History 308W/408 Modernity and Modernism Robert Westbrook This course is a series of advanced undergraduate/graduate seminars on selected topics in the history of modern thought and culture in Europe and the United States. The topic of the course changes each time it is offered, but the focus throughout is on the history of the culture modernity in the West and the intellectual legacy of that history. The following are the syllabuses for the course thus far. It is unlikely, though not entirely so, that any of these particular versions of the course will be repeated.
Transcript
History 308W/408
Modernity and Modernism
Robert Westbrook
This course is a series of advanced undergraduate/graduate
seminars on selected topics in the history of modern
thought and culture in Europe and the United States. The
topic of the course changes each time it is offered, but
the focus throughout is on the history of the culture
modernity in the West and the intellectual legacy of that
history.
The following are the syllabuses for the course thus far.
It is unlikely, though not entirely so, that any of these
particular versions of the course will be repeated.
MODERNITY AND MODERNISM:
LIBERALISM
History 308/408
Fall 2006
M 2-4.40
Rush Rhees 362
Robert Westbrook
Rush Rhees 363
Hrs: W 11-12
X59349; rwbk@mail
The history of civilization, if intelligently conceived,
may be an instrument of civilization.
--Charles Beard
This course is one of a series of seminars on the thought
and culture of modernity in Europe and America since the
mid-seventeenth century. The topic for this semester is
liberalism, arguably the most enduring, powerful, and
successful of modern Western political philosophies,
particularly in Great Britain and the United States. And,
indeed, our focus will be Anglo-American, though we will
give some consideration to the French and German
contributions to liberal thought.
BOOKS
The following books have been ordered at the UR Bookstore:
John Dewey, Individualism Old and New.
John Dewey, Liberalism and Social Action.
Emile Durkheim, The Division of Labor in Society.
L.T. Hobhouse, Liberalism.
Thomas Jefferson, Political Writings.
John Locke, Two Treatises of Government.
John Stuart Mill, On Liberty and Other Writings.
John Rawls, Political Liberalism.
Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations.
Charles Taylor, Sources of the Self.
Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America.
Max Weber, Political Writings.
We will also be reading chunks of a couple of secondary
sources that you might wish to pick up: Gertrude
Himmelfarb, Roads to Modernity and Richard Matthews,
Liberalism and Modern Society. Additional shorter readings
on reserve in Rush Rhees Library are indicated on the
syllabus by an asterisk (*).
REQUIREMENTS
Discussion Questions
Each week each student will prepare two questions for
discussion. These questions will be sent to all members of
the class via e-mail by 10 pm the Tuesday evening before
class.
Lectures
Each class will begin with a thirty-minute lecture on the
principal figures of the week's work, placing their work in
its biographical and historical context. Each student will
deliver one of these lectures, and I will handle the
remainder.
Papers
Undergraduates in the course will write three papers (2000
words) on topics assigned for each week's reading. These
papers will be due in class on the day we discuss that
reading.
Graduate students in the course will in addition to two of
these papers, write two review essays (2500-3000 words).
The first of these, due November 3, will address one of the
following books deeply critical of liberalism:
Ronald Beiner, What's the Matter with Liberalism.
Paul Kahn, Putting Liberalism in Its Place.
John Kekes, Against Liberalism.
Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue.
The second of these, due December 18, will address one of
the following major studies of some of the leading figures
in the course:
Richard Ashcraft, Revolutionary Politics and Locke's Two
Treatises of Government.
Stefan Collini, Liberalism and Sociology.
John Diggins, Max Weber: Politics and the Spirit of
Tragedy.
Gertrude Himmelfarb, On Liberty and Liberalism: The Case of
John Stuart Mill.
Dominick LaCapra, Emile Durkheim: Sociologist and
Philosopher.
Richard Matthews, If Men Were Angels.
Emma Rothschild, Economic Sentiments.
Alan Ryan, John Dewey and the High Tide of American
Liberalism.
Michael Sandel, Liberalism and the Limits of Justice.
