The Philosophers' Cocoon

A safe and supportive forum for philosophers.

Owned & Moderated by Marcus Arvan (University of Tampa)

Contact: marvan@ut.edu

Blog mission & moderation policy

IMPORTANT NOTE on how to ensure anonymity in commenting
Job-Market Reporting Thread (2025-26)
Job-Market Discussion Thread (2025-26)

recent posts

about

Using (some) letters of recommendations from other disciplines in grad applications?

In our January “how can we help you?” thread, a reader writes:

For an interdisciplinary student looking at applying to grad school, what is a good balance of recommenders from each discipline? I’m a double-major in Economics and Philosophy with significant experience working in a sociology lab. I migrated from social science to philosophy and will have solid philosophy work to showcase in my application. My (uninformed) preference would be to have letters showcasing my experience in the different fields, but I don’t know how that would be received. Would an interdisciplinary CV with only philosophy recommenders be seen as missing something? Alternatively, does having non-philosopher recommendations contribute anything in the eyes of a typical committee?

I suspect that this may depend on the departments one is applying to and who serves on their admissions committees. Why? Because some philosophers (and departments) seem to value interdisciplinarity, whereas others may not.

What do readers think?

Posted in

7 responses to “Using (some) letters of recommendations from other disciplines in grad applications?”

  1. Anonymous

    Letters of recommendation speak to an applicant’s aptitude for success at the graduate level. Having letter writers that succeeded there already (i.e. earned a PhD in philosophy) would lend credence to the applicant’s case. They know what it takes, so they can judge if the applicant has that in spades or not. This seems to suggest the more philosophers you can have as letter writers, the better. Nevertheless, it seems worthwhile to have at least one letter come from someone who can say you succeeded already at something (undergraduate economics or sociology) and are poised to succeed in whatever field you choose because of XYZ traits the applicant possesses.

    Reply
  2. Anonymous

    If you are wanting to do a PhD in philosophy, generally it is preferred that your letters are from philosophers – they are the one’s best suited to say how you would do in a philosophy PhD. I say this as someone who works across disciplines, and in an interdisciplinary Centre. But often those in other disciplines do not speak to issues that matter most to philosophers (and when they do, they sometimes have no authority to do so).

    Reply
  3. Anonymous

    As Marcus noted, it really depends. If the philosophy program one is applying to cares about these other fields, I don’t see letters from economists and sociologists as a bad thing. For example, I suspect a place like Arizona, or Tulane (and many others, I’m sure), will see experience in economics/sociology as a good thing, so long as you have enough philosophy in your application generally. Of course, I think it would be good if the economists or sociologists writing for you had a clue about philosophy though, so that they can speak to how your work in economists/sociology bears on your interests and work in philosophy.

    On the other side, letters from non-philosophers might not land as well as letters from philosophers for the obvious reason that most philosophers know what other philosophers care about, but most economists/sociologists likely do not.

    Reply
  4. Anonymous

    Assuming you’ll have 3 letters, you’d want at least two of them to be from people who do philosophy and can talk about your strengths in philosophy. But if you have significant background in another field, and you have a letter writer who knows your work in that field very well and can speak in detail about it, then yes, I’d include such a letter. Marcus is right that this sort of letter might be received differently by different people, depending on how much they value interdisciplinary work, but since you’ve done such work and hope to do it in the future, having a set of letters that will be better received by the people who value that work than by whose who don’t wouldn’t be a bad thing.

    Part of it also depends on just how well you potential letter-writers know you. As I said, you’d want at least 2 philosophy letters, or maybe three, with the science letter being your 4th. But there is a good chance that the science letter writer, if you’ve worked closely with them in a lab, will have more detailed things to say about you than whoever your third philosophy letter writer would be, where you might have had them in only one class.

    Reply
  5. Anonymous

    For reasons pointed out by others, I’d highly recommend having at least two of your three letters from philosophers. There are certain benefits to having a writer in another field. However, a recent letter I read that did the applicant no favors spent its time telling us that the applicant had developed skills in things that philosophers should be focusing on but don’t. Regardless of whether the letter writer was correct in this, they offended certain colleagues on the committee in ways that certainly did not help the applicant.

    Reply
  6. Anonymous

    Even before you get to the stage of requesting letters, email with the department chair or graduate admissions committee chair to be sure that they are open to you doing interdisciplinary graduate work. Some may not be interested. There may be weird local pros and cons about funding across departments. If they are interested, ask them what balance of letter writers they prefer.

    If the point is, rather, that you have an interdisciplinary background but you are intending to do a dissertation in straight philosophy, just have philosophy letter writers, I’d say. For the most part, philosophy departments will be interested in your depth in our discipline, not your breadth in other areas. (I can’t be sure that this is correct, but it seems right to me: Many philosophers will think breadth in other areas before grad school implies shallowness in philosophy, and that any breadth you need you can pick up during grad school. I can only think of one strong exception, which would be having a physics degree before going into philosophy of physics.)

    Reply
  7. Anonymous

    I agree with other commentators that it can be advantageous to showcase a more interdisciplinary educational background. But I wouldn’t draw from that any reason to use recommenders from outside philosophy (if you’re in a position to choose). Having been on admissions committees multiple times, I’d say we’re most concerned about your ability to do philosophy, which, for better or worse, we tend to read as a distinct skill that philosophers alone are well positioned to assess. That said, far better to use a non-philosophers than a non-glowing letter from a philosopher.

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Discover more from The Philosophers' Cocoon

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue reading