Philosophy

We use language all the time to express our thoughts and understand others. But how does language work? Key questions covered in this course include: how do names refer to an object? Do words mean whatever we intend or use them to mean? What role does convention play in fixing meanings? Are our terms vague, or precise? Can a person have a private language? How do we communicate beyond the literal? What are speech acts and are they available to everyone in our society? All of these questions are of interest in their own right, and also have applications to further issues in philosophy and beyond.

In this course, students explore ten of the “big questions”: What do I know? What is consciousness? Who am I, and do I exist? Do I have free will? Does God exist? What are space and time? What are numbers? What should I do? What is justice? What is the meaning of life? To find answers to these questions, students learn essential skills of a philosopher: first, reading philosophical texts, focusing on how to extract and present a philosophical thesis and argument in a clear, logical way; and second, practicing creative, critical thinking and impromptu discussions by participating in philosophical discourse with peers. Students also learn to write philosophical arguments of their own in essay-form.

This course examines how the University of Berlin (now Humboldt University) became Europe's philosophical center, tracing its evolution from its revolutionary founding in 1810 through its various transformations. By exploring the dynamic relationship between the university's philosophers and Berlin's cultural and political life, this course follows how philosophical ideas developed within its walls and resonated beyond them. The course examines key figures who taught, studied, or lectured at the university—from Hegel's influential tenure and the Young Hegelians, through Dilthey's establishment of the human sciences and Cohen's Neo-Kantianism, to the philosophical responses to war, division, and reunification. Furthermore, students explore how the University of Berlin shaped major philosophical movements while being shaped by Berlin's dramatic historical transformations: from Prussian reform era through imperial expansion, from Weimar culture through Nazi persecution, from Cold War division through reunification. By examining philosophical texts alongside historical documents and cultural materials, students understand how the University of Berlin fostered philosophical innovations that responded to and influenced some of the most significant political and cultural developments of modern Europe.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale degree program and is intended for advanced level students. Enrollment is by permission of the instructor. In Spring 2025, the main topic of this course was Soul and Body: Metaphysics of the Person in Plato and Aristotle. The aim of the course is to verify these attributions through the “slow reading” of an anthology of passages taken from the works of the two Greek philosophers, also in light of the most recent critical literature on this topic.

At the end of the course the student has acquired (1) the in-depth knowledge of a philosophical topic or problem typical of Greek and Roman antiquity and (2) three types of skills: (a) philological – he/she knows how to analyze an ancient text using the advanced philological tools needed for the study of Greek and Roman philosophy; (b) dialectical – he/she is trained to discuss a philosophical problem in a synchronic and diachronic way, through the comparison between ancient and modern philosophers; (c) rhetorical – he/she is capable of arguing exegetical and philosophical theses in oral and written form.

This course examines Existentialism and Phenomenology in terms of their unique and considerable contributions to the Western, and particularly French, aesthetic tradition. Students examine views on art by some of the best-known modern theorists to gain understanding of the philosophical issues motivating French aesthetic thought at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th Centuries. The course then covers a shift from a broadly existentialist view of literature to one influenced by the growing structuralist movement and reviews philosophical investigations of the arts in relation to theories of perception.  

This course is part of the laurea magistrale degree program and is intended for advanced level students. Enrollment is by permission of the instructor.

At the end of the course, students have acquired the theoretical and practical conceptual framework of the field of literature and philosophy studies, gaining a deep understanding of how philosophy and literature are two ways of reflection and expression of issues in common that can illuminate each other. At the end of the course, students are expected to possess: (1) knowledge of key theories and texts for the study of the interdisciplinary field of literature and philosophy, including philosophical and aesthetic texts on the study of literature, rhetorical and literary approaches to philosophical texts and philosophical theories of literary criticism, as well as familiarity with exemplary historical connections with a particular focus on the German context; (2) the ability to analyze convergences and differences in the argumentative, representative, and performative modes of the two disciplinary approaches with a particular focus on the different uses and registers of language in one and the other disciplinary context, as well as the development of critical awareness in relation to both textual traditions and their ways of addressing issues of ethical, social, and political significance; (3) differentiated and convincing presentation and argumentation skills that produce an original point of view in the debate, starting from a critical analysis of both philosophical and literary texts.

This course follows the traces of melancholy as a phenomenon connected to the longing for reference in both texts in philosophy of language and literature. During the course, students apprehend an important part of Western literary and philosophical reflection on questions regarding the nexus between language and (mostly) existential and (to a lesser extent) political questions. Students read and collectively interpret canonical and less canonical texts, and train their presentation and discussion skills.

The course traces the tradition of the linguistic turn back to one of its potential roots or affine forerunners, i.e., Early German Romanticism, to see how similar constellations were discussed and expressed in Modernism, and finally engages with more openly postmodern texts. It ends on more optimistic tones (with Judith Butler) that stress the spaces of agency that open up when not being determined by a fixed reference scheme. Readings include: Derrida’s Grammatology; Friedrich Schlegel’s programmatic, theoretic texts; Hegel’s critiques; the novel Nightwatches of Bonaventura; Nietzsche’s Twilight of the Idols; Hofmannsthal’s programmatic texts for the Sprachkrise; Borges’ “Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius”; Ellis’ American Psycho; Hermann’s text “Red Corals”; and end with Butler.

The course discusses big picture questions about the purpose and defensibility of law—for example, scrutinizing the obligation to obey the law, the justification of punishment, and the circumstances in which we can engage in civil disobedience. The course examine a variety of philosophically interesting legal questions. An indicative list includes: When should a court consider something proven? How should the law use algorithms? Should we defer to juries or professional judges? Does it make sense to treat a corporation as morally responsible? Throughout the course, students explore the connection between legal philosophy and other areas of philosophy—especially moral philosophy, political philosophy, and epistemology.  

The course offers critical reflection on the design and evaluation of public policies from the perspective of moral and political philosophy. To this end, students learn a range of theories and concepts that are used in policy evaluation. They evaluate them by focusing on specific policy proposals. 

This course examines, from a philosophical perspective, what is known about the minds of other animals - and what this means for the ethics of how people treat them.

This course is an introductory survey of the art and nature of philosophy, i.e., the ability and activity of articulating one’s views about a philosophical problem and defending them with good arguments. The course examines problems representative of and fundamental to both Western and Asian philosophical traditions and provides perspectives related to current philosophical issues. The main readings are selected from classics in both traditions.