[a] Kant it be experience?
Expérience
History 310 & Anthropology 375
Spring 2025
Wednesday
19:15-22:30
History 310 & Anthropology 375
Spring 2025
Wednesday
19:15-22:30
Robert André LaFleur Office Hours:
Morse Ingersoll 206 Monday 12:00-13:30
363-2005 Wednesday 12:00-13:30
lafleur@beloit.edu ..or by appointment (just
lafleur@beloit.edu ..or by appointment (just
send me an email message)
Required Books (in order of reading)
Readings Available in .pdf Format
HIST 310
Expérience
Spring 2025
Oakeshott, Michael. Experience and its Modes
Collingwood, R.G. Autobiography
Jay, Martin. Songs of Experience
Blake, William. Songs of Experience
Collins, Arthur. Possible Experience.
James, William. The Varieties of Religious Experience.
Dewey, James. Art as Experience.
Dewey, John. Experience and Education.
James, William, and John Dewey. On Belief and Experience
Lienhardt, Godfrey. Divinity and Experience
Mullaney, Thomas and Christopher Rea, Where Research Begins
*** ***
Research notebook
Chicago Manual of Style Guidelines
Research notebook
Chicago Manual of Style Guidelines
Round and Square (www.robert-lafleur.blogspot.com)
Readings Available in .pdf Format
The New York Review of Books (NYRB)
LaFleur, Robert. Writing, History, and Culture (Rob's Writing Guide, fifty-fourth edition)
Adler, Mortimer. How to Read a Book
Richards, I.A. How to Read a Page
Eco, Umberto. How to Write a Thesis
Reserve Books
All books are also available on library reserve.
Course Description
Course Description
xxx
Evaluation
Quizzes 10% Every Session
Expérience Letter 10% Week Five
Exams I & II 15% Weeks Seven and Fifteen
Exams I & II 15% Weeks Seven and Fifteen
Midterm Research Prospectus 10% Week Ten
Presentation 10% Week Fifteen
Final Essay 45% Finals Week
Presentation 10% Week Fifteen
Final Essay 45% Finals Week
Class attendance and participation is expected.
See my class attendance and participation policy.
Late assignments will be penalized—see my late assignment policy.
HIST 310
Expérience
Spring 2025
Week I
(January 22)
Wednesday, January 22
Syllabic Cycles: Introduction (a-d) Read all four posts, not just “a.”
Blake, Songs of Experience (just get a sense of Blake's poetry)
Scruton, Kant: A Very Short Introduction
Life, Works, and Character
Life, Works, and Character
The Background of Kant's Thought
The Transcendental Deduction
The Logic of Illusion
The Categorical Imperative
Due THIS Sunday, January 26:
A thousand-word (three page) essay explaining your possible
seminar paper topic about a topic dealing with "experience." Yes,
it is early, but give it a try.
This should be written as a brief, but well-structured
academic essay, and not an informal work.
Due by 5:00 p.m. in Sunday, January 26
academic essay, and not an informal work.
Due by 5:00 p.m. in Sunday, January 26
Since buildings will be closed, please send it to me (lafleur@beloit.edu)
as a .pdf file on Sunday, and then bring a paper copy
to either Godfrey 106 or MI 206 on Monday
Week II
(January 29)
Wednesday, Janaury 29
Round and Square Quotidian Quizzes:Introduction (a-h)
Round and Square Quotidian Quizzes:Introduction (a-h)
Read all eight posts, not just “a.” (You may skim a-d, but begin reading carefully
with post "e," or "5", depending on the link (some are listed a-h and others 1-8;
they are the same). The last four are crucial; your grade depends on it).
Your task this week, and in the next few weeks, as well, is to learn to read like a graduate student, covering large swaths of material while gaining insight into what the author is doing. In the case, you are aided by the need to be a detective, of sorts, trying to understand what the term "experience" means (specifically for John Dewey, but more generally, as well).
Dewey, Experience and Education
Traditional v.s. Progressive Education
Traditional v.s. Progressive Education
The Need of a Theory of Experience
Criteria of Experience
Social Control
The Nature of Freedom
The Meaning of Purpose
Progressive Organization of Subject Matter
Experience—The Means and Goals of Education
Dewey, Art as Experience
Preface
Preface
The Live Creature
The Live Creature and "Ethereal Things"
The Act of Expression
The Expressive Object
Substance and Form
The Natural History of Form
The Organization of Energies
The Common Substance of the Arts
The Human Contribution
The Challenge to Philosophy
Criticism and Perception
Art and Civilization
Mullaney and Rea, Where Research Begins, 1-15
Introduction (just get a sense of what you'll be doing with this book)
Introduction (just get a sense of what you'll be doing with this book)
*** ***
(hard copy in MI 206 or Godfrey 106; "time-stamps" will be accepted as .pdf files
with hard copies to follow by the beginning of the week,
Week III
(February 5)
Wednesday, February 5
Round and Square Click for separate Round and Square syllabus
Round and Square Click for separate Round and Square syllabus
Magee, Confessions of a Philosopher, xxx-xxx
The Discovery of Kant
Collins, Possible Experience
Kant and the Cartesian Philosophy of Mind
Subjectivism versus Idealism
Idealism and Transcendental Idealism
Are Things-in-Themselves Noumena?
