Course Description

The First-Year Colloquium is a set of seminars organized around the common theme of frontiers. Each section of the course focuses on a particular aspect or interpretation of this theme; and each is organized and taught independently, although there will be some shared events. As a seminar, each section is small and emphasizes student responsibility, involvement, and interaction. Therefore it is essential that you keep up with the readings and other assignments.

This seminar will examine two frontiers: the boundary that we cross individually from childhood to adulthood and the historical ground that we traversed as a nation from the 1950s to the 1960s. President John F. Kennedy’s call at the outset of the sixties for Americans to "ask not what your country can do for you, but ask what you can do for your country" struck a resonant chord with many youth at the time. Idealistic as Kennedy’s "New Frontier" was, it also stemmed from a Cold War mentality that drew a bright line between "them" and "us." The paradox of a powerful and prosperous society poised on the edge of a nuclear holocaust generated a potent mix of anxiety and hope that shaped the coming of age of the postwar generation known as the "baby boomers."

Using a number of different works, both fiction and non-fiction, this course will explore the historical and cultural forces that influenced this generation, the first Americans who formed their identities during an era when the term "nuclear family" acquired a whole new level of meaning. We will also listen to popular music and view a number of films, as well as engage in a service learning project.  Other plans include field trips to the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. and to the American Visionary Art Museum. There are many questions to explore with such a broad and meaningful topic as coming of age. How and when do we form our identities (and how do the authors and filmmakers depict this process)? What constitutes coming of age? How is the experience mediated by history and culture? By gender? By race and class? Are there some universal experiences that we all share as we reach maturity? What are the connections between the works we shall be reading and our own lives?

Course Goals

· To foster knowledge about American society and culture and the values and beliefs that have given meaning and shape to the experiences of its youth.
· To develop an understanding of the passage from childhood to adulthood in America during the second half of the twentieth century.
· To help students improve their formal research skills.
· To develop and refine skills in written and oral communication.

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