Rights before Human Rights: Eighteenth Century Theories and Representations

Module description

The relation of ‘human rights discourse’ to the eighteenth century has been much contested of late. On the one hand, as Samuel Moyn has argued, it is anachronistic to attribute contemporary notions of ‘human rights’ to the eighteenth century, given the prevalence of an older language of rights, for which the state and community, and not the individual, were the primary focus. On the other hand, it cannot be denied that the eighteenth century gave rise to the revolutionary invention of rights that have had such a resounding impact on subsequent political culture (including the abolition of slavery, the right to work, to economic and social equality). How then do we assess the impact and legacy of the Enlightenment conception of rights? And is the history of ideas alone sufficient for understanding a discourse of rights that, aside from being non-linear, seems inextricable from its dramatization?

This module considers the changing language of rights from the perspective of emerging new literary and theatrical representations of sovereignty. The question of ‘representation’ is especially salient given that it contains both a political and imaginary or ‘ideological’ dimension. France in particular was the birthplace of Europe’s first secular state and the place where theatre was most closely affiliated with state representation. Throughout the eighteenth century, thinkers repeatedly turned to theatre to think through and resolve some of the more pressing political and social dilemmas. At the same time, they sought to attribute a new meaning to theatre as an art form dedicated to a specific emotion: that of being human. This module pairs together a series of political ‘discourses’ with theatrical representations in order to investigate the following questions- what is sovereignty? What is obedience and submission? What are the limits of tolerance and compassion? How can rights be vindicated and by whom? 

Assessment details

One 4000 word essay

Educational aims & objectives

• to give students a sound and broadly-based knowledge of the French Enlightenment through a reading of key, canonical texts.
• to reflect upon some of the main themes of the Enlightenment vindication of ‘rights’, including sovereignty, obedience and submission, the master-servant relation, tolerance, and personal and political freedom.
• to contextualize the discourse of rights, which is often treated ahistorically, within broader eighteenth century thinking on sentiments, emotions and representation.
• to introduce students to the specificities of French theatre.
• to reflect upon the legacy of the Enlightenment and its relevance (or not) to the contemporary proliferation of human rights discourse.
• to reflect more broadly on how political and theatrical notions of ‘representation’ interact.

Learning outcomes

At the end of the module students will:

• have acquired a broad knowledge of French Enlightenment thought generally and familiarity with key texts of the Enlightenment ‘canon’.
• have acquired specific knowledge of French theatre in order to better understand the complex relation to both the theory and practice of representation that led up to the French Revolution.
• have a good understanding of the main themes/controversies surrounding the vindication of rights in the eighteenth century.
• have a good sense of the contemporary critical controversies and methodological difficulties of basing rights discourse on an ‘enlightenment’ past.
• have explored key aspects of ‘politics as theatre and theatre as politics’.

Teaching pattern

One two-hour seminar per week

Suggested reading list

Corneille, Cinna

Hobbes, Leviathan (selections)

Bodin, Six Books of the Republic (selections)

Marivaux, L’Ile des esclaves

Rousseau, Discourse on the Origins of Inequality

____________, Letter to D’Alembert on the Theatre

Voltaire, Treatise on Tolerance and the Calas Affair

Lessing, Nathan the Wise

Diderot, Paradox on Acting

_________, Entretiens sur le Père de famille

__________, Droit naturel/Natural Right

Beaumarchais, The Marriage of Figaro

Schiller, The Robbers

_________, The Theatre as Moral Institution

Olympe de Gouges, Declaration of the Rights of Women

Essential Critical Texts

Hunt, Lynn. Inventing Human Rights (2007)

Moyn, Samuel. The Last Utopia: Human Rights in History (2010)

Reinhart Koselleck, Critique and Crisis: Enlightenment and the Pathogenesis of Modern Society [1959] (1998)

Module description disclaimer

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