COOPERATIVE PHILOSOPHY Ph.D. PROGRAM
The University of North Texas — The University of Texas at Arlington
STUDENT HANDBOOK
Revised
July 2007
Graduate students assume full responsibility for knowledge of all Toulouse School of Graduate Studies and University of North Texas rules, regulations, and deadlines published in the Graduate Catalog and of all departmental and program requirements concerning their degree programs.
These guidelines represent the policy of the Cooperative Philosophy Ph.D. Program. They define general established procedures, that are periodically amended. They may be varied on a case-by-case basis upon consultation with the Cooperative Program Graduate Advisor.
Comprehensive Examination Requirement
Course Distribution Requirement
Prescribed Elective Requirement
University of North Texas Courses
University of Texas at Arlington Courses
DISSERTATION ADVISORY COMMITTEE
The main educational objective of the Cooperative Philosophy Ph.D. Program is to train students in the logically rigorous and finely styled modes of thought and expression that characterize work in professional philosophy. Specifically, the program is intended to offer a broad-based doctoral training which allows students who are interested in continuing their graduate education in philosophy both flexibility in structuring their individual programs of study and also the opportunity to focus that training in areas of departmental strength — including environmental philosophy and ethics, the history of philosophy, and philosophy of religion.
The student completing the program will be prepared to teach and to do research in philosophy in colleges and universities. This training could also be appropriately put to use in related non-teaching professional environments — such as legal practice, the ministry, school administration, or state and federal science agencies — in which the student has been, is, or plans to be employed. In any case, the Ph.D. in philosophy will give students advanced mastery of the ultimate in transferable work skills, namely, the abilities to think clearly, to analyze a variety of subject matters, and to express themselves effectively.
Students apply for admission to the cooperative Ph.D. program in philosophy through the Toulouse School of Graduate Studies at the degree granting institution, the University of North Texas (UNT). To apply for admission online, go to http://www.tsgs.unt.edu/admission_to_graduate_studies.htm.
Upon admission, the student is also able to cross-register for graduate courses at the University of Texas at Arlington (UTA) and to make use of the other academic resources available there. Students will enroll in courses at UTA as non-degree or special students.
Once accepted into the cooperative Ph.D. program in philosophy, students must apply as special students to the Graduate School at UTA; the application fee for students in the cooperative Ph.D. program in philosophy will be waived by UTA. For online access to the Graduate School at UTA, go to http://grad.uta.edu/.
The twelve-semester-credit-hour limit for non-degree students will be waived for students in this program, permitting them to take up to twenty-four semester credit hours of work at UTA. These semester credit hours will be treated as transfer hours toward the degree at UNT.
For admission into the program, prospective students must simultaneously meet the following requirements:
In addition to meeting all of the requirements mentioned above, students applying for admission to the cooperative doctoral program in philosophy must submit
Students who do not meet all of the above requirements may be admitted provisionally — for one semester only — pending completion of their files and satisfaction of admission requirements.
To be awarded the Ph.D. in philosophy, students must successfully complete a minimum of 60 semester credit hours (SCH) beyond the Master’s degree. A minimum of 15 of the 48 hours of non-dissertation course work must be taken at each cooperating institution, UNT and UTA.
The table on the following page summarizes the semester credit hour requirements.
Type of Requirement |
SCH |
Course Distribution Requirement Prescribed Elective Courses "Free" Elective Courses Dissertation |
18 12 18 12 |
Total Semester Credit Hours |
60 |
The following special requirements apply to the Ph.D. program in philosophy.
Foreign Language Requirement Each philosophy Ph.D. student must demonstrate a reading knowledge of at least one foreign language relevant to the student’s research interests.
Comprehensive Examination Requirement All philosophy Ph.D. students must pass four Comprehensive Examinations:
The first three Comprehensive Examinations will be administered and graded by a committee made up of members of the faculties of both the UNT and UT Arlington philosophy departments. Students should inform the Graduate Advisor of the areas in which they will be taking their History of Philosophy exams and their Special Area exam; they should then ask the professors with whom they have had courses in these areas for lists of topics to review and to investigate further, in preparation for their exams. Students may petition, with the support of the Graduate Advisor, to replace one of the two History of Philosophy exams, or the Special Area exam, with an interdisciplinary comprehensive on some area of science, humanities, or policy.
