Question for Philosophy Majors on Reading Background

[bar_scene_gambler]

No, you're not misunderstanding. We had the normal survey courses (forgot about having to take those), Ancient, Modern, Symbolic Logic, Contemporary, and Intro. But that only adds up to five courses in Philosophy. Those courses were designed to give us a broad understanding of philosophy, and so we did the anthology thing, but all other courses were "figures and themes" courses in which we read a substantial number of complete texts. In my epistemology class, for instance (it was an unorthodox course), we read Cavell's The Claim of Reason, Austin's Sense and Sensibilia, and filled these in with numerous essays and monograms by Moore, Lewis, Clarke, Malcolm, Fodor & Katz, etc. For an independent study I did on Hume, I read his entire philosophical corpus in a semester. For my course on Kant's Ethics, we read the entirety of The Groundwork, the Second Critique, The Metaphysics of Morals, Religion Within the Bounds of Mere Reason, and then supplemented it with secondary literature which we were meant to read outside of class. Basically, my faculty threw us in the deep end, and we had to learn how to swim. We were expected to put in the necessary extra work outside of class, which basically means that I have lived and breathed philosophy for the last four years. 

A typical class was my professor assigning 100-200 pages of reading, then we would go home and read it with secondary literature if it was necessary. We would come to class and would start discussions on the material from the moment everyone was present. Classes were usually an hour and a half, three times a week. Then usually the philosophy majors would stay after and speak more with the faculty about the reading. Wash, rinse, repeat. There were no homework assignments other than reading and no tests. We would have to write short papers periodically and at the end of the semester we would have to right a 25 pg+ paper on any topic of our choosing from the books we'd read during the semester. The non-intro/survey courses were all pretty intense, but I left feeling better prepared for grad school than most, even though it may mean that my education in certain areas isn't as broad as others.

Edited May 10, 2014 by bar_scene_gambler

[Establishment]

No, you're not misunderstanding. We had the normal survey courses (forgot about having to take those), Ancient, Modern, Symbolic Logic, Contemporary, and Intro. But that only adds up to five courses in Philosophy. Those courses were designed to give us a broad understanding of philosophy, and so we did the anthology thing, but all other courses were "figures and themes" courses in which we read a substantial number of complete texts. In my epistemology class, for instance (it was an unorthodox course), we read Cavell's The Claim of Reason, Austin's Sense and Sensibilia, and filled these in with numerous essays and monograms by Moore, Lewis, Clarke, Malcolm, Fodor & Katz, etc. For an independent study I did on Hume, I read his entire philosophical corpus in a semester. For my course on Kant's Ethics, we read the entirety of The Groundwork, the Second Critique, The Metaphysics of Morals, Religion Within the Bounds of Mere Reason, and then supplemented it with secondary literature which we were meant to read outside of class. Basically, my faculty threw us in the deep end, and we had to learn how to swim. We were expected to put in the necessary extra work outside of class, which basically means that I have lived and breathed philosophy for the last four years. 

A typical class was my professor assigning 100-200 pages of reading, then we would go home and read it with secondary literature if it was necessary. We would come to class and would start discussions on the material from the moment everyone was present. Classes were usually an hour and a half, three times a week. Then usually the philosophy majors would stay after and speak more with the faculty about the reading. Wash, rinse, repeat. There were no homework assignments other than reading and no tests. We would have to write short papers periodically and at the end of the semester we would have to right a 25 pg+ paper on any topic of our choosing from the books we'd read during the semester. The non-intro/survey courses were all pretty intense, but I left feeling better prepared for grad school than most, even though it may mean that my education in certain areas isn't as broad as others.

 

I'm jealous. My undergraduate experience was pretty weak. Even the upper undergraduate courses were still just reading through an anthology. ~20 pages of reading a week. ~10 page term paper. Even some of my graduate courses weren't really any different.

[bar_scene_gambler]

I'm grateful because I feel that it prepared me for the workload of graduate school. That said, because the department didn't worry about breadth, I'll need to take done extra surveys in grad school to make up for it.

