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Textual Analysis

Across its courses and events, the programmes of the IST demonstrate in the practice the originality of its methodology in approaching works of literature and philosophy. All around us, the rigid, top-down and quasi-universal method of the lecture reinforces the teacher as holder of knowledge, the students as passive receptacles, and the acquirement of quantifiable items of knowledge as the purpose of the process. The IST brings back texts as the centre of the process, as the objects of creative concoction by fine minds, worth our study today, and demanding familiarised interpreters as guides. The instructors of the IST are indeed more guides to the texts than teachers ; enthusiasts intimately touched by the texts discussed, and eager to pass on the torch of their emotion to new generations of readers.

Course Preparation

In order not to become a dead letter, this belief is embedded in the very course structure and methodology of the programmes of the Institute. After the initial proposition of a term course, the instructor initiates a process of elaboration with the help of the Course Committee. This process intends to transform a broad idea, recognised for its originality and relevance, into a more detailed course of progression. From the very time of this preparation process, the general theme and texts of the course get translated into sets of excerpts and themes for each of the 8 classes of the term.

Classroom Methodology

The programmes at IST are not meant to “bring knowledge” to the students in a consumption mode ; the courses respond to the initial curiosity and engagement of the participants, and provides them with the keys to do their own interactive exploration of major texts of our literary and philosophical heritages. The excerpts are selected and discussed as landmarks in this progression, but the full course of reading is encouraged in parallel, for a progressive coverage of the book or books of study across the 8 weeks of the course, at the rhythm of a few chapters per week. The excerpts for study during each Textual Analysis session are selected from the chapters of reading prescribed for that week. More experienced participants can thus return to key moments of the text after having discovered it at home already once ; while participants with less time or struggling to enter the text on their own, can get a facilitated access during the sessions, and then return to it alone and in their own time.

During the sessions, through videoconference, excerpts are projected on the screen, while the instructor’s discourse finds its own note, but does it by building around a progressive interpretive exercise that maintains the textual material as the main resource. These excerpts are selected for their importance as key moments in the argumentation of the author, or particularly evocative examples for a desired point of analysis or interpretation. The instructor reads and re-reads the sentences before the participants, highlights certain elements in terms of writing, style, resonances, hidden connections, or argumentation. The participants are invited to interject and contribute to the interpretation, or ask questions. An interactive moment may kept, at the end of the session, for remaining points of discussion or to push the reflection further on certain directions.