Hey guys, nice to meet you here!
Regarding your concerns, I may have a solution: while I was reading various threads in the official forum I came across a post by someone who was enrolled in the first iteration of the course, so he has access to the complete archive and he was generous to share all the assignment topics with us. Here it comes:
HW 1 (by Week 3, week of Aug 12) :
How did Kant define Enlightenment? Use Kant’s definition to discuss whether either Rousseau or Marx is an Enlightenment figure.
HW 2 (by Week 4, week of Aug 19):
Compare the role of historical progress in the ideas of two of the following: Kant, Rousseau, Marx, Flaubert.
HW 3 (by Week 6, week of Sept 2):
Respond to one of the two following prompts:
Darwin wrote that: "Man still bears in his bodily frame the indelible stamp of his lowly origin." Compare Darwin's view of the persistent effects of the past with at least one other writer covered so far in the course (please try to write about someone you haven't written about in the previous assignments).
OR
Describe how Darwin makes use of the intellectual traditions of utilitarianism and romanticism in his work. Compare this use to how another thinker makes use of the past in his or her own work (this can be anyone covered so far in the course, but please try to write about someone you haven't written about in the previous assignments).
HW 4 (by Week 9, week of Sept 23):
Respond to one of the two following prompts:
Freud wrote that art was a “palliative measure” that helped people cope with suffering. Discuss his view and how it compares with the views of art or aesthetics of one of the following authors: Baudelaire, Darwin, Nietzsche. Woolf.
Or
Describe how two of the following thinkers make use of memory or history in their work: Baudelaire, Nietzsche, Freud and Woolf
HW 5 (by Week 10, week of Sept 30):
Respond to one of the two following prompts:
Compare the approach to the ordinary in two of the following: Baudelaire, Woolf, Emerson and Wittgenstein.
Or
How is the cultivation of self-reliance (in Emerson) a continuation of the Enlightenment tradition? Compare Emerson with at least one other thinker from the course.
HW 6 (by Week 11, week of Oct 7):
Respond to one of the two following prompts:
"What human beings seek to learn from nature is how to use it to dominate wholly both it and human beings. Nothing else counts." -- Horkheimer and Adorno
Discuss how the idea of domination plays a role in two of the authors we have read this semester (you may write on Horkheimer and Adorno [as one thinker]).
Or
Horkheimer and Adorno and Foucault see progress as a kind of trap in which we ensnare ourselves. Discuss one of them in relation to another thinker in our course who also saw progress as a trap.
HW 7 (by Week 13, week of Oct 21) :
Respond to one of the two following prompts:
Butler writes that gender “is a practice of improvisation within a scene of constraint.”
Discuss how her idea of improvisation compares with notions of creativity and self-invention we have seen in one other writer we have read this semester.
Or
Butler is very concerned with the idea of vulnerability. Compare her views on the vulnerable with another thinker we have read in this course.
HW 8 (by Week 14, week of Oct 28):
"If the Hegelians are right, then there are no ahistorical criteria for deciding when it is or is not a responsible act to desert a community, any more than for deciding when to change lovers or professions." -- Richard Rorty
Respond to one of the two following prompts:
Discuss how two of the authors we have read this semester have addressed the issue of whether or not one needs a historical criteria for deciding on human responsibility.
Or
Which two thinkers in our class do you think Anthony Appiah would consider “cosmopolitan” in his terms.
I hope you find them useful, maybe I should start a new post for more members to see.
