The Literature of Leadership

An exploration of the hearts and minds of leaders and followers

Unit

1

Unit

2

Unit

3


work


home

Required Work:
If you need more time due to deployment, travel, temporary duty, etc., please let me know via e-mail before the due date.

Unit I:  Readings from texts and online
             1,200-word paper   

Unit II:  Readings from texts and online
              1,200-word paper

OR
              10 more postings on the discussion board
             Your posts should be contemplative, responsive, and germane to the content of the course, and to the question in the discussion board.  Please respond to other students' postings.  Each post should have 50--75 words

Unit III:  Readings from texts and online
                1,200-word paper


Unit IV:  Final Paper -- 1,500 words


OR
                            10 more postings on the discussion board
             Your posts should be contemplative, responsive, and germane to the content of the course, and to the question in the discussion board.  Please respond to other students' postings.  Each post should have 50--75 words

Papers:  Please respond the readings and the guiding questions in a thoughtful manner.  Feel free to explore the issues that interest you, and be sure to make connections between the course content and your perceptions of life, current events, and people you know or know about.  Please cite at least two outside sources, even if your style is informal.  Use APA.  Avoid citing wikipedia.  (here is a link to a podcast / mp3 file on why one should not cite wikipedia in academic papers.

http://www.zenzebra.net/e-learners/podcasts/wikipedia-nash.mp3

Please submit your paper through the digital drop box via D2L.
This is extremely important:
In emergency situations, you may also e-mail me at
smithnash@ou.edu 
An alternative e-mail is: 
susan@beyondutopia.com

Be sure to put in the subject line:  LIT OF LEADERSHIP--UNIT  #

If at all possible, please avoid sending an attachment (I can't always open them!)

Review / Response to one of the texts:  Please write a clear and coherent response to one of the course texts, or one of the primary website sources of information.  Discuss what you found useful about the information, the credibility of the source, its applicability to our times, and your favorite passages.  This will count as one of your journals, so please be sure to indicate which unit's journal your review/response counts for.

Be sure to put in the subject line:  LIT OF LEADERSHIP--UNIT #

Final Project:   Please write a 1,500 word essay on an aspect of this course which you find important and/or provocative.  Ideally, this essay will give you an opportunity to express your views, and describe how your perspectives and views have been expanded. 

Your essay can take many forms -- here are a few options:

  • The New Military:  what will be the character and challenges of leaders in the years to come?  How do some of the readings you have analyzed make you look at military leadership and leadership challenges from a new perspective? How will leaders productively guide the organization and its people through change?  How will tradition be accommodated?

  • Memoir of Vision and Challenges.  Write an autobiographical account of turning points, extreme situations, or other situations that changed your life, and gave you new insight into the human condition, and how that affects your ability to lead.

  • Growing Up Very Quickly:  How does one help develop leadership qualities in a young person who is facing often overwhelming challenges?  Please be specific and use examples.

  • Memoir (can be real or invented, but in it you discuss leadership in day-to-day life.  Be sure to use concrete examples, descriptions, etc.

  • A Bad Leader / Good Leader Checklist:  Make a list and illustrate, either from the readings, or from other examples

  • "Dear Abby -- I know you're on the other side, but HELP!!"  Pretend to be the advice columnist, Abby, responding to letters asking her for advice about knotty workplace / life issues which deal with problematic leaders or managers.  The managers addressed can be real -- for example, you might write a letter that begins this way:   "Dear Abby,  I need your help!  Two years I joined a commune built on the values of Niccolo Machiavelli.  Now I'm wondering if I did the right thing.  I feel manipulated and frustrated…."

  • Debate:  write a script for a debate between two leaders (or individuals who represent a certain leadership philosophy)  that you have studied in this class.   For example, you may want to pit  Machiavelli against Alice H. Cook, or have Malcolm X debate the Duc de Simon.  Alternatively, you could have Malcolm X debate the Dalai Lama.   It's up to you -- be creative!!

  • Other ideas -- check with your instructor.

Photo: susan nash, aug, 2006, tawasentha

Textbooks:

Machiavelli, Nicolo. 
The Prince and Selected Discourses.

Gorn, Elliot.  Mother Jones. Hill and Wang,February 2001; $27.00 US; 0-8090-7093-6

Fox, Wesley L.  Marine Rifleman.  1-57488-529-4.  Brasseys.  2002.

Daft, R. L. 
The leadership experience (4th ed.). Mason, OH: Cengage South-Western. ISBN 9780324539684.

For future studies --
a list of articles

Click here