Sheldon Wolin, Tocqueville Between Two Worlds.
COURSE MEETINGS AND READINGS
INTRODUCTION
September 11
MODERN IDENTITY
September 18: Immanuel Kant, "What Is Enlightenment?"*
Charles Taylor, Sources of the Self, Preface, chs. 6, 8,
11-12, 13, 16-21.
Charles Taylor, "Legitimation Crisis?"*
FOUNDING FATHERS
September 25: John Locke, Two Treatises of
Government, First Treatise, chs. I-II;
Second Treatise.
Locke, Letter on Toleration.*
Jonathan Israel, "Introduction" to Israel,
Radical Enlightenment.*
October 2: Adam Smith, The Wealth of
Nations, Introduction; Book I, chs. I-IV,
VII-VIII; Book II, Introduction, chs. I-
III; Book III, chs. I-IV; Book IV,
Introduction, chs. I-III, VII, IX; Book V, chs. I, III.
Gertrude Himmelfarb, Roads to Modernity, pp. 25-70.*
October 9: Thomas Jefferson, Political Writings,
pp. 61-319, 352-407, 465-498.
James Madison, "Federalist 10,"* "Federalist 51,"*
Himmelfarb, Roads to Modernity, pp. 191-226.*
October 16: NO CLASS FALL BREAK
October 23: John Stuart Mill, On Liberty.
Mill, The Subjection of Women.
Richard Bellamy, Liberalism and Modern Society,
pp. 9-35.*
FRENCH VARIATIONS
October 30: Alexis de Tocqueville,
Democracy in America, Volume I, Part 1, ch.
3; Part 2, chs. 1-9; Volume II, Part 2,
chs. 1-5, 9, 13, 16; Part 4.
Benjamin Constant, "The Liberty of the
Ancients Compared with that of the
Moderns"*
John Stuart Mill, "Review of Democracy in
America"*
Larry Seidentop, "Two
Liberal Traditions"*
NEW LIBERALS
November 6: John Stuart Mill, Chapters
on Socialism.
T.H. Green, "Liberal Legislation and
Freedom of Contract"*
L.T. Hobhouse, Liberalism.
Bellamy, Liberalism and
Modern Society, pp. 35-
57.
November 13: Emile
Durkheim, The Division of Labor in Society.
Bellamy, Liberalism and Modern Society, pp.
59-104.
November 20: John Dewey, Individualism
Old and New.
John Dewey, Liberalism and Social Action.
John Maynard Keynes, "The End of Laissez-Faire"*
SONDERWEG
November 27:
Max Weber, Political Writings, 1-28, 80-
129, 272-303, 309-369.
Bellamy, Liberalism and Modern Society, pp.
157-216.*
LIBERALISM RENEWED
December 4: John Rawls,
Political Liberalism,
Introduction, Part One,
Lectures I-II, Parts Two, and
Part Three, Lectures VII-VIII.
Bellamy, Liberalism and Modern
Society, pp. 217-251.*
December 11: Jürgen Habermas, "Reconcilia-
tion through the Public Use of Reason: Remarks
on John Rawl's Political Liberalism"*
Jürgen Habermas, "Questions of Political
Theory"*
Jürgen Habermas, "Popular Sovereignty as
Procedure"*
John Rawls, Political Liberalism, Part III, Lecture IX, and
Part Four.
MODERNITY AND MODERNISM:
NIETZSCHE AND HIS CHILDREN
History 308/408
Fall 2008
M 2-4.40
Rush Rhees 456
Robert Westbrook
Rush Rhees 363
Hrs: M 11-12
X59349; rwbk@mail
I know my fate. One day my name will be associated with the
memory of something tremendous--a crisis without equal on
earth, the most profound collision of conscience, a
decision that was conjured up against everything that had
been believed, demanded, hallowed so far. I am no man, I am
dynamite.
