The Modern and the Postmodern (Part 1)

The Modern and the Postmodern (Part 1)

Instructor: Michael S. Roth

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8 modules

Gain insight into a topic and learn the fundamentals.

1,044 reviews

1 week to complete

at 10 hours a week

Flexible schedule

Learn at your own pace

98%

Most learners liked this course

8 modules

Gain insight into a topic and learn the fundamentals.

1,044 reviews

1 week to complete

at 10 hours a week

Flexible schedule

Learn at your own pace

98%

Most learners liked this course

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Taught in English

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There are 8 modules in this course

This course examines how the idea of "the modern" develops at the end of the 18th century in European philosophy and literature, and how being modern (or progressive, or hip) became one of the crucial criteria for understanding and evaluating cultural change. Are we still in modernity, or have we moved beyond the modern to the postmodern?

“The Modern and the Postmodern Part I” covers the first half of a full semester course on European history, literature and philosophy. We begin with Immanuel Kant and Jean Jacques Rousseau and conclude with Friedrich Nietzsche and Charles Baudelaire and a very quick look at painting at the time they wrote. Although in the final week themes of postmodernism begin to emerge, a discussion of how modernism becomes postmodernism is at the heart of Part II of this course.

What's included

2 readings

Why is philosophy relevant to modernity? Through reading Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Immanuel Kant, we examine philosophy as a reflection on modernity and progress.

What's included

2 videos1 reading

Using Rousseau’s Discourse on the Origins of Inequality, we study how the pursuit of knowledge is related to the politics of inequality.

What's included

4 videos1 reading

Karl Marx is our focus here as we move from a consideration of ideas to a confrontation with alienation, class struggle and revolution.

What's included

5 videos1 reading1 peer review

5 videos Total 60 minutes

From Enlightenment to Revolution I 12 minutes
From Enlightenment to Revolution II 13 minutes
From Enlightenment to Revolution III 9 minutes
From Enlightenment to Revolution IV 13 minutes
From Enlightenment to Revolution V 13 minutes

1 reading Total 10 minutes

From Enlightenment to Revolution--Marx 10 minutes

1 peer review Total 120 minutes

First Writing Assignment 120 minutes

We read Flaubert’s Madame Bovary as a reflection on convention, stupidity and art in the wake of the failures of mid-19th century revolution.

What's included

4 videos1 reading1 peer review

We situate Charles Darwin’s great achievement in the context of the English Enlightenment traditions and reimaging the world without a goal for change.

What's included

4 videos1 reading

Through an examination of Charles Baudelaire and Friedrich Nietzsche, we focus on an aesthetic embrace of intensity instead of search for the “really real.”

What's included

6 videos1 reading1 peer review

6 videos Total 87 minutes

From Struggle to Intensity I 14 minutes
From Struggle to Intensity II 14 minutes
From Struggle to Intensity III 16 minutes
From Struggle to Intensity IV 12 minutes
From Struggle to Intensity V 13 minutes
From Struggle to Intensity VI 18 minutes

1 reading Total 10 minutes

From Struggle to Intensity--Baudelaire and Nietzsche 10 minutes

1 peer review Total 60 minutes

Third Writing Assignment 60 minutes

A Quick Survey of how advanced painting moved toward a consideration of the surface of the canvas and away from a quest for the most realistic representation of the world.

What's included

2 videos

Instructor

Instructor ratings

(179 ratings)

Michael S. Roth

Wesleyan University

3 Courses 206,784 learners

Offered by

Wesleyan University

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Reviewed on Dec 28, 2020

Excellent course. The lectures were engaging and very informative and broad with the inclusion of a variety of thinkers. I also appreciated learning about the paintings of the post-modern period.

Reviewed on Jan 10, 2024

One of the most unique and rich in knowledge course that I've made, I recommend this course if you're into philosophy or if you want to start learning it. Writing the essay was a challenge but fun.

Reviewed on Jan 30, 2018

Best course and professor I have taken at Coursera, since Demystifying Mindfulness (which is #1).Really liked Prof Roth, and appreciate his continued emails after the course via Mentor connections.

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