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Dear Friends:
This is an announcement for the second part of a seminar on "Modern Western Social Thought" by Dr. Abbas Milani in Berkeley.
Dr. Milani is currently the Chair of the Department of History and Political Science at the College of Notre Dame. He is the author of "Modernity and Its Foes in Iran", "Encounters with Modernity", "On Democracy and Socialism", "The Persian Sphinx: Amir Abbas Hoveyda and the Riddle of the Iranian Revolution", among others.
The first part of this seminar ended last month.
There will be 6 sessions in this seminar. Here are the details:
Date: Every other Sunday, starting November 12
Time: 5:30 to 8:30 P.M.
Place: Saffron Cafe, 2813 7th St., Berkeley CA
Lectures will be in Persian
Registration fee: $100
If you are interested or if you have any questions please e-mail me at:
<mailto:farnia@ix.netcom.com>farnia@ix.netcom.com
Here is Dr. Milani's suggested syllabus:
Modern Western Social Thought - Part II - A seminar
The purpose of this course is to inquire into some of the most
important social, political and aesthetic theories of the last one
hundred years. Key concepts, such as power, revolution, totalitarianism,
legitimacy, liberty, representation, artistic creation, cinematic language,
identity, and the meaning of meaning will be the focus of our discussions.
At the same time, we will attempt to understand major political
tendencies-radicalism, conservatism, liberalism-and their philosophical
underpinnings.
Participants in the seminar are encouraged to write, and share with
the class, a paper on the topic of their choice. Ideally, such papers
would discuss the concepts and theories covered in the seminar as they
have manifested themselves in the writing of Iranian intellectuals.
The following books will be of major importance in our discussions. I
will try to find a way of making a copy of each book available for
temporary borrowing. I cannot promise I will succeed !
--L. Kolokowski, Major Currents of Marxism (three volumes.)
-- Isiah Berlin, The Crooked Timber of Humanity.
-- Sigmund Freud, Civilization and its Discontents.
-- F. Nietzche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra (Persian translation is available)
-- Richard Rorty, Contingency, Solidarity and Community.
-- Unger, Roberto. Democracy Realized.
The general contour of our discussion will be as follows:
I. Walter Benjamin and The Arcade Project
II. Bakhtin and the Materialist theory of culture
A. Bakhtin's theory of the novel
B. Sergei Eisenstein and the materialist theory of film
C. Auteur theory and cinema
D. Semiotics and cinema
E. Psychoanalysis and cinema
III. Adorno, Critical theory and the dialectics of enlightenment
IV. Nietszche and the critique of modernity.
V. Ortega Y Gasset and conservative thought in 20th century.
A. The origins of conservative thought: DeMaister in Berlin
a. Nazism and Fascism as Radical conservative ideas
B. American neo-conservative thought (The end of History idea)
C. Religious fundamentalism and its affinities with conservatism
VI. Freud and social theory in twentieth century
VII. The Post-modern condition:
A. Heideggard and the critique of modernity
B. Lyotard and Post-modernity
C. Rorty and the postmodern
VIII. Foucault and social theory
IX. Unger and New Politics
A. A brief over-view of his Politics
B. Democracy Realized: His latest work
X. Berlin and liberal theory
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