Seminar in European Philosophy

Catalog description

Among the most important movements to emerge in the decades around 1900 are phenomenology (Husserl, Merleau-Ponty) and neoKantianism (Natorp, Cassirer), which make important contributions in metaphysics, epistemology, and to research in the foundations of logic, mathematics, and science. Hermeneutical thought (Dilthey), by contrast, emphasized "historicity" over the ostensibly timeless objects of traditional philosophical thought, insisting that interpretive "understanding" of historically situated subjectivity was a kind of knowledge distinct from the "explanation" of purely objective phenomena, while Marxism urged attention to historical development in the name of social critique and political change. These productive tensions are evident in the major movements that dominate mid-twentieth century Continental philosophy: existentialism (Heidegger, Sartre), critical theory (Adorno, Horkheimer), and structuralism (Jacobson, Lacan, Althusser). Beginning in the 1960s, French Continental philosophy enters a phase of self-criticism that gives rise to innovative and challenging forms of discourse, often referred to collectively as post-structuralism (Derrida, Foucault, Deleuze). These thinkers challenge basic assumptions of classical Continental philosophy, e.g., the centrality of subjectivity; the privileging of identity over difference; the non-violent sovereignty of reason; the unity, continuity, and progressive character of history; the possibility and desirability of totalizing "structures" of collective power, action, and intelligibility. At the same time, secondgeneration critical theorists (e.g., Habermas) seek to revise their teachers' overly rigid commitment to Marxism and outmoded psychological and sociological conceptions in favor of more nuanced theory of "communicative action" and the structural transformation of the public sphere. Building on its survey-oriented precursor ( PHIL 102 ), this course provides an opportunity for more focused engagement with selected authors and works, or with particular topics or streams of thought pursued through attention to a variety of authors and works.