NORMAN - The University of Oklahoma is taking on one of the hottest contemporary controversies - gun control and the Second Amendment - in a set of short, free lectures designed to educate public discussion without inflaming it.
"We want to get a public, rational discourse going about (issues) and help lead that discussion," said OU Political Science Professor Justin Wert, one of six lecturers taking part in the OU Institute for the American Constitutional Heritage's Second Amendment short course. "A civil, rational discourse on these issues is the best first step in coming to an agreement."
The 10 lectures - ranging in length from three to 10 minutes - are available to anyone online through iTunes or the Institute's website.
The privately funded short course is not for academic credit, and there are none of the usual trappings of academic rigor, such as exams, papers or even attendance requirements, said OU Senior Vice Provost Kyle Harper.
The lectures are a part of the school's public outreach mission - the mandate to use the school's expertise to better inform issues of public importance in an objective fashion, Harper said.
As such, viewers of the lectures should be able to get key information about the debate without perceiving the opinions of the lecturers, he said.
"We try to provide the historical context and the interpretive methods that judges use to help citizens understand," Harper said. "The mission is understanding rather than advocacy."
Six OU professors - two from the law school and others with expertise in history and political science - take part in the online lectures, which address issues ranging from the 18th century intellectual background for the Second Amendment to the key 21st century Supreme Court decisions that are shaping current decisions.
Like almost anyone else, Wert said he has opinions about the policy issues surrounding the topics of his lectures, but he said he works hard to keep them out of his online presentations.
Even harder than taking material on a controversial topic and presenting it objectively is shortening complex issues to short presentations, he said.
Professors are accustomed to lecturing for 50 minutes to undergraduates who have taken certain prerequisites, he said. Remolding material into 10-minute bits that are accessible to the public is a huge challenge, Wert said.
"It's the hardest thing that I've ever done as an academic - to give a 10-minute public lecture," he said. "To do it in a way to communicate how important it is to have an academic perspective on this and not just some layman or pundit kind of explanation of these issues ... is very difficult."
Previous online offerings from the institute have dealt with other hot-button issues, including health care, religious freedom, federalism and race - but this is the first time the project has tried to turn around an idea quickly in response to pressing public debate.
The idea for the Second Amendment short course started soon after the December killings of 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., Harper said. From inception to posting, the project took about one month, he said.
If the project proves successful, he hopes to deal similarly with other topical issues involving constitutional questions in the future, he said.
Wert, who is currently on sabbatical at OU and teaching as a visiting professor the University of Pennsylvania, said his past experience with online institute postings is that the public won't hesitate to give him feedback.
When you deal with issues of controversy in a public space, the public will respond, sometimes with anger and sometimes, more often, with thanks, he said. "A lot of people want to know more, but they don't know how to ask the right questions that would lead them to answers," Wert said. "Everyone has opinions and gut feelings."
Harper said the program's role is to give people the factual background for those opinions.
"We don't try to duck the questions that are sensitive," he said. "In fact, I think we can have the biggest impact by providing information and civil discussion on precisely the most sensitive and most important topics."
The Second Amendment
A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
Wayne Greene 918-581-8308
wayne.greene@tulsaworld.com
Original Print Headline: OU offering free course on Second Amendment
