PHI 393-01 - Advanced Studies: Women and Cartesianism

4 credits (Spring)

This course will examine how Cartesian philosophy offered new ways to talk about women and their role in society. After a preliminary study of Descartes’ system, will study how some Cartesians, such as Poullain de la Barre and Mary Astell took away from mind-body dualism that the mind was not sexed and therefore women could be argued to have equality with men. We will also consider how other Cartesians, such as Malebranche used Descartes’ mind-body interaction to emphasize the relevance of the sexed body in arguments for the inferiority of women. We will end the course by considering how Spinoza’s mind-body parallelism and relational account of individuality may allow for discussions of gender diversity (including non-binary genders) while maintaining equality.

Prerequisite: PHI 233.
Note: Plus-2 option available.
Instructor: Nyden