Are my interests too narrow?

[bookofletters]

Hello any and all,

I am an applicant from a small liberal arts school, however I have presented at several conferences, been published, and won scholarships and awards-- but I am quite nervous that I might be taking the wrong approach to the upcoming app season.

To explain, I am concerned that maybe my interests are too narrow. I do like certain fields of philosophy, but I do most of my work within the the history of philosophy. My biggest interest is medieval islamic philosophy. In fact, I am SO interested in that specific area I would not want to consider a school that did not have a medieval islamic philosophy scholar in the faculty. Other interests include medieval philosophy more broadly, philosophy of religion, and existentialism and phenomenology. 

But again, those are small interests compared to my long standing infatuation with the conversations being had in medieval islamic philosophy. 

I guess my question is this: how do i address this in my statement without sounding too rigid/unwilling to do work in other topics? I have done work in Islamic philosophy more broadly as well as many other fields, but if I am going to spend 5-8 years getting an AOS, well, i know for a fact what I want it to be in.

Thanks for any comments, concerns, or scathing indictments you all may have to offer.

Edited May 26, 2016 by bookofletters

[PrimeMumble]

Hey!

In my SoP I stated very clearly that I wanted to work on how one topic is analyzed by one author, and everything went out pretty well. However, I am an international student, so maybe this does not apply to Americans: while I chose my area of interest after a five-year degree in Philosophy and an undergrad thesis of 150 pages, some students from the US leave college with just 5 or 6 philosophy seminars! Maybe writing a little bit about the courses that helped you define your area if interest can help.

[dgswaim]

This may be to your advantage at the places that have someone working in your area, actually, since there probably aren't that many students wanting to work on this stuff. The faculty that are involved in this area probably haven't had the opportunity to work with many grad students, so you might be seen as a very welcome opportunity to do so.

[psm1580b]

On 5/26/2016 at 6:31 AM, bookofletters said:

Hello any and all,

I am an applicant from a small liberal arts school, however I have presented at several conferences, been published, and won scholarships and awards-- but I am quite nervous that I might be taking the wrong approach to the upcoming app season.

To explain, I am concerned that maybe my interests are too narrow. I do like certain fields of philosophy, but I do most of my work within the the history of philosophy. My biggest interest is medieval islamic philosophy. In fact, I am SO interested in that specific area I would not want to consider a school that did not have a medieval islamic philosophy scholar in the faculty. Other interests include medieval philosophy more broadly, philosophy of religion, and existentialism and phenomenology. 

But again, those are small interests compared to my long standing infatuation with the conversations being had in medieval islamic philosophy. 

I guess my question is this: how do i address this in my statement without sounding too rigid/unwilling to do work in other topics? I have done work in Islamic philosophy more broadly as well as many other fields, but if I am going to spend 5-8 years getting an AOS, well, i know for a fact what I want it to be in.

Thanks for any comments, concerns, or scathing indictments you all may have to offer.

You're exactly in the right position. Small liberal arts college, published, specific interests, this is exactly what those applicant committees want to see. State what your interests are. Do not say anything about what your interests aren't. 

[bookofletters]

Thanks gang. I feel a lot better about my upcoming statement of purpose now.

Y'all rock.

[Adequate Philosopher]

Hello bookofletters, 

I hate to be a Hume here--but you should be aware that, generally speaking, there is a bias against the philosophy of religion in the philosophical community at large. This is unfortunate, because I think philosophy of religion is the greatest! I want it to be an AOS. 

What is my evidence, you ask? Professors and my own experience (I do not deny that my sample size is limited, however).   

Regarding professors: I wanted to write my thesis on the problem of evil, and, even among the theistic philosophers at my department, I was advised against it. One professor told me that, when he attended the University of Notre Dame for his PhD (the philosophy of religion capital in the world, or at least the U.S., at any rate) famous philosophers there such as Alvin Plantinga and Peter van Inwagen would gladly advise students for their dissertations--as long as their dissertations focused on a more general metaphysical and/or epistemology problem--that is, not focused on an issue in the philosophy of religion. Apparently, students who do their dissertation on an issue in the philosophy of religion have a tougher time finding jobs, even more so than everyone else. I ended up doing my thesis on the problem of evil anyway, and got accepted into a decent graduate program. But I also got a lot of rejections! 

Regarding my own experience: Not all, but some professors seem implicitly (some explicitly) to be contemptuous of religion. Also, so did most of my colleagues at my undergraduate institution.

You might be thinking, "I said that I wanted to specialize in medieval Islamic philosophy, not philosophy of religion, which you have focused on." Sure, but (please correct me if I'm wrong) religion and philosophy is a bit more difficult to separate in much Islamic philosophy, is it not? 

So what am I getting at here? The short version is this: Are your interests to narrow? Kinda. Now, you might get lucky, and get hired somewhere looking for a scholar in medieval Islamic philosophy. But those jobs are far and few between. It is my understanding that most of us get jobs teaching at smaller schools where the opportunities to teach our "pet interests," (or whatever you want to call them) are slim to none. 

