The Modern Breakthrough in Scandinavia

Resources

• Kierkegaard. “Johannes Climacus” excerpt
• Hegel, Lectures on the History of Philosophy pdf
• H.C. Ørsted. Aanden i Naturen excerpts
• R. Nielsen. “Et synspunkt for Darwinisme” parallel text
• H. Høffding. “Filosofien og Darwinismen” parallel text
• H. Høffding. “Om Realisme i Videnskab og Tro” parallel text
• G. Brandes. Dualismen i vor nyeste Philosophie excerpts
  
• G. Brandes. “Dyret i Mennesket” parallel text

Description

This course explores the intersecting innovations of philosophy, art, science, and social politics that defined the Modern Breakthrough, a period of dramatic transformation in Scandinavia spanning the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Rather than treating these developments in isolation, the course takes a deliberately interdisciplinary approach. Students will examine how new artistic movements, philosophical ideas, scientific worldviews, and political reforms mutually informed and reshaped one another during a decisive moment in the history of ideas. Topics may include realism and symbolism in literature and art, the emergence of modern psychology and social theory, transformations in conceptions of nature and the human subject, and the cultural and political conditions that made these changes possible.