Topics in Twentieth Century Continental Philosophy:

                                                           Critical Theory
 

Required Texts

 Ingram and Simon-Ingram, eds., Critical Theory:  The Essential Readings
 Seidman, ed., Jurgen Habermas on Society and Politics
 David Couzens Hoy and Thomas McCarthy, Critical Theory

Texts on Reserve Reading, Main Library

 Wigggerhaus, Rolf, The Frankfurt School
 Habermas, Jurgen, Autonomy and Solidarity: Interviews
 Habermas, Jurgen, Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action
 Habermas, Jurgen, The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity
 Honneth, A. and Joas, H. eds Communicative Action:  Essays on "The Theory of Communicative Action."
 Ingram, David,Habermas and the Dialectic of Reason
 McCarthy, Thomas, The Critical Theory of J. Habermas
 Rasmussen, David, Reading Habermas
  Roderick, Rick,  Habermas and the Foundations of Critical Theory   White, Stephen, The Recent Work of J Habermas
 Thompson, J and Held, D, eds., Habermas:Critical Debates
 Jay, Martin, The Dialectical Imagination
 Held, David, Introduction to Critical Theory

Course Outline

August 28  Course introduction:  critical theory and modern philosophy

August 30  Competing ideas of theory

   Readings:  Marcuse, "Philosophy and Critical Theory";  Adorno, "Why Philosophy?" (I)

Sept. 6  Challenging the tradition

   Readings:  Horkheimer, from "Means and Ends";  Adorno and Horkheimer, from "The Concept of Enlightenment" (I)

Sept. 11  Philosophy and ethics

   Readings:  Marcuse, "On Hedonism";  Horkheimer, "Materialism and Morality" (I)

Sept. 13  Issues concerning reason and action

   Readings:   Habermas, "Dogmatism, Reason, Decision:  On Theory and Practice in a Scientific Civilization" (S)

Sept. 18  More on practical reason: a communications approach

   Readings:  Habermas from Legitimation Crisis;  Habermas, from "An Alternative Way Out of the Philosophy of the Subject:  Communicative Vs. Subject-Centered Reason" (I)

Sept. 20  Programmatic statements

   Reading:  Horkheimer, from "Traditional and Critical Theory" (I)

Sept. 25  Programmatic statements, continued.

   Reading:  Habermas, "Knowledge and Human Interests:  A General Perspective" (I)

Sept. 27  Sources of critical theory:  Marx

   Reading:  Habermas, "Between Philosophy and Science:  Marxism as Critique" (S)

Oct. 2  Sources of critical theory:  Freud and Nietzsche

   Reading:  Habermas, "Self-Reflection as Science:  Freud's Psychoanalytic Critique of Meaning" and "Psychoanalysis and Social Theory:  Nietzsche's Reduction of Cognitive Interests"(S)

Oct. 4  Critical theory and social analysis

   Readings:  Adorno, "Society," and "How to Look at Television" (I)

Oct. 9  Adorno's analyses, continued

   Reading:  Adorno, "Freudian Theory and the Pattern of Fascist Propaganda" (I)
 
Oct. 11  Confronting technology

   Readings:  Marcuse, "The Catastrophe of Liberation" (I), and Habermas, Technology and Science as 'Ideology'" (S)

Oct. 16  Further discussion of the Habermas/Marcuse debate

Oct. 18  Politics as a distinctive practice

   Reading:  Habermas, "The Public Sphere" (S)

Oct. 23  Social theory and history

   Reading:  Habermas, "Toward a Reconstruction of Historical Materialism" (S)

Oct. 25  Habermas on historical materialism, continued.

Oct. 30  Terms of philosophically minded social theory

   Reading:  Habermas, "Social Action and Rationality" (S)

Nov. 1  Habermas's social theory, continued

   Reading:  Habermas, "The Concept of the Lifeworld and the Hermeneutic Idealism of Interpretive Sociology" (S)

Nov. 6  Dynamics of modern society

   Reading:  Habermas, "The Uncoupling of System and Lifeworld" (S)

Nov. 8  Crisis tendencies

   Readings:  Habermas, "What Does a Legitimation Crisis Mean Today?" (S) and "The Crisis of the Welfare State and the Exhaustion of Utopian Energies" (S)
 

Nov. 13  Reflections on the role of critical theory

   Reading:  Habermas, "Modernity:  An Unfinished Project" (I)

Nov. 15  More on the problems facing critical theory

   Reading:  Habermas, "The Tasks of a Critical Theory of Society"

Nov. 20  Critics and commentaries

   Readings:  Fraser, "What's Critical About Critical Theory?" (I) and Benhabib, "The Utopian Dimension in Communicative Ethics"

Nov. 22  Further discussion of issues about critical theory

   Reading:  McCarthy, "Philosophy and Critical Theory:  A Reprise," pp. 7-62
 

Nov. 27  Continuing review discussion and debates

   Reading:  McCarthy, pp. 63-100

Nov. 29  Critical challenges

   Reading:  Hoy, "Critical Theory and Critical History," pp.103-171

Dec. 4  Further criticism

   Reading:  Hoy, pp. 172-214, McCarthy, "Rejoinder to David Hoy" and Hoy, "Rejoinder to Thomas McCarthy"

Dec. 6  Course review
 

Course Requirements

 Students are required to attend all class meetings having read the assigned readings.
 In addition to three short writing assignments (responding to study questions on the required reading), there will be two projects and a short term paper.  The first project will involve developing a contrast between general features of critical theory and some other approach to philosophy.  The second project will address a specific social issue from a critical theory perspective.  Class members will be expected to make use of their projects in class discussion.  The term paper will address controversies about some feature of critical theory.

 The short assignments are due Sept. 18, Oct. 18, and Nov. 6

 The projects are due Oct. 2 and Nov. 20

 The term paper is due by 12 n, Dec. 14, in the Philosophy Department office, 503 South Kedzie Hall.
 

Office Hours

 Thursdays, 2-4, and by appointment

 Office:  512 South Kedzie Hall
 phone:  353-9378  messages: 355-4490