The course aims at providing the necessary skills in order to grasp a modern philosophical text. To this purpose, the course provides students with the necessary tools in order to:

- elaborate an appropriate historical-social contextualization of a modern philosophical text;

- identify the prior philosophical streams setting up the framework of a given philosophical work and be confident with the text’s features that make them identifiable (by focusing in particular on the traits of lexical permanence, on the recursion of argumentative methods, on shared philosophical objectives).

- pick out the original features that characterize a single work of modern philosophy within its philosophical tradition;

- be able to grasp the stratified character of a philosophical text and to subsequently, possibly identify its weaknesses;

- identify the weak points of a philosophical text also concerning logical fallacies (e.g. incoherence between assumptions and consequences; begging the question; semantic vagueness);

- identify the possible weaknesses of a philosophical work that are due to the simultaneous presence of divergent and incoherent philosophical traditions within the text (that may also stand beyond the explicit author’s purposes).

Erasmus of Rotterdam: Praise of Folly and Sileni Alcibiadis

The great humanist Desiderius Erasmus (Rotterdam 1466 or 1469 - Basel 1536) was a tireless editor and translator of ancient texts, writer of moral treatises and Christian polemicist. At a particular moment in his life - while travelling towards England to join his friend Thomas More - he got the idea to write  "Encomion Moriae", Praise of Folly, perhaps his most compact and inspired text. In it, Folly speaks and tries to show that, despite common sense means the contrary, it is indeed Folly that underlies life in all its best aspects. With great skill, Erasmus leads the reader to discover the possibility of seeing the world differently, or, what is the same, to discover that the world is the opposite of what everyone thinks it is. The comic and bizarre style is combined with noble and sublime themes and motifs in a highly original linguistic and philosophical pastiche.

1. Introduction to the course. Some references to the link between philosophy and literature in the ancient world. Menippean satire and the logic of carnivalesque degradation. The serious-comic genre. The adventure of truth (M. M. Bachtin).

2. Paradox and truth. Paradoxical truth. Paradox as a literary genre and a way of thinking. Paradox in the Renaissance. The oscillation between rhetorical artifice and philosophical dimension.

3. The Adagia. Sileni Alcibiadis. The mechanism of 'Silenus'. The polemic against princes and the religious. Socrates and Christ as 'Silenes'. The prophets and apostles. The 'Silenes in reverse'. The birth of "language in reverse". Scandal and madness of the Holy Cross.

4. Praise of Folly. The world as theatre, fable. Self-love (filautìa) as the universal dimension of life. Madness as the mother of prudence. Masks and reality. Everything is double. Everything is fiction, but there is no reality to compare fiction with. True wisdom and inverted wisdom. In praise of the Golden Age. Plato's cave and the folly of the Christians.

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Knowledge and understanding

- Acknowledgment of the importance of the political-social context for the elaboration of philosophical theories of the contemporary age;

- Ability to detect the peculiar features among alternative forms of philosophical argumentation within a shared philosophical, political and cultural tradition.    

 Applying knowledge and understanding

- The student will be able to master the essential theoretical and lexical tools in order to gain the ability to autonomously read and interpret a philosophical work of the contemporary age;

- The student will be able to appreciate the important role of a correct socio-historical contextualisation for an adequate understanding of the texts of the contemporary age.      

 Making judgements

- The student will develop an appropriate critical ability in order to identify the eventual discrepancies between single philosophical texts and their philosophical tradition;

- The student will develop an autonomous capacity in order to properly evaluate the contradictions and the weak reasoning of a philosophical argumentation.   

 Communication skills

- The student will be provided with the necessary skills in order to present to an audience, even not a specialized one, the core issues of a contemporary philosophical text, by focusing in particular on the historical context, on the lexical and argumentative peculiarities within a given philosophical tradition, on the contradictions, weakness and shortcomings from a logical-argumentative point of view.

 Learning skills

- At the end of the course the student will be provided with the necessary tools for an autonomous study of a philosophical text of the contemporary age;

- The student will understand the meaning and importance of the philosophical lexicon, and of extra-philosophical materials, that are essential in order to gain a deep insight of the political-cultural context of a text. This knowledge will allow the student to autonomously approach to the appropriate bibliographical researches.

The teaching material prepared by the lecturer in addition to recommended textbooks (such as for instance slides, lecture notes, exercises, bibliography) and communications from the lecturer specific to the course can be found inside the Moodle platform › blended.uniurb.it

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Teaching

Lectures

Attendance

Study of M. Mori, Storia della filosofia moderna, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 2007, capp. 1, 2, 3, 4.

Course books

General section:

M. Mori, Storia della filosofia moderna, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 2007, chap. 1, 2, 3, 4.

Monographic course:

Erasmo da Rotterdam, I Sileni di Alcibiade, a cura di S. U. Baldassarri, Napoli, Liguori (esclusivamente questa edizione)

Erasmo da Rotterdam, Elogio della follia, a cura di C. Carena, Torino, Einaudi (esclusivamente questa edizione)

J. Huizinga, Erasmo, a cura di P. Girardi, Milano, Book Time

Further study materials will be made available on the Moodle platform ' blended.uniurb.it

Assessment

The assessment of learning will consist of a written examination. The examination consists of a guided commentary on individual passages from the examination texts. The student must demonstrate that he/she can grasp the fundamental theoretical issues of each passage and contextualise them within the work, including reference to secondary literature.

Particular attention is given to exposure’s capacity through the proper terminology.

Students are expected to be able to develop a critical approach to the theories they studied. In the evaluation, particular attention will be given to the student’s ability to reformulate the materials they dealt with autonomously and to their ability to make comparisons between the authors they studied.

Disability and Specific Learning Disorders (SLD)

Students who have registered their disability certification or SLD certification with the Inclusion and Right to Study Office can request to use conceptual maps (for keywords) during exams.

To this end, it is necessary to send the maps, two weeks before the exam date, to the course instructor, who will verify their compliance with the university guidelines and may request modifications.

Teaching

In order to enable non-attending students to supplement what they have learnt during the lectures with self-study, it is recommended that they make use of all the materials published on the "Blended Learning" platform.

Attendance

Study of M. Mori, Storia della filosofia moderna, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 2007, capp. 1, 2, 3, 4.

Course books

General section:

M. Mori, Storia della filosofia moderna, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 2007, chap. 1, 2, 3, 4.

Monographic course:

Erasmo da Rotterdam, I Sileni di Alcibiade, a cura di S. U. Baldassarri, Napoli, Liguori

Erasmo da Rotterdam, Elogio della follia, a cura di C. Carena, Torino, Einaudi

J. Huizinga, Erasmo, a cura di P. Girardi, Milano, Book Time

Assessment

The assessment of learning will consist of a written examination. The examination consists of a guided commentary on individual passages from the examination texts. The student must demonstrate that he/she can grasp the fundamental theoretical issues of each passage and contextualise them within the work, including reference to secondary literature.

Particular attention is given to exposure’s capacity through the proper terminology.

Students are expected to be able to develop a critical approach to the theories they studied. In the evaluation, particular attention will be given to the student’s ability to reformulate the materials they dealt with autonomously and to their ability to make comparisons between the authors they studied.

Disability and Specific Learning Disorders (SLD)

Students who have registered their disability certification or SLD certification with the Inclusion and Right to Study Office can request to use conceptual maps (for keywords) during exams.

To this end, it is necessary to send the maps, two weeks before the exam date, to the course instructor, who will verify their compliance with the university guidelines and may request modifications.

At the student's request, the course bibliography can also be provided - and the exam taken - in English, Spanish, French and German.