SYLLABUS
COURSE TITLE
FACULTY/INSTITUTE
COURSE CODE
DEGREE PROGRAMME
FIELD OF STUDY
ANCIENT HISTORY
COURSE FORMAT
YEAR AND SEMESTER
NAME OF THE TEACHER
PHILOSOPHY OF MODERN CIVILISATION.
AN INTRODUCTION
INSTITUTE OF HISTORY
CULT.001
DEGREE LEVEL
FORMA STUDIÓW/STUDY
MODE
UNDERGRADUATE
FULL-TIME COURSE
TUTORIAL
2015/2016, SECOND SEMESTER
WITOLD NOWAK PHD.
COURSE OBJECTIVES
KNOWLEDGE
BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF THE MECHANISMS OF FUNCTIONING OF THE
MODERN CIVILISATION AND ITS INSTITUTIONS. A DISPLAY OF THE ROLE OF
RELIGION AND SCIENCE IN MODERN WESTERN WORLD. CRITICAL
PRESENTATION OF LEADING IDEALS OF MODERN WORLDVIEW: FREEDOM,
INDIVIDUALISM, AUTHENTICITY, AND SELF-REALISATION.
RESEARCH DEVELOPMENT
PRACTICAL SKILLS USEFUL IN READING AND INTERPRETATION OF
PHILOSOPHICAL TEXTS.
PRESENTATION
COMMUNICATION SKILLS CONNECTED WITH FORMULATING IDEAS AND
INTERPRETATIONS.
PREREQUISITES
BASIC KNOWLEDGE ABOUT MODERN HISTORY (PASSED
EXAM), ESPECIALLY THE HISTORY OF WESTERN WORLD.
KNOWLEDGE ON MAIN FIGURES IN MODERN PHILOSOPHY
AND THEIR IDEAS WARMLY WELCOMED.
KNOWLEDGE:
BETTER KNOWLEDGE ABOUT THE MECHANISMS OF THE
MODERN CIVILISATION AND ITS INSTITUTIONS. BETTER
KNOWLEDGE ABOUT MAIN IDEAS OF MODERN WORLDVIEW.
LEARNING
OUTCOMES
SKILLS:
BASIC CONCEPT OF WORKING WITH PHILOSOPHICAL TEXTS
(THE PROCESS OF CRITIC AND INTERPRETATION OF
DIFFERENT KINDS OF NARRATIVE AND INTERPRETATIVE
TEXT).
FINAL COURSE OUTPUT - SOCIAL COMPETENCES:
WORKING, ARGUING AND DISCUSSING AMONG OTHER
STUDENTS. SHARING DIFFERENT VIEWS WITH RESPECT TO
INTERLOCUTORS.
COURSE ORGANISATION –LEARNING FORMAT AND NUMBER OF HOURS
15 HOURS OF CLASSES
COURSE DESCRIPTION
The course is intended to display a wide range of factors that contributed to raise and
development of modern western civilisation. It includes new attitudes to sacrum and
profanum and new evaluation of ordinary life. Furthermore it includes concept of modernity
as new ethics focused on the individual and new concept of freedom – freedom as
authenticity. Social and economic factors will be discussed either.
The outline of the course:
- An introduction to the course: an explanation of concepts and methods of inquiry;
- The beginnings of the Modern World: The Renaissance;
- The Reformation and its affirmation of ordinary life;
- The Romantic “expressivist revolution”;
- Modern idea of the self and self-identity;
- J. J. Rousseau and modern ethics of authenticity;
- The ethics of authenticity after Rousseau;
- Conclusion: modernity and post-modernity.
METHODS OF INSTRUCTION
REQUIREMENTS AND
ASSESSMENTS
GRADING SYSTEM
TOTAL STUDENT
WORKLOAD NEEDED TO
ACHIEVE EXPECTED
LEARNING OUTCOMES
EXPRESSED
IN TIME AND ECTS CREDIT
POINTS
LANGUAGE
OF
INSTRUCTION
INTERNSHIP
MATERIALS
WORKING WITH TEXTS (CRITICIZING, ANALYSING),
DISCUSSING, FORMULATIONG CONCLUSIONS AND
GENERALIZATIONS
 ATTENDANCE AND PARTICIPATION IN CLASS
(20%)
 ORAL PRESENTATION IN CLASS ON GIVEN
SUBJECT (40%)
 SHORT PAPER BEING AN INTERPRETATION OF ONE
OF THE CLASSICAL PHILOSOPHICAL TEXTS ON
MODERNITY (40%)
2, 3, 3.5, 4, 4.5, 5
15 HOURS OF TUTORIAL
40 HOURS OF STUDENT’S OWN STUDIES
1 HOUR OF CONSULTATION
.... ECTS
ENGLISH
–
PRIMARY OR REQUIRED BOOKS/READINGS:



Ch. Taylor, Sources of the Self, Cambridge 1989 –
fragments;
Ch. Taylor, The Ethics of Authenticity, Cambridge 1992 –
fragments;
Ch. Taylor, Modern Social Imaginaries, London 2004 –
fragments;




A. N. Whitehead, Science and the Modern World, London
1987 – fragments;
A. MacIntyre, After Virtue. A Study in Moral Philosophy, fragments;
J. Baudrillard, America, New York 2003;
J. Passmore, A hundred years of philosophy, New York
1959.
Additional literature will be provided during the classes.
SUPPLEMENTAL OR OPTIONAL BOOKS/READINGS:


Ch. Taylor, Secular Age, Harvard 2009 – fragments.
A. MacIntyre, Dependent rational animals, Chicago 1999.