Friday, February 22, 2008

Topics for Research

Topics in American Political Thought—

Colonial and Revolutionary Period:
Concepts of Authority in Early New England and Virginia
Concepts of God, Theocracy, and Tolerance in New England
Justifications for Slavery
Influence of Locke, Sidney, and Glorious Revolution on American Revolutionary Thought
The Writings of Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson
Federalists and Anti-Federalists
The Constitution and Centralized Government
The Federalist Papers, Divided Government, and Class
Early Abolitionism in Britain and U.S.
Justifications for Slavery

Ante-Bellum Thought:
American writing on political economy (Henry Carey, newspaper editorials, etc.)
Radical Protests Against Capitalism and Industrialization
Political Theory Concepts in Slave Narratives (other than Frederick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs)
Confederate Fire Eaters
The Political Theories of John C. Calhoun, George Fitzhugh, and Abraham Lincoln in
Various kinds of comparative formulations
Individualism
Fiction and Political Theory
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Herman Melville
James Fenimore Cooper
Temperance fiction like T. S. Arthur
Early African-American fiction
Tocqueville, Democracy in America, J. S. Mill’s Review of Democracy in America
Abolitionism
Concepts of the Frontier, Nature, Manifest Destiny
Native American Thought
Feminism—Seneca Falls Meeting, Sojourner Truth, Elizabeth Cady Stanton,
Labor— Workingmen in Philadelphia, Boston, and NY
Loco Focos

Reconstruction and the Gilded Age
Socialism-- Edward Bellamy, Looking Backward
Henry Demarest Lloyd
Eugene Debs
Emma Goldman

African-American
W. E. B. DuBois, The Souls of Black Folk, Reconstruction, The Philadelphia Negro, etc.
Booker T. Washington, Up From Slavery
Anna Julia Cooper
Ida Wells Barnett
Alexander Crummell

Feminism
Susan B. Anthony

Segregation
Plessy v. Ferguson
Pitchfork Ben Tillman
Tom Watson
D. W. Griffith, Birth of a Nation
Other rationalizations for segregation, lynching, etc.

Depression to Present
Conservatism
Friedrich Hayek, The Road to Serfdom
Jose Ortega y Gassett, The Revolt of the Masses
Milton Friedman, Capitalism and Freedom
Leo Strauss, What is Political Philosophy and Other Studies, Thoughts on Machiavelli,
Natural Right and History
Barry Goldwater, Conscience of a Conservative
Harvey Mansfield, Manliness, Taming the Prince
Robert Nozick, Anarchy, The State, and Utopia
Shelby Steele, John McWhorter, Randall Kennedy, and other black conservatives
Liberalism
J. Kenneth Galbraith, The Affluent Society, The New Industrial State
John Rawls, A Theory of Justice, Political Liberalism
Adorno, et. al., The Authoritarian Personality

Radicalism
Works by C. Wright Mills
Works on the SDS and radical student movements

African-American
Martin Luther King, A Testament of Hope, other works
Malcolm X, various works
bell hooks, various works in library
Patricia Williams
Critical Race Theory
Audre Lorde
Angela Davis
Black Panthers
Feminism
Kate Millett, Sexual Politics
Dorothy Dinnerstein, The Mermaid and the Minotaur
Works by Nancy Chowdorow, Jessica Benjamin, Judith Butler, Wendy Brown

17 comments:

permblndmomnt said...

I am planning on researching feminist thought in the 1960's and 1970's. I have just picked up the book Sisterhood is Powerful by Robin Morgan from the library and I am reading it now. I'm using this book as a launching pad to find out more information on the subject. This book is an anthology of writings from the Women's Liberation Movement so hopefully I will get some good information about my subject.
~Cassi Weinel

kcmono said...

I am planning on researching the political thought behind American Henry David Thoreau and German Friedrich Nietzche. I will basically be comparing the thoughts behind Transcendentalism and Existentialism through these two examples and the rise of these two ideologies in the 1800s. Professor Caric brought this up to another student, but I'm reading Thus Spoke Zarathustra so it fits perfectly with my current personal rec reading interests. Thus Spoke Zarathustra is Nietzche's self-claimed most important of his works. I plan to read more pieces written by Nietzche and Thoreau to get more background for each thought base.

~ Casey Simpson

Ric Caric said...

kcmono should read Nietzsche's Gay Science as a companion piece to Thus Spoke Zarathustra. She would also need to come to grips with Nietzsche and Thoreau's respective views on religion.

agenteagle said...