The scope of the Dissertation Area Examination will be determined by the student’s Dissertation Advisory Committee, which will also administer and grade the Dissertation Area Examination. The Ph.D. Comprehensive Examinations may be taken only after all course-distribution requirements (see below) and the language requirement have been met. Students who fail one or more of their Comprehensive Examinations the first time will be permitted to retake those examinations only once, after a period of time specified by the examining committees. When students successfully complete their Comprehensive Examinations, they are admitted to candidacy for the Ph.D.
It is the student's responsibility to inform the Graduate Advisor of the areas in which he or she wishes to take the two History exams and the Special Area exam. The student and the Graduate Advisor then generate a list of program faculty members with whom the student has taken courses in the relevant areas; these faculty members constitute that student's Comprehensive Examinations Committee. It is the Graduate Advisor's responsibility to inform the faculty members to prepare, for the student, short lists of review topics and to compose in due course exam questions on these topics. For each of these three exams, faculty members are to prepare no more than 10 review topics and to compose no more than five questions. If the student had courses in an exam area with more than one program faculty member, each of these faculty members are responsible for some portion of the 10 review topics and for some portion of the five questions, to be determined by the Graduate Advisor.
Students take four exams. They write on an internet-disabled laptop for four hours on each exam, selecting from a group of five questions and writing on three of them. Each question is to consist of several sentences, i.e., a paragraph.
Dissertation Requirement To complete the degree requirements, all Philosophy Ph.D. students must complete a doctoral dissertation. In writing the dissertation, students will work closely with their committee chairs, as well as with the other members of their Dissertation Advisory Committees. The written work of the dissertation is to be the product of original philosophical research based on the critical examination and evaluation of primary sources and appropriate secondary materials. Completion of the dissertation includes a public oral defense of the dissertation before the members of the Dissertation Advisory Committee.
Course Distribution Requirement In order to achieve its specific goal of offering its students a broad-based though flexible training in philosophy, students in the cooperative doctoral program in philosophy must pass, with a grade of B or better, 18 semester-credit hours of course work from among the courses listed to satisfy their course-distribution requirement: PHIL 5110, PHIL 5250, PHIL 5315, PHIL 5335, PHIL 5392, PHIL 5393, PHIL 5410, PHIL 6100, PHIL 6350, and PHIL 6394.
Prescribed Elective Requirement In addition to satisfying the course-distribution requirement, students must pass, with a grade of B or better, 12 additional hours of course work from among the courses listed to satisfy their prescribed elective course requirement: PHIL 5260, PHIL 5600, PHIL 5800, PHIL 5960, PHIL 6120, PHIL 6160, PHIL 6389, PHIL 6620, and PHIL 6960. Courses listed as satisfying the course-distribution requirement but which were not already taken to satisfy that requirement may also be taken and used to satisfy this requirement.
Note on Conference Courses With the permission of their Graduate Advisor, students will be permitted to take a conference/special-problems course (PHIL 5391, PHIL 5900, or PHIL 5910) in place of one or more courses that would satisfy or partially satisfy one of the above area requirements. Students must provide a justification for satisfying the requirement in this way. See, below, descriptions of PHIL 5391, PHIL 5900, and PHIL 5910.
Free Elective Requirement In addition to fulfilling the course-distribution requirement and the prescribed elective course requirement, students must pass, with a grade of B or better, a further 18 hours of course work to satisfy their free elective course requirement. In order to be exposed to the work in environmental ethics and environmental science, in which the departmental at UNT has considerable strength, students must take one course from among PHIL 5450, PHIL 5451, PHIL 5700, PHIL 5710, PHIL 5720, and PHIL 5730 and one course in environmental science (students should consult with the Graduate Advisor for approval of specific courses they wish to take to meet this part of the requirement). The remaining 12 hours of the free elective requirement may be fulfilled by taking courses from among the courses listed below, courses listed above not already taken including those listed immediately above and those listed as fulfilling the course-distribution and prescribed electives requirements and/or approved graduate courses in classics, religion studies, or other related departments: GREK 5391, LATN 5301, LATN 5302, LATN 5391, PHIL 5391, PHIL 5900, and PHIL 5910 .
Dissertation Course After completing all other course requirements, students will enroll in a minimum of 12 semester credit hours of dissertation writing, PHIL 6950.
