Hello, I’m a prospective student at Emory. I have attempted to scour this forum for information about this department at Emory. Unfortunately, I have only been able to find incredibly vague descriptions about the philosophy department and it’s strength so I come here.
I have however discovered one thing: critical theory is very strong at Emory. Supposedly there’s a French Critical Philosophy teacher here that was actually able to collaborate with Derrida before his death. (wow). I definitely want to be a part of this.
There is just one issue : I’m not sure if Philosophy is the best major to achieve this - a lot of the professors who work in critical theory seem to be in the English department, which seems kind of odd considering the fact that I always associated these critical philosophers, to well, philosphers.
I actually DONT have a lot of exposure to philosophers that aren’t primarily postmodern. Pretty much the only classical text I have ever read ( if you can ever consider this classical ) is Descarte’s Meditations of First Philosophy; I just found reading Foucault and Zizek far more interesting and thought provoking than reading Plato.
One thing that makes me slightly hesitant to fully commit to a philosophy major is that it seems slightly more classical and historical than what I am interested in. What keeps me away from majoring in English is that having to trudge through shakespeare doesn’t excite me in the slightest form.
So two questions:
A) If I want to really delve in to critical theory should I major in Philosophy or English? Maybe comp.lit?
B) Is anyone aware of the strength of the philosophy department in relation to the English department? Do you know anyone who is in it and enjoys it?