MA Seminar (PHIL*6950)
Code and section: PHIL*6950*01
Term: Fall 2020
Instructor: Don Dedrick
Details
This course is cross-listed with PHIL*6960
This course runs for the full year, and it is required for all new grad students, MA and PhD. Normally, it would meet once a week for 2 hours, for both F and W terms. I have listed the course as Face-to Face not because I think that’s necessarily going to happen, on a regular basis, but because it is my hope that, at least once, we will get together on campus to say hello! I’d hate it to be the case that new one yr. MA students never physically meet one another before they graduate, though we will hope things get better, on campus, in the Winter term. The course, then will probably be a mixture of assignments and zoomstyle meetings. I should say that this course is not designed to be challenging academically in the way the other courses on offer in our Dept. are. We cover a variety of material that is intended to [1] help you negotiate some of the things that are part of being a graduate student and an academic: how to apply for external Govt. scholarships—and especially how to do a good application. What makes for a good teacher? What is the nature of philosophical scholarship? How (and what) to submit to an academic conference, and how to find and to choose conferences. I realize not everyone has the academic profession in mind (and jobs are scarce). That brings us to [2], our concern in this course with nonacademic careers. How can one leverage one’s philosophical education into the wider non-academic world?
All course materials will be provided by the Instructor.