I welcome applications from talented and energetic students who wish to study with me in Boulder. In principle, I am open to supervising any dissertation in the history of Western philosophy between Augustine and Hume, including the Arabic tradition. Occasionally, I supervise non-historical theses.
I supervise both MA and PhD students. In either case, students who seek to receive a CU Boulder degree must apply, in the regular way, to be admitted into the Department of Philosophy. Those application deadlines are in December (international applicants) or January (domestic applicants), to begin the following fall. Every year, the department has around six available new PhD positions—all fully funded—and an indefinite number of new MA positions, for which funding is sometimes available but not guaranteed. Students applying to study with me get no special priority: they must compete against all other applicants to the department. We receive over 200 applications a year. There is detailed further information on the department’s website.
Students can apply to our PhD program even if they have not received an MA, and we regularly accept students with that profile. Students who already have an MA in philosophy are not ordinarily eligible to study for a second MA here. Although applicants can choose to apply to our MA rather than to our PhD program, there is no advantage in doing so. Those applicants who are not admitted to the PhD (and who do not yet have an MA) will be automatically considered for our MA program.
Like most North American programs, graduate study here begins with a year or more of coursework, across a wide range of topics in philosophy. Only after the coursework is completed do students begin to write a thesis. Accordingly, we do not expect students who are applying to the program to have a very definite sense of their dissertation topic. It is indeed common for students to change their area of interest radically between being admitted and beginning to write a dissertation.
We expect all students in our program to excel across the range of topics studied in the department. For my students in particular, this means that they will be expected to become proficient in contemporary analytic philosophy. Students with no interest in studying recent English-language philosophy will not thrive here.
It is not important to me, in considering whether to work with a student, that the student be already highly knowledgeable about much of anything in philosophy. What matters is talent and energy. The road to a PhD is long, and knowledge of the subject can be acquired along the way.
It is also not important to me that the student have already acquired much of the necessary languages. To be sure, mastering some languages will be necessary, and an earlier start makes things much easier. But a dedicated student can acquire the necessary languages here in Boulder. For the record, anyone studying with me is likely to require a good grasp of Latin. I increasingly regard Arabic as a prerequisite for studying medieval philosophy. And it is extremely useful to know French, German, and ancient Greek. But that would be something like a complete list: I have never had a student acquire even a basic familiarity with all those languages.
As for English, if you can satisfy the University’s TOEFL requirement then that is good enough to start with.
I encourage students applying to study with me to email me in advance. There is not much point in having a detailed conversation until you are admitted, but it can be helpful for me to know that you have applied.
For students enrolled in graduate programs elsewhere, I am glad to consider proposals to spend a semester or a year studying with me in Boulder. Students interested in this sort of visiting arrangement should contact me directly. Be aware that the University of Colorado does not currently offer a joint-degree option, and has no ability to fund visiting students.
I am also happy to host post-doctoral scholars who wish to spend time in Boulder. But, again, the University of Colorado has no ability to fund such visits.