PHILOSOPHY 81 – POSTMODERNISM

COURSE DESCRIPTION

Postmodernism! This course is an exploration of the several narratives and theoretical insights
which point out both the good and the bad of the modern project. The study begins with a brief recounting
of the thesis of the enlightenment in Kant. After which, an exploration of the post-war polemics by Adorno
and Horkheimer follows. A discussion/reading of Lyotard closes the study on “the post-modern condition".

OBJECTIVES

We are preoccupied only with a few modest tasks:

A. re-visit some modern philosophical assumptions,

B. explore those critical stances against modernity;
C. identity the salient points that make up the post-modern conditions.

SCOPE: CONTENT

Intro/salvo

Kant (1991)
Habermas (1981)
Sheehan (2004)
Jameson (1998)

Fons primaria Tempus

Horkheimer & Adorno (2002) - contingere

Lyotard (1984) - contingere

EXPECTATIONS

a. Absences may be justified but must not be exaggerated.

b. Group dynamics.
c. Participation.

LEARNING PROPENSITY APPROXIMATION

Attendance 30%
Group dynamics 40%
Class Participation 30%
REFERENCES

Butler, C. (2002). Postmodernism. A very short introduction. USA: Oxford University Press.
Calhoun, C. (1993). Postmodernism as pseudohistory. Theory, culture and society 10: 75-96.
Callinicos, A. (1985). Postmodernism, post-structuralism, post-Marxism? Theory, Culture and Society
2: 85-101.
Cooper, D. (1993). Postmodernism and the ‘end of philosophy’. International journal of philosophical
studies 1 (1): 49-59.
Habermas, J. (1981). Modernity vs. post-modernity. (S. Benhabib, Trans.). New German critique
22, 3-14.
Hiett, P.J. (1995). Postmodernism – a cross-cultural perspective. Asian philosophy: an international
journal of the philosophical tradition in the East 5(2): 197-208.
Horkheimer, M. and T. Adorno. ([1947, 1987], 2002). Dialectic of Enlightenment. Philosophical
Fragments. (G.S. Noerr, Ed.; E. Jephcott, Trans.). Stanford, California: Stanford University Press.
Jameson, F. (1998). Theories of the postmodern. The cultural turn: selected writings on the postmodern
1983-1998. (pp21-32). London and New York: Verso.
Kant, I. (1991). An answer to the question: ‘What is Enlightenment?’. Kant: political writings
2nd Ed. (pp.54-60), (H.S. Reiss, Trans.). UK: Cambridge University Press.
Kellner, D. (1988). Postmodernism as social theory: some challenges and problems. Theory, culture and
society 5: 239-69.
Lyotard, J.-F. ([1979], 1984). The postmodern condition: a report on knowledge. (G. Bennington and B.
Massumi, Translators; F. Jameson, Forword). USA: University of Minnesota Press.
Outhwaite, W. (1999). The myth of modernist method. European journal of social theory 2(1): 5-25.
Seidman, S. (1991). Postmodern anxiety: the politics of epistemology. Sociological theory 9(2): 180-190.
Sheehan, P. (2004). Postmodernism and philosophy. The Cambridge companion to postmodernism. (S.
Connor, Editor), (pp20-22). New York, USA: Cambridge University Press.

Prepared by:

Ismael P. Magadan, Jr.

Facilitator