Join in on our 'Guess the Rep' Competition! >>

MPhil / M.A. in Political Thought and Intellectual History

I will be applying to the M.Phil in Political Thought and Intellectual History at Cambridge and the equivalent M.A. from University of London in 2008.

For those of you familiar with the programs or have taken either of them yourself, what are your experiences?

- Your credentials walking in?

- Applications process: were you interviewed?

- Positive and negative points about the program?

- For those in the Cambridge program, to which college did you apply and did you live on campus? What are your thoughts on the program now that Skinner has left?

- For those in the London program, did you live on campus or in the city? What are your thoughts on the program now that Skinner has joined?

Thank you!
- Lorien

Scroll to see replies

Reply 1

Socrates

Which college of the UoL offers this course?

Reply 2

lorienjohnson

http://www.historyofpoliticalthought.org/

Intercollegiate. Control of the program alternates, and I believe that Queen Mary will be in charge when I would be applying and attending. Quentin Skinner, former head of the Cambridge M.Phil in the subject, will have completed his switch to Queen Mary and the program by then.

Reply 3

shady lane

Might want to apply to the LSE MSc Political Theory as well.

Noted! Thank you!

Intellectual history? Please tell me that that is the history of intellectuals.

Reply 6

pharmakos

ChemistBoy

Intellectual history? Please tell me that that is the history of intellectuals.

It refers to history of ideas or, in a broad sense, history of philosophy.

Reply 7

The Boosh

...with a specific emphasis on how ideas change over time

Reply 8

lorienjohnson

ChemistBoy,

When intellectual history is combined with the study of political theory, one focuses on the history of political theories and the historical ramifications thereof.

For example, here is a list of specialist courses in the London program:
* Thought and Action in Aristotle's Political Theory (half)
* Ideology and Propaganda in the Roman Republic (one)
* Democracy: Ancient and Modern (half)
* Psychology, Ethics and Politics in the late Renaissance ( one )
* The Theory and Practice of Golden Age Kingship ( one )
* Hobbes and the English Revolution ( one )
* Infamous Writings: Controversies and Receptions in the History of Political Thought in Early Modern Europe' ( half )
* Political Thought in the British Atlantic World, c. 1660–1801(half)
* Republicanism and Liberalism: Historical and Analytical Perspectives (half)
* The Historian and the Concept of Time (one)
* Republicanism in Nineteenth-Century French Thought (half)
* Nationalism, Patriotism and Cosmopolitanism in Political Thought, nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

The problem, of course, is that it is easy to go rather too far in these analyses.... the more intellectual-focused the history, the more fuzzy-wuzzy nonsense it becomes. Still, when moderated, it can be quite valuable.

Reply 9

ChemistBoy

But it could, literally, be the history of any ideas or theories.

Reply 10

Alan Smithee

Excellent course. The Cambridge one has the prestige of being at Cambridge, but the London one has Skinner and most likely Lisa Jardine, plus a breadth of other TOP scholars. It's hard to choose, but they're both great courses.

Reply 11

apotoftea

Sounds interesting - did a module on intellectuals in History in my second year, fascinating stuff.

FAO Chemistryboy, this is what we covered:

The twentieth century was the most blood thirsty ever recorded in the course of human history, yet it began with various philosophical and ideological ambitions to create human rights communities that should have ushered in freedoms and liberties, emancipation and empowerment for the citizens of various nation states in Europe and elsewhere. Against this background, the course examines various intellectuals - mainly European - who, in the twentieth century, tried to variously understand the times in which they lived and articulate various 'intellectual' responses to it. Beginning by examining the idea of 'the intellectual'…The intellectuals 'role', 'status', 'power', and so on, it develops via the close reading of some of the key works of some of the major intellectuals of the last 100 years: Oswald Spengler, Ortega Y Gasset, T.S. Eliot, Antonio Gramsci, Julian Benda, Jean-Paul Sartre, Albert Camus, Simone de Beauvoir, Edward Said, Judith Butler, Elizabeth Ermarth, Richard Rorty, Franz Fanon and Cornel West. By the end of the course it is hoped students will not only understand some of the foremost thinkers of the twentieth century, but will be beginning to approach texts and ideas with a certain 'intellectuality' of their own

Reply 12

The Boosh

cool.

did you actually read sartre and rorty? if so, which books?

Reply 13

apotoftea

I definately read bits of Rorty and Satre, not entire books, I chose Said and Gasset as my specialities/interests.

Used "What is Literature?" for Satre and for Rorty, used "Truth and Progress" and "Philsophy and Social Hope"

Had some of my most surreal lectures in that module, but glad I did it as will help understand the End of Histories one that I'm doing

Reply 14

The Boosh

I read Sartre's Being and Nothingness about a week ago - 650 pages. Tough book to read entirely. Rorty is a bit wacky too, and can be tough if you don't have a background in philosophy. His "Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature" is useful. Camus & Beauvoir do my head in. I like to read existential literature but these two for some reason rub me up the wrong way.

What T.S. Eliot did you come across?

Reply 15

apotoftea

I don't like Rorty - something about him that I just can't grasp/get my head around. Get infruiated when I read it too so tend to avoid it if I can.

Sartre is tough going, much easier to read the intro, relevent chapters and conclusion rather than try and read from cover to cover. I tend to pick up more that way

I don't think we actually did T.S Elliot, that's just a rough module outline which can vary from year to year. Just checked module handbook and it's not in there so Mr Surreal lecture guy decided there was something else that was worth reading instead.

Reply 16

ChemistBoy

I don't quite get why the word 'intellectual' seems to be confined to philosophers and other writers that delved into political theory. It's interesting that this definition persists in academia when it is a rather archaic usage outside it.

Reply 17

Alan Smithee

Isn't it just a reference to the history of intellectual pursuit in the arts? It's nothing against the sciences, quite the contrary in fact.

Reply 18

apotoftea

Pernell Whitaker

Isn't it just a reference to the history of intellectual pursuit in the arts? It's nothing against the sciences, quite the contrary in fact.

Agree with that, you only have to read Said's work to see that exact statement really. It's about the arts and culture, and how the two interact.

Not sure you'd be able to approach the sciences in exactly the same way

Reply 19

The Boosh

^^ i'm sure you could. the scientific world view emerged because of a pariticular socio-cultural context. I think CB would agree with this too. we have to remember that science as we know it is a relatively recent practice , whilst philosophy etc has a huge history going back to ancient times. science (as ideology or practice) is just as situated as everything else and what's believed to be ideal science now will look like hocus-pocus in the future.

edit: cue rorty...

Quick Reply

Related discussions

Latest

Trending

Articles for you

Postgraduate Master’s Loan

Try out the app

Continue on web