The Concept of Representation
"Space Is in Us"
Other Causes of Perception
Kant Not a Foundationalist
The "How-Possible" Questions
The "Clue" for Finding the Categories
The Parallelism of Inner and Outer Sense
The Subject of Experience
How Representations Make Objects Possible
Objects and Empirical Realism
The Idealistic Understanding of Kant's Theoretical Philosophy
Mullaney and Rea, Where Research Begins, 17-66
Part I: Become a Self-Centered Researcher
Part I: Become a Self-Centered Researcher
Chapter 1: Questions
Chapter 2: What's Your Problem?
*** ***
(hard copy in MI 206 or Godfrey 106; "time-stamps" will be accepted as .pdf files
with hard copies to follow by the beginning of the week,
[b] Experience
Week IV
(February 12)
Wednesday, February 12
Round and Square Click for separate Round and Square syllabus
Round and Square Click for separate Round and Square syllabus
Read the whole book, "graduate-style," working on your skills in noting themes. Your task is to combine this week's reading with the last two, gaining a solid, if still incomplete, sense of "experience" from them. You will "present" two chapters, along with one or two others. Take notes for this. You need not get together with others in your group in advance. I have noted your chapter with your initials. If you have any questions, let me know.
Jay, Songs of Experience
Introduction (Everyone)
Introduction (Everyone)
The Trial of "Experience" (AzS, KC, KK)
Experience and Epistemology (JF, AG, CM)
The Approval of Religious Experience (CK, KK, MM)
Returning to the Body Through Aesthetic Experience (CM, MM, DP)
Politics and Experience (DP, JR, CR)
History and Experience (CR, AaS, JR)
The Cult of Experience in American Pragmatism (SS, AzS, AsS)
Lamenting the Crisis of Experience (KC,JF. SS)
The Poststructuralist Reconstitution of Experience (AG, CK)
Conclusion (Everyone)
Mullaney and Rea, Where Research Begins, 67-116
Part I, continued
Part I, continued
Chapter 3: Designing a Project That Works
*** ***
(hard copy in MI 206 or Godfrey 106; "time-stamps" will be accepted as .pdf files
with hard copies to follow by the beginning of the week,
Week V
(February 19)
Wednesday, February 19
Round and Square Click for separate Round and Square syllabus
Round and Square Click for separate Round and Square syllabus
Read the whole book, "graduate-style," working on your skills in noting themes. Your task is to combine this week's reading with the last two, gaining a solid, if still incomplete, sense of "experience" from them. You will "present" two chapters, along with one or two others. Take notes for this. You need not get together with others in your group in advance. I have noted your chapter with your initials. If you have any questions, let me know.
Jay, Songs of Experience (read it better this week!)
This book is central to the course, so review your presentation notes and spend your time doing a better job than last week with grasping the message of the book as a whole (this will rarely happen in a Ph.D. program, but it is a useful way to do a reset).
Do not use this as an excuse not to work hard this week.