[Nastasya_Filippovna]

where did you go for undergrad, if you feel comfortable sharing? I think that is amazing that you were required to read so much and write such demanding papers; more to the point, I think it is particularly commendable that you are the type of person that reaped the advantages of such an intensive undergraduate program. I could not believe how many of my classmates would gripe about the reading assigned to us in our classes. I mean of course philosophy is a reading intensive major! We only had select excerpts from the major works within our courses too. That's why I ended up doing to many independent studies and a thesis, so I could end up reading full texts from an assortment of philosophers within the disciplines I found most compelling. I truly believe that reading the texts verbatim is crucial to developing a genuine command of the material.

[bar_scene_gambler]

where did you go for undergrad, if you feel comfortable sharing? I think that is amazing that you were required to read so much and write such demanding papers; more to the point, I think it is particularly commendable that you are the type of person that reaped the advantages of such an intensive undergraduate program. I could not believe how many of my classmates would gripe about the reading assigned to us in our classes. I mean of course philosophy is a reading intensive major! We only had select excerpts from the major works within our courses too. That's why I ended up doing to many independent studies and a thesis, so I could end up reading full texts from an assortment of philosophers within the disciplines I found most compelling. I truly believe that reading the texts verbatim is crucial to developing a genuine command of the material.

This will probably reveal who I am, but I suppose it doesn't really matter much. I'm graduating from Lehigh University in a little over a week. Since I see you're a fellow Pennsylvanian, I assume you know where Lehigh is. It comes as a surprise that this isn't the norm, given that Lehigh's philosophy department doesn't have a reputation. 

[Kierkegaardashian]

No, you're not misunderstanding. We had the normal survey courses (forgot about having to take those), Ancient, Modern, Symbolic Logic, Contemporary, and Intro. But that only adds up to five courses in Philosophy. Those courses were designed to give us a broad understanding of philosophy, and so we did the anthology thing, but all other courses were "figures and themes" courses in which we read a substantial number of complete texts. In my epistemology class, for instance (it was an unorthodox course), we read Cavell's The Claim of Reason, Austin's Sense and Sensibilia, and filled these in with numerous essays and monograms by Moore, Lewis, Clarke, Malcolm, Fodor & Katz, etc. For an independent study I did on Hume, I read his entire philosophical corpus in a semester. For my course on Kant's Ethics, we read the entirety of The Groundwork, the Second Critique, The Metaphysics of Morals, Religion Within the Bounds of Mere Reason, and then supplemented it with secondary literature which we were meant to read outside of class. Basically, my faculty threw us in the deep end, and we had to learn how to swim. We were expected to put in the necessary extra work outside of class, which basically means that I have lived and breathed philosophy for the last four years. 

 

Oh, put that way, your experience wasn't all that different from mine. It seems like the difference has more to do with taking independent studies and with a few more focused classes being offered (such as Kant's Ethics). I don't think doing the anthology thing necessarily or even usually entails less rigor (not that anyone here said that; it just seems to be somewhat implied by some). We did the anthology thing in my undergrad, but we only read primary texts, and the amount of reading was substantial. In some ways, I find it more difficult, since every week I had to switch gears and get inside the thought of a new thinker, rather than sticking with one or two thinkers and becoming familiar with their turns of phrase, terminology, ideas, etc. In general, I think the "anthology-method" is better for undergrads, who need a firm understanding of how x idea they will encounter is interacting with the tradition. That being said, I can definitely see the value of focusing intensely on the complete texts of certain authors, especially someone like Kant or Aristotle, who were so incredibly influential in the history of philosophy.

Edited May 12, 2014 by Kierkegaardashian

[Nastasya_Filippovna]

oh but that school has an excellent reputation!! I would have to think that any admissions board would be familiar with that school and know that it at least, in general, is a super liberal arts school! I come from a small liberal arts school with no reputation - I loved my profs, they were absolutely amazing, but I know the fact that my school has no reputation or is not known AT ALL outside central pa is going to hurt me big time!

[sar1906]

Thanks for all the feedback.  I plowed through the Prolegomena and am now working on the first Critique.  Going to read as much as possible.  Good general reference list here from the philosophy undergrads.  Thanks!