In our most recent "how can we help you?" thread, a reader asks:
I'm increasingly teaching courses to non-philosophy majors. It's been a challenge to change my "academic dialect" to better teach these students, but so far its been successful and rewarding to find just the right way to communicate for somebody without a background (or even necessarily an interest) in our discipline. But one area I continue to struggle is finding good texts to assign. My students are baffled by academic or historical philosophy and I can't really justify it, as I would to majors, by saying that learning to read difficult philosophy is a skill they're developing.
So, here is my question: What are other teacher's go-to resources for finding philosophy readings that were written (from the ground up) to be read by the un-initiated?
Good question! For a long time, I had a policy of always assigning original sources, rather than textbooks. But, at least in general education courses, I'm no longer certain this is the best way to go, as my sense is that good textbooks may be more accessible to non-majors--though, of course, finding textbooks that one finds satisfactory can in my experience be a challenging endeavor, depending on the philosophical sub-field.
Anyway, what do readers think? Do you have any helpful tips for selecting readings for courses like these?
Here's a bad answer, in that it is tangential to the main query, but relevant regardless.
Harry Brighouse of UW-Madison has a whole collection of blog posts and articles on teaching philosophy that is largely focused on the fact that teaching undergraduate philosophy means teaching non-philosophy majors (and often teaching students who will only take a single philosophy course). He has a lot to say about how to make a philosophy course useful in these contexts including what and how much reading to assign.
Many of these are excellent resources imo, and it's worth seeking them out.
I wish I could find one of his most relevant articles, but here is one that should contain some info of interest:
https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Becoming-a-Better-College-Teacher-(If-You're-Lucky)-Brighouse/f5f9f1f12a0fb563466a64676e95c33b6e7b96ae
I also won't be surprised if he sees this thread and can provide better more direct insight.
Posted by: Michael | 01/21/2025 at 11:14 AM
The Norton Introduction to Philosophy is a good middle ground between primary sources and a textbook, since it contains readings—often the classics in a field—that have been rewritten for a simpler audience (often by the original authors, but not always). It also has original articles written for the Introduction itself, which is nice.
I regularly use it to supplement a syllabus of articles.
Posted by: Norton | 01/21/2025 at 11:55 AM
I have always taught mostly non-majors and always use primary texts. Partly this is laziness (I don't want to vet a bunch of textbooks) and partly my own preferences (I want to learn more about the primary sources myself). But also, I have a quasi-romantic idea that I owe it to non-majors to give them the primary sources, and from a range of traditions. That this is the only philosophy class they'll take is, for me, a reason to teach primary sources.
Posted by: Madeline | 01/21/2025 at 12:07 PM
Venues like Aeon magazine and op eds in places like the New York Times are often accessible to general audiences but sufficiently rigorous to use in undergrad courses. (Or so I think anyway.) It may be worth searching those places for essays on topics you're teaching.
Posted by: Trevor Hedberg | 01/21/2025 at 01:00 PM
A lot depends on what areas of philosophy you're teaching. I use a mix of primary sources and more accessible contemporary philosophy: e.g., Chalmers' book, Reality + is great for phil-mind topics (and some epistemology). Interesting and accessible. Excepts from Sean Carroll, The Big Picture, also good to supplement with more traditional readings. Thi Nguyen's work in social epistemology and games, etc.
Posted by: Chris | 01/21/2025 at 02:50 PM
1000 word philosophy, SEP, and IEP can be good resources. There is quite a bit of historical philosophy that is accessible and a good introduction. For example, some students really seem to like reading Descartes.
Posted by: some thoughts | 01/22/2025 at 12:56 PM
Topically specific, but I have taught Reason Better by Manley a bunch to largely non-philosophy audiences. It does a really good job at selecting philosophical topics (from e.g. logic, epistemology etc) and communicating them in a way that students outside our discipline find engaging and exciting. I highly recommend it.
Posted by: Grad | 01/25/2025 at 01:49 PM