Structure

The module will be divided into two main parts.

In the first part, we will mainly focus on Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger, namely, upon the former’s The Idea of Phenomenology the latter’s Being and Time, in order to convey students with a clear understanding of some of the fundamental phenomenological concepts (intentionality, consciousness, world, existence, care, temporality, death, and so forth). In the second part, we will explore the ways in which historical phenomenology is at the same time criticized and transformed: chapters and excerpts will be thus read from Phenomenology of Perception (M. Merleau-Ponty); Body, Community, Language, World (J. Patočka); The Essence of Manifestation (M. Henry); Truth and Method (H.-G. Gadamer).

Requirements

Students will be evaluated based upon the following two parameters:

(1) Participation (which includes, yet is not limited to: doing the assignments, attendance, in-class active participation). If you areabsent, please ask some of your classmates for any assignments or key discussion materials missed.

(2) In-Class Final Written Exam (date and additional information will be provided in due course).

Course Outline

Week 1

Introduction to the Module: “What is Phenomenology All About?”

Week 2

E. Husserl, The Idea of Phenomenology

(Lecture 1: The Idea of Phenomenology as a Science of Phenomena. The Concept of Phenomenon)

Week 3

E. Husserl, The Idea of Phenomenology

(Lecture 2: The Notion of Consciousness)

Week 4

E. Husserl, The Idea of Phenomenology

(Lecture 3: The Problem of Transcendence and the Relation between Consciousness and World)

Week 5

M. Heidegger, Being and Time

(§§9-11; 12-14: Dasein and the World as an Existential Structure)

Week 6

M. Heidegger, Being and Time

(§§15, 16, 17, 18, 22, 23, 24: Involvement, Signification and the Spatiality of Dasein)

Week 7

M. Heidegger, Being and Time

(§§39, 40, 41, 42: Anxiety and the Existential Interpretation of Dasein)

Week 8

M. Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception

(Part I, Chapter I and II: Introduction to a Phenomenology of the Lived-Body)

Week 9

M. Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception

(Part I, Chapter V: The Body in Its Sexual Being)

Week 10

J. Patočka, Body, Community, Language, World

(Lectures 4, 5, 6: Intentionality as Movement)

Week 11

M. Henry, The Essence of Manifestation

(§§52, 53, 57: Affectivity as a Universal Form of Experience)

Week 12

H.-G. Gadamer, Truth and Method

(Part 2, Section II, 3cβ; Part 3, 1: “Question” as a Paradigm for Experience and the Universality of Interpretation)

Week 13

Recapitulation and Final Discussion