Wednesday, January 21, 2009
General Confusion
I just posted the pre-reading questions. Then I read further back and saw that I had already posted the pre-reading questions. Did we go over them? I can't remember. If we did, then you're supposed to be reading the assignment with an interpretive note source (I posted that with the pre-reading questions).
Here it is...you've got 2 days!
Here are your pre-reading questions for How an Aristocracy May Be Created by Industry by Alexis de Toqueville. Remember you can make this as short or long as you want. The idea is to make your point - so if you can do that in a few words - fine. If you want to explore your thoughts more fully and go into free-form, that is fine, too. Don't do it just to "do" it. These are some really awesome questions, especially now that our world is on the cusp of change.
Following the pre-reading questions, I am posting all of the additional assignments for this reading. Don't do them until they're assigned.
Pre-reading Questions
1. How would you define "aristocracy?"
"Noblesse oblige"?
2. What obligation do rich people have to help those with less money?
3. In American, can we become whatever we want, or are we limited by circumstances?
4. How might it be a threat to our democracy for some people to be better off than others?
5. Have you ever had to stay with a job you didn't like?
6. Are the president of a large corporation and his or her employees like a monarch and his or her subjects?
Interpretive Note Sources
Mark places where Tocqueville points out a danger to democracy.
Mark places where Tocqueville describes how the development of industry affects the workers who make the products.
Discussion Questions
1. Why does Tocqueville think that democracy constantly tends toward inequality?
2. Why does Tocqueville say that the worker has been assigned to a certain "position in society" instead of to a certain job? (125)
3. Why does Tocqueville think that "industrial theory" exerts a stronger influence on the factory worker than "morality or law"? (125)
4. Does Tocqueville blame the industrial aristocracy for the brutish existence of the factory workers?
5. Why don't the "impoverished and brutalized" workers revolt against their harsh industrial masters? (128)
6. Why doesn't the industrial aristocracy feel any obligation to help its workers in hard and difficult times? (128)
7. Why does the division of labor make the worker "weaker, more limited, and more dependent"? (125)
8. Why does Tocqueville call the new aristocracy a "monstrosity""? (127)
9. Why does Tocqueville stress that the new aristocracy will be made up not only of the rich, but of the "well-educated"? (125)
10. Why does Tocqueville assume that a worker cannot improve his position in society, no matter how hard he tries?
11. Why does Tocqueville see danger to democracy not in the degraded mass of workers, but in the new aristocracy?
12. Why doesn't he industrial aristocracy "know its own mind," and why can't it act? (128)
13. Why does the workman continually engage in making one object become "more adroit" but "less industrious"? (125)
14. Is there anything the worker can do to prevent the creation of the new aristocracy?
Post-Discussion Writing
1. What would Tocqueville say to Adam Smith about his faith in the division of labor?
2. Can a person be as happy working on an assembly line as owning one?
3. Do you agree with Tocqueville that a person who does a repetitive job loses the power to think?
4. Is a new "aristocracy," based on talent and ambition necessarily a bad thing?
5. Do you think Tocqueville would be in favor of labor unions?
6. Should we use robots rather than workers on assembly lines? Would this help or aggravate the plight of the worker?
Following the pre-reading questions, I am posting all of the additional assignments for this reading. Don't do them until they're assigned.
Pre-reading Questions
1. How would you define "aristocracy?"
"Noblesse oblige"?
2. What obligation do rich people have to help those with less money?
3. In American, can we become whatever we want, or are we limited by circumstances?
4. How might it be a threat to our democracy for some people to be better off than others?
5. Have you ever had to stay with a job you didn't like?
6. Are the president of a large corporation and his or her employees like a monarch and his or her subjects?
Interpretive Note Sources
Mark places where Tocqueville points out a danger to democracy.
Mark places where Tocqueville describes how the development of industry affects the workers who make the products.
