Module Directory

This module explores two deeply related philosophical traditions that came to prevalence in the 19th and 20th centuries – existentialism and phenomenology. Existentialism is a philosophical movement associated with thinkers and writers as diverse as Sartre, Nietzsche, Beauvoir, Merleau-Ponty, Camus, Heidegger, and Kierkegaard – though not all of the figures grouped under that heading accepted that designation.

Broadly speaking, however, Existentialism is unified by the belief that human existence cannot be adequately understood using the categories provided by the philosophical tradition or the natural sciences. In light of this belief, many existentialists were committed to profound disruptions in the style in which philosophy is to be practiced – turning to poetry and literature to capture the nature of the human instead.

Existentialism is also unified in its commitment to take seriously the first-person quality of experience – arguing that purely third-personal categories fail to capture the nature of human existence as it is lived. For this reason, Existentialism has close ties to Phenomenology, which is a philosophical methodology defined by its insistence on examining meaning as it is experienced first-personally in order to uncover the structural necessities governing the possibility of those meaningful experiences.

Briefly put, Phenomenology questions how experience can show up as meaningful. This module is dedicated to one or both of these philosophical approaches and/or the relationship between the two.

This year's version of the module is dedicated to the Existentialist injunction to 'become who you are.' Students will examine classic and secondary texts on what such a project of self-becoming could entail. We will address the objection that the formality of such an injunction renders it at best meaningless and at worst an invitation to decisionistic nihilism. We consider more substantive alternative accounts of selfhood, as found in the Romantic tradition and its Existentialist offshoots. We put these themes into dialogue with contemporary theorists from both the analytic and the continental traditions.

The aims of this module are to enable students to:

• Summarise in their own words central discussions in Existentialism and Phenomenology.


• Develop the ability to establish logical - and other- connections between various parts of these discussions.


• Become able to present well thought-out syntheses of these discussions in their essays;


• Acquire the critical skills necessary to such an approach.


• Develop the ability to analyse complex philosophical discussions and become more critical towards the assumptions that underlie them.

By the end of this module, students will be expected to be able to:

• Summarise in their own words central discussions in Existentialism and Phenomenology.


• Develop the ability to establish logical, and other, connections between various parts of these discussions.


• Be able to present well thought-out syntheses in their essays.


• Acquire the critical skills necessary to such an approach.


• Develop the ability to analyse complex philosophical discussions and become more critical towards the assumptions that underlie them.

Skills for your Professional Life (Transferable Skills)

By the end of the module, students should also have acquired a set of transferable skills, and in particular be able to:

1. Define the task in which they are engaged and exclude what is irrelevant.


2. Seek and organise the most relevant discussions and sources of information.


3. Process a large volume of diverse and sometimes conflicting arguments.


4. Compare and evaluate different arguments and assess the limitations of their own position or procedure.


5. Write and present verbally a succinct and precise account of positions, arguments, and their presuppositions and implications.


6. Be sensitive to the positions of others and communicate their own views in ways that are accessible to them.


7. Think 'laterally' and creatively - see interesting connections and possibilities and present these clearly rather than as vague hunches.


8. Maintain intellectual flexibility and revise their own position if shown wrong.


9. Think critically and constructively.

Please note that the scheduling of this module differs from other 2^nd and Final Year Philosophy Modules in the following ways:

• There will be four contact hours per week instead of three during the first 6 weeks.


• There will be no distinction in the timetable between lecture and discussion: each two-hour class meeting will combine both discussion and lecture elements.

The final three weeks will be dedicated to writing workshops in which students will write their final essays and engage in peer review work, both of which will occur on air gapped computers in computer labs.

This module frontloads lectures in the first half of the term, with the second half focusing on student research and writing.

There will be no distinction in the timetable between lecture and discussion: each two hour class meeting during the first 6 weeks will involve both lecture and discussion elements in which all students will participate.