Enlightenment and Romanticism

Academic year 2011-12

Date last modified

23-4-2012 1:29

Period

Period 1

Startdate:

05-Sep-11

Enddate:

28-Oct-11

Code

HUM2005

ECTS credits

5.0

Organisational unit

University College Maastricht

Coordinator

F.M. Doorman

Description

The debate between Enlightenment and Romanticism has an enduring impact on discussions of today in art, politics, science, human identity and social values. This course is a systematical introduction to these two, formative, opposed intellectual traditions. First, a historical context will be presented to the political and ideological ambitions of the Enlightenment (enlightened despotism, the court of Frederick the Great, the diffusion of the Enlightenment). Secondly the opposed approach to ‘Nature’ will be introduced; the influence of Newton, the rise of modern science, the Encyclopédie vs. Romantic science (e.g. Goethe’s criticism on Newton’s Theory of Colour) and the role of the arts in the new approach to Nature. Then, the changes in the visual arts will be treated, illustrating continuity and discontinuity in cultural history (e.g. the ambiguous meaning of Neo-Classicism). In the fourth place human subjectivity in the Enlightenment (based on Lockean psychology) will be confronted to new approaches to the romantic soul (the unconsciousness, irrationality, Weltschmerz). Finally, discussions about morals and politics will be presented (Rousseau, the Social Contract, the slogans of the French Revolution vs. Romantic values concerning the State and personal relationships like love and friendship).

Goals

• To provide students with a historical and philosophical introduction to Enlightenment. • To study these trends as a systematic confrontation in literary, social, anthropological, scientific and political developments.

Instruction language

Prerequisites

Recommended literature

• Dorinda Outram, The Enlightenment. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge / New York 1996. • Norman Hampson, The Enlightenment. An evaluation of its assumptions, attitudes and values. Penguin Books, Harmondsworth 1990. • Maurice Cranston, The Romantic Movement. Blackwell, Oxford / Cambridge (Mass.) 1995. • Charles Larmore, The Romantic Legacy. Columbia University Press, New York 1996.

Teaching methods

PBL
LECTURE(S)

Assessment methods

FINAL PAPER
ATTENDANCE
PARTICIPATION
WRITTEN EXAM

Key words