Hegel:
an introduction

Seminar overview. Hegel is one of the most important and influential philosophers in the Western tradition. Many of the most prominent thinkers in later philosophical fields derived their insights by wrestling with Hegel’s system: as in Marx and his tradition, Nietzsche and Kierkegaard, Foucault, the post-structuralists Lacan, Sartre, and Merleau-Ponty, queer theorists like Judith Butler and José Esteban Muñoz, and so on. Similarly, our modern reception of thinkers who preceded Hegel, such as Plato, Aristotle, Spinoza, and Kant, has been indelibly shaped by Hegelian interpretation.

In its own right, the study of dialectics is excellent training for a wide capacity to engage the world and its thinkers. Its potential as a tool for self-transformation and development explains its thorough influence on modern psychoanalytic thought, particularly in Jungian theory.

Unfortunately for the contemporary student in Toronto, it is difficult to find education on Hegel and his tradition in our local universities’ philosophy departments — and it is difficult, as an autodidact, to break through Hegel’s obscure writing style for the first time.

It will be the purpose of this seminar to offer a guided tour of Hegel’s core texts, with the intent that attendees will walk away not only with a basic understanding of Hegel’s philosophy, but also with the capacity to engage with his texts independently. Our main text will be the Phenomenology of Spirit, but we will also discuss selections from the three volumes of the Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences (Logic, Nature, Spirit), as well as the Philosophy of Right, which was to have such a historical impact through Marx.

Seminar info. This seminar is hosted by Res Futura, and will be facilitated by James Yuan. It will run twice weekly from May through August 2026. Seminar session times have not yet been finalized. Declare your interest in this seminar: https://forms.gle/uxANg1LGLY7xcAnc6.

Read the draft syllabus: https://tinyurl.com/5n77f9z2.

About the poster. The poster for this seminar is based on an illustration by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, from his Theory of Colours (copied below). Although best known as a poet and man of letters, Goethe’s experimental work with botany and optics was a significant inspiration for Hegel’s dialectical method. Goethe theorized that the spectrum of colours is best understood as a totality, each colour being in rational relationship with the others and emerging through the interplay of the two basic principles of light and darkness. Against Newton’s empiricist theory, Goethe championed this rationalist theory under the symbol of the color wheel, which he invented in its modern form. Modern artists, such as Wassily Kandinsky, have continued to draw inspiration from Goethe’s theory of colours.