{"id":42,"date":"2024-03-06T16:11:51","date_gmt":"2024-03-06T16:11:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/?page_id=42"},"modified":"2025-09-09T21:22:32","modified_gmt":"2025-09-09T21:22:32","slug":"graduate-admissions","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/graduate-admissions\/","title":{"rendered":"Admissions"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>The Ph.D. in Philosophy<\/h2>\n<p>A graduate degree in philosophy at Vanderbilt offers extensive study in all major fields and historical periods of philosophy. Our department has strengths in ethics, social and political philosophy, epistemology, feminist philosophy, metaphysics, philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, and philosophy of religion. We also focus on the history of philosophy, especially Kant, nineteenth-century, early modern, and ancient. Our faculty reflects a variety of approaches and methodologies, including analytic, continental, historical, and pragmatic.<\/p>\n<p>Students must complete at least 47 hours of formal coursework, in addition to satisfying other requirements as noted in our <a href=\"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/phd-requirements-guidelines\/\">degree requirements<\/a>. Those who are offered admission to our Ph.D. program <a href=\"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/aid-awards\/\">receive funding<\/a> in the form of an annual stipend, full tuition waiver, and health insurance for six years. The department and Graduate School also provide generous additional sources of funding, including: topping-up awards, a moving stipend, travel and conference funds, summer research funds, language study funds, funds for interdisciplinary research, an ABD stipend, and other awards and fellowships for exceptional research and teaching.<\/p>\n<p>Please reach out to the <a href=\"mailto:karen.ng@vanderbilt.edu\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">director of graduate studies<\/a> or our <a href=\"mailto:vanessa.aguilera@vanderbilt.edu\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">graduate program coordinator<\/a> with any questions.<\/p>\n<h2>Application<\/h2>\n<p>Application to the Vanderbilt Ph.D. program in philosophy consists of five components:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Completion of the <a href=\"https:\/\/apply.vanderbilt.edu\/apply\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">online application<\/a> to the <a href=\"https:\/\/gradschool.vanderbilt.edu\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Vanderbilt Graduate School<\/a><\/li>\n<li>Submission of unofficial transcripts<\/li>\n<li>Submission of at least three, but at most five, letters of recommendation<\/li>\n<li>Submission of a personal statement, discussing philosophy background, research interests, and departmental fit<\/li>\n<li>Submission of a philosophically substantive writing sample of manageable length (ordinarily no more than 7,000 words), demonstrating research potential<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>The application deadline for fall admission of any given year is <strong>January 3<\/strong>\u00a0of that same year.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><a href=\"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/65\/2024\/08\/240509nmVUPhilosophy0382.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-280\" src=\"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/65\/2024\/08\/240509nmVUPhilosophy0382.jpg\" alt=\"The Vanderbilt Department of Philosophy Primary Faculty and Graduate Students\" width=\"918\" height=\"612\" srcset=\"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/65\/2024\/08\/240509nmVUPhilosophy0382.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/65\/2024\/08\/240509nmVUPhilosophy0382-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/65\/2024\/08\/240509nmVUPhilosophy0382-768x512.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 918px) 100vw, 918px\" \/><\/a>The Vanderbilt Department of Philosophy Primary Faculty and Graduate Students<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Ph.D. in Philosophy A graduate degree in philosophy at Vanderbilt offers extensive study in all major fields and historical periods of philosophy. Our department has strengths in ethics, social and political philosophy, epistemology, feminist philosophy, metaphysics, philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, and philosophy of religion. We also focus on the history of philosophy,&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":74,"featured_media":231,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"page-headline-img.php","meta":[],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/42"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/74"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/42\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":587,"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/42\/revisions\/587"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/231"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/philosophy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}