French thinking: difference, bodies, power
What is going on when you watch a movie? Or binge-watch a series?
What does having a body have to do with thinking?
Could your ideas and feelings be mere products of history?
In this course we’ll examine our world, the sciences and ourselves through the French lenses that have so greatly influenced Western thinking since WW2: de Beauvoir, Merleau-Ponty, Foucault, Deleuze, Derrida and others. We’ll become familiar with these and we’ll seek to understand their work in fun and intriguing places.
From schools to prisons, from board games to role play, from James Joyce to J.K. Rowling, from Hitchcock to TikTok… we’ll apply their ideas in practical settings.
No prior experience required – only curiosity and an open mind!
In this course, we will become familiar with some of the 20th century’s most influential and radical thinkers, their vocabularies and projects. We will then turn to the thought, politics, art and languages these theories have inspired all over the world: we will talk about influencers, identities, neoliberalism, borders, nature and so much more! Participative, interactive, this seminar will invite students to apply one or more of these theories and carry out their own investigations.
- Teaching coordinator: Cassidy Meghann