Chin-Tai Kim

Chin-Tai Kim -- Wittke Award winner

by Susan Griffith

Chin-Tai Kim, professor and chair of the Department of Philosophy, uses no notes while lecturing. He espouses his philosophical reason for this -- "A teacher of philosophy should practice thinking in the classroom."

Kim has received one of two 1997 Carl F. Wittke Awards. Undergraduate students nominated 25 faculty members for the award. Kim and fellow honoree Aaron Jennings received the honor during May 18 commencement ceremonies.

Kim teaches courses on topics including Greek philosophy, modern philosophy, 19th century philosophy, phenomenology, epistemology and metaphysics, the philosophy of Religion, comparative philosophy, and East and West philosophy. He came to the University in 1962.

He employs a Socratic conception of teaching. He wants students "to learn for themselves by thinking through the given subject matter" by engaging in a reflective conversation.

Students re-enact the thinking process that produced the thoughts expressed in the text, says Kim, with interpretive and critical responses.

"Teaching is an art rather than a technique," explains Kim. "This means that a teacher, besides having expertise in the field of teaching and necessary communication skills, should embody intellectual and moral virtues, openness of the mind honesty, imagination, courage, fairness, and respectfulness toward the minds whose care has been entrusted in him or her."

"A teacher of philosophy should not be a mere narrator of ideas, a mere exegete, or a mere critic. He or she should show to the students an identity as a thinker participating in a living discourse with the minds that left words as their traces," he explains.

If the teacher is successful, the students will emulate the teacher, Kim believes.

He also cites an ethical mission in teaching philosophy -- to foster students' awareness in their responsibility to think independently yet responsively to all thoughts, regardless of how unfamiliar they may seems to the students.

In addition to teaching, Kim has researched and published work on Descartes, Kant, Hegel and Nietzsche, Brentano, Husserl, foundations of ethics, philosophy of religion, and philosophy of sciences.

Born in Korea, Kim came the United States to attend Brown University, where he graduated with honors in 1958, and to do graduate work for his Ph.D. in philosophy at Harvard University.

He is president of the International Society for Korean Studies in Americas. He has been a visiting professor of philosophy at Yonsei University in Seoul, Korea, and taught a year of philosophy at Stanford University before coming to CWRU.

Kim's career as a philosophy professor carries on a family tradition. He comes from a highly respected literati family in Korea's Confucian society. His ancestors have been theologians, academics, philosophers, and politicians.

All his siblings have pursued careers in either philosophy, literature, or theology, following in the footsteps of their parents -- his father was a Methodist bishop and his mother was a professor of education.

This year was the third time undergraduate students nominated Kim for the honor.