--Friedrich Nietzsche, Ecce Homo
This course is one of a series of seminars on the thought
and culture of modernity in Europe and America since the
mid-seventeenth century. This particular seminar examines
the life, thought, and influence of Friedrich Nietzsche, a
philosopher largely ignored during his late nineteenth-
century lifetime but a thinker whose voice has resonated
throughout the intellectual and cultural history of
twentieth century Europe and the United States. One cannot
wrestle with modernity without contending with Nietzsche
and his legacy, which is our task.
BOOKS
The following books have been ordered at the UR Bookstore.
They are also are on 2-hour reserve in Rush Rhees Library.
Friedrich Nietzsche, Basic Writings, ed. Walter Kaufmann.
Friedrich Nietzsche, The Portable Nietzsche, ed. Walter
Kaufmann.
Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer, The Dialectic of
Enlightenment.
Steven Ascheim, The Nietzsche Legacy in Germany, 1890-1990.
Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish.
Jürgen Habermas, The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity.
R.J. Hollingdale, Nietzsche: The Man and His Philosophy.
Walter Kaufmann, Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist,
Antichrist.
Alexander Nehamas, Nietzsche: Life as Literature.
Additional shorter readings are on electronic reserve (ER).
COURSE REQUIREMENTS
Discussion Questions
Each week each student will prepare two questions for
discussion. These questions will be sent to all members of
the class via e-mail by 10 pm the Monday evening before
class. Preparation of these questions will be an important
part of participation in the class.
Papers
There are three papers of modest length (2000-3000 words)
for the course. The first of these, due 27 October, is to
be on an article of each student's choice from the periodi-
cal press in France, Germany, Great Britain, or the United
States before 1930. The second, due 24 November, is to be
an analysis of an essay by one of several "post-modernist"
French Nietzscheans. The final paper, due 15 December, is
to be an examination of the Nietzschean themes in one of
two novels: Thomas Mann's Doctor Faustus or Ayn Rand's
Fountainhead. Details on each of these assignments will be
forthcoming.
Undergraduates in the course will write two of the three
assigned papers. Graduate students in the course will write
all three of these papers and lead the discussion for one
class (after 15 September).
GRADING
Grading in the course will be weighted as follows: short
papers (20% each); longer ("literary Nietzscheans") paper
R.J. Hollingdale, Nietzsche: The Man and his Philosophy.
FN, Ecce Homo (Basic), 671-725, 782-791.
FN, Selected letters (ER).
Recommended:
Curtis Cate, Friedrich Nietzsche.
Leslie Chamberlain, Nietzsche in Turin.
Ernst Behler, "Nietzsche in the Twentieth Century" in
Cambridge Companion to Nietzsche.
David Krell and Donald Bates, The Good European.
22 September Dionysius/Wagner
FN, Birth of Tragedy (Basic)
FN, "Richard Wagner in Bayreuth,"
Untimely Meditations (ER).
FN, Case of Wagner (Basic)
FN, Ecce Homo (Basic), 726-738,
773-781.
Recommended:
Bryan Magee, The Tristan Chord:
Wagner and Philosophy.
29 September Zarathustra
FN, Thus Spoke Zarathustra
(Portable).
FN, Ecce Homo (Basic), 751-765.
13 October Transvaluation: Beyond Good and Evil
FN, On the Genealogy of
Morals (Basic).
FN, Twilight of Idols
(Portable).
FN, Ecce Homo (Basic), 768-
769
20 October Killing God
FN, The Antichrist
(Portable).
FN, "Seventy-Five Aphorisms
from Five Volumes" (Basic),
145-178.
FN, Ecce Homo (Basic), 770-
772.
27 October Roiling the
Reich
Max Nordau, "Friedrich
Nietzsche" (ER).
Lou Andreas-Salome, "Nietzsche's Essence" (ER).
Karl Jaspers, "How Nietzsche Is to be Understood" (ER).
Steven Ascheim, The Nietzsche Legacy in Germany, chs. 1-7.
PAPER DUE ON EARLY RECEPTION OF NIETZSCHE
3 November The Good German?
Martin Heidegger, "The Word of
Nietzsche: 'God Is Dead'" (ER).
