Module Catalogue 2024/25

Pre Requisite Comment

N/A

Co Requisite Comment

N/A

Aims

General: To introduce students to particular themes and issues in contemporary political philosophy and their relation to culture and society.

How do we as human beings position ourselves vis-à-vis the rest of the living world? What gives us the right to to dominate other life forms and to exploit them for our ends? How have philosophers, form antiquity to the present day, legitimated the allegedly superior position of human being in the order of things and on what grounds has this supposed legitimacy been critiqued? What ethical, political, and ontological implications are opened up by these questions?

Outline Of Syllabus

Topics investigated typically may include:

1. How is the category of the human produced
2. Postmodern ethical emancipation
5. Different conceptions of ‘life’
6. Philosophical resistance to modes of exploitation

The subjects of the lectures will be augmented by discussions in tutorials of specific issues using examples drawn from contemporary culture.

Intended Knowledge Outcomes

By the end of the course, students will be able to:
- Identify and describe basic positions and ideas of thinkers within the post-Enlightenment tradition;
- express the relationship between these modes of thought and science, contemporary culture and society in terms of the crisis of values;
- possess an advanced knowledge of at least two thinkers/positions typical of the post-Enlightenment.

Intended Skill Outcomes

By the end of the course students will:
- have acquired the ability to interrogate and order a variety of systems of thought
- be able to critically discuss theoretical considerations of value and their relation to aesthetic, moral and political value systems
- be able to intelligently apply philosophical theories to current debates about science, society, reality and value.

Teaching Rationale And Relationship

Lectures provide students with a systematic account of the concepts and ideas of the treated thinkers and their relation to key aspects of life e.g. politics, art, science. Students are given a structured reading list, a set of lecture notes with tutorial summaries, supported by controlled questions and references to specific works in order to develop the interpretative, logical and analytical skills required for good argument.

Assessment Rationale And Relationship

The students have the choice between picking an essay title out of six standard topics or designing their own with their tutor’s help and approval. This makes it possible to assess knowledge possession and advanced theoretical understanding as well as the critical and creative verbal skills of the student. The essays test the ability to think analytically, creatively, self-critically and independently as well as managing one’s own work to set time limits. This assessment method also gauges the students’ ability to move between generalisation and appropriately detailed discussion, to cite relevant texts and interpret them adequately, to discover examples in support of or to challenge a position, and to distinguish between relevant and irrelevant considerations.

General Notes

Original Handbook text: