Recording courses

d.e.wittkower · Post by **d.e.wittkower** » January 22nd, 2007, 4:06 pm

This semester I'm recording my class sessions. I'm teaching political philosophy 17th C. to 20th C., and a graduate seminar on Heidegger. I've gotten most of the way through IP clearance to release under my own copyright (I'll be doing CC, not PD).

The release of the courses will be long in coming, as I have much other work to do. If anybody is interested in these courses of study, and would be interested in editing the files, this would greatly speed their release. So I thought I'd check.

Would anybody be into this?

The work on the Heidegger seminar would be lightweight editing – cutting unnecessary discussion at intros and doing sound quality filtering. The work on the political philosophy course presents more options, as I'm teaching two sections, and recording both. We could just pick one for each day, or splice the two together to fill in one version with nice bits from the other, if the room noise difference isn't too extreme.

Suggestions are welcome. Thanks!

Post by **hugh** » January 24th, 2007, 7:14 am

I'd definitely be interetested in listening: no editing unfortunately.

CarlManchester · Post by **CarlManchester** » January 25th, 2007, 1:32 pm

I'd be interested in helping on this, but can't guarantee how much time I can spare (I am moving house soon).

I'm assuming that not only will they be (irrevocably) CC, but they'll also be on the internet (as opposed to just available to your students).

It would be good if you could post a list of topics, so that me and anyone else who comes forward could choose what might most interest them.

Also, if editing counts as property, it goes without saying that I'll be happy to also make mine CC.

Cheers,
Carl.

KuroMokona · Post by **KuroMokona** » February 15th, 2007, 5:20 am

Hi,
I can do some editing for you, when will you have some raw material?

d.e.wittkower · Post by **d.e.wittkower** » February 18th, 2007, 11:31 am

I'll attach the first 10 sessions of the second section of the Political Philosophy course. They've been noise-edited. I suppose the primary work to be done is just to edit out any thumping sounds, and any off-topic conversation, i.e., about the quizzes, papers, or class structure or whatever. I don't think it would be worth it to splice in bits from the recordings of the other section, and this section is usually better anyhow.

Hope you find them interesting! Let me know if I can answer any questions or provide any other information of use or of interest.

Also, as Carl pointed out, I need for you to evacuate your rights as editor. When we get the whole course together and downloadable, I'll ask for the name under which you'd like to be recognized for contributing to the project!

Also, if you make a note of places where I'm referring to something on the board, or the overhead, or whatever, I can be sure to attach my visual aids to the correct files. As I mentioned, the goal is to figure out an easy way for people to download the whole course as a package.

Here's the list of readings, taken from the course syllabus, along with the corresponding recordings:
Hobbes’ Leviathan
M 1/22 Introduction and Ch. 13 – 16 (in Part I) (pgs. 80 – 82, 118 – 135)
http://www.mediafire.com/?4ewzidmmzto
W 1/24 Ch. 17 – 21 (in Part II) (pgs. 135 – 157)
http://www.mediafire.com/?9emzxjtjmiu
F 1/26 Ch. 26, and 29 –30 (in Part II) (pgs. 161 – 171, 183 – 196)
http://www.mediafire.com/?8ldxgkho2mt

Locke’s Second Treatise
M 1/29 Ch. 1 – 6 (pgs. 217 – 240)
http://www.mediafire.com/?3mztjomebmo

W 1/31 Ch. 8 – 11 (pgs. 245 – 260)
http://www.mediafire.com/?czdxgdmmmym

F 2/2 Ch. 17 – 19 (pgs. 276 – 290)
http://www.mediafire.com/?dtwzwwjq3jm

On Toleration, Kant
M 2/5 Locke’s Letter on Toleration, (pgs. 292 – 319)
(Optional: Leviathan, Ch. 43 [Part III], especially the last 4 paragraphs
online here: <http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/h/hobbes/thomas/h68l/>)
http://www.mediafire.com/?9t5jimwtymm

W 2/7 Kant, On the Common Saying: This May be True in Theory but it does not
Apply in Practice,” Part II, (pgs. 557 – 569)
http://www.mediafire.com/?ejrz1r4jtza

F 2/9 Kant, “Perpetual Peace,” (pgs. 571 – 594)
http://www.mediafire.com/?byjgquzbjqg

The American Experiment
M 2/12 Declaration of Independence (pgs. 601 – 3), Constitution (pgs. 604 – 619),
and Federalist Papers 1, 10, and 15 (pgs. 624 – 635)
http://www.mediafire.com/?4ztjjz32jyd

Page numbers are from Cahn, Steven. Classics of Modern Political Theory

For your reference, here are public domain versions:

http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/h/hobbes/thomas/h68l/

http://www.constitution.org/jl/2ndtreat.htm

http://www.constitution.org/jl/tolerati.htm

http://oll.libertyfund.org/Home3/Book.php?recordID=0056
(Parts II and III of "On the Old Saw" are translated as parts II and III of this book)

http://www.ushistory.org/declaration/document/

http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.overview.html

http://www.foundingfathers.info/federalistpapers/

CarlManchester · Post by **CarlManchester** » February 19th, 2007, 11:03 am

Hi de,

Have downloaded this one:

Hobbes’ Leviathan
M 1/22 Introduction and Ch. 13 – 16 (in Part I) (pgs. 80 – 82, 118 – 135)
http://www.mediafire.com/?4ewzidmmzto

With a view to editing, but no time right now.

