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Advice and Information for Applicants to our Graduate Programs

  1. What philosophical background do you expect to see in a successful candidate for your graduate program?

 

Though there have been exceptions to this rule, we generally admit students with a philosophy major--sometimes a minor--who have at least been exposed to the kinds of things our program specializes in, namely, continental philosophy, social and political philosophy, ethics, and critical race theory. Students need not have attended a "continental department" as an undergraduate, but a good background in continental philosophy and the history of philosophy is certainly a plus.



  1. What GPA and GRE scores do students generally need to be accepted into your graduate program?

 

We do not have a minimum GPA or GRE score for admittance to our program since we understand that there might well be reasons why a student's GPA or GRE score is not indicative of their ability (for example, students may have begun in another major or had a difficult time in their first year of college or there may be exceptional circumstances surrounding the taking of the GRE).

That said, our students generally have very high GPA's (between 3.5 and 4.0) and our average GRE score is probably around 650 verbal and 700 quantitative. We try to put the GPA and the GRE score into the context of the entire application.



  1. What do you look for in a student's writing sample?

 

The first thing we look for is clarity in writing and argumentation. We have found that students who have difficulty expressing themselves clearly in writing will have problems in our program. We also look for writing that has a bit of style without being pretentious or full of artifice. We are looking for essays, not experimental pieces of philosophy and literature. Finally, we look for essays whose content reflects the emphases in the department. A brilliantly argued and written paper in the philosophy of mind will be at a terrible disadvantage in relation to other pieces of writing for the simple reason that we have no one on our staff who will be able to nurture such an interest. The ideal paper would probably be one that treats some theme or figure in the history of philosophy with some reference to contemporary trends or readings of this theme or figure.



  1. What are some key characteristics of students who succeed in your program?

 

Probably the very first characteristic for success in our program is, as mentioned above, the ability to write and argue clearly. This is the sine qua non of doing well at DePaul. Language expertise or experience is also a very important factor since doctoral students must pass two language exams (typically French, German, Latin or Greek, though sometimes Spanish and Italian depending upon research interests) and every student is encouraged to study abroad at some point in his or her graduate career. The reading of texts in the history philosophy in their original language is a mandatory requirement at the dissertation stage. Finally, students have to be self-motivated. While as a faculty we are always generous and supportive, we do not hold the student's hand from start to finish and we expect requirements to be completed in a timely manner. "Incompletes," for example, are not permitted. Students who do not have the habit of completing work on time will thus find DePaul a difficult place to flourish and will be asked to leave the program.



  1. What is the typical placement for graduates from your program?

 

Among our doctoral students, they have been placed--almost without exception--in teaching positions at the university level (for example, in the past few years, U Cal Berkeley, U of Miami Ohio, Earlham College, Grinnell College, Xavier University of New Orleans, American University in Cairo, George Washington University). A couple have taken university related posts (as administrator in a graduate school, as co-director of a humanities institute).



  1. Which PhD programs have accepted graduate students who completed your B.A. or M.A. programs?

 

Emory University, U Cal Berkeley, SUNY Buffalo, Vanderbilt University, U of Kentucky, U of Toronto, Boston College, Memphis.



  1. What role does Continental Philosophy play in your graduate curriculum? What aspects if any are given special prominence?

 

As stated above, we think of ourselves as a department that specializes in continental philosophy and the history of philosophy with special emphases in social and political philosophy, ethics, and critical race theory (all 16 of the department's members specialize in one or more of the above). In addition to almost yearly courses in figures important to the continental tradition (Husserl, Heidegger, Sartre, Ricoeur, Derrida, Foucault, Irigaray, etc.) as well as the history of philosophy (Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Descartes, Leibniz, Kant, Hegel, Schelling etc.) we have theme based courses that revolve around social and political issues (with readings from Marx or Jameson or Hobbes or Rousseau) and issues in critical race theory (with readings from, for example, DuBois or Fanon or Spivak). The recent hiring year of two experts in critical race theory and African Philosophy brings to four the number of members specializing in these areas. The recent hiring of a highly respected feminist philosopher has strengthened our program in this area as well.