Continental Philosophy

Continental Philosophy since Kant                         

2 credits                                 Fall 2012

Time and Location: W 3:30-5:10

Instructor: David Weberman. Office Hours: M, Th 11.30 -1:30 and by appointment

Course Level: MA core

Course Description: After a brief overview of Kant, Hegel and Marx, the course will cover five thinkers in continental philosophy: Nietzsche, Husserl, Heidegger, Sartre, and Foucault. Depending on students’ interests, we might include one more philosopher. We will also look a attempts to delineate the nature of the difference between continental and analytic philosophy as discussed by recent philosophers.

Course Goal: To gain an in-depth and critical understanding of the questions, concerns, methods and answers provided by the philosophers studied.

Learning Outcomes: The desired learning outcomes are: i) to achieve the course goal stated above to the greatest extent possible and ii) improve one’s skills at reading philosophical texts and writing about them.

Requirements and Grading: Aside from regular attendance and completion of the assigned reading, requirements are: For 2-year M.A. students, exam and three response papers. For other students, 2000 word term paper and three response papers. More information will be given in class.

Text: course reader

Week 1 W September 19 Introduction; Kant

Week 2 W September 26 Kant, Hegel, Marx

Week 3 W October 3 Nietzsche

Week 4 W October 10 Nietzsche

Week 5 W October 17 Husserl

Week 6 W October 24 Heidegger

Week 7 W October 31 Heidegger

Week 8 W November 7 Heidegger; Sartre

Week 9 W November 14 Sartre

Week 10 W November 21 Foucault

Week 11 W November 28 Foucault

Week 12 W December 5 to be determined