Much of 19th Century thought can be understood as a productive debate between philosophers working in an idealist tradition - where the key questions are to do with the conditions of possibility of thought or presentation, whether these conditions are understood transcendentally or historically - and those working in a broadly materialist tradition - where the key questions concern the material basis of both mind and appearance. This thematic will be used to investigate key figures and positions within this period. Philosophers studied will be selected from a list that includes Kant, Schelling, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Lange, Marx, Nietzsche, Bergson, among others. Throughout, critical reference will be made to the transformations that these ideas, and the philosophers that espoused them, received at the hands of more recent Continental Philosophy (e.g., Heidegger's Kant, Deleuze or Foucault's Nietzsche).

The essay (Assessment Element 1) will provide evidence to evaluate students against Learning Outcomes 1, 2, and 3.

The mid-semester assessment (Assessment Element 2) will provide evidence primarily to evaluate students against Learning Outcome 1. It may take the form of a short critical analysis, a review of a piece of relevant secondary literature, or an equivalent presentation in the form of a podcast or video.

The discussion board contributions (Assessment Element 3) will primarily provide evidence to evaluate students against Learning Outcome 3.

The main focus will be guided independent study within a structured framework organised around reading and research materials provided by the module tutor. Week by week students will work through course materials (e.g., 'lecture notes,' tutorial videos, podcasts, delivered via blackboard) that provide guidance in reading key texts, the context in which they sit, and activities and/or questions. This work will be undertaken on an individual basis as independent study, but students will be expected to interact regularly with fellow students, tutors, and guest lecturers through the discussion forum.

1. Understand critically a range of ideas in nineteenth century and early twentieth century continental philosophy in relation to the theme of transcendental and materialist thought as well as other competing philosophical narratives. Knowledge and Understanding

2. Understand these discrete ideas in relationship to each other, and in relation to certain other intellectual or historical phenomena. Enquiry

3. Communicate in a clear, balanced, well-structured, critical and analytical manner concerning your research findings. Communication

Blackboard
Library Services

Bailey, Tom (2021). ‘Will to Power: Nietzsche's Transcendental Idealism’ The Journal of Nietzsche Studies (2021) 52 (2): 260–289.

Burnham, Douglas. (2004) Kant's Philosophies of Judgement. Edinburgh.

Davis Acampora, Christa. (2013) Contesting Nietzsche. University of Chicago Press.

Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich (2019). Phenomenology of Spirit. Cambridge University Press.

Heidegger, Martin. (1997) A Phenomenological Interpretation of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. Indiana.

Kant, Immanuel. (1984) The Critique of Pure Reason. Trans. Pluhar. Hackett.

McGrath, Sean. J. (2012) The Dark Ground of Spirit: Schelling and the Unconscious. Routledge.

Merleau-Ponty, Maurice. (2013). The Phenomenology of Perception. Routledge.

Morris, Katherine J. (2012). Starting With Merleau-Ponty. Continuum.

Mitcheson, Katrina (2013). ‘Translating Man Back into Nature: Nietzsche’s Method’. Epoché: A Journal for the History of Philosophy, Volume 18, Issue 1, pp.107-128.

Nietzsche, Friedrich. (2005) The Nietzsche Reader. Ed. Ansell-Pearson and Large. Blackwell.

Pippin, Robert. (2008) Hegel’s Practical Philosophy: Rational Agency as Ethical Life. CUP.

The list above indicates the range of texts that may feature in the module. It is not meant to be a recommended or required book list.

Study key figures in nineteenth and early twentieth century philosophy who determined the problems, the concepts, and the methods that later continental philosophy inherited and to which it responded in movements such as existential phenomenology, historical epistemology, and structuralism.