University of North Texas Courses
PHIL 5110 Theory of Knowledge. 3 hours. Analysis of the essential problems involved in the theory of knowledge, including some of the classical answers to important epistemological problems.
PHIL 5250 Philosophy of Natural Science. 3 hours. A study of the nature, limits and significance of physics, chemistry, biology and related sciences with emphasis on the similarities and contrasts between scientific and other modes of knowing.
PHIL 5315 Topics in Ancient Philosophy. 3 hours. An examination of some major problem areas in the history of ancient Western philosophy — for example, concepts of nature, concepts of the character and function of knowledge, concepts of the nature and extent of value. Major thinkers normally covered include Plato and Aristotle.
PHIL 5335 Topics in Modern Philosophy. 3 hours. An examination of some major problem areas in the history of modern Western philosophy — for example, concepts of nature, concepts of the character and function of knowledge, concepts of the nature and extent of value. Major thinkers covered may include Descartes, Spinoza, Locke, Hume, and Kant.
PHIL 5410 Ethical Theory. 3 hours. An examination of a variety of ethical theories and their application.
PHIL 6100 Aesthetics. 3 hours. An examination of principles of value and aesthetics proposed by representative artists and philosophers.
PHIL 6350 Metaphysics. 3 hours. Examination of problems that arise from attempts to give an account of reality and its manifestations: possibility and necessity, causality, the nature of events, mind-body, and universals.
PHIL 5260 Philosophy of Social Science. 3 hours. Questions on explanations, observable human purposes and science of valuation. Contrasting science, ideology, and occultism. Darwinism as cultural scheme. The “causal” status of symbols and verbal behavior. Debates about objectivity, Verstehen, phenomenology, and behaviorism, referring to K. Popper, G. Netter, L. A. White, B. F. Skinner, C. Geertz, T. Kuhn, P. Winch, and M. Weber.
PHIL 5600 Philosophy of Religion. 3 hours. Examination of arguments for and against the existence of a deity; meanings of concepts of religion, evil, good, and worship; impact of religious beliefs and commitments on social and moral life.
PHIL 5800 Logic and Metamathematics. 3 hours. Review of the history, development, and present status of symbolic logic and metamathematics, including a consideration of the problems encountered in the philosophical interpretation of logical concepts.
PHIL 5960 Seminar in Problems of Philosophy. 3 hours. Intensive analysis of major philosophical issues against the background of classical and contemporary investigations. May be repeated for credit as topics vary.
PHIL 6120 Social and Political Philosophy. 3 hours. Examination of the relation between philosophical ideas and community, natural right, justice, freedom and authority.
PHIL 6160 American Philosophy. 3 hours. An examination of the central philosophical works of Pierce, James, Dewey, and Mead.
PHIL 6620 Existentialism. 3 hours. An examination of the place of man in the world and his relation to problems of authenticity, anxiety and forlornness; Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Sartre.
PHIL 6960 Seminar in Problems of Philosophy. 3 hours. Intensive analysis of major philosophical issues against the background of classical and contemporary investigations. May be repeated for credit as topics vary.
PHIL 5450 Seminar in the Philosophy of Ecology. 3 hours. Traces the evolution of ecology from its roots in 19th-century natural history through general ecology, restoration ecology, human ecology and mathematical ecology. Also explores the sociocultural contexts in which ecology emerged and now exists, including the so-called second scientific revolution and the two-culture split.
PHIL 5451 Environmental Ethics. 3 hours. An examination of basic positions in the field of environmental ethics with emphasis on legal and moral rights for nature, animal liberation and Western philosophical and religious traditions.
PHIL 5700 Seminar in Environmental Ethics. 3 hours. An intensive analysis of new positions in environmental ethics with special emphasis on their theoretical value as a contribution to contemporary philosophy and their practical value with regard to environmental policy and decision making.
PHIL 5710 Ecofeminism: Women's Studies and Environmental Ethics. 3 hours. Examines the merger of feminism with environmental ethics and its subsequent evolution. Subject matter includes the analysis of patriarchy, gender issues and multicultural perspectives within the larger framework of ethical responses to ecocrisis.
PHIL 5720 Comparative Environmental Ethics. 3 hours. An exploration of resources for environmental philosophy in non-Western traditions, focusing on India but including Taoist and Buddhist traditions.
