The UCSC Graduate Program in Philosophy admitted its first doctoral students in 2001. There are approximately 20 current graduate students in the program and each year 3-4 new Ph.D. and 2-3 new M.A. students will be admitted.

The department’s distinctive profile emerges from its approach to the study of philosophy, including an interest in the history of philosophy as an indispensable background to the main areas of contemporary concern in the discipline. More specifically, the department’s characteristic and compelling strength lies in its attitude towards the two current traditions in philosophy—the so-called analytic and continental traditions. While analytically trained, the great majority of the faculty has research and teaching interests in some major 19^th and 20^th century European figures, including, among others, Hegel, Nietzsche, Husserl, Heidegger, and Foucault. Most important, the department’s approach to the two traditions is highly unusual. Many departments cover both traditions, but one rarely finds the curriculum and the research programs in the two as comfortably joined together as one can find them in our department. We are happy to be, in this way, at the front of what we hope is the wave of the future: one in which the research and curriculum in the best programs of philosophy reflect and integrate the virtues of both traditions.

Among the faculty’s main contemporary interests are those topics commonly pursued in any high-ranking research and teaching program, and particularly those comparable to departments of philosophy at other UC’s: including for example research and teaching interests in philosophy of science, metaphysics, philosophy of mind, epistemology, philosophy of language, philosophy of religion, ethics and moral psychology.  The faculty’s research and teaching in these areas is informed by leading historical figures, including especially Kant, Aristotle, Hume, Wittgenstein and—again, uniquely for such a small department—leading figures from the Middle Ages and late antiquity (including medieval Islamic figures).

The department’s strongest area of contemporary research and teaching is one that reflects its integration of all three concerns (historical, analytic and continental): namely the history of 20^th century analytic and continental philosophy and its main figures—Husserl, Heidegger, Carnap, Quine and Wittgenstein.

The department sponsors colloquia speakers that provide the community the opportunity to interact with distinguished guests from other universities. Some past visitors included Scott Soames (USC), Bas van Fraassen (Princeton), Brian Skyrms (UCI), Alvin Plantinga (Notre Dame), Graham Priest (Melbourne), Michael Friedman (Stanford), and Mark Colyvan (Queensland).

Graduate students and Visiting Scholars also have an opportunity to make presentations via the Works-in-Progress series. Typically these are run much like colloquia and allow for an intellectual exchange that asks questions of and provides feedback on the research.

Inquiries should be directed to:

Hollie Clausnitzer
Department Manager & Graduate Program Coordinator
hclausni@ucsc.edu

Daniel Guevara
Graduate Program Director
guevara@ucsc.edu