Our graduate students are actively engaged both within the academy and beyond. Keep up with news of their activities and achievements, and get to know their perspectives on various philosophical issues in this News & Blog feed. To request a news announcement or submit a blog post proposal, current students and alumni should contact the graduate adviser (philgpa@uw.edu).
Graduate Student News & Blog
Earlier this month on February 13, 2026, Philosophy Graduate Student Daniel Galley successfully defended his dissertation titled: "The Ethics of Persuasion". He was overseen by a committee consisting of Philosophy faculty members Michael Blake, Colin Marshall, and José Mendoza. In this dissertation, I use ‘persuasion’ to refer to the provision of reasons offered with the intention of changing the target’s mind on some moral matter. A key premise that underlies much of this dissertation is…
Earlier this month on December 11, 2025, Philosophy Graduate Student Aaron Barker successfully defended his dissertation titled: "Schopenhauer on Character, Cognition, and Moral Responsibility". He was overseen by a committee consisting of Ellwood Wiggins, Chair of German Studies. Along with fellow Philosophy faculty members Colin Marshall, Paul Franco and Shawn Wang.His dissertation addresses some of the central features of Arthur Schopenhauer's theory of action. It does so through three…
Last month, on August 21st, 2025, Philosophy Graduate Student Sofia Huerter successfully defended their dissertation titled: "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings: Domestication, Disability, and Moral Repair". They were overseen by a committee consisting of Jamie Mayerfeld, Department Chair of Law, Societies, & Justice. Along with fellow Philosophy faculty members Michael Blake, Sara Goering, Department Chair and Colin Marshall. The abstract for their dissertation is as follows: …
Earlier this month on August 15th, 2025, Philosophy Graduate Student Kyle O'Dwyer successfully defended his dissertation titled: "Deflationary Challenges and Essentialism". He was overseen by a committee consisting of Michael Raven, a Philosophy professor from University of Victoria. Rob Rhee, Chair of Interdisciplinary Visual Art, at the school of Art + Art History + Design. Along with fellow Philosophy faculty members Sosseh Assaturian, Paul Franco and Colin Marshall.
The…
We made it to the summer! I hope that you are able to enjoy a somewhat slower pace in the coming months, with time to reflect and revel in the lengthy days of summer. If you’re looking for reading recommendations, check out our faculty summer reading list.
This has been a challenging year on campus, with grant terminations, international student visa revocations, significant budget cuts and more. Academic institutions across the country are under fire, and trying to figure out how to maintain…
We are proud to announce, that third year graduate student Kai Milanovich was awarded the 2025 Nancy Hartsock Endowed Graduate Student Award, which recognizes creative achievements of an emerging scholar doing work in feminist theory, for their paper "Distinguishing Situated Knowledge and Standpoint Theory: Defending the Achievement Thesis." The paper was recently accepted for publication in Hypatia.
Huge congratulations to Kai!
The Department of Philosophy celebrated the achievements of our students and faculty at our annual awards ceremony. We had an in-person celebration in Savery Hall June 5th, 2025, and were thrilled to celebrate our award winners’ accomplishments together. Our heartfelt tradition of sharing personal anecdotes about each recipient continued, to the delight of family, friends, and classmates.
We are proud of the accomplishments of all our department members and look forward to seeing what…
The College of Arts & Sciences celebrates undergraduate and graduate students from across all four divisions, who are recognized for making the most of their time at the UW.
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on 2025 Husky 100
Huge congratulations to graduate student Erica Bigelow, who won a 2025 Philosophy in Media fellowship from the Marc Sanders Foundation for a summer workshop on podcasting!
https://marcsandersfoundation.org/philosophy-in-media-2025/
UW Philosophy PhD candidate Aaron Barker will spend the 2024-2025 academic year as a Fulbright Fellow in Germany. Aaron, whose dissertation project focuses on Schopenhauer’s moral psychology, will be working with Dr. Matthias Koßler, director of the Schopenhauer-Gessellschaft in Mainz. Read further details here.