PHIL 5730 Western Religion and the Environment. 3 hours. A historic and contemporary overview of Euro-American religious thought concerning the environment, including investigation of the ancient Western religions, Judaism, Christianity and Native American religions.
PHIL 5900 Special Problems. 1-3 hours. Prerequisite: Consent of department.
PHIL 5910 Special Problems. 1-3 hours. Prerequisite: Consent of department.
PHIL 6950 Doctoral Dissertation. 3, 6, or 9 hours. To be scheduled only with consent of department.
University of Texas at Arlington Courses
PHIL 5392 Topics in the History of Philosophy. 3 hours. Consideration in- depth of the work of a single philosopher or a related philosophical school against the background of the development of philosophy. May be repeated for credit as the topic changes.
PHIL 5393 Philosophical Perspectives on the Humanities. 3 hours. A philosophical inquiry into problems and issues of relevance in humanistic disciplines. May be repeated for credit as the topic changes.
PHIL 6394 Topics in Systematic Philosophy. 3 hours. In-depth treatment of an issue or issues in metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, aesthetics or related subdisciplinary areas. May be repeated for credit as the topic changes.
PHIL 6389 Seminar in Philosophical Analysis. 3 hours. Seminar-style treatment of some major problem in contemporary philosophy. May be repeated for credit as topics vary.
GREK 5391 Conference Course in Greek. 3 hours. May be taken only with the permission of the instructor and the Graduate Advisor.
LATN 5301 Intensive Latin for Reading I. 3 hours. Covers approximately the same material as LATN 1441/1442 (Levels I and II).
LATN 5302 Intensive Latin for Reading II. 3 hours. Covers approximately the same material as LATN 2313/2314 (Levels III and IV).
LATN 5391 Conference Course in Latin. 3 hours. May be taken only with the permission of the instructor and the Graduate Advisor.
PHIL 5391 Conference Course in Philosophy. 3 hours. May be taken only with the permission of the instructor and the Graduate Advisor.
In the initial stages of study in the program, program students will be advised primarily by the Philosophy Graduate Advisor at UNT. The current Graduate Philosophy Advisor is Dr. Robert Frodeman. Student supervision and advisement in the more advanced stages of study will be the responsibility of the student’s five-member Dissertation Advisory Committee, headed by the dissertation director or chair.
DISSERTATION ADVISORY COMMITTEE
Philosophy department faculty at either UNT or UTA will be available to serve on Dissertation Advisory Committees and, if qualified, as dissertation directors. Each student’s committee must have at least two members from UNT and at least one member from UTA. All members of a Dissertation Advisory Committee must be members of the Graduate Faculty of their respective institutions. A Graduate Advisor at UNT, working with the Cooperative Program Graduate Studies Committee, will approve the selection and composition of a student’s Dissertation Advisory Committee.
The timing of the dissertation prospectus will vary, but it should be presented to the student’s Dissertation Advisory Committee before the actual writing of the dissertation begins. Students should consult with their major professors on timing. It should readily convey even to a non-specialist the nature and import of the student’s project. The main text should be 15 to 20 pages in length and include a brief description and statement on the significance of the project, an overview of the state of current research, a plan of research and statement on methodology, and a preliminary outline of chapters. There should also be a substantial bibliography.
When students are ready to schedule the oral defense of their dissertation (also known as the final oral examination), they must notify their Dissertation Advisory Committee members and arrange a date and time for the defense. Students must also notify the Graduate Advisor to arrange for a room and to ensure that the necessary paperwork will be available on the day of the defense.
The Dissertation Advisory Committee then administers the exam. Students usually lecture briefly on the main findings of their dissertation and its relation to the philosophical research area to which it contributes, before questions from the Committee members ensue.
There is some financial support for program students in the form of teaching assistantships. The usual teaching load for a graduate assistant is two three-hour sections for both fall and spring semesters. Currently teaching assistants receive $13,000 per academic year. To be considered for financial support, applications must be submitted by February 1st.
Both UNT and UTA are located in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex. The Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area has over five million inhabitants, a mild climate, and extensive cultural resources. There are a number of other major universities in the immediate area, as well as several colleges and junior colleges. The Metroplex is served by a major international airport.