Discussion Questions
1. Why does Tocqueville think that democracy constantly tends toward inequality?
2. Why does Tocqueville say that the worker has been assigned to a certain "position in society" instead of to a certain job? (125)
3. Why does Tocqueville think that "industrial theory" exerts a stronger influence on the factory worker than "morality or law"? (125)
4. Does Tocqueville blame the industrial aristocracy for the brutish existence of the factory workers?
5. Why don't the "impoverished and brutalized" workers revolt against their harsh industrial masters? (128)
6. Why doesn't the industrial aristocracy feel any obligation to help its workers in hard and difficult times? (128)
7. Why does the division of labor make the worker "weaker, more limited, and more dependent"? (125)
8. Why does Tocqueville call the new aristocracy a "monstrosity""? (127)
9. Why does Tocqueville stress that the new aristocracy will be made up not only of the rich, but of the "well-educated"? (125)
10. Why does Tocqueville assume that a worker cannot improve his position in society, no matter how hard he tries?
11. Why does Tocqueville see danger to democracy not in the degraded mass of workers, but in the new aristocracy?
12. Why doesn't he industrial aristocracy "know its own mind," and why can't it act? (128)
13. Why does the workman continually engage in making one object become "more adroit" but "less industrious"? (125)
14. Is there anything the worker can do to prevent the creation of the new aristocracy?
Post-Discussion Writing
1. What would Tocqueville say to Adam Smith about his faith in the division of labor?
2. Can a person be as happy working on an assembly line as owning one?
3. Do you agree with Tocqueville that a person who does a repetitive job loses the power to think?
4. Is a new "aristocracy," based on talent and ambition necessarily a bad thing?
5. Do you think Tocqueville would be in favor of labor unions?
6. Should we use robots rather than workers on assembly lines? Would this help or aggravate the plight of the worker?
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Friday, November 21, 2008
Share on blog
I meant to say this with the assignment. Let's try posting your responses and discussin via blogging. If I feel we have enjoyed a useful exchange of ideas in this medium, we go a little faster through the series. So....post your answers.
Pre-reading Tocqueville
Here are the prereading questions. Choose one and answer it in essay form if you can. If you feel the answer lends itself to a paragraph, then you may do that, instead. Then read How an Aristocracy May Be Created by Industry.
1. How would you define "aristocracy"? "Noblesse oblige"?
2. What obligation do rich people have to help those with less money?
3. In America, can we become whatever we want, or are we limited by circumstance?
4. How might it be a threat to our democracy for some people to be better off than others?
5. Have you ever had to stay with a job you didn't like?
6. Are the president of a large corporation and his or her employees like a monarch and his or her subjects?
1. How would you define "aristocracy"? "Noblesse oblige"?
2. What obligation do rich people have to help those with less money?
3. In America, can we become whatever we want, or are we limited by circumstance?
4. How might it be a threat to our democracy for some people to be better off than others?
5. Have you ever had to stay with a job you didn't like?
6. Are the president of a large corporation and his or her employees like a monarch and his or her subjects?
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
homework for this friday
Hi Guys!
Second Reading of Chelkash
Mark places where you respect or pity either Chelkash or Gavrilla.
Mark places where Chelkash tries to corrupt Gavrilla, and places where he shows that he cares for him.
For our textual analysis we will examine an exerpt from page 95 beginning with "Nice, the sea, isn't it," and ending, "and gives birth to great dreams."
Then we will do some dramatic reading! I know! Exciting!! (and dramatic)
We will read pages 113-116 and pages 116 - 188 with feeling :) and then do a textual analysis.
And here are the post-discussion writing questions for the FOLLOWING week. I'm just going ahead and posting now them because I am sitting here and it is convenient.
1. Does a thief like Chelkash emjoy more freedom than someone who follows the law?
2. Do you admire people who refuse to live by any rules other than their own?
3. Is Gavrilla right when he claims that money is the key to "honor, comfort, and pleasure"? (pg 112)
4. Do you think you would make a good professional thief?
5. Why do people become outcasts like Chelkash?
6. Does your world make you choose, like Chelkash, between being a "slave" or being free?
I THINK THESE ARE SOME GREAT QUESTIONS! I look forward to hearing what you guys have to say.
