What do we mean when we call something “evil”? Is evil a force, a choice, a structure, or a failure of imagination? This five-week course explores how philosophers, theologians, psychologists, and writers have grappled with evil—from its most obvious horrors to its ordinary disguises in everyday life. We’ll consider the “banality of evil,” “the evil of banality,” structural and systemic harm, projection and denial, and the tension between despair and hope. Participants will be invited to think critically and empathetically about evil’s nature—and our own capacity to resist or perpetuate it. We will discuss such writers and thinkers as Hannah Arendt, Elizabeth Minnich, Reinhold Niebuhr, Carl Jung, Bill Moyers, Elaine Scarry, Ariel Dorfman, and MLK.