What is Called Living?
Course Description
We take the fact of living for granted, as we should. Why focus on each breath when it just comes and goes? (Though many mystics and ascetics would disagree, as we shall see). But the same logic doesn't apply to the idea of "life" itself. For instance, living today has strangely divided into many parts: our love lives, our sex lives, our work-life balance, the nightlife, the meaning of life, and so on and so forth, which begs the question: what is this thing we call "living"?
In this course, we will probe into these various facets of our lives through a critical reflection on the ways we live today and the ways we talk about life today. But we will also enhance our reflections by considering how other cultures, ancient and foreign (or just hidden in plain sight), have lived and talked about life in ways that challenge our very conception of what life entails. All of this will be facilitated through an eclectic array of activities: watching films together, reading poetry and novels, field trips (to an LSD museum or a scent shop), philosophical discussions, and collective writings/vlogging and practices of self-examination. The purpose of this course is to introduce students to the life of the humanities--or, at the very least, what this life could be.
Meet the Instructor: Rushain Abbasi
“I always tell people that there are two parts of me: one from Hyderabad, Sindh and another from Annapolis, Maryland. In a way, this class is structured along this division: a self that is connected to the earth and its people, and another that is always distant, always away. I came to the topic of how we conceive of 'life' because I wrote a dissertation on the Muslim word dunya, which refers to the 'nearer' as opposed to the 'further life' (akhira), and now I want to reflect more broadly on how we moderns have come to view 'life' in strange and peculiar ways (and, more importantly, to access - and not only imagine - other ways of living). Aside from all of this, I live with my wife and two kids in the East Bay. I love reading, watching movies, and looking at trees, but only when I'm not kicking it with friends and family (which is the best activity of them all).”
Of related interest