Carol
Second Reading of Chelkash
Mark places where you respect or pity either Chelkash or Gavrilla.
Mark places where Chelkash tries to corrupt Gavrilla, and places where he shows that he cares for him.
For our textual analysis we will examine an exerpt from page 95 beginning with "Nice, the sea, isn't it," and ending, "and gives birth to great dreams."
Then we will do some dramatic reading! I know! Exciting!! (and dramatic)
We will read pages 113-116 and pages 116 - 188 with feeling :) and then do a textual analysis.
And here are the post-discussion writing questions for the FOLLOWING week. I'm just going ahead and posting now them because I am sitting here and it is convenient.
1. Does a thief like Chelkash emjoy more freedom than someone who follows the law?
2. Do you admire people who refuse to live by any rules other than their own?
3. Is Gavrilla right when he claims that money is the key to "honor, comfort, and pleasure"? (pg 112)
4. Do you think you would make a good professional thief?
5. Why do people become outcasts like Chelkash?
6. Does your world make you choose, like Chelkash, between being a "slave" or being free?
I THINK THESE ARE SOME GREAT QUESTIONS! I look forward to hearing what you guys have to say.
Carol
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Post-Discussion Writing on Concerning the Division of Labor
Below are the post-discussion questions for Concerning the Division of Labor. Before you begin to write, let me quote from our teacher's guide:
Having students write essays based on interpretive or evaluative questions related to the selection they have discussed enables them to assimilate new ideas and measure them against their own experience and opinions. Such writing can be an opportunity to return to questions not fully resolved in discussion, or to investigate unexplored avenues of inquiry. It is also a satisfying closure for students to articulate their own points of view carefully and thoroughly in written form.
In the Great Books program, writing is a natural extension of interpretive work on a selection. During the week's work with a text, students experience and important part of the writing process as they continually formulate, revise, and refine their ideas, draw inferences and reasoned conclusions, and order their thoughts. Having done so, they will be better prepared to present a thesis clearly and forcefully, and to develop a significant contest for their ideas - when they write. In their final essays, students should explain the importance of the ideas they are developing, support their points with convincing arguments and evidence from the text, and consider other possible points of view - all important elements of effective writing, and of shared inquiry as well.
1. do you agree with Smith that habit, custom, and education account for almost all the differences in people's talents?
2. Is it irrational to act in a manner that does not promote self-interest?
3. How could the division of labor promote or discourage creativity and individuality?
4. What problems does the division of labor cause in our society?
5. Should a basketball player and a construction worker be paid the same amount if they work equally hard?
6. How does the division of labor operate in your school or family? How could you improve the efficiency of your school or family by increasing (or decreasing) the division of labor?
Having students write essays based on interpretive or evaluative questions related to the selection they have discussed enables them to assimilate new ideas and measure them against their own experience and opinions. Such writing can be an opportunity to return to questions not fully resolved in discussion, or to investigate unexplored avenues of inquiry. It is also a satisfying closure for students to articulate their own points of view carefully and thoroughly in written form.
In the Great Books program, writing is a natural extension of interpretive work on a selection. During the week's work with a text, students experience and important part of the writing process as they continually formulate, revise, and refine their ideas, draw inferences and reasoned conclusions, and order their thoughts. Having done so, they will be better prepared to present a thesis clearly and forcefully, and to develop a significant contest for their ideas - when they write. In their final essays, students should explain the importance of the ideas they are developing, support their points with convincing arguments and evidence from the text, and consider other possible points of view - all important elements of effective writing, and of shared inquiry as well.
1. do you agree with Smith that habit, custom, and education account for almost all the differences in people's talents?
2. Is it irrational to act in a manner that does not promote self-interest?
3. How could the division of labor promote or discourage creativity and individuality?
4. What problems does the division of labor cause in our society?
5. Should a basketball player and a construction worker be paid the same amount if they work equally hard?
6. How does the division of labor operate in your school or family? How could you improve the efficiency of your school or family by increasing (or decreasing) the division of labor?
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