The Philosophical Gourmet Report

The philosophical Gourmet Report 2004-2006, "a ranking of graduate programs in philosophy in the English-speaking world," edited by Brian Leiter (UT Austin), came out online this morning.

Very interesting to me, not so much for most people. But take a look, if you felt like it.

I realize that those universities that rank highest in the overall ranking are often not so strong in philosophy of religion and philosophy of art, in which I am strongly interested. This is partly attributable, of course, to the increasingly meaningless analytic/continental distinction of the philosophical tradition (in the last century).

For someone interested in studying philosophy of language, religion, and aesthetics, with fairly substantial attention to so-called continental philosophy, i.e., for me, then, the best two programs seem to be offered by: Oxford, Yale, Chicago, Texas, etc.

It would take a miracle (or two) to get me into those programs, to be sure. And this ranking shouldn't concern me any more than this kind of ranking appropriately does. Yet the time will come, as I am determined to go study philosophy at some university. I wonder which ones I'll be looking a year from now.