29424 - Seminars (1) (LM) (G. B)

Learning outcomes

The Philosophy Seminars aim to achieve the following educational objectives specific to seminar-style teaching: (1) to train students in philosophical argumentation by encouraging discussions on philosophical themes and texts, including those in their original language, presented in meetings with Italian and foreign scholars; (2) to broaden and deepen their philosophical knowledge through participation in conferences held by specialists from various areas of philosophical knowledge; (3) to compare different methodological approaches to philosophy, complementing their regular curriculum.

Course contents

Title of the seminar: Perception as Familiarization

The topic at the center of the seminar will be perception understood as a dynamic process of familiarization with the environment. The seminar is aimed at reading and discussing contributions that between the 20th and 21st centuries have addressed the topic in varied and transversal ways. In particular, the seminar aims to provide the student with the tools a) to contextualize the most significant directions of the debate in question in the broader field of the history of philosophy and b) to identify key concepts and apply them to specific case studies. Each week will be devoted to the analysis of specific readings that will be discussed on Tuesdays and Thursdays, while on Friday mornings students will work individually or in small groups (depending on the number of attending students) to create a bilingual (Italian and English) philosophical lexicon on the topics addressed in the seminar. In this sense, the seminar also aims to c) provide skills in writing philosophical texts of different lengths and d) make philosophical concepts as operative and effective as possible in relation to contemporary reality.

Readings/Bibliography

- J. Dewey, “Qualitative Thought”, in J.A. Boydston (ed.) The Later Works of John Dewey vol. 5 Southern Illinois University Press, Carbondale, 1984, pp. 243-262.

- E. Gombrich, “The Mask and the Face: The Perception of Physiognomic Likeness in Life and Art”, in E. Gombrich, J. Hochberg, M. Black (eds.), Art, Perception and Reality, The John Hopkins University Press, Baltimore-London, 1972, pp. 1-46.

- O. Naukkarinen, What is “Everyday” in Everyday Aesthetics?, Contemporary Aesthetics, vol. 11, 2013 [https://digitalcommons.risd.edu/liberalarts_contempaesthetics/vol11/iss1/14/]

- M.G. Portera, “Babies Rule! Niches, Scaffoldings, and the Development of an Aesthetic Capacity in Humans” in The British Journal of Aesthetics, vol. 6, issue 3, 2020, pp. 299-314.

- R. Dreon, L. Candiotto, “Affective Scaffoldings as Habits: A Pragmatist Approach”, in Frontiers in Psychology, vol. 12, 2021 [https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.629046/full]

Please note that the bibliography may change before the seminar begins.

Teaching methods

Traditional lectures, workshops, presentations by students

Assessment methods

- Production of bilingual entries for a philosophical lexicon in the classroom

- Classroom presentations of a case study analyzed through some of the concepts discussed (indications will be provided during the seminar)

N.B.:

Regular attendance of students is mandatory. In order to be admitted to the final exam students will need to have attended at least 12 out of 15 classes (24 hours out of 30).

Teaching tools

Powerpoints

Office hours

See the website of Gioia Laura Iannilli