I suggest broadening your metaphysical/epistemological/ethical interests, and this is likely to be strongly suggested if you are accepted into a graduate program. But still, by broadening your interests you may be able to use your expertise on medieval Islamic philosophy to contribute to current philosophical debates. Analytic philosophers have a short memory regarding the history of philosophy. (For example, my thesis adviser was writing a paper on Biblical interpretation basically identical to that of Averroes' view of how to interpret the Koran.)   

Let me know if I can clarify anything! But ultimately, you have to decide for yourself. 

"A man convinced against his will

is of the same opinion still." 

[bookofletters]

19 hours ago, Adequate Philosopher said:

Hello bookofletters, 

I hate to be a Hume here--but you should be aware that, generally speaking, there is a bias against the philosophy of religion in the philosophical community at large. This is unfortunate, because I think philosophy of religion is the greatest! I want it to be an AOS. 

What is my evidence, you ask? Professors and my own experience (I do not deny that my sample size is limited, however).   

Regarding professors: I wanted to write my thesis on the problem of evil, and, even among the theistic philosophers at my department, I was advised against it. One professor told me that, when he attended the University of Notre Dame for his PhD (the philosophy of religion capital in the world, or at least the U.S., at any rate) famous philosophers there such as Alvin Plantinga and Peter van Inwagen would gladly advise students for their dissertations--as long as their dissertations focused on a more general metaphysical and/or epistemology problem--that is, not focused on an issue in the philosophy of religion. Apparently, students who do their dissertation on an issue in the philosophy of religion have a tougher time finding jobs, even more so than everyone else. I ended up doing my thesis on the problem of evil anyway, and got accepted into a decent graduate program. But I also got a lot of rejections! 

Regarding my own experience: Not all, but some professors seem implicitly (some explicitly) to be contemptuous of religion. Also, so did most of my colleagues at my undergraduate institution.

You might be thinking, "I said that I wanted to specialize in medieval Islamic philosophy, not philosophy of religion, which you have focused on." Sure, but (please correct me if I'm wrong) religion and philosophy is a bit more difficult to separate in much Islamic philosophy, is it not? 

So what am I getting at here? The short version is this: Are your interests to narrow? Kinda. Now, you might get lucky, and get hired somewhere looking for a scholar in medieval Islamic philosophy. But those jobs are far and few between. It is my understanding that most of us get jobs teaching at smaller schools where the opportunities to teach our "pet interests," (or whatever you want to call them) are slim to none. 

I suggest broadening your metaphysical/epistemological/ethical interests, and this is likely to be strongly suggested if you are accepted into a graduate program. But still, by broadening your interests you may be able to use your expertise on medieval Islamic philosophy to contribute to current philosophical debates. Analytic philosophers have a short memory regarding the history of philosophy. (For example, my thesis adviser was writing a paper on Biblical interpretation basically identical to that of Averroes' view of how to interpret the Koran.)   

Let me know if I can clarify anything! But ultimately, you have to decide for yourself. 

"A man convinced against his will

is of the same opinion still." 

Thanks for your advice and for giving me your earnest thoughts on my question. As for the employment side of things, maybe I am thinking backwards about it, but I just have no interest in tailoring my work in some way that improve my job chances, but should a small school give me the opportunity to teach broad subjects, I would absolutely be fine.

And I would agree with you about the bias to the extent that most philosophers groan at the mention of God or religion more generally. However, that's fine with me, because the conversation going on in these topics with the people who are interested, religious, atheistic, or otherwise.

I think in my statement of purpose, I probably should make it clear that I want to do serious work in medieval Islamic more than anything else. However, I could also say I am interested in any and all of the problems in that tradition, as well as ways they might inform contemporary philosophical discussion in metaphysics, epistemology, etc. This way, maybe despite my narrow scope, they know I am open to all fields of inquiry to that extent?

[psm1580b]

"(please correct me if I'm wrong) religion and philosophy is a bit more difficult to separate in much Islamic philosophy, is it not?"

I hate to say this, but as one who has taught Islamic philosophy--this is absolutely false. 

[bookofletters]

10 minutes ago, psm1580b said:

"(please correct me if I'm wrong) religion and philosophy is a bit more difficult to separate in much Islamic philosophy, is it not?"

I hate to say this, but as one who has taught Islamic philosophy--this is absolutely false. 

Yeah there's a lot more going on.

[Adequate Philosopher]

Would you guys mind elaborating a bit? Awaken me from my dogmatic slumbers. 

[bookofletters]

5 hours ago, Adequate Philosopher said:

Would you guys mind elaborating a bit? Awaken me from my dogmatic slumbers. 

Well for starters al-Farabis book of letters starts at the political but finds itself as a thorough treatise on language. He also wrote about music. Avicenna, though he has the best ontological argument for God (imo), his falling man thought experiment basically says what Descartes cogito well before his birth.

Also they wrote vast amounts of philosophy on logic, even good ol al-Ghazali.