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American Philosophies

Anglo-american Philosophy

Anglo-American philosophy, also known as analytic philosophy, is largely an import from European thinkers who immigrated to the United States during the first half of the twentieth century and their followers. Perhaps the most famous of these immigrants was Bertrand Russell (1872–1970), who was a serious academic philosopher and a great popularizer of both analytic philosophy and his own controversial ethical and political beliefs. Analytic philosophy focuses on rigorous argumentation, is typically quite amenable to scientific evidence and concerns, and tends to primarily address linguistic, logical, epistemological, and metaphysical issues. In some ways, analytic philosophy arose as a reaction to what was seen as a weakness in much of European philosophy—its increasing tendency toward vagueness, metaphor, and literary conceit. By the end of the twentieth century, Anglo-American philosophy and its methods had become the most influential force in most academic philosophy departments in the United States, as well as in the largest group of professional philosophers, the American Philosophical Association.

See also Analytical Philosophy; Philosophies: Feminist, Twentieth-Century; Pragmatism.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Addams, Jane. Democracy and Social Ethics. New York: Macmillan, 1902.

Deloria, Vine, Jr. Spirit and Reason: The Vine Deloria, Jr., Reader. Golden, Colo.: Fulcrum, 1999.

Flower, Elizabeth, and Murray Murphey. A History of Philosophy in America. 2 vols. New York: Putnam, 1977.

Harris, Leonard, ed. Philosophy Born of Struggle: Anthology of Afro-American Philosophy from 1917. Dubuque, Iowa: Kendall/Hunt, 1983.

Martinich, A.P., and David Sosa, eds. Analytic Philosophy: An Anthology. Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 2001.

Myerson, Joel, ed. Transcendentalism: A Reader. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.

Schneider, Herbert W. A History of American Philosophy. New York: Columbia University Press, 1946.

Seigfried, Charlene Haddock. Pragmatism and Feminism: Reweaving the Social Fabric. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996.

Smith, John E., Harry S. Stout, and Kenneth P. Minkema, eds. A Jonathan Edwards Reader. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1995.

Stuhr, John J., ed. Pragmatism and Classical American Philosophy: Essential Readings and Interpretive Essays. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999.

Waters, Anne, ed. American Indian Thought: Philosophical Essays. Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 2003.

Stephen Barnes

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Science EncyclopediaScience & Philosophy: Ambiguity - Ambiguity to Anticolonialism in Middle East - Ottoman Empire And The Mandate SystemAmerican Philosophies - Native American Philosophy, Puritan Thought, Transcendentalism, Pragmatism, African-american Philosophy, Feminist Philosophy