DIDACTICS OF PHILOSOPHY

The course aims to provide students with an adequate knowledge of the main issues related to the history and teaching practices of philosophy, analysing them from the perspective of the connection between the successive redefinitions of philosophy as a discipline and the corresponding redefinitions of the identity and practices of the historiography of philosophy. Considering the ways in which some philosophers have connected philosophy and the history of philosophy, we will attempt to isolate models and methods useful in the analysis of philosophical texts.

At the end of the course the student
- Is familiar with some of the main reflections on the connection between philosophy and the history of philosophy and the educational scope of philosophical texts.
- Is familiar with the recent history of the teaching of philosophy and the regulations that currently govern it.
- He/she is aware of the main teaching methodologies developed in research in the didactics of philosophy, also with reference to the history of teaching practice during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, to the specific role of the teacher, to the conceptual, epistemological and didactic nodes of the teaching and learning of the disciplines of interest.
- He/she is able to design and construct teaching activities related to philosophy, to illustrate its principles and methodologies, and to prepare the relevant assessments.

In order to deal effectively with the contents of the course, the student must have acquired the following during the three-year course: mastery of the philosophical vocabulary; knowledge of the fundamental themes and junctures of the history of philosophy.

Definitions of philosophy and the practice of the history of philosophy: problems, concepts and methods.
In Europe, philosophy, as a scholastic and academic discipline distinct from other areas of knowledge, has undergone continuous redefinitions by those who practice and teach it since its emergence at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries. Some of these redefinitions have become famous and have become part of the history of the discipline. Each new definition has almost always been accompanied by a partial rewriting of its history, and of the description of the aims and methods of the discipline that has always accompanied it, the history of philosophy.
The definition of philosophy has also implied two other fields: a theory of science - i.e. the way the fields of knowledge are organised - and a theory of knowledge, which implies a theory of subjectivity, faculties and their different uses.
The course is ideally divided into two parts: it will initially provide a brief history of the ways in which philosophy is practised in Italy and other European countries (both in secondary school and at university) and its educational functions. We will take a look at the current legislation on the subject, and dwell on the different discussions on pedagogical methods.
Afterwards, the bulk of the course will be devoted to the analysis of some important texts by German, Austrian and German philosophers that redefine both the idea and the practice of philosophy and the history of philosophy; during the reading and discussion we will isolate some key terms essential for the practice and teaching of philosophy - concept, problem, question, idea, system, diachrony, synchrony - and some issues such as the method and style to be adopted in philosophy and the history of philosophy. Students will be asked to simulate short presentations.
It will be essential to have read the texts before the meetings in order to be able to discuss them together.

Bibliography (most of the texts will be available in electronic format on the moodle platform)

Wilhelm Windelband, What is Philosophy? Concept and History of Philosophy. In Pietro Rossi (ed.), Lo storicismo tedesco, Unione tipografico-editrice Torinese, Turin, 1977, pp. 271-312.
Henri Bergson, The Thought and the Motive, Olschki, Florence, 2001 (pp.1-23; 91-109; 135-170).
Martin Heidegger, "What is Metaphysics?"
Edmund Husserl, The History of Philosophy and its Purpose, Città Nuova, Rome, 2004.
Edmund Husserl, The Crisis of the European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology, Il Saggiatore, Milan, 2015 (1-47)
Rudolf Carnap, The Overcoming of Metaphysics through the Logical Analysis of Language (1932), in Il neoempirismo, Utet, Turin, 1978.
Gilles Deleuze, Félix Guattari, Che cos'è la filosofia? (part one), Einaudi, Turin 1996.

The final examination will be oral, involving a dozen open questions that will be announced at the end of the course, from which four each@ will be chosen at random, and on which the discussion will be based. Students who wish to submit a short written work on certain topics and authors or, during the meetings, a presentation (in the form of a short lecture) will be exempt from one or two questions. Assessment will also be based on attendance and interaction during the meetings.

oral

Grading will follow departmental guidelines.

Teaching will be divided into
- into a frontal teaching part, in which the lecturer will introduce students to the course topics
- and a dialogue-seminar part, in which students will be asked to prepare short lectures.

Accessibility, disability and inclusion

Ca' Foscari applies Italian law (Law 17/1999; Law 170/2010) for the support and accommodation services available to students with disabilities or specific learning disorders. If you have a motor, visual, hearing or other disability (Law 17/1999) or a specific learning disorder (Law 170/2010) and you require support (classroom assistance, technological aids for examinations or individualised examinations, material in accessible format, note-taking, specialist tutoring to support study, interpreters or other) please contact the Disability and DSA office: disabilita@unive.it.

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "Human capital, health, education" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development