Blog Intro to "Conflict and the Human Condition" Course

As I remember, the course “Conflict and the Human Condition" was an experiment. All involved, teachers and students, were guinea pigs. The course consisted of three parts and ran an entire academic year. It was team-taught.

 I was excited to be invited to take part but also apprehensive. Would I, a green 18-year-old from a small town in the rust belt, who was lacking in sophistication and wide exposure to the world outside my growing-up place, be able to keep up, let alone make a contribution? (In my naiveté, I assumed all my classmates were rich geniuses; as it turns out, some were, some weren't.)

But now, reading old papers and notes from the course, I am surprised by the "young me." I was an assiduous note taker with a sponge-like willingness to absorb everything I read or heard; I wrote fairly well about some challenging topics; and I made it through the year without "being found out" as the student who had, by some careless registrar’s error, been assigned to a class way over her head!

But getting through this class, even learning what I could, owes much to the professors -- they were outstanding.  A total of 15 or so took part, all males but one. Preparing this class must have been a challenge, involving careful planning, development of three separate but interrelated and progressive course outlines, and a gathering of material from a variety of sources. (And this before Google and laser printing.)

 I wonder if the students responded as the professors had hoped. I understand now, as I didn't then, that the course was meant to provide several tools or approaches to analysis and problem-solving for use not only during our formal education at Ohio Wesleyan but for a life-time. The underlying themes – the relationship between conflict and the human condition and the spectrum of possible resolutions -- continues to ground much of my thinking and approach to life. I suspect that might also be true for others who took the course.

It would be gratifying to meet up with those professors again, not only to thank them but also to benefit from their analysis of what the past thirty-some years have wrought. America, the world, and --I suspect -- Ohio Wesleyan have changed dramatically.  Those academicians would need to use more "inclusive" language and be prepared for many more female and minority colleagues.  They would inevitably compare and contrast our actions in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya with the Vietnam War, shaking their heads that we have advanced so slowly in finding alternatives to violence and terror and ways to combat them. 

Today's students might appear less strident, less willing to strike or take over administration buildings, but also less inclined to love reading or learning for its own sake.  Above all, they would find themselves in "The Age of Information" and astonished by dizzying advances in the sciences and the world's interconnectedness. TV coverage of the Vietnam War made protesters out of many at the time, but the professors would be astounded by the power of the internet and social media to bring pressure on non-democratic regimes in the Middle East.

So, have the assumptions and conclusions of "Conflict and the Human Condition" stood the test of time -- at least three decades' worth?  Why or why not? (Sounds like an exam question!). That's what I hope to write about in future blogs.