CFS 495: Civic Engagement & Graduate Education
Professor James Farr
james-farr@northwestern.edu
Fall 2014
102 Scott Hall
Hrs: T 1:30-3 & appt.
The Idea(s) of Chicago
This seminar—CFS 495: Civic Engagement and Graduate Education—is the academic,
credit-bearing dimension of the Graduate Engagement Opportunity (GEO) as offered by
the Chicago Field Studies (CFS) and the Center for Civic Engagement (CEE). Your
various internships with educational institutions, community organizations, museums,
and/or public health sites constitute the experiential dimension of GEO.
Chicago is the site of your internships, and something we all have in common. A large
and exciting city with a rich and turbulent history, Chicago is ready-to-hand and well
worth our (further) exploration, however much or little each of us knows about it.
Chicago is also to be the intellectual subject of this particular, focused version of CFS
495. In particular, the seminar will focus on the idea—or, rather, ideas—of Chicago. We
will be interested, that is, in the ideas about or inspired by Chicago, as expressed by
Chicago writers, across a good stretch of civic history. They cover urban development,
city water, cultural philanthropy, labor struggles, model towns, immigration, settlement
houses, educational experiments, public life, mayoral politics, engaged literature, political
journalism, mayoral politics, and the new urbanism. These will be revealed to us in
writings (or commentary) by, among others, Jane Addams, John Dewey, Nelson Algren,
and Mike Royko, as well as Carl Smith, Alison Kadlec, Bill Savage, and Larry Bennett.
Three basic (but not readily or definitively definable) concepts shall govern our attention
to Chicago sites or issues: public work, civic engagement, and the infrastructure of ideas.
Seminar Requirements
The seminar requires faithful, on-time attendance and participation in discussion, on the
basis of careful reading in advance. The readings are purposefully not as long or
extensive as those in most other graduate seminars, in recognition of the time
commitment involved in your respective internships. However, they are important and
deserve close attention.
Each session of the seminar (on Tuesdays from 10 to 1) will consist of two parts. The
first (from 10 to 11:15 or so) will involve class discussion of the readings for that week.
After a 15-minute break, the second (from 11:30 to 1) will either be a continuation of the
discussion with a distinguished guest or renewed attention to your internships (whether
updates, problem solving, or extension of readings).
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There will also be a field trip to Chicago on Sunday 9 November (time and meeting place
to be determined). It will consist of a multi-stop, 3-hour van tour of some important sites
in the city. Bill Savage will be our guide.
The writing requirement of the seminar consists principally in two short papers.
One will be a commentary, critique, extension, or application of the reading for a
particular week. Each seminarian, that is, will be responsible for writing a short (4 to 5
page) paper on the readings for a particular session. The paper will be circulated to
members of the seminar in advance of the session in question (by Monday noon).
Moreover, it—and you, its author—will be a significant part of the focus of the session,
as a critical object of attention by the rest of the seminar.
The second paper is open-ended, to suit your discipline, research, or interests. It could be
on a Chicago topic that we will not have covered (say, about architecture or music or
anything else), or a deeper pursuit of one we will have covered. It could consist in an
historical and contemporary analysis of the organization or institution where you are
serving your internship. Depending on your disciplinary interests, it could be on one or
another “Chicago School” or a principal text or research project associated with it (for
example, sociology, political science, economics, law, or psychoanalysis). The paper, in
short, is open to your design bounded only by the general goals of the seminar and the
GEO internship. Please plan on speaking with me when the paper is taking shape in your
mind, say, around the mid-point of the seminar. The paper is due during exam week. It
should be at least 5 pages, though you may wish to make it longer or more involved.
Finally, there may be occasion for a short reflection piece, depending on the issue and
progress of the seminar. (There will be one for the second session, for example, as a way
for us to think collectively about our upcoming individual internships).
As a rough guide to the assignment of grades for the seminar, the second final paper is
40%, the first paper is 25%, seminar participation is 25%, and the shorter reflection
pieces are 10%.
Reading Materials
The following required books are available for purchase at Beck’s Book Store. Also, the
additional articles or chapters assigned for any particular week will be made available to
you before the relevant session. If necessary, please be prepared to make your own
photocopies of them.
