Learning Outcomes:
Students who successfully complete this module should be able to:
* PLAN and pursue independent small research projects and be able to apply philosophical research and writings skills to their own projects;
* REFLECT critically upon central philosophical questions and develop their own philosophical responses to a variety of these questions;
* IDENTIFY key philosophical concepts and show awareness of potential problems that lead to the revision and refinement of these concepts;
* INTERPRET complex philosophical texts;
* ANALYSE arguments in the literature and construct their own arguments with improved clarity and precision;
* WRITE well-structured and coherent essays that explain and critically assess philosophical views;
* ARTICULATE their own responses to philosophical views, support them by reasons and defend them in light of criticism;
* INTERACT effectively and respectfully with other students, listen to and learn from others.
Indicative Module Content:
Week 1
9/9 Introduction (taught by MC and TvS)
Essential Reading:
Kant, Immanuel (2006). “An Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment?” In Immanuel Kant,Towards Perpetual Peace and Other Writings on Politics, Peace, and History, edited by Pauline Kleingeld, translated by David L. Colclasure. New Haven: Yale University Press, Ak 8:33–42, pp. 17–23.
Dweck, Carol (2017). Mindset: Changing the way you think to fulfil your potential, revised edition. New York: Random House, ch. 3, pp. 55–81.
TOPIC 1: DISCIPLINARY POWER (taught by MC)
SHORT DESCRIPTION
Michel Foucault argues that in capitalist modernity ‘discipline’ becomes a new modality of power that infiltrates every part of the social order and constitutes the kinds of human agents required to sustain and reproduce it Disciplinary power operates insidiously and its effectiveness requires internalization. It neutralizes counter-power: it does not supress rebellions, agitations, spontaneous protests and the like, it prevents them from happening in the first place.
On reason why Foucault’s account of disciplinary power seems as relevant to the societies of contemporary capitalism as it was to the societies of the 1960s and 1970s is that it offers an explanation of how capitalism as a lifeform continues to be maintained and reproduced, despite major historical shifts in how it operates. In these two sessions we will consider the historical distinctiveness of disciplinary power, focusing on the questions of whether protest and resistance to disciplinary power is possible and if so, how?
Week 2
16/9 The Concept of Disciplinary Power
Essential Reading:
Foucault, M. (1995 [1975]). Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, trans. A. Sheridan. 2nd ed. New York: Vintage, Excerpt.
Week 3
23/9 Disciplinary Power: Protest and Resistance
Essential Reading:
Foucault, M. (1995 [1975]). Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, trans. A. Sheridan. 2nd ed. New York: Vintage, Excerpt.
Suggested further reading on topic 1:
To be supplied later.
TOPIC 2: PROTESTING ‘WHITE IGNORANCE’ (taught by MC)
SHORT DESCRIPTION
‘White Ignorance’ is a term coined by Charles Mills (2007) essay to designate an ignorance among whites, in the sense of a pervasively deforming outlook, that is not contingent but causally linked to ‘whiteness’. ‘Whiteness’ has no biological connotations but refers to people socially categorized as white within a racialized system.
In the first session we will consider Mills’ (2022) expanded account of ‘white ignorance’ as ‘global white ignorance’. In the second session, on the basis of a text by José Medina, we will analyze the power of protest to break social silences, to transform social sensibilities and change the political imagination. We will approach the question of protest in the context of ‘White Ignorance’, focusing on the question of how political institutions can enable public engagement with protesting people in all their diversity, without ‘ignoring’ marginalized voices and perspectives.
Week 4
30/09: The Concept of ‘White Ignorance’
Essential Reading:
Charles Mills (2022). ‘Global White Ignorance’. In M. Gross and L. McGoey (eds.) Routledge International Handbook of Ignorance Studies. Routledge, pp. 217-227.
Suggested further reading on topic 2:
To be supplied later.
Week 5
07/10: ‘White Ignorance’: Protest and Resistance
Essential Reading
J. Medina (2023), The Epistemology of Protest: Silencing, Epistemic Activism, and the Communicative Life of Resistance. Oxford University Press. Excerpt.
