Richmond Journal Of Philosophy
The RJP was established in 2002 by members of the philosophy department of Richmond upon Thames College. The founding co-editors were Steve Grant, Paul Sperring and Paul Sheehy. They were later joined by Mat Carmody who made all kinds of on-line things possible. The Guardian wrote a small piece about the journal - it can be found here.
It was launched as a subscription-based hard copy journal aimed at providing serious philosophy for those embarking on a first course of study - A-level, IB or undergraduate. Its contributors consisted of university, college and school teachers. After a few years the RJP moved on-line. The post 2009 funding crisis in English FE meant that its editorial board had to endure several years of appallingly managed institutional restructuring, the dashing of any hope of moving to a new building and the removal of the remission that made it possible to edit the RJP.
Since September 2017 the RJP has not been available on-line. Its papers can be accessed in full via this site (when the link opens, the archive can be found by scrolling down). The papers are not tailor-made guides for exam topics. The nature of the papers collected here is still best summed up by the first editorial, which is set out below.
The motivation for and ambition of the journal is to provide serious philosophy for students who are at an early stage in their philosophical studies. The style and content of the papers will be accessible to students who have yet to become hardened to the more technical and specialised journals of professional philosophy. What do we mean by ‘serious' philosophy? First, the content of the journal is not constrained by a remit to appeal to or reach the interested general public. Whilst the papers must speak to the needs of students who are relatively inexperienced in philosophy, they presuppose that their audience is actively engaged in philosophy. Second, the content is serious in its focus on the central areas of philosophy.
The big or traditional questions of metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics will provide the journal's centre of gravity. The third way in which the philosophy is serious is through the scope, variety and depth of analysis that can be achieved by the accumulation of papers over time. Moreover, each paper is not simply an introduction to one of the main topics on A-level, IB or degree courses. Such papers will indeed have a role in the journal, but they will not be the only kind. Our contributors will be offering original papers based on their own research. The journal will be a forum for the kind of critical engagement and debate that characterise the practice of philosophy. The fourth way in which the philosophy is serious is in the contributors themselves. The vast bulk of the papers will be written by professional philosophers engaged in both research and teaching.