Trent University :: Theory, Culture and Politics

Topics in Continental Philosophy

Previously Offered Courses

M.A. Program Courses Offered in 2011-2012

T5000 - Seminar on theory, culture and politics
Cultural Theory - Anne Meneley

Political Theory - Doug Torgerson
Subjects of Desire- James Penney
Topics in Continental Philosophy - Emilia Angelova

Seminar on Theory, Culture and Politics (T5000)

Co-ordinator: Program Director
Full year
Time: Thursday, 7:00pm-9:00pm OR Friday, 10:00am-12:00pm
Location: TC CH102

Note: as a rule, the T5000 seminar will meet on Thursday evenings; occasionally, especially when there are visiting speakers, the seminar will meet instead on Friday mornings.

1. Aims
The course has three aims:
a. to introduce students to key contemporary issues, problems, and perspectives in the theoretically reflexive study of theory, culture, and politics;
b. to provide a forum within which students can develop a bridge between these issues and the various elements of their own study projects;
c. to foster professional skills in the writing and oral presentation of academic work.

The speakers’ series associated with the T5000 course is central to the intellectual life of the Centre for the Study of Theory, Culture and Politics within which the M.A. Program is situated. By participating in T500, students are encouraged to become involved with faculty and other students, in the ongoing development of the Centre’s program of research.

2. Theme
The overall theme for this year’s course, and for the associated speakers’ series, is “Re-presentations,” a theme that is deliberately broad and that invites discussion of its scope and meaning.

3. Format
The week-by-week activities in the course include a variety of sessions:
a. seminar discussions of readings proposed both by the co-ordinator and the students;
b. public presentations by invited speakers;
c. follow-up seminars for T500 students, led by these speakers (who will also have assigned one or two readings as background for their talks). These follow-up sessions will usually be scheduled on the Friday morning after the Thursday evening presentation;
d. sessions toward the end of the academic year devoted to student presentations of their thesis projects;
e. a student-based, one-day symposium at the end of the course, at which each student will present a short paper on a topic of her/his choice (normally related to the student’s thesis project) under the general rubric of “Re-presentations.”

4. Readings by such authors as
... Louis Althusser, J.L. Austin, Walter Benjamin, Judith Butler, Teresa de Lauretis, Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, Sigmund Freud, Jürgen Habermas, Donna Haraway, Martin Heidegger, Max Horkheimer, Luce Irigaray, Fredric Jameson, Jacques Lacan, Jean-François Lyotard, Joan Riviere ...