Campus News
By Luca Filigenzi, Local News Editor
Earlier this month, Director of the Philosophy, Politics and the Public (PPP) Honors Program, Dr. Timothy Brownlee, announced via Canvas that his term as the director of the program will be coming to an end.
He has been selected to become the new Chair of the Philosophy Department, effective July 1, 2025, after current Philosophy Chair, Dr. Michelle Brady, steps down after this semester.
Brownlee has a long history at Xavier, beginning as a visiting assistant teacher in the philosophy department in 2007. He became an associate professor in 2016, Director of the PPP Program in 2019 and full-time professor in 2022.
Dr. Timothy Brownlee will end his time as PPP Director to become the new Chair of the Philosophy Department.
Some of the classes he has taught include “Ethics as Intro to Philosophy” for first-year PPP majors where they read works by philosophers Immanuel Kant, Plato and Karl Marx. He also taught “Philosophy Perspective: Modern Political Thought” where philosophy students continued to learn political theory.
Brownlee has worked on many of the PPP study abroad trips, particularly the annual trip to Berlin that many philosophy, history and PPP students have taken over the years.
Alongside being a faculty member, Brownlee is also a published writer. He released a book inspired by the German philosopher Georg Hegel called “Recognition and the Self in Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit,” that was published by Cambridge University Press in 2023.
“I’m interested in sustaining and discovering venues for expressing the perennial significance of the humanities in helping us make sense of fundamental questions that emerge in human existence,” Brownlee said.
While overall excited about the new job, Brownlee did say that there were many parts of his role as PPP Director that he will miss.
“I’m saddened by the thought that I won’t have all of the same opportunities to engage with the students of the PPP Program. Over the past six years, I have been hugely fortunate to be able to bear witness so closely to their transformation. It’s been the most meaningful experience of my life as a teacher, and I’ll certainly miss it,” he said.
Some of the new responsibilities that Brownlee will have as Philosophy Chair, in addition to overseeing the entire department, are to be involved in other majors and programs.
“Philosophy will contribute to expected new programs, including programs in Medical Humanities, Artificial Intelligence and Pre-Law, and I’m excited at the opportunity to collaborate on those,” Brownlee said.
One of his students, sophomore PPP major Drew Sikes, commented on Brownlee’s teaching.
“He was really good at making sure discussions on topics always stayed on track while never having the classroom feeling overbearing or specifically directed to one answer,” Sikes said.
“He was a really good teacher during my first year here, my favorite people we read were probably Kant and Habermas and our class had a lot of great discussions about them,” Sikes continued.
In regards to his predecessor as Philosophy Chair, Dr. Michelle Brady, Brownlee stated that “Dr. Michelle Brady has done an outstanding job of leading the department over the past years, and I’m grateful that her excellent work will make the transition to the new position a smooth one,” Brownlee said.
The next director of PPP has yet to be announced.
