ManchesterPhoto of Maurice Merleau-Ponty with the quote ""The philosopher is a perpetual beginner."ManchesterQuote from Simone de Beauvior, "It is in the knowledge of the genuine conditions of our life that we must draw our strength to live and our reason for acting."Drawing of Immanuel Kant with the quote ""From such crooked wood as humanity is made of, nothing straight can be fashioned."ManchesterPhoto of Toni Cade Bambara, with the quote "We'd better take time to fashion revolutionary selves, revolutionary lives, revolutionary relationships...not all speed is movement."Photo of William James with the quote "“My thinking is first and last and always for the sake of my doing.”Painting of Jean-Jacques rousseau, with the quote "To live is not [only] to breathe, but [also] to act."Iris Murdoch, Irish-British novelist and philosopherPhilippa Foot, English Philosopher

The Philosophy Department at UConn is internationally recognized as a top place to do research in a wide variety of areas in philosophy, including: Aesthetics, Africana Philosophy, Decolonial Philosophy, Epistemology (Formal and Social), Existentialism and Phenomenology, Feminist Philosophy, History of Philosophy, Indigenous Philosophy, Metaphysics, Latin American and Latinx Philosophy, Philosophy of Culture, Philosophy of Language, Philosophical Logic, Philosophies of Mind and Language, Philosophies of Medicine, Psychiatry, and Psychoanalysis, Philosophy of Human Sciences, Philosophy of Race and Racism, Philosophy of Science, Social and Political Philosophy, and more.

The department is also a leader in public philosophy, with members addressing topics such as the ethics of artificial intelligence, language and genocide, political epistemology, and shifting the geography of reason. Four peer-review journals are headquartered here: Journal of Philosophical Research, Philosophia, Philosophy and Global Affairs, and, as of 2023, Journal of the American Philosophical Association.

Recent PhDs have secured positions at St. Andrews University, Oxford University, Notre Dame University, the University of Oslo, Kuwait University, Gonzaga University, the University of Delhi, Lewis & Clark College, the University of Massachusetts at Boston, the University of Memphis, Grand Valley State University, the University of California at Merced, Fairfield University, the University of Iowa, the University of Idaho, the University of Kentucky,  the University of Konstanz, Monash University, Yonsei University, the University of Tokyo, Muhlenberg College, Sam Houston State University, the University of Minnesota-Duluth, the Czech Academy of Sciences, the University of California-Merced, TPX Communications, Cambridge Semantics, and Cycorp. Our doctoral students are a global community from Argentina, China, Egypt, India, Ireland, Turkey, Pakistan, and the United Kingdom, as well as the U.S.

The undergraduate major and minor has a stellar record of preparing students for advanced study in a variety of professional schools and disciplines, in addition to philosophy, and careers ranging from the entertainment industry to nonprofits, private, and public service.

Our department is also an attractive research community for international scholars, several of whom came on Fulbright scholarships from Argentina, Bulgaria, France, and Senegal, and others on special fellowships from Australia, Brazil, and China.

Yes, they studied philosophy at their institutions of higher learning

Philosophy Majors Nominated for an Oscar

Q&A: Patrisse Khan-Cullors: 'My favourite word? Freedom'

Upcoming Events

  1. 12/15 PHIL End-of-Year Event
  2. 1/26 Vice Squad Meeting
  3. 1/27 Connecticut High School Ethics Bowl
  4. 2/2 Philosophy Department Colloquium: Christopher Zurn (U Mass Boston)
  5. 2/2 Philosophy Department Colloquium: Christopher Zurn (University of Massachusetts, Boston)
  6. 2/10 Kinds of Consciousness
All Events »