The Great Books

Fall ’26 – Political Geography

For this term, we will read Tim Marshall’s Prisoners of Geography in order to understand the complexities of geopolitics. Many people want to simplify international politics based on the political system of the country, or their particular beliefs and religion. This is a poor understanding of the problem that many countries face. Marshall makes the argument that the mountains, rivers, and seas of a country play as much into the psyche of the politicians as their political ideologies.

As an example, why is China obsessed with Tibet? It has nothing to do with the Dali Lama, but in fact is because Tibet forms the headwaters of most of the major Chinese rivers. If India, or a free Tibet, were to damn those rivers, China would be left vulnerable to a man-made drought, just like when they damned the Mekong River and caused a man-made drought through Thailand and Cambodia.

Similarly, a great curse of Africa is the lack of navigable rivers. Waterfalls are beautiful and make for great scenery, but are a monumental hinderance to shipping goods downriver. This lack of accessible trade routes has hampered growth in a continent that is blessed with natural resources but cursed with no way to move them.

This class aims to lay a foundation of the world’s politics from the lens of geography. Geography does not explain everything, but it does explain far more than most people appreciate.

Spring ’27 – Political Geography II

For this term, we will read The Silk Roads: A New History of the World by Peter Frankopan, which helps explain the transfer of cultures and religions across the crossroads of Central Asia. So much of our understanding is from a Eurocentric perspective, from the naming convention of the near east, mideast, far east, to the arrival of goods from China.

For most people, the Silk Road is a name that they know, but have no appreciation for its significance. This class will help students understand the role that Asian politics and philosophy had on the West.

As an example, most Americans view Iran as a troublemaker out on the periphery of civilization based on the current conflicts, but they do not realize the depth of Persian culture, far older than anything found in the U.S. Only by understanding this history can we place our current events in the proper context. Asia does not fight simple wars based on oil, they are continuing cultural conflicts that extend back millennia.