German Studies

Certificate in European Critical Thought

The Certificate Program in European Critical Thought offers Brown undergraduates from all areas of the University a scaffolded approach to foundational texts in critical theory, as well as its antecedents and legacy.

Certificate in European Critical Thought

The Certificate Program in European Critical Thought offers Brown undergraduates from all areas of the University a scaffolded approach to foundational texts in critical theory, as well as its antecedents and legacy.

Students will hone skills in analyzing a wide range of complex arguments and modes of expression, including literary and aesthetic idioms, which probe and expose the limits and conditions of possibility for conceptual formations, institutional establishments, disciplinary boundaries, and organizations of power. Students will develop a broad familiarity with the most enduring aspects of European thought since the eighteenth century, and they will gain a deeper understanding of especially significant movements within this tradition (such as the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory). This transdisciplinary certificate program is therefore exceptionally suited not only to prepare students of literature and culture to analyze the tensions that span works of art and larger social structures, but also to prepare scientists to question, for instance, the social and conceptual presuppositions of the scientific approach to data and knowledge. In this way, the Certificate Program in European Critical Thought will affirm the central role of the humanities within the broader context of the University, and it will offer a much-needed complement to the recent investment in other areas of research at Brown, such as the newly established Data Science Institute. Thinkers to be studied on a regular basis will include, among others, Kant, Schelling, Hegel, Marx, Nietzsche, Freud, Gramsci, Heidegger, Bloch, Benjamin, Adorno, Horkheimer, Arendt, Lacan, Foucault, Blanchot, Lyotard, Derrida, Cixous, and Agamben.

 

Certificate Requirements

Students will be required to complete four courses, including: 

At least one of two course offerings in the “Introduction to German Critical Thought” sequence: 

  • GRMN 1000A Introduction to German Critical Thought I (Kant to Freud)
  • GRMN 1000B Introduction to German Critical Thought II

At least one of the 1000-level courses offered in German Studies with the designation “Special Topics in Critical Thought” (STICT), which will focus on different topics each year. These courses will numbered in the GRMN 1700 - 1799 series: 

Fall 2025: 

  • GRMN 1701 / COLT 1611A: The Uncanniness of Being: Freud, Heidegger, Derrida (cross-listed) 

Two additional courses, to be chosen in consultation with the Director of the program. These courses will change from year to year. For Academic Year 2025-2026, courses counting toward the ECT certificate include the following: 

Fall 2025: 

  • GREK 1110J: Plato: Theaetetus
  • GRMN 1200D: Repetition: Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, and Freud
  • GRMN 2663A: Identification: On the Mark(s) of the Same in Literature, Philosophy, and Psychoanalysis (graduate seminar)
  • HMAN 1977F: Hospitality and Literature
  • HMAN 2402E: Trace and Absence: Comparative Perspectives on the Past in Things (graduate seminar)
  • HMAN 2402G: Mending What is Broken: Repair, Debt, and Reparations (graduate seminar)
  • PHIL 1230 Kant: The Critique of Pure Reason
  • PHIL 1320: Schopenhauer's Ethical Thought
  • RUSS 1848: Central Europe: An Idea and Its Literature 

Spring 2026: 

  • COLT 1210: Introduction to the Theory of Literature
  • COLT 1430I: Poetry of Europe: Montale, Celan, Hill
  • COLT 1430L: Voices of Romanticism
  • COLT 1611C: Gift and Debt
  • COLT 2520F: Theories of the Lyric
  • GRMN 2663B: Dream-Work; or, the Poetics of Thought (graduate seminar)
  • HIST 1956A: Thinking Historically: A History of History Writing 

Experiential Learning: 

Critical theory profoundly challenges the distinctions between theory and practice, experience, and cognition. For this reason, the “experiential” component of the program will be fulfilled in a manner that highlights the unique and profound interventions that thinking can make. 

1. Critical Theory Colloquium: Students will be required to participate in four sessions of the Critical Theory Colloquium, a three-hour forum for the intensive discussion of primary texts and recent research in critical theory that will be held at least once per semester. A faculty member from the Department of German Studies, sometimes in collaboration with an invited guest, will design and facilitate each session. Readings will be made available to participants no later than two weeks in advance of each session, so as to allow each participant ample time to prepare. A Zoom option will always be available for those students who are unable to attend the colloquium in person.

This colloquium series will ensure that all students enrolled in the certificate program, regardless of whether they are enrolled in the same classes, will have the opportunity to convene once per semester and engage collaboratively with pathbreaking studies in critical theory. Since the Critical Theory Colloquium will be open to all interested members of the Brown community, it will also add a public dimension to the students' learning experience, while serving as a community-building institution beyond the certificate program. The final session of the Critical Theory Colloquium each year will include public presentations of research on the parts of those students who are completing the certificate program. (See below, nr. 3.)

2. Research in Critical Theory: 

a. Capstone Project: Students may fulfill the research component of the experiential learning requirement by completing an Honors Thesis for their declared concentration that engages substantively with critical theory. Proposals for theses will be reviewed and approved by the Director of the certificate program.

b. Graduate Seminar: Upon receiving approval from the Director of the certificate program, students may also fulfill the research component of the experiential learning requirement by successfully completing a graduate seminar that entails extensive engagement with critical theory. 

3. Public Presentation: All students completing the certificate program will be expected to present their research at the final meeting of the Critical Theory Colloquium for the academic year. 

Contact

  • Professor Gerhard Richter is the Director of the Certificate in European Critical Thought, and is the first point of contact for students interested in pursuing an undergraduate certificate.