Problem of the Self

Catalog description

This is a class that examines the self as a problem. We will explore the historically specific conditions under which the modern notion of selfhood came to be and how ideas about self-knowledge, self-definition, and fulfillment exposed individuals to persistent existential questions such as: who am I? what am I? who do I want to be? how do I know? The point of this class is to interrogate deeply held, taken-for-granted ideas about ourselves and try to make sense of where they came from, how we use them, and where it all might be going. The aims of the class are threefold: (1) historicize, disaggregate, and sociologically explain different dimensions of selfhood (self-definition, self-knowledge, self-fulfillment, relationship of individual and society; (2) learn how we use concepts to make sense of and narrate human experience; (3) make visible the taken for granted assumptions we have about identity and meaning.