Subject Code/Name: MULT10016 Reason (Arts Foundation Subject)
Workload: 2x 1 hour lectures, 1 x 1 hour tutorial per week, and 6 x 1 hour workshops in weeks 3-8
Assessment: A "Bibliographic Exercise" due in Week 5 (600 words, 15%), an essay due in Week 9 (2000 words, 45%) and a take-home exam during the Examination Period (1500 words 40%).
Lectopia Enabled: Yes, with screen capture etc.
Past exams available: The take-home exam format changed for our year, so we didn't get a sample prompt but maybe offer some from now on.
Textbook Recommendation: None. Subject reader is online but it's not necessary. Read whatever is relevant to your chosen essay topic and you'll be fine.
Lecturer(s): James Bradley, Greg Restall, Kristian Camilleri, Deirdre Coleman
Year & Semester of completion: 2014 Semester 1
Rating: 3 Out of 5
Your Mark/Grade: H1
Comments: First off: some notes on Arts Foundation subjects. No one I know likes them. You'll have a choice between Aboriginality, (which is basically Sociology) Identity (which is basically Media) Language (which is a mix of Sociology and Linguistics) Power (which is basically politics, by which I mean Marxism) Representation (which is also basically Media) and Reason.
If any of these interest you then I suppose you might enjoy yourself but for the most part they're all pretty much interchangeable.
Supposedly these subjects give you the core skillset you need to approach your arts degree. In reality, most of the assessment is overly convoluted and too specific to each discipline to give you any general, transferable ability. That said, each subject has a large cohort, so it's a good way to meet people if nothing else. Personally, I find philosophy quite interesting, and this subject might as well be Philo101. It's coordinated by the philo department, and though there are some interdisciplinary elements it all comes back to the philosophy of reason, or rather, what each philosopher thought reason was. This was quite frustrating for some people: you're never actually given a working definition of 'reason.' Dictionary definitions, yes, and there were a few different theories throughout the ages that we learnt, but still... every essay had to begin with a disclaimer about how reason was a "mutable and manifold concept" etc.
The course starts with Plato, Socrates, Aristotle and other Greeks, then pretty much skips forward to the Enlightenment era. Most of the course centres around this time period. There are a few lectures on Romanticism and then onto the modern day. It's very much centre-heavy in that everything post-Enlightenment isn't really given much weight except as a contrast to/consequence of the Enlightenment. Background knowledge is not needed as every lecturer will go into A LOT of detail about what each movement and philosopher meant.
Lecturers:James Bradley and Kristian Camilleri were both pretty good. Greg Restall was by far the best. Deirdre Coleman is actually from the Lit department and came in the post-Enlightenment weeks to talk about Romanticism. She... just reads poetry off her slides. This was by far the most tedious part of the course, and that's coming from an English nerd. Those lectures had little to do with the rest of the subject and were literally word-for-word slide readings. After the 3rd or 4th session most people realised this and stopped attending.
Generally, you could probably get by without attending lectures, but most of them were interesting to sit through. You'll get a feel for them within a couple of weeks and know whether or not you need to attend.
Tutorials:I was lucky enough to get Steve as my tutor and he is brilliant. Even during weeks of dry content he'd make everything interesting even though we'd often run out of time to cover the "important" things. I guess this might be frustrating if you genuinely don't understand some of the concepts, but if you speak up you'll get an answer. I guess in that regard the subject is teaching you useful skills
Aside from that, most of the tutes were just geared towards the assessment which I'll talk about later. I heard good things about the other tutors, and most people found these way more helpful than the lectures.
Workshops:THESE ARE A WASTE OF TIME. I cannot emphasise this enough. The workshops are by far the most boring part of this entire subject, and this seemed to be the case for all the other Foundation subjects too. This is where the real skills (essay writing, citations, note taking) are meant to be taught. In reality... well I'll let these quotes from my workshop leader speak for themselves:
"So who can tell me what a paragraph is?"
"What
is a sentence?" *waves hands in an artsy manner*
"Remember your capital letters everyone!"
I cannot recall a single thing I learned. Mercifully these only run from weeks 3-8, but you have to attend at least 5/6. I'm trying really hard to think of any possible benefits but I've got nothing. This is a major downside to the subject but ultimately inescapable for arts students.
Assessment:Luckily this was all cleared up in tutes because the information provided on the LMS was useless jargon.
The first piece was referred to as the 'CACL' (pronounced 'cackle') which stood for comment, argument, comment/critique, link. We were assigned a journal article and had to select a key quote/comment, use that to branch out into a wider discussion of the author's overall argument, then critique that argument, and finally link this to another journal article of our choosing. This was the most unnecessarily complicated piece of assessment I've ever had to do. First of all, the article we were given had no author and very few publication details which made it borderline impossible to reference. Secondly, the article had nothing to do with the course (it was some random rant about why scientists make mistakes.) Thirdly, this piece had to be under 600 words and the article itself was close to 2000. The argument couldn't really be summed up succinctly and certainly couldn't be explored in depth. Again, for a subject that's meant to provide you with a skillset, this was more difficult than any of my other work. This piece is also due in week 5 ie. after everyone has already had one or maybe even two rounds of assessment. PLUS every other subject will have different citation styles, so it's not like this task actually helped much.
The second piece was worth the most overall and centred on the Enlightenment. The prompt: (unchanged for the past couple of years I believe) 'Was the Enlightenment really the Age of Reason?' You're then able to pick two philosophers or philosophical works in order to answer this question. The lecturers provide more information for this one and it's actually relevant to the course so I won't say too much. This essay was quite manageable and the ability to select your subject matter and focus made it surprisingly enjoyable.
The take-home exam is just as broad, except you only have 2 days to complete it. So long as you have a general understanding of each philosopher you'll be fine with this. We were told we'd have to do a heap of revision because two days didn't give you any time to research, but I found it to be pretty relaxed. You have heaps of time to go back to the relevant readings and take notes, and the 1500 word limit ends up approaching pretty fast when all you're doing is summing up/regurgitating information.
I know a lot of these comments might seem negative, and there are definitely elements of the course that need improvement, but this was still a pretty enjoyable subject. It did offer quite a bit in terms of philosophical theories and it opened up some interesting avenues in other disciplines. If you have even a remote interest in philosophy you'll have fun. Based on what I've heard, I'd recommend this over any other Foundation Subject; unless you're looking to get into Sociology, Media or Politics, Reason is your best bet for a good time and a pretty easy mark.