Class Time, Location: M/W 10:30-11:45, SN 1103
Office Hours: M/W/F 11:30-12:00pm; Friday 1-3pm, and by appointment
Class Cancellations: If class is cancelled for any reason, the cancellation will be posted under the cancellations section of the main page of the Memorial University website.
Also note, the schedule on the syllabus may be updated during the semester, thus you should keep track of assignments, essays, etc., on this site below
| Date | Reading |
| Sept 9 | Course introduction. Begin reading from Arendt’s “Tradition and the Modern Age”
Recommended: Maurizio Passerin d’Entreves, “Hannah Arendt,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. |
| Sept 14 | No class. |
| Sept 16 | Arendt’s “Tradition and the Modern Age,” finish.
Douglas Klusmeyer, “Hannah Arendt on Authority and Tradition” (from Arendt: Key Concepts [Acumen, 2014]) |
| Sept 21 | Arendt’s “The Concept of History Ancient and Modern.”
Masa Mrovlic, “Narrating and Understanding” (from Arendt: Key Concepts [Acumen, 2014]) |
| Sept 23 | Hannnah Arendt, “What is Freedom?” (available on course website) |
| Sep 28 | Arendt, “Action”
Heidegger, “Introduction” to Being and Time, first half. Dorothea Frede, “The Question of Being: Heidegger’s Project,” from Cambridge Companion to Heidegger. |
| Sep 30 | Arendt, “Action”
Heidegger, “Introduction” to Being and Time, second half. |
| Oct 5 | Arendt, “Action” |
| Oct 7 | Class Cancelled |
| Oct 12 | No class |
| Oct 14 | Heidegger, “Language” from Poetry, Language, Thought |
| Oct 19 | Heidegger, “What are Poets for?” from Poetry, Language, Thought, pp. 15-50 |
| Oct 21 | Heidegger, “What are Poets for?” from Poetry, Language, Thought, pp. 50-end
Benjamin Noys, “Heidegger and the Hermeneutic Turn,” from Cambridge Companion to Heidegger. |
| Oct 26 | Foucault, “The Order of Discourse,” inaugural lecture at the Collège de France, available on course website.
Recommended Resources: Thomas Flynn, “Mapping Foucault on History,” and Joseph Rouse, “Power/Knowledge,” from the Cambridge Companion to Foucault, ed. G. Gutting (2005). |
| Oct 28 | Foucault, “Lecture on Nietzsche,” in Lectures on the Will to Know
Recommended Resources: Stuart Elden, Power, Nietzsche and the Greeks: Foucault’s Leçons sur la volonté de savoir, Berfois (July 20, 2011) Also, Peter Gratton, chapter 4, The State of Sovereignty (2012). |
| Nov 2 | Foucault, Lectures on the Will to Know, lectures one to two. |
| Nov 4 | Foucault, Lectures on the Will to Know, lectures three to four. |
| Nov 9 | Foucault, Lectures on the Will to Know, lectures five to six. |
| Nov 11 | No class. |
| Nov 16 | Foucault, The Punitive Society, lectures 6-8 |
| Nov 18 | Foucault, Punitive Society, 9-11 |
| Nov 23 | Foucault, The Punitive Society, lectures 12-end |
| Nov 25 | Derrida, Rogues, Part I, ch. 1-2.
Recommended: Len Lawlor, “Deconstruction” from A Blackwell Companion to Derrida(2013) |
| Nov 30 | Derrida, Rogues, Part I, ch. 3. |
| Dec 2 | Derrida, Rogues, Part I, ch. 4-5. |
| Dec 4 | Derrida, Rogues, Part I, ch. 5-end.
Recommended: Peter Gratton, Chapter 5, The State of Sovereignty: Lessons from the Political Fictions of Modernity (2012) |
| Finals Week: Final Paper due at Final Exam time, 15-20 pages, double-spaced, topic to be chosen by each student. |
