Shimer Great Books Podcast "The Conversation" Episode 1

"The Conversation" Podcast Introduction - a conversation about conversations!

Dr. Stuart Patterson, Chair of the Shimer Great Books School joins Dr. David Shiner, former faculty member and Dean of Shimer College and now Emeritus Faculty at North Central College and Sophie Juhlin, a third-year student in the Shimer Great Books School. Together, we examine the ways we educate ourselves and others through conversation about Great Books, and how the ideas and practices that have informed human history are still most central to our own lives. We look especially at the fruitful interplay of freedom and discipline in the conversational format of the Shimer classroom. We delve into how our classroom discussions of natural science (for example, Albert Einstein on relativity or Marie Curie on radioactivity) are intended to guide inquiry not only into the specific principles of the texts but how the texts reflect the discussion itself and help refine our method in the classroom.