course-schedule

Master Colloquium (Kolloquium)

Dozent/in: Armin Beverungen, Ben Trott

Inhalt: This Master Forum, which will be held entirely in English, provides first and foremost an opportunity for students embarking on their MA theses to present an outline of their projects, with the goal of receiving productive critical feedback – both from instructors and from student peers. In addition, it also aims to facilitate critical reflection on a set of what may initially appear to be quite practical or even technical issues – around how scholarly research is carried out and presented – and yet often ultimately prove to be caught up with questions of content, argument and approach. In the first two meetings of the Master Forum, Armin Beverungen and Ben Trott will introduce some of the common issues confronted by those carrying out scholarly research or writing in Cultural Studies, the Humanities and the Social Sciences. This will include general questions, including: how to arrive at and formulate a research question and a suitable framework for your project; how to begin thinking about method and methodology, and starting to conducting research; and ways of referencing and of acknowledging the use of sources. We will also explore together a number of specific issues commonly confronted by those carrying out research: how to use inclusive language, and whether or not to do so when writing about institutions or milieu marked by exclusion; whether or not to quote passages of text which use racist language, and why; how to deal with the terminology which is widely used in historic texts but is no longer in use or has a different meaning today; and what to consider when drawing on translations of primary texts, and when translating passages oneself. Rather than attempting to provide definitive answers or solutions to these issues, the instructors will give some examples of how they and others have approached these problems in their own work – and some of the difficulties involved in doing so. Plenty of space will be provided for critical reflection on these and other issues. Students are invited to sign up to present an outline of their MA thesis in subsequent meetings of the Master Forum, with presentations set to take place in English. Several dates are available to choose from, distributed throughout the semester. While this will ultimately depend on the number of students participating, students should expect to have around 30 minutes in total for the presentation and discussion of their projects, and presentations themselves should last between 10 and 15 minutes, allowing plenty of time for discussion. Students are required upload a two-page summary of their project to myStudy one week before they are due to present. This should include: • a working title for your thesis as well as your research question; • the approach, method or methodology that you plan on using, and the theoretical framework or points of reference for your project; • what you anticipate discovering or arguing in your thesis; • and a list of up to five key works that you will use, along with any additional information about sources you plan on using – such as archives, exhibitions or interview partners. Students are asked to attend all sessions of the Master Forum, not the simply the session in which they will present, and to have read the two-page summaries ahead of time. Please be ready to provide your fellow students with productive critical feedback on their projects! The Master Forum is examined (pass/fail) as a combined scholarly work [Kombinierte wissenschaftliche Arbeit] made up of (a) your two-page summary and (b) your presentation.

Feminist and Queer Contributions to Social and Political Philosophy (FSL) (Vorlesung)

Dozent/in: Ben Trott

Inhalt: This lecture-based class introduces feminist and queer philosophical approaches to thinking the social and political world. It entails, first, an exploration of feminist and queer engagements with, appropriations from, and critiques of the modern, western canon of social and political philosophy, including the ways it has thought justice, equality, the social contract, freedom and rights. Here the focus is primarily on feminist and queer engagements with liberal social and political thought, which is itself shown to be a highly heterogeneous enterprise. In the second part of the seminar, students address feminist and queer contributions to social and political philosophy that break with or move beyond liberal traditions. Students will engage key work by Susan Okin, Carol Pateman, Mary Wollstonecraft, John Stuart Mill and Harriet Taylor, Nancy Fraser, Angela Davis, Michel Foucault and Judith Butler.

Gender, Sexuality and Intersectionality (FSL) (Vorlesung)

Dozent/in: Ben Trott

Inhalt: This lecture-based class introduces students to intersectional and multi-dimensional approaches to the study of gender and sexuality. It explores theories and methods of Gender and Queer Studies, paying particular attention to the ways in which these fields have understood gender and sexuality as inextricable from other axes and hierarchies of social difference (including ‘race’/racism and ethnicity) as well as from the social relations of class and nation. Students will explore key works by Angela Davis, the Combahee River Collective, José Esteban Muñoz, bell hooks, Nancy Fraser, Roderick A. Ferguson, Sara Ahmed, Judith Butler and Kimberlé W. Crenshaw.

Social and Political Philosophy (Seminar)

Dozent/in: Ben Trott

Termin:
wöchentlich | Mittwoch | 12:15 - 13:45 | 16.10.2023 - 02.02.2024 | C 5.311 Seminarraum

Inhalt: The point of departure for this seminar is a critical engagement with the ways in which philosophy has sought to comprehend the spheres of ‘society’ and ‘politics’, how the two often blur, and their relation to the realms of ‘economics’ and ‘culture’. Through a critical reading of canonical and contemporary works of social and political philosophy, students will explore the concepts of government, the social contract, resistance, the subject, utopia, human nature, freedom, colonialism, liberty, exploitation, democracy, revolution, human nature, violence and rights. Students will read works by Wendy Brown, Niccolò Machiavelli, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, Carole Pateman, John Stuart Mill, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Dipesh Chakrabarty, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak and Judith Butler.

Leuphana Bachelor - Minor Philosophie (ab Studienbeginn WS 17/18) - Politische Philosophie

Political (Economic) Theories of Extraction and Primitive Accumulation (Seminar)

Dozent/in: Ben Trott

Termin:
wöchentlich | Dienstag | 16:15 - 17:45 | 16.10.2023 - 02.02.2024 | C 5.019 Seminarraum

Inhalt: In recent years, much critical scholarship around capitalism, coloniality and globalization has turned towards questions of “extraction” and “extractivism”. This has been driven in part by an interest in struggles, especially in Latin America, around socially and ecologically destructive practices of appropriation – of nature, primary resources, labour, data and knowledge. Throughout the course of this seminar, we will examine and evaluate some of this scholarship, beginning with the genealogy of the concept of “extraction” itself and its relationship to related notions, such as Karl Marx’s concept of “primitive accumulation” and David Harvey’s account of “accumulation by dispossession”. We will explore theories of “fossil capitalism”, the relationship between extraction and “racial capitalism”, feminist uses and critiques of Marx’s notion of “primitive accumulation”, the functioning of extraction in an age of digitization and financialization, the implication of a queer politics of recognition in the extractive activities of international financial institutions, and the histories of primitive accumulation under conditions of colonialism. The primary goal of this seminar is a critical engagement with capitalism, coloniality and globalization via the notion of “extraction” and related concepts. The seminar forms part of one module with, and has been organised so as to complement, Susanne Leeb’s seminar “Zeitgenössische Kunst: Darstellungsformen von Extraction und Ursprünglicher Akkumulation”.

Masterprogramm Kulturwissenschaften: Kritik der Gegenwart - Künste, Theorie, Geschichte - Kernbereich - Kapitalismus, Kolonialität, Globalisierung

Course Schedule

Veranstaltungen von Ben Trott

Lehrveranstaltungen

Master Colloquium (Kolloquium)

Feminist and Queer Contributions to Social and Political Philosophy (FSL) (Vorlesung)

Gender, Sexuality and Intersectionality (FSL) (Vorlesung)

Social and Political Philosophy (Seminar)

Political (Economic) Theories of Extraction and Primitive Accumulation (Seminar)