however, about what this body of knowledge means to me as a human being, as a husband and father, and as a member of a community. That’s why I am teaching this course – I want to confront my beliefs on these matters. My goal is also not to spend lots of time debating whether evolution has occurred (although if you have questions about this, I am happy to address them), but we will explore why people continue to debate it and why that fact is culturally and politically important. I hope you will realize that evolution has been, and will probably remain, at the center of very important issues in our society, including issues of health, social welfare and justice. To achieve this understanding, we have to be willing to examine issues that make us uncomfortable and arguments that make us angry. If we exchange ideas freely and respectfully, it should be an exciting semester.

Readings

Readings for this course will consist of selections from a number of texts. Some are available only on reserve, and some I will hand out (since they are no longer protected by copyright) or make available on the class website. The remainder are in the required texts, which you should purchase from the college bookstore or from some other vendor:

Fulwiler and Hayakawa – The College Writer’s Reference 4th Edition
Pat Shipman--The Evolution of Racism
A.S. Byatt -- Angels and Insects
Marlene Zuk – Sexual Selections

An overview of the reading assignments for the entire course is below. You should carefully read each assignment before coming to class! Every Thursday, I will be giving you a handout - also posted on the class web page - with descriptions of readings for the following week, focus questions, and assignments that are due or upcoming. The focus questions should help guide your reading, and I expect you to have formulated preliminary answers to the questions before you come to class. In addition, you are required to email me at least one good discussion question about the reading(s) before each class, due before 11:59 PM the night before class. [After that time, you should be preparing for class by being ASLEEP!] I will use your questions, as well as my own, to structure our discussion of the readings.

To summarize, before each class you should:

1.    Carefully read the assignment.
2.    Write out answers to the focus questions (I might ask you to read them aloud!).
3.    Send me a question for class discussion by 11:59PM the night before class.
4.    Get a good night’s sleep.

What you get out of this course, both intellectually and in terms of grade, depends on your regular preparation for class.

Writing

One of the primary goals of this course is to develop your ability to communicate your ideas through writing. For this reason, there will a writing assignment every week, typically due on Tuesday by 1 pm. I am willing to read and comment on drafts of your assignments if you email them to me in advance of a Thursday-Friday writing appointment. On Mondays, I’ll only look at rewrites of drafts I’ve already seen. What’s the message here? Even short pieces of writing need to be started well ahead of the due date! I have very high expectations of you, which you can realize if you come to class prepared and work regularly on your writing assignments.

Types of writing assignments:

Notes: These are 1-2 paragraph (< 1 page) responses to the focus questions generated by the class or by me. They are a good way to make sure you understand the issues and to work on developing effective arguments. Writing and revising these should help you practice the art of answering “essay questions” on exams in many classes. You’ll have five Notes due.
Essays: In these assignments, you will develop a specific idea of your own about the course material. Writing an essay is a good way to come to grips with your opinions about the texts and the general subject, but also a good time to pay attention to the structure of your writing. We will start with 500-word essays, and work up to longer essays later in the course. I want you to “make every word count,” so I won’t let you write longer papers until you are able to write a good 500-word essay. You’ll have five essays to complete.
Presentation: You’ll also deliver an oral presentation on a research project.

All writing assignments MUST be submitted electronically as an email attachment by the due date and time. You may submit your papers in either MS-Word (name.doc) or rich-text (name.rtf) formats; convert your documents to the latter, if you use Wordperfect, OpenOffice or another word-processing program. Use a 12 point font, please, and double space. Please do not forget to put your name and page numbers on each paper! I’ll be returning comments and grades to you electronically.

I will accept late papers with a penalty of one letter-grade per 24 hours or portion thereof. These penalties will be waved with documentation of illness from the health center. Note, however, that assignments or exams in other classes, while they may make you feel ill, will not make you eligible for an extension. PLAN AHEAD!

Grades

Your grade in this course will be based on my evaluation of your participation in the class discussions (including your submitted discussion questions) (25%), your five Notes (15 %), your five essays (50 %), and your oral presentation (10%). When deciding on your final grade for the course, I will also take into consideration how you have improved from the beginning by dropping the lowest score on an assignment from the first half of the semester. I do not grade on a “curve” (in any class) – thus, you are not in competition with the other members of the class. I hope that knowing that you are going to be graded motivates you to do your very best, but that your satisfaction with this class comes from much more than your final grade. If you are worried about your performance in the class, please come talk to me. I will have very high expectations of you – and nothing is more important to me than helping you reach and surpass them.

A note about working together – I encourage you to work with each on all aspects of this course, with one exception: when all of you are writing papers on the same subject, you should not choose someone from the class as a peer reviewer. I will make it clear on each written assignment when you should NOT use a tutorial classmate as a peer reviewer.