With 118 acres of campus dedicated to the College Woods, there’s always a way to get-a-way for a hike or steal some time for reflection. And if 118 acres aren’t enough, there’s always the big back yard (aka, The Great Smoky Mountain National Park).

 

Experiential Learning Opportunities

Humanities majors have recently held internships and practica setting up exhibits and cataloging materials for the East Tennessee Historical Society, doing youth ministry in a United Methodist Church, serving as a summer intern for the Auld Kirk of Southern Ayrshire, Scotland, and working as support staff at the Sam Houston School House.

Many Humanities majors enhance their understanding of History, Religion and Philosophy through travel/study experiences to destinations such as India, Turkey, Malta, Morocco, Tibet, China, Ghana, and other international locales.

Dr. Aaron Astor, assistant professor of history, is taking a January Term 2010 class on a visit to Tennessee’s Civil War history sites.  Students will be able to explore the enduring landscape of a war that divided Americans – and Tennesseans – nearly 150 years ago.

Dr. Doug Sofer, Assistant professor of history, serves as the adviser to Maryville's chapter of Phi Alpha Theta, the national history honors society. In that role, he accompanies students to Phi Alpha Theta's regional conferences, held each year in a different part of Tennessee. While here, students present their original historical research and take part in the process of doing history on a professional level.

Dr. Bill Meyer has many titles: Professor of Philosophy and the Ralph W. Beeson Professor of Religion, Executive Director, MC Initiative on Vocation yet he is most famous with students for his illustrative “Meyer-grams” drawn throughout his lectures.

Faculty Profile

Name: Doug Sofer

Title: Assistant Professor of History, Humanities Division

Courses taught: WCV 180, 190 & 390; HIS 111 (U.S. from 1492-1800), 203 (U.S. in the 20th century); 243 (Modern World Civ,); 334 (Hist. of Latin America), 335 (African Hist.), 371 ("Narcotics: A Global History"); FRS 130, SRS 480 (Nationalism); Others.

Education: B.A. from Hartwick College, Oneonta, NY (Double major in History & Philosophy); M.A. & Ph.D. University of Texas at Austin (History with major specialization in Latin America & minor specialization in Modern Africa)

At MC since: 2005-06 as an adjunct; 06-07 as full time, tenure-track faculty.

When and why did you decide to become a historian?

I was a poor history student in high school since I was not great at the rote memorization that was required of me back then. During my first year at Hartwick College, though, my professors helped me realize that history is not just about memorization of facts that cannot be challenged; it is instead a process of interpreting the past based on written and oral historical evidence.

What attracted you to Maryville College?

I went to graduate school to be a professor because I wanted to do for my students what my professors did for me—to show them that history is a living process of analysis, not a repetition of non-negotiable facts. Maryville's emphasis on small classes, on working closely with professors, and on student accountability make this an ideal place for this kind of learning.

What do you enjoy most about teaching at MC?

Of my many roles on campus, probably my favorite is as thesis adviser. I enjoy working one-on-one with students and helping to guide them through a long project of doing original historical research. Thesis students often begin believing that they don't have enough to say in 45 pages, and they usually finish wishing that they'd have another semester to add more.

What are your goals for your students?

I want to help my students to think for themselves so that they're less vulnerable to specious arguments and facile, emotion-based propaganda.

What matters to you?

History matters to me because I see it as a study of human possibilities. We cannot look into the future, but we can 'see' the past and in this sense we can understand how our species has acted within contexts that are both similar and alien from our own. In this sense, I think that history is critically important to understanding who we are.

Describe one course that you think might be particularly interesting to prospective students?

One course that attracted a good bit of attention last fall was an upper-level history seminar called "Narcotics: A Global History." In this class, we looked at how different psychoactive substances affected different societies, and how the cultural contexts in which they existed altered the effects they had on each of these societies. I also took part in leading a J-Term trip to Ghana in West Africa this past January, which was an incredible experience for my students as well as for me and the other faculty on the trip.

What else are you involved in on campus? Off campus?

I'm one of the founders and the adviser of the Maryville College Historical Society, which gained affiliation with Phi Alpha Theta, the national history honors society, during my first full-time year here. I'm also the adviser to the Presidential Scholars scholarship students, and I had the honor last year of being voted by my peers to be the faculty representative to the Student Government Association.

With 118 acres of campus dedicated to the College Woods, there’s always a way to get-a-way for a hike or steal some time for reflection. And if 118 acres aren’t enough, there’s always the big back yard (aka, The Great Smoky Mountain National Park).