(Updated 03 August 2018)
PY952-7-SP is intended to introduce MA students to what is generally agree to be the most influential and significant tradition of critical social philosophy to have emerged within twentieth-century European thought. This tradition continues up to the present day, and is usually referred to as the 'Frankfurt School'. The module may concentrate on one or more of the leading figures, such as Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Jürgen Habermas and Axel Honneth, or focus on specific themes such as reification, social pathology, or freedom and autonomy.
The topic for Spring 2018 is The Frankfurt School and French Critical Theory
According to thinkers of the 'Frankfurt School', modern society has become dominated by 'instrumental rationality', which prioritizes technical efficiency at the expense of reflection on the goals and values guiding human nature. But how do we justify critique if we assume there are no social relationships which have not been contaminated by it? And how do we prevent our vision of an alternative kind of society from being implausibly utopian, or even authoritarian?
In this module we shall pursue two lines of inquiry. The first will look at how this problem is articulated in the first two generations of the Frankfurt School, with particular focus on Adorno and Horkheimer's Dialectic of Enlightenment and Jürgen Habermas's critique of the 'colonization of the life world'. The second line of inquiry will turn to the work of Michel Foucault, which is often presented as offering an alternative model of social critique that is able to circumvent the whole problem of 'normative foundations', and to avoid proposing utopian alternatives.
Learning Outcomes
At the end of the module students should have:
* introduce students to key Frankfurt School thinkers such as Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer, and Jürgen Habermas;
* introduce students to the thought of Michel Foucault
* consider the philosophical problems involved in constructing a critical social theory, and in particular the justification of critical judgements concerning contemporary society;
* assess the extent to which the approaches developed by the Frankfurt School and Foucault and can deliver convincing critical diagnoses of contemporary society.
By the end of the module, students should also have acquired a set of transferable skills, and in particular be able to:
* demonstrate good understanding of the central philosophical problems involved in constructing a critical theory of society;
* explain the distinctive contributions that the Frankfurt school and Foucault make to a critical theory of society;
* define the task in which they are engaged and exclude what is irrelevant;
* seek and organise the most relevant discussions and sources of information;
* process a large volume of diverse and sometimes conflicting arguments;
* compare and evaluate different arguments and assess the limitations of their own position or procedure;
* write and present verbally a succinct and precise account of positions, arguments, and their presuppositions and implications;
* be sensitive to the positions of others and communicate their own views in ways that are accessible to them;
* think 'laterally' and creatively - see interesting connections and possibilities and present these clearly rather than as vague hunches;
* maintain intellectual flexibility and revise their own position if shown wrong;
* think critically and constructively.
PY952-7-SP is intended to introduce MA students to what is generally agree to be the most influential and significant tradition of critical social philosophy to have emerged within twentieth-century European thought. This tradition continues up to the present day, and is usually referred to as the 'Frankfurt School'. The module may concentrate on one or more of the leading figures, such as Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Jürgen Habermas and Axel Honneth, or focus on specific themes such as reification, social pathology, or freedom and autonomy.
The topic for Spring 2018 is The Frankfurt School and French Critical Theory
According to thinkers of the 'Frankfurt School', modern society has become dominated by 'instrumental rationality', which prioritizes technical efficiency at the expense of reflection on the goals and values guiding human nature. But how do we justify critique if we assume there are no social relationships which have not been contaminated by it? And how do we prevent our vision of an alternative kind of society from being implausibly utopian, or even authoritarian?
In this module we shall pursue two lines of inquiry. The first will look at how this problem is articulated in the first two generations of the Frankfurt School, with particular focus on Adorno and Horkheimer's Dialectic of Enlightenment and Jürgen Habermas's critique of the 'colonization of the life world'. The second line of inquiry will turn to the work of Michel Foucault, which is often presented as offering an alternative model of social critique that is able to circumvent the whole problem of 'normative foundations', and to avoid proposing utopian alternatives.
Learning Outcomes
At the end of the module students should have:
* introduce students to key Frankfurt School thinkers such as Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer, and Jürgen Habermas;
* introduce students to the thought of Michel Foucault
* consider the philosophical problems involved in constructing a critical social theory, and in particular the justification of critical judgements concerning contemporary society;
* assess the extent to which the approaches developed by the Frankfurt School and Foucault and can deliver convincing critical diagnoses of contemporary society.
By the end of the module, students should also have acquired a set of transferable skills, and in particular be able to:
* demonstrate good understanding of the central philosophical problems involved in constructing a critical theory of society;
* explain the distinctive contributions that the Frankfurt school and Foucault make to a critical theory of society;
* define the task in which they are engaged and exclude what is irrelevant;
* seek and organise the most relevant discussions and sources of information;
* process a large volume of diverse and sometimes conflicting arguments;
* compare and evaluate different arguments and assess the limitations of their own position or procedure;
* write and present verbally a succinct and precise account of positions, arguments, and their presuppositions and implications;
* be sensitive to the positions of others and communicate their own views in ways that are accessible to them;
* think 'laterally' and creatively - see interesting connections and possibilities and present these clearly rather than as vague hunches;
* maintain intellectual flexibility and revise their own position if shown wrong;
* think critically and constructively.