Just Ideas invites some of the most talented professors in New York City to teach in our program. We work together to select philosophically rich literature that will engage students and provoke conversations about fundamental philosophical questions -- about the role of family, friends, loves, and losses in life, about what it means to be human, about the precarity of justice and wisdom.
Our courses have included The Epic of Gilgamesh, Aeschylus' Oresteia, Sophocles' Antigone and Oedipus, Plato's Republic and Apology, Boccaccio's Decameron, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House, Franz Kafka's Metamorphosis, and Nella Larson's Passing. Our teachers are trained in our embodied learning pedagogy and paired with a veteran intern so that the moment they walk into class, they are prepared to speak to the dignity and capacity of every single person. Although our expectations are high, our students always rise to the occasion and always teach the teachers
Christia Mercer, Founder and Director, Just Ideas | Gustave Bern Professor of Philosophy, Columbia University
Michael Holmes, PhD Candidate, Philosophy, Columbia University
Dhananjay Jagannathan, Assistant Professor, Philosophy, Columbia University
Jessica Moss, Professor, Philosophy, New York University
Achille Varzi, Professor, Philosophy, Columbia University
Julie Crawford, Mark van Doren Professor, English and Comparative Literature, Columbia University
Buka Oyoke, M.A., Philosophy, Columbia University
Clemence Boulouque, Carl and Bernice Witten Assistant Professor, Religion, Columbia University
David Albert, Frederick J. E. Woodbridge Professor, Philosophy, Columbia University
Emma Kaufman, Columbia College '08 (Philosophy, Gender Studies), Associate Professor of Law, NYU
Kimuli Kasara, Professor, Professor of Political Science, Columbia University
Dena Shottenkirk, Assistant Professor, Philosophy, Brooklyn College