Richard Wolin, The Politics of
Being, 131-169 (ER).
Berel Lang, "Misinterpretation as
the Author's Responsibility
(Nietzsche's fascism, for
instance)" (ER).
Ascheim, Nietzsche Legacy, chs. 8-
10, Afterword.
Recommended:
Martin Heidegger, Nietzsche
Georg Lukács, The Destruction of
Reason, 309-399.
Tracy Strong, "Nietzsche's Political Misappropriation" in
Cambridge Companion.
10 November Exiles
Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer,
The Dialectic of Enlightenment.
Thomas Mann, "Nietzsche's
Philosophy in the Light of
Contemporary Events" (ER).
Christoph Menke, "Genealogy and
Critique: Two Forms of Ethical
Questioning of Morality" (ER).
17 November The Americanized
Nietzsche
Walter Kaufmann, Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist,
Antichrist, Prologue, Parts I and III, Epilogue.
Jennifer Ratner-Rosenhagen, "Conventional Iconoclasm: The
Cultural Work of the Nietzsche Image in Twentieth-Century
America" (ER).
Recommended:
Jennifer Ratner-Rosenhagen, "'Dionysian Enlightenment':
Walter Kaufmann's Nietzsche in Perspective," Modern
Intellectual History 3 (2006): 239-269.
24 November Nouveau Nietzsche
FN, "On Truth and Lie in an Extra-
Moral Sense" (ER).
Alexander Nehamas, Nietzsche: Life as
Literature.
Recommended:
Maudemarie Clark, Nietzsche on Truth
and Philosophy.
Alan Schrift, "Nietzsche's French
Legacy" in Cambridge Companion to
Nietzsche.
Richard Wolin, "Zarathustra Goes to
Hollywood: On the Postmodern
Reception of Nietzsche" in Wolin, The
Seduction of Unreason.
PAPER DUE ON FRENCH NIETZSCHE
1 December The Genealogical
Inheritance: Foucault
Michel Foucault, "Nietzsche,
Genealogy, History" (ER).
Michel Foucault, Discipline and
Punish.
James Miller, "Carnivals of Atrocity:
Foucault, Nietzsche, Cruelty" (ER).
Recommended:
James Miller, "The Prophet and the
Dandy: Philosophy as a Way of Life in
Nietzsche and Foucault," Social
Research 65 (1998): 871-896.
Douglas Smith, Transvaluations: Nietzsche in France 1872-
1972.
8 December Anti-Nietzsche
Jürgen Habermas, The
Philosophical Discourse of
Modernity, chs. 1-6, 9-12 (skip
"Excursuses" if you wish).
Allan Bloom, "How Nietzsche
Conquered America" (ER).
Luc Ferry and Alain Renault,
"'What Must First Be Proved Is
Worth Little'" (ER).
Philipe Raynaud, "Nietzsche as
Educator" (ER).
15 December PAPER DUE ON LITERARY
NIETZSCHEANS: THOMAS MANN, DOCTOR FAUSTUS
(1947) OR AYN RAND, THE FOUNTAINHEAD
(1943).