My research paper will focus on writings from the ante-bellum thought period. I plan to focus on the topic of individualism. The research will include comparisons between Emerson, the slave narratives, and maybe several others. I wanted to try to relate this topic to "black vs. white" writers debate and the diagram I have been formulating. In my mind all this relates but I am not sure if it is narrowed down enough. I am certain I want to research individualism in relation to the pieces we have been studying in class lately.
--Teresa

Bloody King of the World said...

Well, my dear Thaddeus, I have decided that the best choice would be to read works on the SDS and other student organizations. I'm particularly interested in how their ideas of revolutionary ideology tie into traditional methods of American Political Thought.

Do they have a valid point? I want to examine the SDS in relation to the ideals of Thomas Paine and other American writers: One is not a man unless one fights for their rights. Do the SDS have a valid point? They fought for what they believed in- does this make them men?

In short, I wish to contrast the SDS with Thomas Paine, a revolutionary much like themselves.

Tony&Bartley said...

I am planning on researching manifest destiny as imperialism from the antebellum period to Teddy Roosevelt. I am going to look at manifest destiny as justification for war, Indian removal and part of the white rationale that other human beings are inferior to them. Manifest destiny in itself seems to be a racist ideology that was used by the people of the United States of America to kill, steal and subjugate as many people, and their lands as they could because God said it was their duty!

Brandy01 said...

I am going to focus primarly on African American women. Hopefully the topic will not be to ambitious, but I'm planning on taking this from the time of the Revolutionary War and the Declaration of Independence through modern day. Mostly I want to concentrate on the cruelty of slave owners to their slaves and assimilate this to cruelty of pornography especially the crudeness of pornography aimed at women of color. I think I can make the connection between the pleasure in slavery and the pleasure in porn. There are several different directions that I can take this paper, so I'm going to just write it out and see where my research and thoughts take me. I am going to read more into slave narratives and Dworkin. I think I may also be able to tie in Hurtado and Jenson's new book as well. Hopefully it will be fun and interesting and really gory.

willie said...

I am planning on researching concepts of nature, mainly on Antibellum thought. I will most likely seek to compare Throeau and others who see the God through nature, with those who justify the explotation of nature through expansion, manifest destiny, and perhaps aspects of the industrial revolution.

LuckyThreeMins. said...

I would like to focus my research around C. Wright Mills and his analyses of American class structure using mainly his writing Sociological Imagination. I would also like to tie Marx in somehow. I'm still looking into that.

Eric Boos

unmodified said...

I am currently researching Feminism in relation to male domination and how this concept has suppressed women since the beginning of time. I will focus mostly on the domination sexually and are looking at the works od Kate Millett, Catherine McKinnon, Andrea Dworkin and looking at Robert Jensens work "Getting Off" to see what I can use from that.

Lakin Brown

unmodified said...

I am currently researching Feminism in relation to male domination and how this concept has suppressed women since the beginning of time. I will focus mostly on the domination sexually and are looking at the works od Kate Millett, Catherine McKinnon, Andrea Dworkin and looking at Robert Jensens work "Getting Off" to see what I can use from that.

Lakin Brown

bmattox717 said...

I would like to examine the radical thought of Malcolm X, his influences, and his own influence on black culture during his life and following his assassination.

~Ben Mattox

Dr. Flanders said...

I am planning to research Eugene Debs and socialism of his time. There are several interesting events in his life that are of particular importance, such as his presidential run, and the time he spent in jail. I plan to do some research on these events as well as other events that might be relevent. - Brandon Bowling

above_and_not_beneath said...

I am unsure of a definite topic at this time, however I know I'm going to pursue one of the topics under Reconstruction and Gilded Age. I was leaning towards a comparison between W.E.B. DuBois and Booker T. Washington. Another idea I had was to do something with feminism and explore Susan B. Anthony's life. Besides this I haven't come up with any concrete decisions as of now.
~Madison Harris

Lokanda2 said...

My research paper will be about the Black Panther Party and will focus mainly on there impact on politics and the influence they had on the entire civil rights movement. I will also compare and contrast the political influence the Black Panther Party had in retrospect to the influence of Martin Luther King JR. and Malcom X.

Chris Hess

Scottye said...

My research paper will focus on concepts of masculinity and neoconservative foreign policy. There are a few routes I can take with this but specifically I want to look at the ideas linked to masculinity and how they are reflected within the policies. I also want to examine individualism in this dynamic. To be masculine in neocon terms means to be individual and isolated, immune to the influence of others. Looking at America's alienation of other countries, "The Axis of Evil," and it's defiance of the UN will be helpful in that regard.

Unknown said...

I know I'm a little late on being on here, and that's my fault. But I'd like to do my research on revolutionary thought, mainly focusing on what this country was founded on and compare that to what it actually is.

Kevin Worthington