Introduction (Everyone)
The Trial of "Experience" (AzS, KC, KK)
Experience and Epistemology (JF, AG, CM)
The Approval of Religious Experience (CK, KK, MM)
Returning to the Body Through Aesthetic Experience (CM, MM, DP)
Politics and Experience (DP, JR, CR)
History and Experience (CR, AaS, JR)
The Cult of Experience in American Pragmatism (SS, AzS, AsS)
Lamenting the Crisis of Experience (KC,JF. SS)
The Poststructuralist Reconstitution of Experience (AG, CK)
Conclusion (Everyone)
Mullaney and Rea, Where Research Begins, 117-152
Part II: Get Over Yourself
Part II: Get Over Yourself
Chapter 4: How to Find Your Problem Collective
(hard copy in MI 206 or Godfrey 106; "time-stamps" will be accepted as .pdf files
with hard copies to follow by the beginning of the week,
Week VI
(February 26)
Wednesday, February 26
Round and Square Click for separate Round and Square syllabus
LaFleur, Writing, History, and Culture
Part One: Writing and Time
Round and Square Click for separate Round and Square syllabus
LaFleur, Writing, History, and Culture
Part One: Writing and Time
Part Two: The Writing Process
Part Three: Styling Culture: Navigating Grammatical Forests
Part Four: Citing Culture
Part Five: Exemplary Miscellany (appendix material; not required for today)
Adler, How to Read a Book, 3-95
Part One: The Dimensions of Reading
The Activity and Art of Reading
The Levels of Reading
The First Level of Reading: Elementary Reading
The Second Level of Reading: Inspectional Reading
Part Two: The Third Level of Reading: Analytical Reading
How to Be a Demanding Reader
Pigeonholing a Book
X-Raying a Book
Richards, How to Read a Page
Use the skills you gained from Adler to "get to know" this book)
Introduction
How a Reader Might Improve
An Obvious Characteristic of All Animals
To Learn, Compare
Random Scratching and Clawing
To Unite, Abstract
The Warfare of Heart and Head
The Choice of the Key Words
Part-Whole Shifts and Content Changes
Make, Get, Give, Love, Have
Seem, Be, Do, See
Mind, Thought, Idea, Knowledge
Reasons, Purpose, Work, Retrospect
***. ***
(March 5)
See my class attendance and participation policy
Wednesday, March 5Round and Square Click for separate Round and Square syllabus
James and Dewey, On Belief and Experience
Read the whole book, "graduate-style," working on your skills in noting themes. Your task is to combine this week's reading with the last month of work, gaining a solid, if still incomplete, sense of "experience" from them. You will read the introduction the introduction the middle section (James writing about Dewey and Dewey writing about James), as well as one of the two major sections. .
Introduction (Everyone)
Introduction (Everyone)
William James (AzS, KC, KK, JF, AG, CM, DP, JR)
Reflex Action and Theism (1881)
Psychology and Belief (1889)
Is Life Worth Living? (1895)
The Will to Believe (1896)
From The Varieties of Religious Experience (1902)
What Pragmatism Means (1907)
A World of Pure Experience (1904)
From A Pluralistic Universe (1909)
Transitions (Everyone)
William James (1910) by John Dewey
The Chicago School (1904) by William James
John Dewey (CR, CK, KK, MM, CM, DP, SS, AaS)
The Influence of Darwinism on Philosophy (1909)
The Postulate of Immediate Empiricism (1909)
The Copernican Revolution (1929)
What I Believe (1930)
From A Common Faith (1934)
From Experience and Nature (1929)
From Art as Experience (1934)
Mullaney and Rea, Where Research Begins, 152-191
Part II: Get Over Yourself
Part II: Get Over Yourself
Chapter 5: How to Navigate Your Field
Chapter 6: How to Begin
Exam 1 (in class)
***. ***
Week VIII
Spring Break
Blakewell, How to Live (highly recommended—just think about "experience")
Q. How to live?
Michel de Montaigne in one question and twenty attempts...
