Courses

TBA

The course covers the themes of critique, 'negative' thought and utopian possibility in the works of Frankfurt School Critical Theorists Adorno, Herbert Marcuse and Max Horkheimer. We will explore their critiques of western philosophy, Reason, consciousness, ideology, capitalism, mass consumer/popular culture, aesthetics, mass psychology and authoritarianism, as well as their philosophical, historical, social, cultural and political contexts and the implications of their distinctive analysis. Course credit exclusion: Political Science 6070 6.0 and Social & Political Thought 6600 6.0

This full-year course is mandatory for all first-year PhD students in Social & Political Thought. Normally the course is facilitated by the gradate program director of Social & Political Thought and reviews a diverse variety of ideas, theories, methods and research approaches.

The course provides students with an opportunity to draft their proposal and their Major Research Paper (MRP) in a collective environment. It also provides them a chance to work closely with their instructor in developing the design, methodology and theoretical approach of the MRP. Third, it gives students a chance for reflexive and dialogical space for students to interact and provide feedback on each other's projects.

The course provides students with an opportunity to draft their proposal and their Major Research Paper (MRP) in a collective environment. It also provides them a chance to work closely with their instructor in developing the design, methodology and theoretical approach of the MRP. Third, it gives students a chance for reflexive and dialogical space for students to interact and provide feedback on each other's projects.

Examines important texts on the philosophy of human freedom in modern continental philosophy from the late eighteenth to late twentieth centuries. It focuses on essays by Kant, Schelling, Heidegger and Žižek, in which the later essays interrogate the earlier essays.

An introduction to the histories, theories, concepts and praxis of Black Feminism, as produced through intersectional struggles around race, class gender and sexuality. It considers shifts in the articulation of Black feminisms across geography, culture and time, and encourages further research into the specificities of Black Canadian feminism.

Accelerating Technicity examines the concept of technology in select works of Heidegger, Marcuse, Deleuze, Simondon, Stiegler, Hayles, Virilio and Acclerationism. Using these theorists the course will grapple with Heidegger's two conflicting tendencies in technology: the dominant tendency of instrumental technology (the danger inherent in technology) and second, the tendency toward poeisis (the revealing and saving potential inherent in technology). The course is presented in blended(BLEN)format that includes in-class, on-line and print EE components: seminar presentation, seminar participation, interactive on-line discussion forum, one minute film, plus paper abstract and essay. The aim is for the student to be able to interact proficiently and seamlessly both online and in person to meet the requirements of a networked world.

This advanced seminar seeks to understand the origins, ideas, and problems of the return to political philosophy in contemporary French thought. This multifaceted intellectual phenomenon presents a particularly rich and intense debate on the fundamental issues of political life such as freedom, democracy, conflict, domination, and social division.

This course explores the different historical and contemporary varieties, senses, and figures of ignorance, and its overlap with other concepts. It will focus on the main ways in which ignorance has been analyzed, thematized, valorized, and employed heuristically, and introduce students to the emerging scholarly field of agnotology.

This course explores the different historical and contemporary varieties, senses, and figures of ignorance, and its overlap with other concepts. It will focus on the main ways in which ignorance has been analyzed, thematized, valorized, and employed heuristically, and introduce students to the emerging scholarly field of agnotology.

This course investigates Marx’s procedure for addressing humans as collective, historical and cultural beings. It is derived largely from Aristotle, and combines essentialism and materialism in a unique synthesis that constitutes an active rather than a passive reflection.

This course is intended as an in depth study of major theoretical schools and debates within contemporary film theory. The course is divided into three key units, each of which will focus on the historical development, methodological principles and philosophic underpinning of a specific school. This is a required course for all Critical and Historical Studies students.

This course is intended as an in depth study of major theoretical schools and debates within contemporary film theory. The course is divided into three key units, each of which will focus on the historical development, methodological principles and philosophic underpinning of a specific school. This is a required course for all Critical and Historical Studies students.

This course examines the impact of international economic integration on Latin America and the Caribbean. It focuses on the social impact of globalization and the responses that these changes call forth: state policies, the rise of new political parties, unions and grassroots organizations and, in particular, international migration and transnationalism.

The course will explore key concepts, texts and debates in the field of contemporary cinema and media studies. While maintaining a focus on the intellectual and material histories of cinema studies and media studies as disciplines (and their recent convergence), including epistemological and ontological fr ameworks, methodological approaches, and institutional and technological supports, the course will emphasize recent developments in cinema and media studies. Three broad areas of study will structure the course: cinema and cultural theory; national and transnational cinema; cinema and technologies of the image.

This course develops a sociological analysis of the economy in a global context. The social organization of capitalist markets, the social implications of economic processes, and the sociological bases of economic power are explored through Marxist, world systems, institutionalist, network, feminist, and postcolonial perspectives.

This course develops a sociological analysis of the economy in a global context. The social organization of capitalist markets, the social implications of economic processes, and the sociological bases of economic power are explored through Marxist, world systems, institutionalist, network, feminist, and postcolonial perspectives.

The course is an overview of the field Black Studies. The focus of the course is, as much as possible, to provide both an international and historical view of these fields.

This course engages a critical examination of Transatlantic slavery and its afterlife, and the ways in which the imagination functions in the articulation of a desired, but always elusive, Black freedom.

This course engages a critical examination of Transatlantic slavery and its afterlife, and the ways in which the imagination functions in the articulation of a desired, but always elusive, Black freedom.

Provides a close reading of the writings of Frantz Fanon. The principal aim is to assess Fanon's status as a major thinker of the twentieth century. This requires, first, examining the formal characteristics and substantive ideas of Fanon's texts; and, second, reading his work with major intellectual currents such as post-war Hegelianism and Marxism, Existentialism and psychoanalysis, Negritude and African philosophy.

This course provides a comparative inquiry about the nature of transnational communal, religious, and political identities at the age of late capitalism. It puts emphasis on critical approaches to diasporas, their variant constructions of homeland and home, and their marked effects on the politics of the post-Westphalian state and international relations.

This course considers Marxism and psychonalaysis through an overview of key thinkers who have brought these two traditions into conversation and an examination of points of contact and divergence with respect to concepts central to each, such as alienation, fetishism, etc.

The concept and potential trajectory of the Anthropocene has challenged all avenues of human thought and expression. From physical sciences to the humanities, from history to postcolonial theory, our modes of inquiry are increasingly entangled with one another in search of a response. This course offers students a portal into key interventions and debates in the humanities and social sciences.

Subjectivity, the first-person perspective in the conduct of everyday life, has become an interdisciplinary topic in the social sciences, humanities, and psychology. In this course we discuss (a) theories of subjectivity that include the notion that individual subjectivity is embedded in social, cultural, and historical contexts and that economy, politics, and society are interwoven with the very fabric of subjectivity. (b) We analyze critical theories of subjectivity that reflect on Western biases as well as the processes of subjectification by which we consider ourselves subjects. (c) Finally, this course focuses on opportunities of resistance in the context of subjectivity. The course provides an overview of the debates that exist on the topic.