Class Schedule:
T 8/23: Introduction and expectations
R 8/25: Charles Guignon, On Being Authentic, “The Culture of Authenticity” (P 1-11) & Charles Taylor, “The Sources of Authenticity” in The Ethics of Authenticity (P 25-29)
I: Virtue and Sincerity
T 8/30: Aristotle, Book I, chapters 1, 4-5, 7-13 in Nicomachean Ethics (P 3, 5-7, 10-22)
R 9/1: Augustine, “Aged Thirty-One” (“The Birthpangs of Conversion”) in Confessions (P 141-162)
T 9/6: Charles Guignon, On Being Authentic, “Romanticism and the Ideal of Authenticity” (P 49-77)
R 9/8: Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “First Walk” and “Third Walk” in Reveries of the Solitary Walker (P 1-8 and 27-40)
*Paul Taylor Lecture: “Facing the Future After Obama”
4PM, Walls Lounge, Elaine Langone Center
T 9/13: Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “Fourth Walk” in Reveries of the Solitary Walker (P 43-59)
R 9/15: Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “Fifth Walk” in Reveries of the Solitary Walker (P 62-71)
II: Reason, Freedom, Autonomy
T 9/20: Charles Guignon, On Being Authentic, “The Modern Worldview” (P 26-48)
R 9/22: Immanuel Kant, “What Is Enlightenment?” (P 58-63)
T 9/27: Epictetus, Discourses, §4.1 and Handbook (P 217-237, 287-304)
R 9/29: Epictetus, Discourses, §1.1-1.2, 1.18, 1.20, 1.28, 2.2, 2.6, 2.8, 2.11, 2.13 (P 4-9, 41-43, 46-48, 59-62, 74-76, 81-83, 85-87, 92-95, 97-100)
*Charles Mills Lecture: “Liberalism and Racial Justice”
7PM, Forum, Elaine Langone Center
T 10/4: Descartes, Meditations, Dedication, Preface, Synopsis, and First Meditation (P 3-17)
R 10/6: Descartes, Meditations, Second and Fourth Meditations (P 17-24 and 38-45)
T 10/11: *NO CLASS – FALL BREAK*
III: Challenges to the Self
R 10/13: Charles Guignon, On Being Authentic, “The Heart of Darkness” (P 78-106)
T 10/18: Charles Guignon, On Being Authentic, “De-Centering the Subject” (P 107-125)
R 10/20: Daniel Dennett, “In Darwin’s Wake, Where Am I?” (P 13-26)
T 10/25: Friedrich Nietzsche, “Preface” and “First Treatise” in On the Genealogy of Morality, (P 1-33)
R 10/27: Ian Hacking, “Madness: Biological or Constructed?” in The Social Construction Of What? (P 100-124)
T 11/1: Richard Rorty, “The Contingency of Selfhood” in Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity (P 23-43)
IV: A Social Self
R 11/3: Charles Taylor, “The Need for Recognition” in The Ethics of Authenticity (P 43-53) & Charles Guignon, On Being Authentic, “Story-shaped Selves” (P 126-145)
T 11/8: Jean-Paul Sartre, Existentialism Is a Humanism (P 17-36)
R 11/10: Jean-Paul Sartre, Existentialism Is a Humanism (P 37-54)
T 11/15: Anthony Appiah, “But Would That Still Be Me? Notes on Gender, ‘Race,’ Ethnicity, as Sources of ‘Identity’” (P 493-499)
V: Particularities of Identity
T 11/15 cont: Dean Spade, “Mutilating Gender” (P 1-20)
R 11/17: Simone de Beauvoir, “The Data of Biology” in The Second Sex (P 3-37)
T 11/22 + R 11/24: *NO CLASS – THANKSGIVING BREAK*
T 11/29: Sally Haslanger, “Gender and Race: (What) Are They? (What) Do We Want Them To Be?” (P 31-52)
R 12/1: Charles Mills, “But What Are You, Really? The Metaphysics of Race” in Blackness Visible (P 41-66)
T 12/6: Course wrap up via Ralph Ellison, “Little Man at Chehaw Station: The American Artist and His Audience” (P 25-48)