Programs

The Department of Philosophy at Western offers two graduate degrees, a master’s and a doctoral degree in Philosophy. 

MA Program 

Our MA in Philosophy is a one-year funded program. Students take six one-term courses and write a 10,000 word research paper over the summer. Each year the courses available reflect the strengths and diversity of interests of the faculty, which collect along five principal fields: feminist philosophy; history of philosophy (ancient, medieval and modern); moral, political and legal philosophy; philosophy of mind and language; and philosophy of science (including mathematics and logic).

PhD Program

There are two streams in the Ph.D. program in Philosophy at Western. Students entering with an MA are enrolled in a four-year funded program. In their first year, students take courses; in their second, they take a comprehensive exam in their main research area and complete a course that will lead to the writing and defense of a thesis prospectus; their third and fourth years are spent writing their dissertations.

There is also a five-year program for students entering with a BA. Students in this stream are funded for five years. The program is as described above but with an extra year of coursework at the beginning.