Next Meeting: Wednesday 13 March 2013, 5pm, Wolfson

Our next meeting will take place at 5pm on Wednesday 13th March in Committee Room, Wolfson.

The reading will be an excerpt from Simone Weil's The Need for Roots (pp. 9-19; from 'Order' on p. 9 to the end of 'Honour' on p. 19)

As ever, if you have suggestions for future readings get in touch (christos.hadjiyiannis@ell.ox.ac.uk)

Date change: Next meeting 6 February, 5pm

Please note the date change for our next meeting: Wednesday *6 February* (not 30 January as previously advertised). Same time and place: 5pm, Committee Room, Wolfson

Next meeting: 6 February 2013, 5pm

A happy new year to all!

Our next meeting will take place on Wednesday 6 February at 5pm in Wolfson (room tbc).

We will be discussing chapter 9, 'Aestheticism, Perfectionism, Utopianism', (from vol 1) of Karl Popper's Open Society and its Enemies, which you can access here (pp.160-72). It is a relatively short text but contains various integral ideas that (will hopefully) lend themselves to fruitful discussion.

As ever, do get in touch if you have any questions/suggestions etc.

Looking forward to seeing many of you on the 6th!

Alan Ryan on Berlin (via Marcus)

Marcus has very kindly alerted us to this timely article by Alan Ryan on Berlin: "Isaiah Berlin: The History of Ideas as Psychodrama", in European Journal of Political Theory (December 2012)

Isaiah Berlin on Desert Island Discs

(No Wagner, clearly - but Mussorgsky is in there...)

January meeting

Huge thanks to everyone who attended our first meeting last Tuesday. It was great to get the chance to talk about "History of Ideas", and we can all look forward to continuing our discussions.

Thanks also to those who passed on suggestions for future readings - please keep them coming!

This is all very *provisional*, but, as it stands, for our January meeting we will be reading an excerpt from Karl Popper's Open Society and Its Enemies (1962).

In February, we will read something by Simone Weil (possibly an excerpt from Gravity and Grace (1947) or Oppression and Liberty (1955)).

Details and dates tbc. 

First meeting: Tuesday 27 November, 5pm

Our first meeting will take place at 5pm on Tuesday 27^th November in Committee Room, Wolfson College. The Committee room is located on the first floor, up the marble stairs at the far end of the Berlin Quadrangle.

We are hoping to use this first session as an opportunity to meet and chat informally over wine about the set text (please see below), and also to ponder on future readings - so please do come with suggestions.

The reading is a very short piece (4 pages long) by Isaiah Berlin, which discusses the field of History of Ideas, and which also gives a useful insight into Berlin's style and “method” to those unfamiliar with his work: Part I of the 1949 article “Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century”, reprinted in Liberty, ed. Henry Hardy (OUP, 2002). The entire essay can be accessed here.

We can perhaps then head to the dining hall for dinner - so in case you can't make it at 5, you are welcome to join us afterwards.

Meanwhile, do get in touch if you have any questions: christos.hadjiyiannis@ell.ox.ac.uk

Looking forward to seeing many of you on Tuesday!