MODERNISM AND MODERNITY: FRENCH LESSONS
History 308W/408 Fall 2010 F 2-4.40 RR 456
Robert Westbrook Rush Rhees 440/X59349 Office Hrs: M 11-12 robert.westbrook@ rochester.edu
An investigation of the major themes, texts, and contexts in the history of French existentialism, structuralism, neo-Marxism, and post-structuralism (1940-1970) and something of their impact on American thought and culture. BOOKS The following books have been ordered at the UR Bookstore and are also available on two-hour reserve. Roland Barthes, Mythologies
Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex Judith Butler, Gender Trouble
Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus Albert Camus, The Stranger François Cusset, French Theory
Guy Debord, Society of the Spectacle Jacques Derrida, Writing and Difference Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth Michel Foucault, Madness and Civilization Claude Levi-Strauss, The Savage Mind Jean-Paul Sartre, Existentialism Is a Humanism
Jean-Paul Sartre, Nausea Richard Wright, The Outsider
Cheaper copies of these books may well be found on-line. Other texts used in the course can be found there as well should you wish to purchase them. Additional, shorter course readings are on Blackboard. There are two films for the course (Breathless and And God Created Woman), which will be screened on 16 and 17 November (7.40 pm, Meliora 218) and then placed on reserve in the Multimedia Center. I have also placed an excellent reference work, Lawrence Kritzman, ed., The Columbia History of Twentieth-Century French Thought, on Reserve. COURSE REQUIREMENTS: EVERYONE Class Meetings: Each week the class will discuss the week's reading. Students are required to attend these sessions and expected to participate actively in them. Discussion Questions: Each week each student will prepare two questions for discussion. These questions will be sent to all members of the class via e-mail by 10 pm the Thursday evening before class. Preparation of these questions will be an important part of participation in the class. Papers: There are three papers of modest length (2000-3000 words) required of all students in the course. Two of these essays are to explicate and critically analyze one or more of the primary sources among the assigned readings (or films) . These papers are due on the day on which source is assigned. The first of these papers must be completed by 15 October, and the second by 3 December. The final paper, due 17 December, is to be an examination of themes of the course, the "French lessons," at work in one of four novels: Simone de Beauvoir, The Mandarins, Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man, Julia Kristeva, The Samurai, or Philippe Sollers, Women ADDITIONAL COURSE REQUIREMENTS: GRADUATE STUDENTS If they wish, graduate students may substitute for the final paper on a novel, a historiographical review essay on the work of either Tony Judt or Richard Wolin in postwar French intellectual history. In addition to the above requirements, graduate students will complete the following two assignments: Biographies: A brief (500-word) biography of one of the main figures in the course. This biography is due (by email to me) on the Wednesday before we discuss his or her work. I will then put it up on Blackboard for the rest of the class to read.
Fourth Paper: In addition to the three short papers describe above, each graduate student, will write an essay review (of the sort that might be published in Reviews in American History) of either George Cotkin, Existential America or Tamara Chaplin, Turning on the Mind: French Philosophers on Television. This paper (2500-3000 words) is due on 19 November. GRADING Grading in the course will be weighted as follows: Undergraduates: papers (25% each); class participation (25%). Graduate Students: short papers (15% each); longer paper (20%); Dickstein review (20%); class participation (30%). CLASS MEETINGS AND ASSIGNMENTS
3 SEPTEMBER Introduction to the Course Tyler Stovall, "French Culture and the Intelligentsia" FROM EXISTENTIALISM TO POST-STRUCTURALISM 10 SEPTEMBER Jean-Paul Sartre, Nausea Jean-Paul Sartre, Existentialism Is a Humanism
17 SEPTEMBER Albert Camus, The Stranger Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus
24 SEPTEMBER Simon de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1 OCTOBER Franz Fanon, Wretched of the Earth Jean-Paul Sartre, "Black Orpheus" 8 OCTOBER Claude Levi-Strauss, The Savage Mind, Roland Barthes, Mythologies, 15 OCTOBER Michel Foucault, Madness and Civilization Allan Megill, Prophets of Extremity, Part III
22 OCTOBER NO CLASS: US INTELLECTUAL HISTORY CONFERENCE, NYC
29 OCTOBER Guy Debord, Society of the Spectacle Claude Levi-Strauss, The Savage Mind, ch.9. Mark Poster, Existential Marxism in Postwar France,
5 NOVEMBER Jacques Derrida, Writing and Difference, Allan Megill, Prophets of Extremity, Part IV TRAVELING THEORY 12 NOVEMBER Richard Wright, The Outsider Norman Mailer, "White Negro" 16 NOVEMBER SCREENING OF
BREATHLESS 17 NOVEMBER SCREENING OF AND
GOD CREATED WOMAN 19 NOVEMBER Breathless And God Created Woman Richard Neupert, "Cultural Contexts: Where Did the Wave Begin?" Vanessa Schwartz, It's So French, chs. 3 DECEMBER Judith Butler, Gender Trouble
10 DECEMBER François Cusset, French Theory
MODERNITY AND MODERNISM:
WEIMAR CULTURE
History 308/408
Spring 2012
Celia Applegate
Rush Rhees 461
Hrs: W 10-12
X53834
celia.applegate
@rochester.edu
W 2-4.40
Rush Rhees 456
Robert Westbrook
Rush Rhees 440
Hrs: MW 10-11
X59349
robert.westbrook
@rochester.edu
Movement and frankness. The maximum irritant for the nerves
corrected by the maximum sedative. Berlin stimulates like
arsenic, and then when one's nerves are all ajingle she
comes with her hot milk of human kindness.
