Greetings / First Assignment

Welcome to the new Humanities 9 course blog. This will serve several purposes. First, I will use it to pass on basic information, involving things like schedule changes. Second, I will use it as a place to follow up on class discussions, answering unsolved questions or providing links to sites with more info on the subject. Finally, you will find prompts here for assignments on your own group blogs, which will sometimes be homework and other times tasks for writing lab.

One question that I couldn't sufficiently address this week came up in one of the Humanities sections - how exactly did the Colosseum deteriorate over the years? Were there specific events that damaged it, or did it just slowly crumble over time? This website does a nice job of outlining the great building's decline and is worth a look.

For today, in Writing Lab, I would like you to write a short blogpost on the readings from the last two nights. Please respond to the following two questions, devoting a similar amount of time to each:

• From "The Hero's Adventure" - Joseph Campbell states that "our world seems drained of spiritual values. People feel impotent. To me, that's the curse of modern society, the impotence, the ennui that people feel, the alienation of people from the world around them." His point is that where the ancient and medieval worlds were places of action, in which heroism was a tangible and possible thing, we don't have that today. Instead, people in the modern world feel powerless, lifeless, and out of touch. Do you agree or disagree with Campbell? Don't just state your opinion - bring up specific examples that support it.

• From "Reports of The Origins of Athens" - As the title suggests, these readings help to explain how Athens came to be. Based on all of the readings (and please refer specifically to each reading as you go), what existed before Athens? And, what did Athens look like or involve once it was established?