Module Directory

This module introduces students to different traditions of “Critical Theory”. The point of critical-theoretical approaches to philosophy is to identify marginalisation and oppression, to understand what drives these phenomena, and to help us emancipate ourselves and others from them.

At Essex, we embrace a wide notion of critical theory that includes, for instance, Frankfurt School Critical Theory (e.g., Adorno, Horkheimer, Habermas, Honneth), Marx and the Marxist tradition, Contemporary French Theory (e.g., Foucault, Derrida, Rancière, Badiou), feminism and Critical Race Theory. The “Critical Theory” module provides students with the tools to critically engage with the contemporary social and political world.

The aims of this module are:

• To introduce students to key topics in Critical Theory (e.g., alienation, social pathology, deconstruction, exploitation; progress).


• To enable students to identify and critically examine the assumptions that underpin different forms of marginalisation and oppression and to critically evaluate current human practices that are informed by these problematic assumptions.


• To enable students to appreciate the different ways in which philosophical insights and skills can inform attempts by political activists who fight against discrimination and oppression.

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

1. Reconstruct the philosophical positions in Critical Theory that they have studied;


2. Critically evaluate the strategies and positions of critical theorists;


3. Understand the practical implications of such strategies and positions, and how they bear on on-going public debates and conflicts;


4. Begin to form their own opinions on the solutions others have suggested to the complex problems of marginalisation and oppression that we face;

Skills of 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. Process diverse (and sometimes conflicting) arguments and empirical studies;


2. Compare and evaluate different arguments;


3. Write and present verbally a succinct and precise account of strategies, arguments, and their presuppositions and implications;


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

Indicative Syllabus

• The meaning(s) of critical theory: What’s critical about it? What do members of the Frankfurt School have to say about this question? Do they live up to their own aspirations? Which others outside the official ‘canon’ might have a claim to be critical theorists? And does their example suggest different and even better ways of thinking about critical theory’s proper aspirations?


• The varieties of critical theory (I): What are the internal differences within the Frankfurt School? Between Adorno and Horkheimer and Marcuse? And between the ‘first generation’ and contemporary critical theorists such as Habermas and Honneth? How do their different approaches embody (or fail to embody) the aspirations of critical theory?


• The varieties of critical theory (II): How does the thought of critical theorists (or those we might plausibly regard as such) outside the Frankfurt School tradition differ from the thought of the Frankfurt School? How do the contributions of feminists, critical race theorists and queer theorists (among others) relate to the aspirations of critical theory?


• Focus on ideology: What is ideology? And why is the critique of ideology so important for critical theory? What might constitute the most urgent forms of ideology-critique today?

This module will be delivered via:

• Three hours per week to cover lecture and seminar sessions.

There will also be a Reading Week when no teaching will take place, exact week to be confirmed.