".. a new configuration is emerging: departments that are not readily identifiable as either analytic or Continental, departments which cannot be happily captured by those labels, and for the most part, do without them themselves.. There is one department that seems to me to have this new shape: the Department of Philosophy at Sussex University..The profile of the department is distinctive, original and interesting".
Simon Glendinning, The Idea of Continental Philosophy (2006).
We, the Philosophy Department at Sussex, believe we are particularly well-placed to offer outstanding graduate supervision to those students, funded by the AHRC or other means, whose long-term aim is to enter the academic jobs market. Among other things:
• Our teaching approach makes us distinctive amongst UK universities. We offer genuine expertise in both Post-Kantian "Continental" and Anglo-American "Analytic" Philosophy, and strongly encourage our research students to engage with both traditions, where appropriate to their area. We have a strong research interest in Classical Indian and Buddhist Philosophy. We have lively research links with other departments and research groupings, including English, Cognitive Science, History, Social and Political Thought, and Art History. Generally, we offer students an unparalleled opportunity to step over traditional academic divisions, and to participate in an open, friendly, but focused dialogue with scholars in different philosophical traditions.
• We have a very strong research record ourselves. In the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise, we were one of only 9 departments in the country to have 100% of the research we submitted judged as internationally recognised or better; meanwhile, 60% was judged as world-leading or internationally excellent. For many of us, 2008 was our first RAE submission, and it is likely that we will produce even better work in time for the next assessment. Indeed, in 2008 alone we have produced at least 18 journal and book articles, in publications such as Philosophical Quarterly, Journal for the History of Philosophy, European Journal of Philosophy, Australasian Journal of Philosophy, Telos, Philosophy and Public Affairs, Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Husserl Studies, Philosophical Topics, Polish Journal of Philosophy, and The Blackwell Companion to Hegel. The prestigious journal Bulletin of the Hegel Society of Great Britain is edited in our department.
• We are scholars with a deep understanding of the history of Philosophy. The Philosophy faculty includes experts on Kant, Hegel, Heidegger, Plato, Aristotle, Wittgenstein, Habermas, Marcuse, Kripke, Rawls, Levinas, Marx, Fichte, Nietzsche, Blanchot, Schiller, Adorno, Horkheimer, McDowell and Burge. It also contains scholars in French, German, Ancient Greek, and Latin.
• In our own research, we are strongly engaged with contemporary philosophical problems. We work on issues such as: descriptions; semantic externalism; forgiveness; causation; retributive and restorative justice; the relationship between language and the world; the imagination; the nature of knowledge; metaphor; identity; counterpart theory; immanent criticism; the ontology of the musical work; externalism in action ethics; fictional objects; definitions of art; normativity; constructivism.
• We aim to support you in your formation as a professional philosopher. We understand the academic jobs market: the importance of getting publications out from an early stage, of regular conference-going, and of preparing a strong c.v. We also understand that producing high quality research takes time, patience, and motivation, and that it may involve a few false starts. We are prepared to support you through both productive and difficult times, and to work with you to develop the intellectual and practical resources to cope with the latter, should they occur. We are enthusiastic, committed and skilled teachers who are keen to attract good students, and to nurture them.
• We have a wide experience of Philosophy as it is pursued in different departments around the world, having studied or taught in Oxford, St. Andrews, Chicago, Leeds, UEA, Birkbeck, Stonybrook, Essex, Lancaster, Bristol, Witwatersrand, Nottingham, Oklahoma, Manchester, Wupperthal, London, Berlin, Kansas, Nebraska, Liverpool, York, Dublin, and Southern Illinois. This gives us insight into how Philosophy is taught in other places, and into how we might do it better!
• We are friendly and approachable department. The composition of the department is unusual in having almost equal numbers of female and male lecturers. In 2007 we were recognised by the Society for Women in Philosophy as a "Woman Friendly Department".
• We have a vigorous and active graduate community. We run regular graduate reading groups and work-in-progress sessions. Our Royal Institute of Philosophy-sponsored Philosophy Society regularly showcases the research of top speakers from around the UK, and attracts 30-40 audience members. Graduate students of ours have recently set up a Triangular Conference in London with other graduate students at Essex and Warwick. Graduates on the Social and Political Thought programme produce their own peer-reviewed journal, Studies in Social and Political Thought.
• A high number of our former graduates have gone into successful academic careers. These include Arif Ahmed (Cambridge), Keith Ansell-Pearson (Warwick), Robert Bernasconi (Penn State) Alison Stone (Lancaster), and Michael Wheeler (Stirling). (For a fuller list, see http://www.sussex.ac.uk/philosophy/1-5-10.html).