Analytic Philosophy

Our approach to analytic philosophy focuses on creating dialogues between analytic texts and thinkers, and alternative traditions, such as Pragmatism, Continental Philosophy, Feminist Philosophy and Psychoanalysis. We believe that attention to possible intersections of these different traditions provides a much richer and deeper understanding of key issues than is available through analytic methods and modes of argument alone. Consequently, our courses that deal with themes and problems raised in Analytic Philosophy tend to bring in material from other points of view as well.

Current faculty interests in Analytic Philosophy are indicative of this cross-tradition orientation. One focus draws on empirical research on concepts, meaning and language from the cognitive sciences to help clarify and resolve questions in the philosophy of mind and language. A second emphasizes how a naturalized approach to epistemology that unites empirical research on cognition with cultural studies of knowledge formation bears on central questions in epistemology and the philosophy of science. A third focus combines insights from phenomenology and developmental psychology to arrive at a conception of mind as both necessarily embodied and situated within the network of social relations. A fourth focus, in moral theory, includes cognitive research on moral reasoning and character development in addressing issues in virtue ethics, moral realism and ethical naturalism. Our work in aesthetics and the philosophy of art includes key analytic texts and problems, along with work from hermeneutics and film and literary studies. In addition, historical courses and specific authors' courses may have analytic approaches appropriate to their subject matter.