The study of a "core curriculum," or a selection of classic texts and great books, is the primary focus of inquiry within the Institute of Philosophic Studies. Each of the works read in the program is distinguished by its extraordinary power to illumine reflective minds through an exploration of the human soul at the deepest moral and metaphysical plane.
The concentration disciplines come into dialogue with each other through a common core of course work. Occupying twenty one hours in the doctoral curriculum, it comprises courses that engage fundamental texts, principles, and issues that are formative of the literary, political and philosophical strains in the Western intellectual tradition. The following six courses are taken by all students in all three concentrations. They are scheduled in a three-year cycle, one course each semester.
Study the Iliad and Odyssey of Homer and Vergil's Aeneid.
Read the seminal texts by two thinkers who laid the foundations of Western philosophy; ordinarily these texts are the Republic and the Nichomachean Ethics.
Study two of the great Christian thinkers; readings include Confessions, City of God, and the Summa Theologiae.
Read Dante's The Divine Comedy and Milton's Paradise Lost.
Study the Leviathan and various works of Rousseau, such as Emile, the Social Contract and the two discourses.
Study the three thinkers in transition between modernity and postmodernity. Texts are typically the Preface to the Phenomenology of the Spirit, the Genealogy of Morals, and the Brothers Karamazov.
The seventh core course is one in the Bible. This requirement may be satisfied by a number of courses, whose principal text is some portion of the Bible. Such courses are offered most frequently by the Theology Department but also intermittently by the other departments in the Institute.
The university mourns the passing of Professor Emeritus of Chemistry Jack Towne, Ph.D. (April 23, 1927 - July 8, 2019), who passed away in his Irving home at age 92. He had a long, celebrated career in education, culminating in his roles at UD.
+ Read MoreJuly 1 marked an era of new beginnings at the University of Dallas as Thomas S. Hibbs, Ph.D., BA '82 MA '83, stepped into the limelight as the university’s ninth and first alumnus president. And his early morning arrival on UD’s Irving campus denoted a full-circle homecoming for the former Holy Trinity seminarian.
+ Read MoreOn July 9, President Thomas S. Hibbs, Ph.D., BA '82 MA '83, along with Alex and Martha Galbraith, parents of alumna Alison Galbraith, BA '12, signed the C.W. Eaker Scholarship Fund for Chemistry/Biochemistry at UD. The endowed scholarship is the first to be received by Hibbs since his presidency began on July 1; it honors longtime and much-loved chemistry professor C.W. Eaker, Ph.D., who served UD with distinction for over 40 years, first as a faculty member, then as dean of Constantin College and finally as provost of the university.
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