_Investigates the role of family in Hegel’s phenomenology._.

In the thesis I explain why an immanent approach in philosophy means taking contingency to be "irreducible". I show why Deleuze and Guattari believe this to be the case and why they think Hegel fails to do this. I then go on to show in what way Hegel incorporates contingency into his system and how he also creates his own sense of "necessity" that emerges from the systematic treatment of contingent concepts. In this way I show how Hegel can respond (...) to the demand for immanence made by Deleuze and Guattari. I suggest that freedom, for Hegel, consists in the systematic treatment of contingency in our lives and in our thinking. (shrink)