MAL 510: Visions of Leadership
A Historical and Literary Journey

Leadership Model

"Visions of Leadership" is a course in which graduate learners observe leadership in both historical and literary contexts, interweaving their considerations of the past with observations of the contemporary.

The course is been based on the Augsburg model of leadership as "a process that inspires cooperation among people who must compete for limited resources, promotes productivity within and beyond the organization, and works toward progress for the individual and the organization." The leadership model asserts that leaders "must possess three key attributes: a sense of vision, the ability to persuade, and the ability to direct action."

In this course, we will be particularly concerned with the ethical and creative visions of leaders, considering both their writings and the historical contexts in which they write and live. We will notice when and how these writers/leaders connect with ethical and creative senses of vision like those listed in the MAL program: social awareness, environmental awareness, tolerance of religious and philosophical differences, appreciation of situational complexity, long term perspective, flexibility, adaptability, and innovativeness.

We will read some of the classic texts that have influenced us in our politics, our social and civil associations, our work environments, and our organization of family life since the beginning of history. They include works by Plato, Sophocles, Thomas More, and Nicolo Machiavelli. Also included in this course are two texts which, although classic, are not often found on textbook lists. They are texts written by two women, Enheduanna, the first author in history to sign a text, and Christine de Pizan, a woman who earned her living as a writer in the late Middle Ages, who wrote, among other works, a primer on the education of princes and a book on the proper conduct of war. The book we'll read in this course is a classic The Book of the City of Ladies an early "re-vision" of history in which the female hero plays a prominent role.

Course Protocol

Graduate learners will read and discuss the texts and come to class with substantial notes on each work. They will write one interpretative paper ( approximately 5 pages), deliver one oral presentation (10 minutes), post weekly analyses of readings on the online Blackboard discussion page using specific examples from the texts, and write a final paper (5-7 pages) in which learners integrate and connect the notions discernible in the texts with each other and with contemporary leadership issues.

In the papers, online postings, oral presentations, and final papers, learners will link ideas, images, circumstances, and authors from the beginning of the course to the end, noting historical and literary context. That is, learners will interlace ideas they find in ancient, medieval, renaissance, and contemporary texts, interweaving between these texts their own new threads. It's possible that de Pizan may remind us of Machiavelli, or More. Piercy could bring to mind examples from Enheduanna or Havel. Achebe may remind us of Machiavelli or Sophocles. They may also remind us of contemporary popular works on leadership or new management plans at the office. So, from time to time, we'll look at additional books and articles that spring from the enthusiasm of the professor and the graduate learners. Learners can link this material to our readings, as well as experiences at work, at home, and in public life.

The more we learn, the more associations we'll be able to make -- negative and positive -- unlocking what philosopher Elizabeth Minnich calls "oppositional definitions and usages" so they can be "fruitfully connected." These fruitful connections will help us become aware of issues of plurality and diversity.

Before our first class: Read the play Antigone, and then read through the following questions and come to class ready to share your answers to these questions and your thoughts on the literary imagination and leadership. As you answer these questions, use specific examples from the play to demonstrate your arguments. Cite the examples (using the text) so that we can all find the passage you're using. (If you use note cards to answer these questions, you'll be off to a good start.)

...also during first class

We will also explore the work of Plato in which he enunciates his vision of the articulation of thought as childbirth and the technique of questioning as the work of the midwife. This interrogation of ideas has become known as the Socratic method (Theaetetus). But Plato's was not the earliest enunciation of that metaphor. So to begin this course with a clear vision of the classical canon, we will go even earlier, to the first signed text in history, a text in which a Mesopotamian leader named Enheduanna first spelled out the metaphor of creative thought as labor and birth (nin me sar ra).

Enheduanna was a priest, a poet and a "prince." She was also a woman. By first examining these two early descriptions of intellectual inquiry as that technique which gives birth to thought, and by attributing these ideas to their rightful authors, we will be ready to begin our journey toward a vision of the creative power of the written text. We will also have begun an inquiry into the risks involved in making decisions, which connect such simple acts as creativity and communication. There will be handouts on the brief passages from Enheduanna and Plato in class the first time we meet.

Early in this journey we will also consider questions raised about power, government, society, and the responsibility of the governed.

We will set the schedule for the risky labor that will lead us to the birthing of our historical and literary concepts of leadership. The texts chosen for this course will guide us through a discussion of sovereignty and creativity as they relate to the self, to civil society, to our fellow humans and our stewardship of the planet earth, and to our future. One of these texts, Machiavelli's The Prince, has never been out of print since it was first published in 1513 and the philosophies espoused in this book have been practiced by politicians, business people, and heads of household ever since that time. What sort of ethical decisions do these philosophies encourage? Whether we admire the "wisdom" included in this text or not, we need to know exactly what Machiavelli told the prince.

Two of our most compelling goals are to become aware of what we learn and how we learn it, and to continually connect ideas, images, and their authors as we move through history and literature. To do this, we will take notes. Old fashioned notes on old fashioned note cards, which can be carried into class and used in discussions and filed and re-sorted and re-used throughout the MAL program. Of course you may find it most practical to type your notes into your computer as you read, so that you have them in electronic format as well, but remember, you will want to keep repeating the source and page before each idea so that when you separate your notes into cards or half pages that can be shuffled you'll still be able to trace your idea source.