The following syllabus is for a virtual 5-week summer course on Moral Psychology for
undergraduate students at a public university. The course specifically looked at how one’s racial or gender identity influences the expressions of feelings, like anger, pain, and empathy. Because this was such a short course, I share this syllabus as more of a blueprint for those hoping to adopt similar strategies. I was inspired to develop this course after reading Myisha Cherry’s The Case for Rage. My research focuses on the expression of pain, particularly in the context of racial and gender disparities in pain management. However, Cherry’s discussion of fittingness, feelings rules as a type of racial rules, and the role that gender has on expressions of emotions seemed compatible with other literature I was reading on gendered and racial stereotypes related to pain expressions. Many of the philosophy of mind and moral psychology courses I took as a student presented discussions of feelings and emotions in such an abstract way that at times felt disconnected from my own lived experiences as an African American woman. Thus, I designed this syllabus to include readings that have historically been considered a part of the philosophy of emotion canon as well as readings that were either written by or reflected the positionality of women and people of color.
I also designed the syllabus to cater to diverse learning styles and to take into consideration students’ responsibilities beyond the classroom. During my time as a graduate mentor for UCSD PATHways to STEM through Enhanced Access and Mentorship (PATHS), a program targeted toward underrepresented students in STEM, I learned that my students had difficulties finding time to watch lecture videos and that this was primarily due to their long commutes to campus/work. I realized there could be value in having the stage-setting components of the lectures available in podcast form, so students could download them and listen to them during their commutes, errands, exercising, etc. These considerations caused me to divide each virtual class into three parts: a 30-minute asynchronous podcast lecture (including a transcript), a 30-minute asynchronous video lecture, and a one-hour synchronous Zoom class discussion. I surveyed the students at the end of the five weeks. I was surprised to learn that, when asked on a scale of one to five how helpful they find each component of the course, students on average preferred the asynchronous lecture videos (5/5) over the podcasts (4/5). Students shared that ‘seeing’ an instructor helped make the course material more engaging. A preference that seems to mirror the growing prevalence of video-recorded options to popular podcasts.
Lastly, to foster connections between the course topics and students’ lived experiences, I set aside five minutes at the end of each virtual class for students to journal. Students were invited to write and express their feelings or to answer a prompt related to the day’s topic. For example, after discussing various forms of political anger, students were invited to reflect on a time they felt, witnessed, or were even targets of political anger. The prompts served as opportunities for students to develop the skill of identifying examples of various concepts and theories, examples that students could later incorporate into their essays. The prompts also allowed students to see how philosophy could be applied to their lives outside the (virtual) classroom.
The Syllabus Showcase of the APA Blog is designed to share insights into the syllabi of philosophy educators. We include syllabi in their original, unedited format that showcase a wide variety of philosophy classes. We would love for you to be a part of this project. Please contact Editor of the Teaching Beat, Dr. Smrutipriya Pattnaik via smrutipriya23@gmail.com, or Series Editor, Cara S. Greene via cara.greene@coloradocollege.edu with potential submissions.
Jada Wiggleton- Little
Jada Wiggleton-Little is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at The Ohio State University. She primarily works on issues of pain communication that lie at the intersection of philosophy of mind, social epistemology, bioethics, and race.