Jane Addams, Twenty Years at Hull House (Signet Classics)
978-0-451-52739-4 paper
John Dewey, The School and Society & The Child and the Curriculum (Dover)
0-486-41954-1 paper
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John Dewey, The Public and its Problems (Swallow Press)
0-8040-0254-1 paper
Carl Smith, City Water, City Life: Water and the Infrastructure of Ideas in Urbanizing
Philadelphia, Boston, and Chicago (University of Chicago)
0-226-15159-X paper
Nelson Algren, Chicago: City on the Make (University of Chicago)
978-0-226-01386-2
Mike Royko, Boss: Richard J. Daley of Chicago (Plume)
0-452-26167-8 paper
Larry Bennett, The Third City: Chicago and American Urbanism (University of Chicago)
978-0-226-04293-0 cloth
Topics and Weekly Readings
9/23) Seminar Introduction: The Idea(s) of Chicago
Welcome: CCE and CFS
9/30) Community Research and Internship Problem-Solving
Due (on Monday 29 September by 12 noon via email to all): A short (2 or 3 page)
reflection (pre-flection?) going into your internship. What do you know about the
organization or institution hosting your internship? What skills do you think you
have or will need to develop to get the most out of your internship? What fears do
you have or problems do you anticipate? What goal(s) have you set yourself for
the internship? How will you try to integrate the internship with the seminar
readings and discussions?
Guests: Heidi Gross, Rob Donahue, and Jordie Cox (of CCE)
10/7) City Water, Civic Culture, and Cultural Philanthropy
Read: Carl Smith, City Water, City Life: Water and the Infrastructure of Ideas in
Urbanizing Philadelphia, Boston, and Chicago (emphasize Chicago, esp. ch. 1
[pp. 1-9]; ch. 2 [11-14; 38-52]; ch. 3 [53-66; 82-84; 92-97; 111-119]; ch. 4 [121122; 129-136]; ch. 5. [161-167; 177-199]; ch. 6 [219-228]; ch. 7 [229-246])
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Read: Helen L. Horowitz, Culture and the City: Cultural Philanthropy in Chicago
from the 1880s to 1917 (ch. 2 [27-48]; ch. 5 [93-125])
10/14) Labor Struggles and the Model Town of Pullman
Read: Carl Smith, Urban Disorder and the Shape of Belief: The Great Chicago
Fire, the Haymarket Bomb, and the Model Town of Pullman (foreword [ix-xvi];
ch. 1 [pp. 1-9; 15-16]; part 3 [177-279])
http://nucat.library.northwestern.edu/cgibin/Pwebrecon.cgi?v1=1&ti=1,1&Search_Arg=Urban%20Disorder&SL=None&
Search_Code=TALL&CNT=25&PID=o1yi2vCrZFSrCvDVRPde0VSicjuq&SEQ=20140919184647&SID=1
Guest: Carl Smith
10/21) Immigration, New Citizens, and Hull House
Read: Jane Addams, Twenty Years at Hull House
Guest: invited
10/28) Experiencing Education in the Laboratory School
Read: John Dewey, The School and Society & The Child and the Curriculum
Read: Alison Kadlec, Dewey’s Critical Pragmatism (ch. 3 [pp. 55-86])
11/4) Problems of the Public
Read: John Dewey, The Public and its Problems (ch. 1 [pp. 3-36]; chs. 4-6 [110232])
Read: Alison Kadlec, Dewey’s Critical Pragmatism (ch. 4 [pp. 87-114])
Guest: Alison Kadlec
11/11) Mayoral Politics and the Party Machine
Read: Mike Royko, Boss: Richard J. Daley of Chicago
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Read: Studs Terkel, “Jowl to Jowl,” Law and Disorder: The Chicago Convention
and Its Aftermath
Guest: Bill Savage
11/18) Chicago and American Urbanism
Read: Larry Bennett, The Third City: Chicago and American Urbanism
Read: Larry Bennett, “Forging Barack Obama: Harold Washington, Chicago, and
the Politics of Race,” Introduction to Gary Rivlin, Fire on the Prairie: Harold
Washington, Chicago, and the Roots of the Obama Presidency, revised edition
Guest: Larry Bennett
12/2) Cultural Criticism and Literary Protest
Read: Nelson Algren, Chicago: City on the Make
Read: Carlo Rotella, October Cities: The Redevelopment of Urban Literature
(chs. 1-2 [pp. 19-64])
Read: Carl Sandburg, Chicago (four poems)
Read: Gwendolyn Brooks (four poems)
Guest: Bill Savage
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