Monmouth College - Ravelings Yearbook (Monmouth, IL)

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.Jg lfcOTj MSn- Pajie Twenty-flv HISTORY K% M«11 V MI 0 D C SCHILLING. Depaitment of History. Since the beginning of the war in Europe the colleges and universities in the United .States have reported increasd enrollments in their history departments. This is not un- natural, especially when we recall how limited our knowledge of contemporary European agairs has been in the past. We have given more time to Hannibal, Alfred and Charlei magne, than to Cavour, Gladstone and Bismark whose policies and diplomacy have made the Europe of our day. The History department of Monmouth College gives two groups of courses in both American and European history. In the first group are introductory courses covering the whole field ; in the second are courses which cover special periods in a much more detailed manner and in which more advanced methods are used. All the work is elective but the introductory courses are a prerequisite to the advanced work. The department aims to give standard courses and give them in such a way as to enable the student to transfer his credits to any college or university with no dimunition because of failure to measure up to their standard in both quality and quantity. Another aim is to create a taste for, and an appreciation of, historical reading which as Lecky says will give young men something of th e experience of old men, and untravelled men something of the experience of travel- led ones. D. C. Schillixg. EVA BARE. Department of Modern Lanpuapes. H. W. CHURCH. Department of Modern Lanpuapes. The Modern Languages being a comparatively recent addition to the curriculum of the American school and college, the methods of teaching German, French, and Spanish are not yet standardized, and every teacher has his own aims and ideals in the presenta- tion of his subject. One teacher will emphasize the grammatical phase of a language.

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- ' - - ' ■ ' - - 5 ; ftv »artrtt-,.,a; j.,«,cv,«, Pape Twenty-four as sources of ideas, the department encourages intimate contact between the student and the library. The hope is to cultivate the reading habit, the dictionar}- habit, and a taste for direct and effective modes of expression. The ideal is approached in those students who discover and adopt the habit of voluntary reading and writing, and the power of success- ful self-criticism. The courses in English and American literature which follow endeavor to stimulate a friendship for the greater poets and prose writers of both branches of the English-speaking race. They include the master-thinkers and the master-artists of speech. Their work is the storehouse of the best that has been thought and said in the experience of the world ' s two greatest democracies, on liberty, on society, and on religion, and is believed to be of the highest educational value. Literature is the recorded life of the spirit of man seen at its highest. To promote the personal possession of its ideals and to discuss their influence upon the thouglit and character of the student is, in the main, the aim of the department. L. E. Robinson. POLITICAL SCIENCE RUSSELL GRAHAM. Department nf Political Science. Social Science is a broad term including that group of Scineces having to do more directly with human Society. It has especially to do with the living present rather than with the dead past. Sociology proper develops and emphasizes two main lines of thought — suggestion which moves men directly or indirectly to act in masses; and organization of Society into groups which results in building vast human structures necessary for the Political, Industrial, and Social activities of man. Economics is a Social Science which deals with domestic and national housekeeping; the Science some say of getting a living ; the Science of subduing the forces of Nature and applying them to the uses of man. In Political Science men agree to observe certain rules, obey certain Laws. It is the study of human government which is over all for the good of all, their comfort, happiness, and safety. In all these ways and others men co-operate, they work together. Great problems, Social, Industrial, Political, vital to the welfare of the human race, challenge the con- sideration of every thoughtful man. The student of Social Sciences must keep up with the march of men and events. They deal largely with the sum of the present. Russell Graham.

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O ii ' v: 3fes«-«-A«v-r«»«M-- -i Page Twenty-! another tlie ability to read the foreign tongue, anotlier the art of translation, another the spoken language, still another the acquainting of the student with the literature of the people whose language he is studying, and so on almost indefinitely. Unquestionably the ideal course should do justice to all these values, but in practice it is necessary to sacrifice some of them in order to secure anything like satisfactory residts. Our department t f Modern Languages aim.s to teach German and French primarily as cultural subjects. Our definition of a cultural subject is one that broadens the horizon of the student, opens to him a new field of vision and inspiration, and contributes to counter- act the provicialism with which we are all hampered in spite of ourselves. The sympathetic understanding of a foreign people is from this point of view a distinct cultural asset. As the life of a people is always mirrored in its literature, and as no literature can be thoroughly understood and appreciated except in the original, we regard the language as the key to this sympathetic understanding. To secure this our first and most important aim, and with this always in view, we try to do as much justice as possible to conversation, grammar, and the other less important phases of language study. H. W. Church. PUBLIC ff Mffi m- SPEAKING ' ' ' , E. MARK WISDOM, Department ot Public Sjteakinp. The world wants men who can speak in puldic. The Lord said of Aaron: I know he can speak well lie shall be thy spokesman unto the people . The man who can express himself well is always in demand. Xo matter what line of work one engages in after leaving college, he needs to be able to speak. Other things being equal, the man who can make the best showing before a group of hearers is the man who will receive the great- est recognition. Tt is not by accident that men become good speakers. It is by liard work and con- sistent training. A man can no more speak well without training than he can perform any other skilled work without training. Recognizing these facts, the Department of Pub- lic Speaking believes that its work has an important place in the curriculum. It believes that its duty is to make those under its charge better able to use those powers of expression which nature has given them. Its aim is the building of character and the making of men and women. E. M. rk WisnoM.