Courses 09-10, Institute for Christian Studies

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ICS Launches Centre for Philosophy, Religion and Social Ethics

INTERDISCIPLINARY
CONFERENCE
TRUTH MATTERS
Toronto, August 18–20

Courses 2009–2010

Fall 2009 (September — December)

The Aesthetics of Compassion Dr. Rebekah Smick ICS 1120/2120 F09	In the history of Western thought, the innately imaginative character of compassion has been called upon to rationalize both its exclusion from and inclusion in a just society. For Plato, compassion was a disorderly and obfuscating emotion that did not belong in his utopian republic. For Aristotle, on the other hand, it was an emotion that had, when properly elicited through tragic drama, a potentially educative value. This course examines the place and role of compassion in the development of the Western aesthetics tradition, in particular among those writers who expanded upon the Aristotelian notion of poetic eleos.
Biblical Foundations Dr. Nik Ansell ICS 1215/2215 F09	This course will explore the Bible as the ongoing story of and for God and creation, paying special attention to the way in which God's story is intertwined with that of humanity and the world. In asking whether and in what way the Bible is also our story, we will attempt to identify which hermeneutical methods might help us discern its significance for present day life, including the academic enterprise.
Deconstruction and Politics Dr. Shannon Hoff ICS 1620/2620 F09	This course will explore the issue of the uneasy relationship between decontruction and politics. We will begin by reading Derrida, after which we will explore the work of his contemporaries and critics. Readings could include Derrida's Of Hospitiality, On Cosmopolitanism and Forgiveness, Politics of Friendship, Specters of Marx, Ernesto Laclau's Hegemony and Socialist Strategy, Gilles Deleuze's What is Philosophy?, Giorgio Agamben's State of Exception, Lyotard's The Differend, and Butler, Laclau, and Zizek's Contingency, Hegemony, Universality.
Metaphysics after Auschwitz: Adorno's Negative Dialectics Dr. Lambert Zuidervaart ICS 2730 F09	No serious philosopher since Kant has been able to avoid his critique of metaphysical specualtions about God, the soul, and the meaning of existence. The horrors of recent history give added urgency to such questions. Theodor W. Adorno has posed these issues in dramatic and decisive ways. This seminar studies his reflections in Negative Dialectics on the status of metaphysics "after Auschwitz."
Religion, Life and Society: Reformational Philosophy Dr. Robert Sweetman ICS 1715/2715 F09	An exploration of central issues in philosophy, as addressed by Herman Dooyeweerd, Dirk Vollenhoven, and the "Amsterdam School" of neoCalvinian thought. The course tests the relevance of this tradition for recent developments in Western philosophy. Special attention is given to critiques of foundationalism, metaphysics, and modernity within reformational philosophy and in other schools of thought.
Wittgenstein, Language, and the Philosophy of Religion Dr. Ronald Kuipers ICS 1523/2523 F09	Wittgenstein's philosophy continues to generate enormous interest, and his name is frequently cited in connection with radical developments in theology and the philosophy of religion. Via an exploration of the different accounts of language and meaning he presents in both his early and later work, this course will focus on his thought as it relates to religious belief and commitment.
Spring 2010 (January - April)

The Divine (at) Risk? Open Theism, Classical Theism and Beyond Dr. Nik Ansell ICS 1823/2823 S10 TST ICT3730 HF	Did God take a risk in creating the world? How are divine and human freedom related? Can we confess God's sovereignty in the face of evil? This course will explore the different ways in which the God of history is viewed by advocates and critics of "Open Theism." Our examination will stimulate our own reflections on how we might best understand and, indeed, image God's love, knowledge and power.
Feminist Social Thought Dr. Shannon Hoff ICS 1630/2630 S10	This course will focus on the work of prominent feminist philosophers such as Gloria Anzaldua, Seyla Benhabib, Wendy Brown, Judith Butler, Drucilla Cornell, and Nancy Fraser. We will explore their analyses of gender, oppression, and justice, as well as identify the links between their work and broader philosophical issues and questions.
Grace as an Aesthetic Concept Dr. Rebekah Smick ICS 1121/2121 S10	During the Renaissance, a notion of grace served as the central critical concept for understanding art, and the achievement of grace in art was taken to be the highest artistic ideal. The course will examine the concept of grace within its theological, philosophical, and art theoretical contexts in an effort to understand more completely how art was thought to function in the early modern period. It will also consider the place of grace in the development of the aesthetics tradition.
Imagining the Word with Ricoeur: Narrative, Action, and the Sacred in Ricoeur's Hermeneutic Phenomenology Dr. Ronald Kuipers ICS 2533 S10	This course will explore an important piece of Paul Ricoeur's contribution to the philosophy of language, paying special attention to his three-volume work, Time and Narrative. After gaining appreciation for the "healthy circle" that Ricoeur discovers between time and narrative, we will explore his understanding of the meaning of religious uses of narrative in particular, using the anthology Figuring the Sacred as our guide.
IDS - Way, Truth, Life: (Re)visions of Truth from the PreSocratics to Hegel ICS Faculty ICS 2955 S10	This seminar reexamines Western conceptions of truth from the preSocratics to Hegel in light of contemporary debate over the nature and meaning of truth. How and out of what contexts has truth been conceived in the Western tradition? Which contexts have been privileged and which forgotten? How might one's understanding of the Western truth tradition be reconceived to address postmodern concerns? Seminar style, weekly reflections, major paper.