Thanks,
Carl.

CarlManchester · Post by **CarlManchester** » February 26th, 2007, 2:40 pm

http://www.carlmanchester.net/3016_12207.mp3

Took out non-relevant stuff, coughing, repeats, long pauses etc.

The only visual aid seems to be the frontispiece, but there are also references to Aquinas and Aristotle, in case you wanted to create relevant links. Forgot to take time-marks, sorry - will get back to you.

Please let me know when the file is safely back with you, so I can take it down (and subsequently maybe replace with another).

Cheers,
Carl.

d.e.wittkower · Post by **d.e.wittkower** » February 27th, 2007, 1:50 pm

File received safely! Thanks much for the editing, and thanks also for the notes: I will, indeed, tie this file to links to the frontispiece and the relevant passages of Aquinas and Aristotle (as well as the Gutenberg etext and LV recording of the Hobbes).

Huh. I just noticed that you got the playtime down from 48 minutes to 36 minutes. That's a lot of dead air that used to be in there.

Anyhow, I hope it's interesting, and thanks again!

CarlManchester · Post by **CarlManchester** » February 27th, 2007, 3:15 pm

The time difference is probably mainly just pauses actually. I didn't take out much actual talking except at the beginning and the end, one place where I think a student was talking but literally nothing could be made out (I also left in one bit where a student was talking and it was very very difficult to make out), and also a few times where you started to say something and then went something like "no, I'll rephrase that".

I'm now downloading the "Perpetual Peace" one, which I'll edit parallel to listening to your forthcoming assoiated reading.

Thanks,
Carl.

CarlManchester · Post by **CarlManchester** » February 27th, 2007, 3:17 pm

"assoiated", obviously, is a typo, rather some arcane slur on your abilities...

CarlManchester · Post by **CarlManchester** » June 14th, 2007, 12:18 pm

Hi de,

Have a second file here:

http://www.carlmanchester.net/3016b_20907.mp3

Cutting out inaudible questions - its a balance between effective dead air some of the time, and then on the other hand sounding as if you're going off in a random direction unprompted.

At this rate, you'll have a full set by 2012...

Cheers,
Carl.

Mdale · Post by **Mdale** » June 17th, 2007, 9:01 pm

There is a real trick to using noise reduction without getting flanger tones. A good mid cut and eq would be a plus. It would cut some of that harsh tone and give a more natural sound.

Post by **knotyouraveragejo** » June 18th, 2007, 8:17 am

Mdale wrote: A good mid cut and eq would be a plus. It would cut some of that harsh tone and give a more natural sound.

Mdale,

Could you elaborate on this a little for the benefit of us amateurs?

(Sorry for taking this thread a little off-topic, but all advice on improved noise removal strategies is always welcome!)

Thanks,

Jo

d.e.wittkower · Post by **d.e.wittkower** » June 18th, 2007, 8:37 am

BTW - I'm sorry to say the project itself is off. I should have posted this some time ago --- the disruption of normal class activities at Tech this last April resulted in the impossibility of having a whole, intact course. (pretty much the least important result of that time) This was also part of why I suddenly stopped being around here.

Anyhow - if anybody is interested in any particular class sessions, I'll edit them myself and put them up on archive.org (as long as I don't deem them embarrassing in some way . . . ).

Carl: Did you find these classes you've edited to be of value? Would you like for me to put them up on archive? If so, I think I'd like to put together the other class on Kant, to go along with the one you've edited, and the other two classes on Hobbes, so they can be released together. What do you think?

(Oh - and, Jo, please don't worry about being off-topic!)

CarlManchester · Post by **CarlManchester** » June 18th, 2007, 2:59 pm

Yes, definitely think so. The basic thing is they've been recorded, so should they just sit on your hard drive or be released into the world? There's (maybe surprisingly) very little secondary philosophy material in audio format out there, so taking the former option would (just IMO) slightly immoral.

Have to agree on the recoding quality though. Whilst hi-fidelity is not necessarily a must for this material, all the avant guard techno you seem to like playing in the background during your seminars does, I think, make the files a bit cumbersome (they take a lot lot longer than normal to load). Also, it would be nice to hear all the questions, even if this might be difficult to achieve without mics all round the room. Even when some of the questions are maybe not so incisive, I think a lot of listeners would find these bits quite illuminating. Also interesting how the types of question were different (not necessarily better or worse) than I think you would get in a British university. That's a whole other tangent though.

BTW, didn't find the files a chore to do at all, so would certainly be willing to do more in future (although I'd have to insist on an "at my leisure" clause).

thanks,
Carl.