--Harold Nicolson, "The Charm of Berlin"
(1932)
This course is one of a series of seminars on the thought
and culture of modernity in Europe and America since the
mid-seventeenth century. This particular seminar examines
the culture of Weimar Germany (1918-1933), a place and a
time in which modernity and modernism each found a
particularly acute and fraught expression.
BOOKS
The following books have been ordered at the UR Bookstore.
They are also on 2-hour reserve in Rush Rhees Library. Many
are available in used copies at a substantial discount
online.
Bertolt Brecht, Threepenny Opera
Hans Fallada, Little Man, What Now?
Sigmund Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents
Martin Heidegger, Being and Time
Christopher Isherwood, Berlin Stories
Ernst Junger, Storm of Steel
Anton Kaes, et al., eds. The Weimar Republic
Sourcebook
Irmgard Keun, The Artificial Silk Girl
Karl Korsch, Marxism and Philosophy
Siegfried Kracauer, The Mass Ornament
Siegfried Kracauer, The Salaried Masses
Detlev Peukert, The Weimar Republic
Joseph Roth, What I Saw
August Sander, Face of Our Time
Carl Schmitt, The Concept of the Political
Eric Weitz, Weimar Germany
Additional shorter readings are on electronic reserve (ER).
MOVIES
Movies will be an important part of this course, as they
were of Weimar culture. Screenings of these films will be
held on the following Mondays at 7.40 pm in Dewey 2110E.
They will also be on reserve in the Multimedia Center. Most
of them are as well available on Netflix or other online
outlets.
All Quiet on the Western Front (23 January)
People on Sunday (30 January)
The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny (13
February)
Metropolis (20 February)
Blue Angel (27 February)
Diary of a Lost Girl (5 March)
The Threepenny Opera (9 April)
Pandora's Box (16 April)
The Triumph of the Will (30 April)
COURSE REQUIREMENTS
Discussion Questions
Each week each student will prepare two questions for
discussion. These questions will be sent to all members of
the class via email by 10 pm the Tuesday evening before
class. Preparation of these questions will be an important
part of participation in the class.
Papers
There are three papers of modest length (2000-3000) words)
for the course required of undergraduates. Two of these are
to be critical essays—feuilletons, if you will, of the sort
crafted for German newspapers by Walter Benjamin, Siegfried
Kracauer, or Joseph Roth—one on a major course primary text
and the other on one of the course movies. These papers are
due in class on the date on which the text or film is
discussed in class. The third paper, requiring some modest
research, will be a consideration of one of two major
German novels of the 1920s—Thomas Mann's Magic Mountain or
Alfred Döblin's Berlin Alexanderplatz. Graduate students in
the course will, in addition to these three papers, write a
fourth paper: a reader's report to a publisher on one of
two recent books on Weimar thought and culture: Peter
Gordon, Continental Divide: Heidegger, Cassirer, Davos or
Anton Kaes, Shell-Shock Cinema: Weimar Culture and the
Wounds of War. This paper is due on 2 May. Detail on each
of these assignments will be forthcoming.
GRADING
Grading in the course will be weighted as follows:
Undergraduates: papers (25% each); class participation
(25%). Graduates: papers (20% each); class participation
(20%).
CLASS MEETINGS, READINGS AND FILMS
Powerpoint slides presented during class sessions will be
posted on Blackboard in the Course Materials section.
