About us
Welcome to the Edinburgh Existentialist Philosophy Reading Group! We read books, essays and stories that are historically or thematically linked to the existentialist tradition, and then we meet up weekly to talk about them. We've been reading Nietzsche, Camus, Kafka, Kierkegaard, Sartre, Heidegger and a bunch of others - take a look at our past & upcoming meetings for an idea of what we're about.
Everyone is welcome to attend. We meet in University of Edinburgh rooms, but we’re a community group and not affiliated with the university - no academic background is necessary. Our members have varying levels of prior involvement in philosophy, so even if this is your first time reading a philosophical text, please come along!
We’re always happy to welcome newcomers, even if we're half way through a long read - feel free to dive in at some point along the way. Our conversations are open, respectful, lively & wide-ranging. You might get a little more from the conversation if you've read at least some of the text, but don't worry, we're not going to test you on it :)
Our group provides opportunities for:
- meeting like-minded people interested in existentialist philosophy - enjoying philosophical reading, thinking, and discussion
- finding much needed peer-support & accountability for untangling these famously unintuitive texts - helping each other to keep up & to understand
- sharing one’s personal relationship to the text: "what this means for me"
- developing one’s own philosophical worldview and personal canon of important texts
See https://sites.google.com/view/edinburgh-existentialists/reading-suggestions for our list of past & present reading suggestions. Anyone who's been to at least one meeting can nominate, and we select our next readings by poll in our WhatsApp group chat.
If you've got any questions, feel free to ping a message to any our admins (Isabela, Ben, Lachlan, Marton, Livia, and Richard) or grab us for a quiet word after a meeting on a Weds night.
Or you can also email edinburghexistentialists@gmail.com with questions/feedback.
Also see our FAQ for more details: FAQ Document
Upcoming events
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Keiji Nishitani - Religion and Nothingness - week 1
Room G.43, Paterson's Land, Holyrood Road, Edinburgh, GBKeiji Nishitani — Religion and Nothingness
Wed 14 Oct
Our first week of Nishitani - looking ahead to some of the critical themes & concepts that we'll uncover as we read. We can also sketch our reading plan for the upcoming sessions - how much we aim to take on each week.Pages for this week: Translator's Introduction (xxiii to xlii) and Preface (xlvii to l)
Who are we?
We're a reading group that welcomes all - young, old, completely new to philosophy or well versed, from keen students to those who've never darkened the door of a lecture room. We read both long & short texts, but you don't need to join at the very start of our longer reads - you can come along at any stage of the journey. Our conversations are lively, wide-ranging & respectful.We usually head to the pub to continue the discussion after our meetings.
For more info on the group, see our FAQ Document
For more info on these readings, see The Nothing Project25 attendeesKeiji Nishitani - Religion and Nothingness - week 2
Room G.43, Paterson's Land, Holyrood Road, Edinburgh, GBKeiji Nishitani — Religion and Nothingness
Wed 21 Oct
Chapter 1 - What is Religion?
Pages for this week: tbd but likely to be the first half of chapter 1 - let's say sections I to III, which is pages 1 to 22Who are we?
We're a reading group that welcomes all - young, old, completely new to philosophy or well versed, from keen students to those who've never darkened the door of a lecture room. We read both long & short texts, but you don't need to join at the very start of our longer reads - you can come along at any stage of the journey. Our conversations are lively, wide-ranging & respectful.We usually head to the pub to continue the discussion after our meetings.
For more info on the group, see our FAQ Document
For more info on these readings, see The Nothing Project15 attendeesKeiji Nishitani - Religion and Nothingness - week 3
Room G.43, Paterson's Land, Holyrood Road, Edinburgh, GBKeiji Nishitani — Religion and Nothingness
Wed 28 Oct
Chapter 1 - What is Religion?
Pages for this week: tbd but likely to be the second half of chapter 1Who are we?
We're a reading group that welcomes all - young, old, completely new to philosophy or well versed, from keen students to those who've never darkened the door of a lecture room. We read both long & short texts, but you don't need to join at the very start of our longer reads - you can come along at any stage of the journey. Our conversations are lively, wide-ranging & respectful.We usually head to the pub to continue the discussion after our meetings.
For more info on the group, see our FAQ Document
For more info on these readings, see The Nothing Project12 attendeesKeiji Nishitani - Religion and Nothingness - week 4
Room G.43, Paterson's Land, Holyrood Road, Edinburgh, GBKeiji Nishitani — Religion and Nothingness
Wed 4 Nov
Chapter 2 - The Personal and the Impersonal in Religion
Pages for this week: tbd but likely to be the first half of chapter 2Who are we?
We're a reading group that welcomes all - young, old, completely new to philosophy or well versed, from keen students to those who've never darkened the door of a lecture room. We read both long & short texts, but you don't need to join at the very start of our longer reads - you can come along at any stage of the journey. Our conversations are lively, wide-ranging & respectful.We usually head to the pub to continue the discussion after our meetings.
For more info on the group, see our FAQ Document
For more info on these readings, see The Nothing Project9 attendees
Past events
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