This seminar will explore the nexus of terms from the title as a slightly new way of approaching problems of subjectivity. The central question will be how subjects are formed in relation to the phenomenon of life. How is the value of life framed at different historical periods? How does that value determine the ways in which subjective attachments to life and to living are made and how identities are fashioned around these attachments? Is there a pleasure to living in itself? Does this have any value? The flipside of these questions is how death comes to signify in the economy of the living. Science and technology increasingly have a bearing on these questions too.
Texts to be discussed on the syllabus will be more or less theoretical and philosophical, with the aim of giving students a foundation for posing their own questions in their own areas of interest. The readings in common (mainly excerpts) will range from classical antiquity (Plato, Aristotle, Lucretius, Seneca) to early modernity (Spinoza, Rousseau, Kant) to the nineteenth century (Nietzsche) to the twentieth century (Freud, Bergson, Arendt, Lacan, Butler, Lear, Agamben, Deleuze, P. Singer) to the present (E. Santner and Žižek), while focusing on the italicized authors. During the last few weeks of the seminar, students will bring in their own readings representing their personal projects, which can be in any area, whether literary, sociological, historical, philosophical, science studies, etc., and in any period. Students from Comparative Literature and from other disciplines are welcome.
Main readings: Plato, Phaedo; Aristotle, De anima; Spinoza, Ethics; Rousseau, Reveries; Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra; Freud, Beyond the Pleasure Principle; Agamben, Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life
Further details available at CTools; access is permitted for those who sign up for the course. Questions? Contact me.