Week 6
14/10 Buffer or Independent Reading
TOPIC 3: THE BADNESS OF DEATH AND THE GOODNESS OF IMMORTALITY (taught by TvS)
Assuming that death is the absolute end (that is, there is no afterlife or personal rebirth), how can death be bad for the deceased, who no longer exists to experience any badness. We will explore the deprivation account that suggests that death is bad because it deprives the deceased of the good things in life they would have otherwise experienced. If death is bad, immortality must be a good thing. Is any form of immortality desirable? Or is there no form that could ever be desirable?
Week 7
21/10 The Badness of Death
Essential Reading:
Kagan, S. (2012). Death. New Haven: Yale University Press, Chapter 10: The Badness of Death
Week 8 Reading Week – no class meeting
Week 9
4/11 Immortality
Essential Reading:
Kagan, S. (2012). Death. Yale University Press, Chapter 11: Immortality
Suggested further reading on topic 3:
Badness of Death
Brennan, S. (2006). Is death's badness gendered? Dialogue, 45(3), 559-566.
Egerstrom, K. (2021). Making death not quite as bad for the one who dies. In M. Cholbi & T.
Timmerman (Eds.), Exploring the philosophy of death and dying: Classic and contemporary perspectives (pp. 93-100). Routledge.
Nagel, T. (1979). Death. In Mortal Questions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Olson, E. T. (2013). The Epicurean view of death. The Journal of Ethics, 17(1-2), 65-78.
Smuts, A. (2012). Less good but not bad: In defense of Epicureanism about death. Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 93(2), 197-227.
Goodness of Immortality:
Behrendt, K. (2015). Learning to be dead: The narrative problem of mortality. In M. Cholbi (Ed.),
Immortality and the philosophy of death. Rowman & Littlefield International.
Belshaw, C. (2015). Victims. In M. Cholbi (Ed.), Immortality and the philosophy of death. Rowman & Littlefield International.
Cholbi, M. (2015). Immortality and the exhaustibility of value. In M. Cholbi (Ed.), Immortality and the philosophy of death. Rowman & Littlefield International.
Gorman, A. (2021). Taking stock of the risks of life without death. In M. Cholbi & T. Timmerman (Eds.), Exploring the philosophy of death and dying: Classic and contemporary perspectives. Routledge.
Timmerman, T. (2015). Reconsidering categorical desire views. In M. Cholbi (Ed.), Immortality and the philosophy of death. Rowman & Littlefield International.
Williams, B. (1973). The Makropulos case: Reflections on the tedium of immortality. In Problems of the self.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
TOPIC 4: SEEING FICTIONAL EVENTS IN MOVIES (taught by TvS)
We will be asking whether viewers of fiction films actually see the fictional events and characters in films, and, if so, how this perception is possible. These seemingly straightforward questions reveal deeper, more complex issues regarding the nature of fictional narratives and their presentation in films. We will also explore the controversy among philosophers of film regarding the existence and role of cinematic narrators.
Week 10
11/11
Essential Reading:
Wilson, G. M. (2012). Seeing fictions in film: The epistemology of movies. New York: Oxford University Press, Part I: Introductory Chapters
Week 11
18/11
Essential Reading:
Wilson, G. M. (2012). Seeing fictions in film: The epistemology of movies. New York: Oxford University Press, Part 2, article 2 “Le Grand Imagier steps out: On the primitive basis of film narration”
Suggested further reading on topic 4:
Curran, A. (2019) Silly Questions and Arguments for the Implicit, Cinematic Narrator. In N. Carroll, L. T. Di Summa, & S. Loht (eds), The Palgrave Handbook of the Philosophy of Film and Motion Pictures. London: Springer, pp. 97–118.
Gaut, B. (2004) The Philosophy of the Movies: Cinematic Narration. In P. Kivy (ed.), The Blackwell Guide to Aesthetics. Oxford: Blackwell, pp. 230–253.
Kania, A. (2005) Against the Ubiquity of Fictional Narrators. Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 63(1): 47–54.
Thomson-Jones, K. (2007) The Literary Origins of the Cinematic Narrator. British Journal of Aesthetics, 47(1): 76–94.168
Thomson-Jones, K. (2012) Narration in Motion. British Journal of Aesthetics, 52(1): 33–43.
Wilson, G. M. (2007). Elusive Narrators in Literature and Film. Philosophical Studies, 135(1): 73–88.
von Solodkoff, T. (2023). Does every story have a fictional narrator? In S. Lebens & T. von Solodkoff, Thinking about stories. Routledge.
Week 12
25/11 Thesis planning/Concluding Discussion