Enlightenment & Its Discontent

Is there a politics to the age of reason? This course focuses on enlightenment thought and its critics, in the modern as well as the contemporary era. We will inquire about the role of reason in setting the terms of citizenship, including how the citizen should behave. Is reason a male attribute? Does passion and/or religion play a role in reasonable thinking? The historical span of this course will generally cover the 17th to the 19th centuries and show how we have come to think about politics the way we do today.