The choice to declare philosophy as an undergraduate major can evoke a variety of opinions: Some call it a major for slackers, others deem it made for the law school-bound, and many push it aside for the soul-searchers.
A recent New York Times article about philosophy on the college campus found a large increase in the number of philosophy majors at large universities including Rutgers, Notre Dame, the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. Each of these schools has seen a 50 to 100 percent increase in philosophy majors over the past five years.
But here at Tufts, while an increasing number of Jumbos are taking select philosophy courses, the number of philosophy majors remains stagnant.
While total enrollment in philosophy courses on the Hill has increased 23 percent between the 1996-97 and 2006-07 school years, the number of majors and minors has remained relatively constant. The average and median numbers of majors has stayed at 72 over that same period despite total undergraduate enrollment in the university increasing by about 10 percent over that same period.
According to junior and philosophy major Brian McLoone, one reason students at universities across the United States are becoming more interested in philosophy courses is to make sense of current issues like the war in Iraq, political scandal and the role of technology in modern life.
"The Bush administration has been one of the most corrupt in history," McLoone said. "People are retreating to more fundamental issues in the face of contradictory evidence."
Another incentive to declare a philosophy major is the discipline's ability to lay the foundation for a variety of career paths.
"The study of philosophy helps students to develop the intellectual abilities that are important for life, beyond the knowledge and skills they might need for a particular profession at a particular time," said Susan Russinoff, senior lecturer in philosophy and the director of the Critical Thinking Program. "The philosophy major enhances analytical, critical and interpretive skills that can be applied to any subject and in any context. It encourages students to think creatively, to develop and express their own ideas, and to engage in debate about problems that have no easy or obvious answers."
Russinoff explained that these skills will be important for students facing the current economic conditions in which one profession may no longer suffice as a longtime career.
"Students know that they'll have to adapt to a continually changing work world, and it's hard to know where the jobs will be," Russinoff said. "They don't expect to get a job and keep it until retirement."
Associate Professor of Philosophy Nancy Bauer, however, believes the reasons for the increase in majors may be less clear. She explained that an increase in philosophy majors could indicate university-specific phenomena, citing that a number of the universities seeing dramatic increases have some of the largest and most respected departments in the country.
"Rutgers' philosophy department has exploded in recent years," Bauer said. "They've hired a large number of very famous faculty ... and they have a lot of money for conferences."
The Philosophical Gourmet Report, a ranking of the faculties of philosophy departments with Ph.D. programs across the English-speaking world, is a set of ratings compiled by philosophy professors. Professors are asked to rate lists of faculty without knowing the names of their universities. They are evaluated on a one-to-five scale based on their attractiveness to a prospective student in terms of quality of work, talent, range of areas of study and availability.
The report supports Bauer's theory on the philosophy departments at varying universities, and it ranks five of the six schools mentioned in the Times article in the top 24 out of 110 Ph.D. programs in the country.
While Bauer hasn't observed a change in students' approach or desire to study philosophy at Tufts, she said that during tougher economic times, students may become more inclined to major in philosophy.
Bauer also explained that the findings of increased philosophy majors fail to recognize an underlying issue in the makeup of a discipline long dominated by white males.
"I'm not convinced we've done anything here," Bauer said. "In the long term, the profession would be seriously served by examining why people are turned off at a higher level."
