Imagined Societies (SOTH40002)

This subject critically engages with questions regarding the place of subjectivity in the organisation of social and political relations, at both the theoretical and empirical levels. It investigates the ways in which discourses and subjectivities interact. Through critical engagement with such theorists as Freud, Klein, Lacan, Castoriadis, Kristeva, Butler, Zizek, Fanon, Nandy, Beck, Bauman, Giddens and Habermas, the subject highlights the place of the imaginary and the unconscious in the formation of ideologies and subjectivities. Through postcolonial theory issues of colonial and postcolonial identities are explored. Students completing this subject should possess knowledge of some major contemporary debates regarding the formation and organisation of subjectivities, an understanding of the centrality of subjectivity to the organisation of social and political relations, an awareness of the difficulties associated with analysing subjectivities in late or postmodernity, and an acquaintance with attempts to bring contemporary theories of subjectivity to the study of empirical cases.