Course Format:
This course will meet in person Mondays 2:30-5:20 pm
Course Synopsis:
Existential Phenomenology was developed in Europe in the 1930s and ’40s by such writers as Martin Heidegger and Maurice Merleau-Ponty, and remains one of the most powerful and important developments of contemporary philosophy. We will begin with Merleau-Ponty’s Phenomenology of Perception to introduce this method and then turn to the philosophy of art developed in Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty as a lens to deepen our study of this philosophical approach. The phenomenological study of art will lead us to explore issues ranging from fundamental questions about subjectivity and the nature of meaning to broad themes of politics and history, as well as taking us into the rich and exciting domain of human artistic practice. We will supplement our study of Merleau-Ponty and Heidegger with texts by John Dewey and G.W.F. Hegel.
Required Textbooks:
Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception, Routledge.
Heidegger, Basic Writings, HarperCollins.
Dewey, Art as Experience, Perigree.
Hegel, Aesthetics Vol I, Oxford.
