About

Although we are a relatively small department, our faculty have wide-ranging interests. We have particular strengths in metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of mind and language, and meta-ethics, and in select areas in the history of philosophy (Stoic philosophy, women philosophers in the modern period, British empiricism, Kant, and early analytic philosophy). We offer teaching and supervision (at both graduate and undergraduate levels) in all these areas, as well as general ancient and modern history of philosophy, normative ethics (including applied ethics), feminist theory, and the philosophy of science.

Our faculty also have interdisciplinary research and teaching interests that intersect with those of faculty in other units of the university, especially the departments of Linguistics, Psychology, Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, Economics, as well as the UMass Cognitive Science Initiative and the Arthur F. Kinney Center for Renaissance Studies.

Beyond teaching and research, our mission includes service to both the profession and the community at large. We are especially proud to have helped organize the Mentoring Project For Pre-tenure Women Faculty in Philosophy, and to have contributed to the Philosophy for Children movement, especially through the efforts of the late Gareth Matthews, and the UMass Center for Philosophy and Children.