University of the West of England
MODULE SPECIFICATION
(Revised November 2002)
Code: UPCPRC-30-3 Title: Contemporary Continental Philosophy Version: 1
Level: 3 UWE credit rating: 30 ECTS credit rating: 15
Module type: Standard
Owning Faculty: HLSS Field: Cultural Studies
Valid from: September 2004 Discontinued from: N/A
Contributes towards: Awards up to BA (Hons)
Pre-requisites: None, although students are advised that the level of difficulty presupposes previous experience of philosophical or theoretical study (eg., UPCPAA-30-1 Introduction to Philosophical Studies I: Theoretical Philosophy; UPCPRB-30-1 Introduction to Philosophical Studies II: Practical Philosophy; UPCPMA-30-2 Metaphysics).
Co-requisites: None
Excluded combinations: None
Learning outcomes:
On completion of this module, students should normally be able to:
• use a range of logical, analytic and theoretical tools in the analysis of philosophical problems (assessed through examination and essay);
• demonstrate advanced skills in the presentation and analysis of arguments (assessed in examination and essay);
• demonstrate their knowledge of the development of the major schools of post-1900 European philosophical thought (assessed in all assessment points).
Syllabus outline:
This module provides an option for students to conduct specialist studies in the field of Contemporary Continental Philosophy. Covering one of the richest areas of contemporary philosophical activity, this module will provide students with an overview of the history of continental philosophy after 1900, as well as detailed analyses of its major internal movements: Phenomenology, Existentialism, Deconstruction, and Contemporary Problems. Students will examine a combination of primary texts and philosophical problems deriving from them. In addition, since there is a vast amount of current research underway in this area, students will acquire an understanding of the most important trajectories being pursued in philosophy. At one level, this module is a primer for further philosophical researches; at another, it is a survey of some of the most foundational works for the contemporary humanities and social sciences.
Teaching and learning methods:
Teaching will be by lecture and seminar. Following the first two weeks, which introduce the defining characteristics of continental philosophy, the module is divided into four blocks of five weeks each, with three blocks devoted to specific schools or movements, and the final one focussing on the current philosophical landscape. Because the seminars will begin with developing students’ abilities to get to grips with philosophical problems independently, students will be encouraged to lead the seminars from the earliest possible stage, effectively turning them into self-organised reading groups. These groups are self-organising in that they will focus around those texts in which students display the most interest.
Indicative sources:
Introductory and Reference:
Simon Critchley, Continental Philosophy. A Very Short Introduction (Oxford:
OxfordUniversity Press, 2001).
Simon Critchley, ed., Companion to Continental Philosophy (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2000).
Simon Glendinning, ed., The Ediburgh Encyclopaedia of Continental Philosophy (Edinburgh:
Edinburgh University Press, 1998).
Tom Rockmore, Heidegger and French Philosophy (London: Routledge, 1995).
Christopher Norris, Derrida (London: Fontana, 1989).
Vincent Descombes, Modern French Philosophy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1980).
Primary Texts May Include:
Martin Heidegger, Being and Time (Oxford: Blackwell, 1962).
Edmund Husserl, The Idea of Phenomenology (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1964).
Edmund Husserl, Cartesian Meditations (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1977).
Jacques Derrida, Speech and Phenomena and other essays on Husserl’s Theory of Signs
(Evanston, ILL: Northwestern University Press, 1973).
Jacques Derrida, ‘Plato’s Pharmacy’, in Dissemination (London: Athlone, 1981).
Jacques Derrida, ‘White Mythology’, in Margins of Philosophy (London: Harvester
Wheatsheaf, 1982).
Maurice Merleau-Ponty, The Visible and the Invisible (Evanston ILL: Northwestern University
Press, 1980).
Soren Kierkegaard, Either/Or (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1997).
Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness (London: Routledge, 1996).
Jürgen Habermas, The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: Polity, 1986).
Alain Badiou, Manifesto for Philosophy (Albany NY: State University of New York
Press, 1999).
Alain Badiou, Deleuze: the Clamor of Being (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota
Press, 2000).
Assessment
Weighting between components A and B (standard modules only) A: 40% B: 60%
ATTEMPT 1
First Assessment Opportunity
Component A
Description of each element Element weighting
1. Examination (3 hours) 40%
Component B
Description of each element Element weighting
1. Critical Bibliography 25%
2. Essay (2000 words) 35%
Second Assessment Opportunity (further attendance at taught classes is/is not required)
Component A
Description of each element
1. Examination 40%
Component B
Description of each element
1. Critical Bibliography 25%
2. Essay (2000 words) 35%
SECOND (OR SUBSEQUENT) ATTEMPT Attendance at taught classes is not required.
Specification confirmed by …………………………………………………Date ……………………………
(Associate Dean/Programme Director)