Applications are now closed, but if you are interested in participating please email
kyle@buckleyinstitute.com!
Transcendentalism is the most authentically American of our philosophical schools. But just what is so “American” about it? And for that matter, is it in fact best understood as a school of philosophy?
The Buckley Institute's fall break seminar, led by Boston College's Ryan Patrick Hanley, will take up these questions through a close examination of the work of the two leading figures of American Transcendentalism, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau. In so doing, the seminar seeks to provide an introduction to transcendentalism’s core themes – including individualism and nature – and an examination of its implications for key concepts in political philosophy, including democracy, greatness, freedom, slavery, and resistance.
The seminar will take place on October 16-18 at the Buckley Institute office in New Haven. Participants will be expected to complete a moderate amount of reading prior to the seminar. Students will receive free course materials, lunch and dinner will be provided for the duration of the seminar, and those who complete the full seminar will be eligible to receive a $150 stipend. Applications are due September 11, 2023.
This seminar is open to current Yale undergraduate and graduate students.
Ryan Patrick Hanley is Professor of Political Science at Boston College. Prior to joining the faculty at Boston College, he was the Mellon Distinguished Professor of Political Science at Marquette University, and held visiting appointments or fellowships at Yale, Harvard, and the University of Chicago. A specialist on the political philosophy of the Enlightenment period, he is the author of Adam Smith and the Character of Virtue (Cambridge, 2009), Love's Enlightenment: Rethinking Charity in Modernity (Cambridge, 2017), and Our Great Purpose: Adam Smith on Living a Better Life (Princeton, 2019). Most recently he is the author of The Political Philosophy of Fénelon (Oxford, 2020) and the editor and translator of a companion volume, Fénelon: Moral and Political Writings (Oxford, 2020).
