Philosophy Insights
General Editor: Dr Mark Addis
Reader in Philosophy and Cultural Theory, Birmingham City University
To propose a title in this series please write to mark.addis@bcu.ac.uk
1. Philosophy Titles - Published, in Preparation or Reserved
| Aesthetics | Felicity Colman, University of Melbourne |
| American Political Liberalism | Martin Bertman, University of Helsinki |
| American Pragmatism | Martin Bertman, University of Helsinki |
| Roland Barthes | Mireille Ribière |
| Business Ethics | S. L. Dwyer, Georgia State University |
| Critical Theory | Jennifer Rich, Hofstra University |
| Ethics | James Taggart, Georgetown University |
| Contemporary Epistemology | Lars Gundersen, Aarhus University |
| Existentialism | Richard Gravil, Humanities-Ebooks |
| Feminist Theory | Jennifer Rich, Hofstra University |
| Formal Logic | Mark Jago, University of Nottingham |
| Foucault | author to be announced |
| Heidegger | Robert Craig Baum, European Graduate School |
| Hume | reserved to an author at the University of Western Australia |
| Informal Logic and Critical Thinking | Timothy Crews-Anderson, University of Illinois at Chicago |
| Islamic Philosophy | Jesper Garsdaal, Aarhus University |
| Lacan | Ian Edwards, University of Birmingham |
| Marxism | author to be announced |
| Metaethics | Paul Davis, University of Edinburgh |
| Nietzsche | Emmet Cole, University of Essex |
| Philosophy of Architecture | reserved to an author at the University of Western Australia |
| Philosophy of Economics | Alessio Moneta, University of Jena |
| Philosophy of Language | Jennifer Rich, Hofstra University |
| Philosophy of Literature | author to be announced |
| Philosophy of Mathematics | Mark Jago, University of Nottingham |
| Philosophy of Mind | Julia Tanney, University of Kent |
| Philosophy of Mind: Mental Causation | Sven Walter, Universität Bielefeld |
| Philosophy of Religion: an Overview | Michael Levine, University of Western Australia |
| Philosophy of Religion: Contemporary | Steven Duncan, Bellevue College, Washington |
| Philosophy of Social Science | Frank A. Salamone, Iona College |
| Philosophy of Sport | Martin Bertman, University of Helsinki |
| Plato | Edward Moore, St Elias School of Orthodox Theology |
| Plato, Republic | Edward Moore, St Elias School of Orthodox Theology |
| Postmodernism | Pia Mukherji, Tufts University |
| Rhetorical Terms | Christopher Kelen, University of Macau |
| Sartre, Existentialism and Humanism | Robert Craig Baum, European Graduate School |
| Wittgenstein | Mark Jago, University of Nottingham |
| On Wonder | Emmet Cole, University of Essex |
| Žižek | Henrik Jøker Bjerre, Aarhus University |
2. Proposals Invited
Please nominate other topics of interest, or enquire about reserved titles, some of which may become available
PERIODS
Pre-Socratic philosophy, Greek philosophy, Post-Aristotelian philosophy, Medieval philosophy, Renaissance philosophy, Seventeenth century British empiricism, Enlightenment philosophy,
Nineteenth century philosophy, Twentieth century analytic philosophy, Twentieth century continental philosophy
THINKERS
Aquinas, Aristotle, Augustine, Berkeley, Chomsky, Descartes, Frege, Hegel
Hobbes, Hume, Kant, Kierkegaard, Leibniz, Locke, Marx, Mill, Quine, Rousseau, Russell, Sartre, Schopenhauer, Socrates, Spinoza, Vienna Circle
TEXTS
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Descartes, Meditations;
Hume, Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding; Marx and Engels, The German Ideology;
Mill, On Liberty; Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil;
Russell, The Problems of Philosophy; Ayer, Language, Truth and Logic
AREAS
Applied ethics, Animal rights, Medical ethics
Political philosophy, Anarchism, Democracy
Introductory mathematical logic, Modal logic and its philosophy, Non-classical logics, Set theory and its philosophy
Philosophy of mind (specific areas), Consciousness, Emotion, Personal identity, Free will
Epistemology, Jurisprudence, Metaphysics, Philosophy of cognitive science, Philosophy of education, Philosophy of film, Philosophy of history, Philosophy of religion (specific areas), Philosophy of science, Scepticism
African philosophy, Buddhist philosophy, Chinese philosophy, Jewish philosophy, Intercultural philosophy
INTERDISCIPLINARY STUDIES
Adorno, Badiou, Deleuze, Derrida, Freud, Gadamer, Habermas, Husserl, Levinas, Merleau-Ponty, Ricoeur
Frankfurt School, Hermeneutics, Modernism, Phenomenology, Structuralism
3. Philosophy Insights: Guidelines
Philosophy Insights titles fall into several broad categories:
- Thinkers: e.g. Hume, Sartre
- Texts: e.g. Descartes Meditations, Nietzsche Beyond Good and Evil
- Periods: e.g. Seventeenth Century British Empiricism, Twentieth Century Analytic Philosophy
- Areas: e.g. Ethics, Philosophy of Mind
- Interdisciplinary Studies: e.g. Postmodernism, Derrida
Each Philosophy Insights title will give a clear introduction to the thinker, text, period or area under consideration. The guides will offer an authoritative, accessible, and thought provoking treatment of major philosophical positions and questions. They will address key issues of interpretation. Contemporary philosophical debates will be elucidated and analysed with a view to bringing out their significance. The books will provide lucid presentations of complex issues so that readers who wish to actively engage with philosophical questions for themselves have necessary guidance to do this profitably. Exposition and explanation should predominate over criticism. Each Philosophy Insights text will be about 25-30,000 words in length. The sections which are likely to be included depend upon the category it belongs to:
- The guides about Thinkers will have an introductory chapter on life, times, and intellectual concerns of the individual. The largest section will supply a careful account of the person's thought and work. They will conclude with a chapter on the legacy and continuing influence of the thinker, which should partly outline critical responses.
- Books devoted to Texts will provide a close reading of the philosophical work, which indicates the major interpretative disputes. They will contain an exposition and critical discussion of the ideas presented in the text, and a discussion of the place and significance of the work in the history of philosophy and contemporary debate will be supplied.
- Insights concerning Periods will contain a survey identifying the principal intellectual developments of the time and sections covering major themes. In this case a Chronology (as an appendix) and / or brief individual biographies might be useful.
- Those dealing with Areas will offer a comprehensive presentation of the central themes in each field, elucidating the main ideas, arguments and counter arguments, and devoting sections to principal topics.
- Interdisciplinary titles will approach the thinker or the area in a manner appropriate to a combination of disciplines so as to be of value to students of philosophy, literature and (possibly) cultural studies.
- All Philosophy Insights will contain an annotated bibliography of further reading, which should normally offer some critical comment on important books and source collections. It should normally not be longer than two pages and include no more than 25 key items. It is unlikely that the undergraduate and sixth-form market we are aiming at would require more
It is necessary that titles within each category share elements of a common framework, so that purchasers know what they are getting, and so that the series develops a reliable identity, but intending contributors are invited to discuss the appropriate form for their proposed titles with the General Editor. In writing for electronic publication, you have certain tools that can be of great pedagogic utility. The hyperlink for example can be used for a coherent and succinct extended note, relevant to the main discussion, which would seriously disrupt it if included therein - and it is important that the main discussion have a strong and energetic forward thrust which will engage readers who are in the main in the early stages of their scholarly careers. But this hyperlink option should not be over used: hyperlinks should be kept to one page and have only one anchor link in the text.