The USC School of Philosophy supports a number of opportunities to hear from and interact with scholars from across the United States and around the world. Many of these opportunities are pitched at the advanced graduate/faculty level, but care is taken to ensure that there are events which students at all levels can benefit from. To see what is happening now, visit the department calendar.
Our regular department colloquium brings guest speakers for a 2 hour talk and Q&A session, and guests are often available during their visit for one-on-one meetings and group meals with students and faculty. The department hosts around 8 speakers a year.
The Mind and Language series supplements our regular colloquium series with 1-2 invited speakers per year, and highlights scholars whose research crosses traditional disciplinary boundaries between philosophy of language and mind with linguistics and cognitive science.
Also ongoing is the Graduate Speculative Society, which brings graduate students together in an informal setting to discuss their research and topics of shared interests.
There are also two single weekend events of note. The UCLA/USC graduate conference in philosophy features an invited graduate student talks and a faculty guest speaker. GPS California brings together underrepresented groups in philosophy, at the undergraduate level, for a chance to meet and greet graduate students and faculty in philosophy, and to learn more about studying philosophy at the graduate level.
The Conceptual Foundations of Conflict Project aspires to find the philosophy at the center of interpersonal conflict.
Devoted to advancing interdisciplinary scholarship in legal, moral, and political philosophy, the USC Center for Law and Philosophy is a joint project of USC Gould School of Law and the School of Philosophy. The center also holds conferences, workshops, and other activities that enhance the study of law and philosophy.
In summer of 2022, the USC School of Philosophy co-hosted the North American Summer School in Logic, Language, and Information (NASSLLI) alongside the Department of Linguistics and the Program in Cognitive Science.