INTRODUCTION TO CONTEMPORARY PHILOSOPHY

The course falls within the common core subjects of the degree course in philosophy and aims at providing students with the necessary methodological tools for a critical learning of the main historical-philosophical issues of contemporary times, also in connection with other knowledge and research fields. In particular, the teaching objectives are aimed at the acquisition of the understanding, knowledge and critical interpretation of the main contemporary philosophical texts.

The course aims to provide in-depth knowledge of the philosophers and the most important historical and cultural contexts, of the problems of contemporary times and of the increasingly close interrelationship between the various 'specialised' fields of knowledge.
For these reasons, the didactic task is to provide knowledge and to train comprehension skills so that the student can build a critical autonomy of judgement and correct linguistic and communicative skills.

General knowledge of the processes and dynamics of modern philosophical history.

The use of neologisms and unusual combinations of words, often preceded by turns of phrase such as the famous "what we call..." have become common practice among a portion of those who today are considered or call themselves philosophers. These practices seem to be signs of the spread of a conception of philosophy as a practice aimed at the "creation of concepts". The consequence of this conception is to treat the philosophical past as a huge repository of old concepts that can be analyzed by the historian of philosophy and, eventually, made his own. But has this idea always existed? Why has it asserted itself? If philosophical concepts do not refer to any of the objects we handle every day, among so many multicolored creations, how can we distinguish between a concept and a mere neologism? Does a concept in itself have the quality of "philosophical"? Does the creation of concepts have a purpose? And if not, why should we struggle so much to create new ones?
In the bestseller What is Philosophy! (1993), written together with Félix Guattari, Gilles Deleuze explicitly presents himself as the defender of this idea of philosophy as creation of concepts and, willingly or unwillingly, popularizes it. In fact, it is to Deleuze that the idea of philosophy as an activity of "creation of concepts" is associated. Building on Deleuze's provocation, this course will attempt to do several things together.
First, by carefully examining complex passages from Deleuze's most explicitly "philosophical" works, particularly the chapter on "The Image of Thought" in his dissertation "Difference and Repetition" and the first two chapters of "What is Philosophy?", we will attempt to understand what, according to Deleuze, a concept is and what distinguishes it from an idea, a question, and a problem. Given that philosophy is far from encompassing the totality of thought, what idea of thought did Deleuze have? How did he situate philosophy in the encyclopedia of disciplined knowledge?
Second, we will isolate some texts that helped Deleuze define philosophy as a creation of concepts. We will mention some authors (Barthes, Foucault), contemporary and past (Nietzsche, Bergson), whom Deleuze considered as inspirers and allies, and others, whom he considered as enemies (Kant, Descartes, Hegel). Why talk about "signed" concepts at a time, i.e., the second half of the twentieth century, when the social sciences, history, and the humanities in general were challenging the notion of authorship and disciplinary divisions? What other ideas of philosophical practice did Deleuze oppose to his own? And why? Was this conception the result of choice? Can we locate its precursors? Would this not be a contradiction?
Third, we will try to distance ourselves a bit from our question, our author and his statements. We will try to consider Deleuze's creations in relation to this great archive called the history of philosophy. How did Deleuze treat the texts of the past? Was he inspired by them? Did he use them? What are the reasons for Deleuze's choices and operations on texts? Can we talk about choices? Is this conception of philosophy as creation really new, or is it finally just one of the possible positions that philosophy allows, since it exists as an institutionalized discipline?
Starting with the case represented by Deleuze's texts, we will try to see if it is possible to combine text and context, and we will ask if these two notions really have an operational use.

Pierre Bourdieu, "Ma chi ha creato i creatori?", in Questioni di sociologia.
Gilles Deleuze, Félix Guattari, Che cos'è la filosofia?
Gilles Deleuze, Differenza e ripetizione.
Gilles Deleuze, Logica del senso.
Gilles Deleuze, Bergsonismo.
Gilles Deleuze, Nietzsche e la filosofia.
Gilles Deleuze, L'isola deserta e altri testi.
Michel Foucault, "Cos'è un autore?
Martial Gueroult, "Leçon inaugurale au Collège de France".
Martin Heidegger, "Sull'essenza del fondamento".
Immanuel Kant, Critica della ragion pura.
Jean-Paul Sartre, La trascendenza dell'Ego.
François Zourabichvili, Gilles Deleuze, una filosofia dell'evento.

Oral exam based on a series of open questions communicated about ten days in advance. The "weight" of the oral exam may be reduced if students give a short presentation or send me a paper on the course topics. These papers may also be developed and presented collectively.

Lectures, commentary on selected texts, collective discussions. For the discussions, it will be important to have read selected passages from the texts BEFORE the lectures

Italian

Gli studenti che dovessero ancora sostenere sia l'esame di "Introduzione alla storia della filosofia contemporanea" sia quello di "Storia della filosofia contemporanea I" sono pregati di contattare il docente per concordare un programma alternativo.

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