Philosophy BA (Hons)

This module aims to explore how the philosophy of logic understands facts, asking “is there such a thing as facts”. It will trouble the limits of logical truth and explore how philosophy can speak to issues of knowledge and truths in a “post truth” world.

Compulsory

This module offers a comparative overview of environmental philosophies and protest movements, preparatory to students designing and critiquing one another’s philosophically-infused manifestos for climate justice. Environmental campaigns from around the world will be considered alongside the writings of European, indigenous and global south environmental philosophers and writers.

Compulsory

Beginning with a whistle-stop tour of feminist philosophical tenets through time, this module will then introduce you to ten fierce feminists who have changed the world through their words and actions. You will explore historical events, key texts, and crucial changes in vocabularies, attitudes, and opportunities afforded by these thinkers and learn to critique the world through an intersectional feminist lens.

Compulsory

This module explores the impact that the media has had on conceptions of the world from Plato’s literary challenge to Socrates oral view of philosophy and the impact of the printing press on early modern philosophy to the rise of the Global Village. It will also examine how modern media shapes our understanding of the past and how the advent of the network society, social media and virtual environments have altered philosophical perspectives of the world.

Compulsory

This module will introduce you to the most important ideas and debates in gender and sexuality. Covering a wide range of texts, including fiction, poetry, essay, film, and philosophy, you will have the opportunity to engage with key concepts of gender and sexuality, and learn to apply them to other forms of writing.

Compulsory

The modern world is surrounded by words and signs that need interpreting. Yet our interpretation and understanding of these signs are often socially produced (or even socially enforced). This module will examine how our experience of the world and our interpretation of signs is shaped and limited by the language we use.

Compulsory

This module² provides you with an opportunity to reflect upon and gain experience for an approved placement undertaken during your programme. A placement should usually be at least 26 weeks or equivalent; however, each placement will be considered on its own merits, having regard to the ability to achieve the learning outcomes.

Optional

This module² provides you with an opportunity to reflect upon and gain experience for an approved international study/work placement undertaken during your programme. A work/study placement should usually be at least 26 weeks or equivalent; however, each placement will be considered on its own merits, having regard to the ability to achieve the learning outcomes.

Optional

French Existentialism is often dismissed as a product of its time; chain-smoking, polo-neck wearing, coffee-drinking introspection in the wake of two World Wars. Despite this, we see manifestations of its tenets time and again across philosophy, culture, politics and art. This module will cover the main themes of the philosophy, delve into the complexities of its texts and thinkers, and explore some cultural interpretations.

Compulsory

In this module, you will explore the philosophy of disability and bioethics. You will critically explore scenarios of disability, illness and care. The module will centre the voices and experiences of disabled people in critical philosophical reflection.

Optional

This module takes as its starting point the midlands-based Lunar Society, an eighteenth-century group of artists, industrialists, inventors and scientists. The legacy of these key members of the English Enlightenment will be considered in the culture, politics and industry of the midlands as we ask: Is it possible to define a philosophy of the Midlands?

Optional

This module responds to the new realisms, new materialisms and flat ontologies of twenty-first-century philosophy. It considers the philosophical heritage which contemporary thinkers including Donna Haraway, Timothy Morton, Graham Harman, and Jane Bennett draw upon in order to contextualize what is new in their work. It aims to critically apply their thinking to contemporary problems including AI, the climate crisis, global inequality and resurgent nationalisms.

Optional

This module embraces the great diversity of works of fantasy, gothic and science fiction and will explore their relationship to each other, place them within literary traditions and examine the ways in which such popular writing is essentially intertextual and cross-generic.

Optional

This module critically assesses the role of numbers in our everyday lives and culture. Should we think of mathematics as a language, or do numbers speak to reality in a more direct and objective way than is possible in verbal language? Students will extend their knowledge of the use/misuse of statistics and the relationship between propositional logic and mathematics as well as consider alternative uses of numbers such as numerology.

Optional

This module aims to introduce students to the literature and philosophy of the Enlightenment. including both eighteenth-century debates about progress and modernity as well as contemporary accounts concerning the significance of ideas about Enlightenment.

Optional

This module provides an opportunity for you to exercise independent learning and research skills in the final semester of your degree. You will be able to conceive, plan and carry out an individual programme of discipline-specific research under the supervision of a member of staff, leading to the ultimate submission of a final project in the form of a dissertation, portfolio, or artefact, as appropriate.

Optional