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Survey of the Philosophic Discipline

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Abstract

The academy is widely reported to be going through a period of transformation: not just changes to what is taught, but threats to tenure and internal funding, perhaps balanced by new possibilities for external funding and interdisciplinary projects. This article discusses a recently conducted survey of US and Canadian Philosophy departments, in an effort to understand one discipline’s perspective on and reaction to these changes. The survey found that, for the majority of departments, Philosophy has largely not changed over the last decade in terms of shifts in subfields, tenure and tenure criteria, internal funding and external grant awards. However, a minority of departments are demonstrating potentially transformative possibilities, especially as related to interdisciplinarity.

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Notes

  1. This article is intended in part to reveal responses to trends widely believed in academia to exist; for example, a search of the Chronicle of Higher Education for “college cost crisis” yielded 1,206 articles as of this writing; over a hundred from the last year alone. One should note, however, that specific elements can be interpreted in various ways. For example, there is some debate about whether increases in tuition result from decisions internal to academia, if they are justifiable, and even if increases are illusionary (cf. Archibald & Feldman 2010 to Taylor 2010; Fish 2003 to Boehner & McKeon 2003).

  2. This is due in part to the increased numbers of such degrees awarded over the last decade. Between 1997–1998 and 2007–2008, the number of bachelor’s degrees awarded by public and private not-for-profit institutions increased 27% (private for-profit institutions, while still in the minority, increased fourfold), while the number of master’s degrees over the same period increased 45% (National Center for Education Statistics 2010: 124). (NB. For comparison, the average annual population increase in the US was 1.10% at the beginning of this period, and is in decline (Day, n.d.)).

  3. See http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d10/tables/dt10_286.asp.

  4. In an investigation of seven top journals in the field (Ethics, Journal of Philosophy, Mind, Nous, Philosophical Review, Philosophy and Public Affairs, and Philosophy and Phenomenological Research), Haslanger (2008) notes that less than 13% of authors from 2002 to 2007 were women.

  5. Psychology’s boundaries shifted again when clinically-minded members left the former APA to form the American Psychological Society (now the Association for Psychological Science).

  6. http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d09/tables/dt09_275.asp.

  7. Here, we intended to learn the relative proportions of each specialty within individual departments’ curriculum. There is an alternative possibility—that participants interpreted this question to compare them to other departments. If so, then even an occasional class in a very rare field could be deemed ‘above average.’ We do not believe this to be the case, however: the anchoring points of the scale (“Primary focus” and “Not represented”) reflect the wording of the original question (“in your department”). Further, it would seem unlikely (but not impossible) that over 80% of departments think themselves to be “above average” in ethics. Interpreting these numbers as indicative of ordinal importance is more parsimonious.

  8. Departments with both undergraduate and graduate programs are represented below by an average of the responses for both grad and undergrad curricula.

  9. Scores for graduate curricula (M=5.5, SD=1.5) were higher than for undergraduate curricula (M=3.4, SD=1.6) at significant levels (using an independent samples t-test, t(207)=−6.8, p<.001).

  10. Scores for graduate curricula (M=3.4, SD=1.9) were higher than for undergraduate (M=1.5, SD=0.8) at significant levels (using and independent samples t-test, equal variances not assumed, t(38)=−5.8, p<.001. However, note that for this question data variances were not homogeneous: from the bimodal distribution observed in the left-most graph under “Training on applying for grants” in Fig. 12, I conclude that training in applying for grants is a feature only of some graduate departments, and is not representative of graduate curricula as a whole.

  11. An independent samples test comparing undergraduate to graduate curricula overall does find a significant difference, however, the graphs of the raw data show that this appears only because graduate programs’ undergraduate curricula contribute only a small proportion of all undergraduate curricula. When a similar test compares the graduate and undergraduate curricula only among departments with graduate programs, differences virtually disappear (graduate curricula (M=3.7, SD=2.0), undergraduate curricula (M=3.7, SD=1.9), t(33)=0.0).

  12. This includes advice for academic careers; note that the survey did not specify careers in philosophy.

  13. When asked how influential the Philosophical Gourmet was on their department’s activities, participants’ average response on a 6 pt. Likert scale was 4.5: below “Not very influential: we are aware of it and our department’s standing, but don’t worry about it.”

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Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank the following people at the Center for the Study of Interdisciplinarity: Prof. Robert Frodeman for introducing me to an interesting topic as well as sharing ideas and guidance; Dr. J. Britt Holbrook for his help and support with data collection; and Clara Benson, Michelle Sanit and Stephanie Santayana for their valuable assistance.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Philosophy and Religion Studies, Center for the Study of Interdisciplinarity, University of North Texas, Denton, TX, 76201, USA

    Steven Hrotic

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Correspondence to Steven Hrotic.

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Hrotic, S. Survey of the Philosophic Discipline. Minerva 51, 93–122 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11024-013-9218-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11024-013-9218-x

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