Teaching

The main areas of teaching at the Chair are philosophy in classical antiquity, in late antiquity, and in the medieval period, especially in the Islamic world.

Teaching at the Chair of Late Ancient and Arabic Philosophy

We place a high priority on reading seminars, in which students have the opportunity to go slowly through a text, with many seminars offering reading of the text in the original language (Greek, Latin, or Arabic). These works also offer a chance for intensive philosophical discussion, concerning questions ranging right across the philosophical subdisciplines, like ethics, metaphysics, and epistemology.

From Greek to Arabic philosophy and beyond

Culturally and historically, our teaching offer is also wide-ranging: even beyond the mainstay topics of ancient and late ancient Greek and Arabic philosophy, we offer seminars and lecture courses on topics in Latin medieval philosophy, Renaissance philosophy in Europe, and even Indian philosophy. Prof. Adamson’s introductory lectures on ancient philosophy are unusual in integrating material from classical China and India with texts from Greek antiquity.

Master in Ancient Philosophy and the Munich School of Ancient Philosophy (MUSAΦ)

© Susanne Neumair

At our Chair and those of Prof. Christof Rapp and Prof. Oliver Primavesi, who work in close collaboration with Prof. Adamson, it is possible to follow a path to expertise in pre-modern philosophy from Master to doctoral level and beyond.

Our MA in Ancient Philosophy is unique in allowing students at this level to focus on philological and philosophical aspects of texts from the ancient tradition. The faculty offers expertise on a wide historical range of topics in ancient thought – from the Presocratics through the Hellenistic period and Late Antiquity – and on the medieval, modern and contemporary reception of classical philosophy.

Doctoral studies in ancient philosophy at the Munich School of Ancient Philosophy (MUSAΦ)

For those pursuing research degrees, the Munich School of Ancient Philosophy (MUSAΦ) has one of the world’s most successful doctoral programs in ancient thought. Like the MA, it brings together philological and philosophical expertise to offer the best conditions for pursuing a range of topics in ancient thought and its later reception.

Prof. Adamson also accepts proposals for doctoral projects outside of MUSAΦ, for instance on topics in philosophy of the Islamic world without a close connection to antiquity, or on Latin medieval philosophy.