Reed College
Reed College

Humanities 110

Introduction to the Humanities

Paper Topics | Fall 2012 | Paper 2

Due Saturday, October 6th, 5 p.m., in your conference leader's Eliot Hall mailbox.
Length: 6-8 pages (1500-2000 words)

Write an essay in response to one of the following prompts. Structure your essay around a strong, analytical claim, and provide specific, detailed evidence from the primary texts to support that claim. You will want to focus on specific characters, episodes, relations, themes, or claims in the texts, rather than provide general summaries.

  1. The triumph of order over chaos is one of the central themes of both Egyptian and Greek mythology as we see in both the battle between Horus and Seth in the Egyptian texts we have read and in Hesiod's recounting of the founding of the Olympic order in the Theogony. Drawing from your observations on these two myths, compare and contrast the role that gender plays in the Egyptians' and Greeks' construction of a cosmic order.

  2. On the basis of close readings of one Egyptian and one Greek text, compare and contrast these civilizations' understanding of the relationship between mortals and gods. How does each text conceptualize the relationship between the human realm and the divine realm? To what degree do these texts portray the two realms as being essentially analogous and closely related? To what degree do they prioritize one realm over the other?

  3. Both "The Teaching of Khety" and Hesiod's Works and Days provide a great deal of information regarding Egyptian and Greek social structures and mores, including information about economic life and attitudes towards work, in their respective societies. Compare and contrast these works' treatment of manual labor, including the relationship between the elite and the working class, and consider what their portrayals of their respective economic orders reveal about both societies' attitudes towards work and the larger construction of the social order.

  4. "The Dialogue of a Man and his Soul" and the Harpers' Songs both present a contrast between this world and the next. Compare and contrast these views. To what degree do they support or complicate the idea that death is something to look forward to in Egyptian society?

  5. Among other things, "The Tale of Sinuhe" is a meditation on the idea of "home" and its connection to "identity." In an analysis of the text, consider the degree to which the hero does or does not lose his identity when away from home, the different ways in which he constructs and construes home, and the ways in which he does or does not benefit/grow from his time away from home. While the primary focus should be on "Sinuhe," you might also think about these questions in terms of Odysseus.

  6. Compare how the temple at Karnak and the Dipylon amphora (Lecture image #1 from 5 September) similarly or differently construct space.

  7. In consultation with your conference leader, write an essay on a topic of your own devising.