Overview
PART A:
Refine with textual evidence You will need to locate 3-4 quotes from our readings refining the definition of the big idea, and explain the idea in greater detail across 3-4 paragraphs. This is your chance to revise any misunderstanding from your reflection presentation, but also to specify more closely how the philosopher’s specific big idea is different from the common sense definition of the concept chosen (ex. Aristotle on friendship vs general usage of friendship.
PART B:
Put into dialogue with another philosopher, author, or film from the class. To demonstrate an analytic (not reflective or speculative) understanding of our materials, you will need to integrate the work of another text/film from the class. There are several options for developing your analytical writing: 1) show how another text extends or expands the idea you chose, 2) show how another text points to an oversight (missing) point that should be added to the big idea, OR 3) show how another text helps us in understanding an important ethical problem or question raised by the big idea. You will need to use at least 3-4quotes or scenes from the other author/film as textual evidence to support your analysis. Again, you will be assessed according to the quality and accuracy of the connections you draw. It helps to almost role play a dialogue between the author of the big idea and another author from the class. What would they say to one another if they met in real life and had a conversation about the big idea?
PART C:
Impact as the class concludes. This section should be written in the first-person and should discuss what the idea means to you now that we have finished the class. How will it stay with you after the end of the semester? This section is still reflective, but it is a summary reflection that draws together your understanding of the entire semester. This section should comprise no more than 250-500 words of your paper.
I need an essay as a big idea topic on "Letter from a Birmingham Jail [King, Jr.]". In the essay you will also compare the ideas of Ida B Wells concepts with King's concept for part 2 as per the instruction above. I will provide the required materials to watch and read. Please only use those sources, NO OUTSIDE SOURCES IS ALLOWED. Also NO PLAGRAISM PLEASE.
Please provide citation and in text citation for the essay. Please follow the prompt and outline above and use simple language.
Here are the sources to use: You should be focusing more on King's sources as that is the big idea topic. Well's is juts for comparing part on part 2.
For King's part:
- First, watch Short video: Ten OTHER things King said. This video should familiarize you with a more complex picture of King than is presented in the popular media. Watch twice if needed.
- Read King's Letter from a Birmingham Jail [King, Jr.] (upenn.edu) Even if you have read this classic text before, be sure to read it again slowly as a model for deontological or universality ethics.
- Read Handout on Kingian Nonviolence.
For Well's part:
- Read this hand-out: Guide to Wells and King
- Watch the 2021 WTTW film: Ida B. Wells: A Chicago Stories Special Documentary.
- Follow up by reading ONE of the resources below.
- Read Exposing the "Thread-Bare Lie": How Ida B. Wells Used Investigative Journalism to Uncover the Truth About Lynching | Ida B. Wells | Chicago Stories | WTTW Chicago. This includes primary materials of images and writing from Wells. Some of the images are graphic, but you have to click-through to view them.
- Read Joy James's "The Quartet in the Political Persona of Ida B. Wells." James is a contemporary Black feminist philosopher who unfolds the importance of Wells as a political thinker in 4 parts.
- Read Tommy J. Curry, "The Fortune of Wells." Curry is also an influential contemporary philosopher; here he connects Wells to the intellectual tradition of militant resistance to racist violence. This reading also helps us expand our understanding of the power of friendship in moral development.
- The documentary video is:https://youtu.be/ML8XiKVStWQ
- background informationThis is for King's readings:King connects to Kant, because each shares a commitment to universal moral principles. Like Kant, King's universalism rested in natural law and its belief in a higher law of justice that went beyond the laws of worldly nations. But this was not his only universalism. He also believed in the universal connectedness of humanity, he might call this brotherhood or simply beloved community grounded in love. Unlike Kant, this love did not have to be justified by reason and ignore emotion. Instead, universal love was worthy in and of itself as a moral ideal and a moral feeling. For King, you didn't have to prove universal love, it was a gift available to all of humanity, despite our failures and despite hate. We just had to embrace it. This was glorious and joyful. It is the case that King was very motivated by his Christianity, but it is also the case that much of his philosophy of nonviolence arose from Gandhian principles and he believed in unity regardless of religion. Love and justice were his two guiding universal principles.Like Kant, King is very preoccupied with the status of the law. In the reading for this week, he is responding to those who tell him that nonviolent civil disobedience is not moral, because 1) it involves breaking the law, and 2) it incites social unrest. As you read through King, mark out each point in which he responds to a criticism telling him that he is immoral. It is in those responses, he sketches a contrasting universal morality that is just, democratic, and committed to the love of humanity.For Well's reading:All of our readings have placed great emphasis on the importance of justice and the rule of law. These are seen as vital to the principles of humanity (Kant) and the defense of our mutual respect, dignity, and fundamental autonomy and freedom as persons. These are also seen as vital in our fostering of King's beloved community, a vision of justice, but also of love and non-violence. He was despised for holding out hope for true integration, the protection of all, and a path of growth for every child not marred by hate. Finally, Wells was driven by principles of truth, fairness, justice before the law, self-determination, and self-defense. Wells allied with a great number of white antiracists and had deep, intimate friendships, but she first wanted Black Americans to speak dangerous truths, demand justice, and organize for their own protection and felt this was the precursor to meeting the white establishment as true equals and from a position of power.
- Short video: https://youtu.be/AIFTNmOOLmk