The Bachelor of Arts is the ultimate, flexible university degree. With over twenty named majors, you can select subjects to build your knowledge, and electives to enhance your skills. Our students are curious about the big questions of life, embrace the joy of open enquiry, and are on a life-long quest for knowledge and inspiration. At the University of Tasmania, you will be part of an academic community that cares deeply about the topics that we teach and study. Studying Philosophy allows you to ask (and occasionally answer) the very biggest of questions. What makes for a meaningful life What can we know What is the nature of the world, or of ourselves in it What kind of societies are just Philosophy explores fundamental questions about the human condition, relevant for people at all times and in all places, but equally arising out of the specifics of each life – whether in Tasmania or anywhere else. It considers problems and concerns arising from art, literature, science, law, religion, and many other human endeavors, along with the basic matter of an ethical engagement with the world. Philosophy also gives you skills in analysis, reasoning, and clear and cogent communication – highly valued attributes across all study areas in the Bachelor of Arts as well as contemporary professions.
In this major you will encounter philosophical issues from different perspectives across both Eastern and Western philosophical traditions. In the first year, you will study some of the central branches of philosophy – ethics and political philosophy, metaphysics, and epistemology. In the second year you will explore the history of philosophical thinking, in ancient Greece, the Buddhist tradition and the early modern world in Europe. By third year you will be investigating current issues: reading major modern philosophical texts, examining the connections between philosophy and other fields of inquiry, and bringing philosophical work to bear on contemporary problems.
