FIL 4532 – RECENT HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY: CONTINENTAL PHILOSOPHY
Seminar: Heidegger’s Being and Time
Thursdays 14.15 – 16.00
Seminar room: GM 152
Dr. Ingvild Torsen
IFIKK, University of Oslo, SPRING 2017
Office: GM 439
E-mail: [email protected]
Office hours: Wednesdays 13 – 14, or by appointment
Course description:
This course is devoted to a careful study of Martin Heidegger’s magnum opus from 1927, Being and
Time, with an emphasis on themes that become prominent in Division II of the work, such as
selfhood (including authenticity, anxiety, and death), time and history. However, before we even
begin reading Division I, we have to discuss Heidegger’s Nazism, what consequences his politics
should have for our study of the text, and how and whether we can justify devoting our time and
work to this text, given its very problematic association.
Being and Time was immediately recognized as an important work, both as a rejuvenation of the
phenomenological tradition established by Heidegger’s teacher, Edmund Husserl, and as initiating
new developments in philosophy, such as existentialism, existentialist psychology and
deconstruction. Being and Time is considered a classic in Western philosophy and is essential for
understanding the development of Continental philosophy in the 20th Century. The course will
consist of lecture and discussion, in which we try to carefully analyze and interpret Heidegger’s
difficult text. The course plan will be adjustable to interests and difficulties as we go along, but it is
the goal of the course to get through Division I within the first 6 weeks and then to carefully work
through most of Division II and also discuss recent secondary literature on themes from this
Division for the remainder of the semester. We will focus on actually understanding what we read,
rather than covering the whole text, so, inevitably, some sections and topics will not be discussed in
the seminar.
General requirements:
You are required to read 25-50 pages of difficult philosophy each week. Keeping up with the
reading and at the same time trying to understand what you read is your most important task in this
course. In addition, you should also consult secondary sources as you read. At least one reading
from secondary sources is assigned every week.
Regular class attendance and participation in discussion in class is mandatory. You should always
come to class having read the relevant sections of the text and be prepared to discuss it in detail.
You will have to present an article in the second half of the course. The article will be assigned by
the instructor (trying to take into consideration input from each student). Further guidelines for
presentations will be distributed in February. Students must complete the written requirement.
This is made up of a short research paper and is the basis for the grade you will receive in the
course. Students will be able to choose their own topic, but it needs to be approved by the
instructor. It is important that you consult and incorporate secondary sources on Heidegger’s text
in the final paper. The instructor will be available to recommend and help students find relevant
secondary material.
Plagiarism of any kind will not be tolerated and will lead to an F grade.
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FIL2505/4532
Ingvild Torsen
Spring 2017
Required texts:
Martin Heidegger. Sein und Zeit, Max Niemeyer, 1993.
Anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of German will benefit from consulting the original. Especially for Norwegian
speakers, looking at the German will be helpful, even if you don’t actually know the language.
or
Martin Heidegger. Væren og Tid, trans. Lars Holm-Hansen, Pax 2007.
We have a Norwegian translation, but it has some shortcomings as an academic text.
or
Martin Heidegger. Being and Time, trans. Macquarrie and Robinson, Harper, 1962 (2008 reprint).
NB: If you choose to use the English version, it is very important that you use this translation of the text.
and
Wrathall, Mark (ed.). Cambridge Companion to Heidegger’s Being and Time, Cambridge University Press,
2013.
You have access to this electronically through UB
and
McManus, Dennis (ed.) Heidegger, Authenticity and the Self, Themes from Division Two of Being and Time,
Routledge 2014
Recommended texts:
Dahlstrom, Daniel. The Heidegger Dictionary. Bloomsbury, 2013.
This little dictionary covers all of Heidegger’s texts and is incredibly useful. Short entries for key terms and
philosophical concepts and also references to the most important texts where these are discussed by Heidegger.
Website:
The course has an online component on Fronter. Students are responsible for checking this site
frequently and posting reader reports when they are in charge of the reading.
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