Philosophy of History B

Teacher(s)

Maesschalck Marc;

Language

French

Prerequisites

Basic instruction in the history of philosophy.

Main themes

The course will attempt to lay out the origin of the concept of a " philosophy of history " by distinguishing it from epistemological questions about the foundations of historical science.
The course will present a historical overview of the evolution of the concept of a philosophy of history.

Next, the course will present some observations on differing interpretations of the concept in order to point out the conflicts that set these interpretations against each other.
On this basis, a more specific debate shall be studied in order to provide an example of the general presentation.

Aims

At the end of this learning unit, the student is able to :
1	Upon successful completion of the course, the student should : - Be able to identify the major schools of thought in the philosophy of history ; - Know the fundamental concepts associated with those schools of thought ; - Be able to explain briefly the conflicts of interpretation that have resulted within contemporary thought.

The contribution of this Teaching Unit to the development and command of the skills and learning outcomes of the programme(s) can be accessed at the end of this sheet, in the section entitled “Programmes/courses offering this Teaching Unit”.

Content

A new philosophy of history. The question of the subject III
This course will offer a comparison of two major turns in the theory of the subject: the first takes place in the romanticism of the beginning of the 19^th century and in the context of modern psychiatry's birth, in the work of Reil and Hoffbauer, then Esquirol; the second in Soviet primo-structuralism with the birth of sociological poetics. Two épistémès that seem antithetical at first glance center on the relationship between subjects and the production of truth, as well as the origin of meaning that actually determines the contemporary configuration of subjectivity and the control over it. These two approaches should, we think, be confronted with Foucault's course aiming at founding a hermeneutics of 'self-care' capable of escaping such a configuration. The perspective of a eudemonics of the relation to self will attempt to sketch out the exit conditions of the order imposed by wills and languages.

Teaching methods

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Evaluation methods

Students will be asked to write a 10 page paper to be based off of a reading of one of the proposed texts. After emailing the paper, the student will receive a question on the paper to be prepared for the oral exam.
The student will have approximately 15 minutes to present this answer during the oral exam.
The paper may be written in French, English, Spanish, or German, with the professor's agreement.

Other information

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Bibliography

Altman M. C. & Coe C. D., The Fractured Self in Freud and German Philosophy, Palgrave Macmillan, New York, 2013.
Bernaz O., Identité nationale et politique de la langue, Peter Lang, Bruxelles, 2016.
Foucault M., Subjectivité et vérité, Cours au Collège de France (1980-1981), Ed. EHESS/Seuil/ Gallimard, Paris, 2014.
Foucault M., L 'herméneutique du sujet. Cours au Collège de France (1981-1982), Ed. EHESS/ Seuil/Gallimard, Paris, 2001.
Gauchet M. et  Quentel J.-Cl., Histoire du sujet et théorie de la personne, La rencontre Marcel Gauchet Jean Gagnepain, Presses universitaires de Rennes, Rennes, 2009.
Maesschalck M., La cause du sujet, Peter Lang, Bruxelles, 2015.
Seriot P., Structure et totalité, Les origines intellectuelles du structuralisme en Europe centrale et orientale, Lambert Lucas, Limoges, 2012 (1ère éd. PUF, 1999).
Regenspurger K. et van Zantwijk T. (dir.), Wissenschaftliche Anthropologie um 1800 ?, Franz Steiner Verlag, Wiesbaden, 2005.
Wallace IV E. R. & Gach J.  (eds), History of Psychiatry and Médical Psychology, Springer, NY, 2008.

Faculty or entity

EFIL