Eno Agolli

About

I have a PhD in Philosophy from Rutgers University. I have done coursework and research in philosophy at UChicago, Cambridge (UK), UConn, and Notre Dame. I am an analytic philosopher, specializing in language and logic but also highly interested in metaphysics, epistemology, and occasionally even beyond. I was born in Albania, raised in Greece, and I now live in New York City.

Research

I care about what it means to mean. My main research is on how we employ language to relate to objects in the actual world, but also to possible worlds. I work on the formal semantics, but also syntax and pragmatics, of referential expressions (definite descriptions, names, pronouns, plurals) and modal expressions (epistemic and deontic modals, propositional attitude reports, grammatical mood). This research has led me to questions within metaethics and metaphysics.

I know a good deal of non‑classical logic (especially relevance and connexive logics). I also think about the history of analytic philosophy (Frege, early Wittgenstein).

Analytic philosophy salon

I’m building a public‑facing discussion series: The Analytic Salon.

Misc.

I (mostly) exist outside of academia too. I’m an active poet. My first book of poetry, Ποιητικό Αίτιο (Poetic Cause), was published in April 2015 in Greece and received the Varveris Prize (2016). My second book, Παράξενα Φρούτα που Κρέμονται (Strange Fruit Hanging), was published in November 2023. A third book is in the making.

I love languages, human and otherwise. I speak Albanian, English, Modern Greek, Portuguese, Spanish, and French at an intermediate level or higher. I can read Ancient Greek, and can understand some very basic Arabic and Norwegian. I’m also learning how to code in Python and CSS/HTML.

I love hiking, good wine, the New Yorker, volleyball, and jazz.

Are you a student?

I’ve been a philosophy student for most of my life. It was tough much of the time, mainly because I had no guidance and had to figure it out mostly on my own—from whether to study philosophy, to how to do philosophy, to how to craft a successful application for philosophy grad school. I want to give back some of what I learned.

If you are a student—in high school, college, or graduate school—feel free to email me. I can offer general advice, read a personal statement, and give feedback on a writing sample. I have transferred across three PhD programs, so I can also help with that.