1. Q. How to live? A. Don't worry about death
2. Q. How to live? A. Pay attention ; Starting to write
3. Q. How to live? A. Be born ; Micheau ; The experiment
4. Q. How to live? A. Read a lot, forget most of what you read...
5. Q. How to live? A. Survive love and loss
6. Q. How to live? A. Use little tricks A. Little tricks and the art of living
7. Q. How to live? A. Question everything ; All I know is that I know nothing...
8. Q. How to live? A. Keep a private room behind the shop
9. Q. How to live? A. Be convivial, live with others ; A gay and sociable wisdom...
10. Q. How to live? A. Wake from the sleep of habit
11. Q. How to live? A. Live temperately ; Raising and lowering the temperature
12. Q. How to live? A. Guard your humanity ; Terror ; Hero
13. Q. How to live? A. Do something no one has done before
15. Q. How to live? A. Do a good job, but not too good a job
16. Q. How to live? A. Philosophize only by accident
17. Q. How to live? A. Reflect on everything; regret nothing
18. Q. How to live? A. Give up control
19. Q. How to live? A. Be ordinary and imperfect
20. Q. How to live? A. Let life be its own answer
 [c] "A" is for Anthropology Week IX (March 19) See my class attendance and participation policy Wednesday, March 19 No Class. Do the quiz, and read the assigned book, which we'll discuss next week. James, The Varieties of Religious Experience Religion and Neurology Circumscription of the Topic The Reality of the Unseen The Religion of Healthy-Mindedness The Sick Soul The Divided Self and the Process of its Unification Conversion Saintliness The Value of Saintliness Mysticism Philosophy Other Characteristics Conclusions Postcript ***. *** Week X (March 26) See my class attendance and participation policy Wednesday, March 26 Round and Square Click for separate Round and Square syllabus Review your notes from William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience Lienhardt, Divinity and Experience Introduction Part One Division in the World Divine Unity and Multiplicity: Free Divinities Divine Unity and Multiplicity: Clan Divinities Divinity and Experience Part Two The Myth of the Spear Masters The Control of Experience: Invocation and Prayer The Control of Experience: Symbolic Action Burial Alive ***. *** Week XI (April 2) See my class attendance and participation policy Wednesday, April 2 Round and Square Click for separate Round and Square syllabus New York Review of Books Click for separate New York Review of Books syllabus Collingwood, Autobiography Bent of a Twig Spring Frost Minute Philosophers Inclination of a Sapling Question and Answer The Decay of Realism The History of Philosophy The Need for a Philosophy of History The Foundations of the Future History as Self-Knowledge of Mind Roman Britain Theory and Practice Collingwood, The Idea of History, 205-496 Epilegomena Human Nature and Human History The Historical Imagination Historical Evidence History as Re-Enactment of Past Experience The Subject Matter of History History and Freedom Progress as Created by Historical Thinking Preliminary Discussion The Idea of a Philosophy. of Something, and, In Particular, a Philosophy of History Lectures on the Philosophy of History Outlines of a Philosophy of History ***. *** Make sure that you read the Final Seminar Paper Assignment (due as a .pdf copy (no hard copies) by Tuesday, May 6 by 5:00 p.m.  [d] The starry heavens above... Week XII (April 9) Wednesday, April 9 Oakeshott, Experience and its Modes Introduction Experience and its Modes Historical Experience Scientific Experience Practical Experience Conclusion ***. *** Make sure that you read the Final Seminar Paper Assignment (due on Tuesday, May 6 by 5:00 p.m.—.pdf attachment only) Week XIII (April 14) Monday, April 14 Please note that we are meeting on Monday this week ONLY Round and Square Click for separate Round and Square syllabus McDermott, The Culture of Experience: Philosophical Essays in the American Grain Introduction: An American Notion of Experience To Be Human is to Humanize The Community Experience and Religious Metaphors Deprivation and Celebration: Suggestions for an Aesthetic Ecology Life Is in the Transitions: Radical Empiricism and Contemporary Concerns From Cynicism to Amelioration: Strategies for a Cultural Pedagogy Feeling as Insight: The Affective Dimension in Social Diagnosis Nature Nostalgia and the City: An American Dilemma Space, Time, and Touch: Philosophical Dimensions of Urban Consciousness ***. *** Make sure that you read the Final Seminar Paper Assignment (due on Tuesday, May 6 by 5:00 p.m.—.pdf attachment only) Week XIV (April 21—Monday This Week Only) Monday, April 21 Please note that we are meeting on Monday only this week. Round and Square Click for separate Round and Square syllabusMcDermott, Streams of Experience: Reflections on the History and Philosophy of American Culture One: Some Philosophical Foundations The Cultural Immortality of Philosophy as Human Drama Spires of Influence: The Importance of Emerson for Classical American Philosophy The Promethean Self and Community in the Philosophy of James Two: The American Odyssey and its Bequest as Champions of Surprise Transiency and Amelioration: An American Bequest for the New Millennium America: The Loneliness of the Quest Classical American Philosophy: A Reflective Bequest to the Twenty-First Century A Relational World: The Significance of the THought of William James and John Dewey for Global Culture Three: The Pragmatic Upshot The Aesthetic Drama of the Ordinary Experience Grows by its Edges: A Phenomenology of Relations in an American Philosophical Vein The Inevitability of Our Own Death: The Celebration of Time as a Prelude to Disaster Do Not Bequeath a Shamble: The Child in the Twenty-First Century Cultural Literacy: A Time for a New Curriculum Glass Without Feet: Dimensions of Urban Aesthetics Isolation as Starvation: John Dewey and a Philosophy of the Handicapped Appendix: The Renascence of Classical American Philosophy ***. *** Make sure that you read the Final Seminar Paper Assignment (due on Tuesday, May 6 by 5:00 p.m.—.pdf attachment only) Week XV (April 30) See my class attendance and participation policy Wednesday, April 29 Round and Square Click for separate Round and Square syllabus T.S. Eliot, The Wasteland The Burial of the Dead A Game of Chess The Fire Sermon Death by Water What the Thunder Said T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets Burnt Norton East Coker The Dry Salvages Little Gidding T.S. Eliot, Collected Poems The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock The Hollow Men Mullaney and Rea, Where Research Begins, 193-201 Part II: Get Over Yourself What's Next in Your Research Journey? ***. *** Make sure that you read the Final Seminar Paper Assignment (due on Tuesday, May 6 by 5:00 p.m.—.pdf attachment only) |
No comments:
Post a Comment