Module Directory

This module examines the philosophical methodology and relevance of a major phenomenological thinker, such as Edmund Husserl, Martin Heidegger, Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir or Maurice Merleau-Ponty. We will examine how this methodology addresses existential questions.

For instance, in discussing Heidegger, we may address central themes such as being-in-the-world, anxiety, authenticity, and temporality - while focusing in particular on how to understand the individual's relationship to the public norms and practices through which she understands herself. In addressing, Merleau-Ponty we may address topics such as: perception, reflection, spatiality, temporality, expression, as well as the way in which certain artworks offer a form of implicit phenomenological reflection.

The aims of the module are: 

• Developing the ability to provide cogent interpretations of phenomenological texts.


• Engaging with advanced secondary literature on these primary texts.


• Being able to relate these texts to other major twentieth century schools of thought.


• Providing critical discussion on selected topics.


• Writing a well-researched paper on a problem arising from the study of the text.

Skills for your Professional Life (Transferable Skills)

By the end of this 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.

This module will focus on Merleau-Ponty. We will start with a selective examination of his Phenomenology of Perception, before moving on to some of his later works such as Eye and Mind and The Visible and the Invisible, examining specfic topics from among: temporality, spatiality, reflection, perception, experience of other, expression and the role of the arts within Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenological methodology. We will look at some particular examples of artworks capable of exhibiting a form of phenomenological reflection, some discussed by Merleau-Ponty himself, others susceptible to his approach.

The module will be delivered via:

• One 1-hour lecture per week.
• One 1-hour seminar per week.

There will also be a Reading Week, to be confirmed.