• Log In

The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast

A Philosophy Podcast and Philosophy Blog

Subscribe on Android Spotify Google Podcasts audible patreon
  • Home
  • Podcast
    • PEL Network Episodes
    • Publicly Available PEL Episodes
    • Paywalled and Ad-Free Episodes
    • PEL Episodes by Topic
    • Nightcap
    • Philosophy vs. Improv
    • Pretty Much Pop
    • Nakedly Examined Music
    • (sub)Text
    • Phi Fic Podcast
    • Combat & Classics
    • Constellary Tales
  • Blog
  • About
    • PEL FAQ
    • Meet PEL
    • About Pretty Much Pop
    • Philosophy vs. Improv
    • Nakedly Examined Music
    • Meet Phi Fic
    • Listener Feedback
    • Links
  • Join
    • Become a Citizen
    • Join Our Mailing List
    • Log In
  • Donate
  • Store
    • Episodes
    • Swag
    • Everything Else
    • Cart
    • Checkout
    • My Account
  • Contact
  • Mailing List

Introducing the PEL Citizen Commons and Not School Study Groups

October 6, 2012 by Mark Linsenmayer 1 Comment

Robot
You should now see the words "PEL Citizen Commons" on the PEL site in the menu bar below the header. Clicking this will allow you to set up a recurring $5/month donation to PEL which will give you access to a whole new portion of this site. There's a discount if you sign up for a year.

Doing this will not only allow PEL podcasts to continue, but it will immediately net you a bunch of free stuff, including the full versions of those vintage episodes that are just previews on our public feed, other bonus audio including group discussions of texts that PEL hasn't covered, exclusive essays and fiction by all PEL podcasters and some guests, transcripts for a few episodes, and high-bitrate mp3s of many of the songs featured on PEL episodes. We will add to this store of member booty over time.

A key feature of this resource is support for listener study groups, and we call this feature PEL Not School. The tools for Not School are fairly simple, the kind of thing you can find in lots of places on the Internet: forum functionality, and the ability to create and manage user groups, including internal-to-the-PEL-site messaging and group-specific forums.

The second ingredient is the structure: groups run on a monthly basis, so you don't have to make a major study commitment to join one. Anyone can start a group, but you have to (via the forum) negotiate with other people to get at least two of them to sign on to your group proposal. A proposal specifies what you'll talk about (which could be a couple chapters of a book, but could also be some episodes of our or another podcast, some online course materials, or philosophy-related movies) and how you'll talk about it (you could just use the site forum, but many groups get together via Google Hangout or Skype).

Even busy people, and even people already in school, can set up groups with very modest expectations, and the social pressure of having other people relying on you to follow through and do the work and communicate about it will help you finally get around to reading that thing you keep meaning to, or take a closer look at one of our episode topics, or have some substitute satisfaction by getting other PEL listeners to talk with you about some topic that we haven't gotten around to yet.

We also hope that less busy people will use this resource to find each other and vigorously pursue their own education. If you're not in school, and you want to learn things, just listening to us isn't enough. You need to practice talking and writing about these things, or you'll never know if you're making sense. You need feedback, and social interaction. You need Not School.

Compared to actual tuition, or tutoring, or paying someone to read your work, $5/month is a pittance.

Read more about how Not School works.

The art on this page is by Genevieve Arnold.

Facebooktwitterredditpinterestlinkedinmailby feather

Filed Under: General Announcements

Trackbacks

  1. Not School Update: Time to Start Proposing November Groups | The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast | A Philosophy Podcast and Blog says:
    October 16, 2012 at 1:09 pm

    […] sure you’re sick to death between my post here, my Facebook posts, and my very long commercial on our most recent episode of hearing about Not […]

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

PEL Live Show 2023

Brothers K Live Show

Citizenship has its Benefits

Become a PEL Citizen
Become a PEL Citizen, and get access to all paywalled episodes, early and ad-free, including exclusive Part 2's for episodes starting September 2020; our after-show Nightcap, where the guys respond to listener email and chat more causally; a community of fellow learners, and more.

Rate and Review

Nightcap

Listen to Nightcap
On Nightcap, listen to the guys respond to listener email and chat more casually about their lives, the making of the show, current events and politics, and anything else that happens to come up.

Subscribe to Email Updates

Select list(s):

Check your inbox or spam folder to confirm your subscription.

Support PEL

Buy stuff through Amazon and send a few shekels our way at no extra cost to you.

Tweets by PartiallyExLife

Recent Comments

  • Mark Linsenmayer on Ep. 302: Erasmus Praises Foolishness (Part Two)
  • Mark Linsenmayer on Ep. 308: Moore’s Proof of Mind-Independent Reality (Part Two for Supporters)
  • Mark Linsenmayer on Ep. 201: Marcus Aurelius’s Stoicism with Ryan Holiday (Citizen Edition)
  • MartinK on Ep. 201: Marcus Aurelius’s Stoicism with Ryan Holiday (Citizen Edition)
  • Wayne Barr on Ep. 308: Moore’s Proof of Mind-Independent Reality (Part Two for Supporters)

About The Partially Examined Life

The Partially Examined Life is a philosophy podcast by some guys who were at one point set on doing philosophy for a living but then thought better of it. Each episode, we pick a text and chat about it with some balance between insight and flippancy. You don’t have to know any philosophy, or even to have read the text we’re talking about to (mostly) follow and (hopefully) enjoy the discussion

Become a PEL Citizen!

As a PEL Citizen, you’ll have access to a private social community of philosophers, thinkers, and other partial examiners where you can join or initiate discussion groups dedicated to particular readings, participate in lively forums, arrange online meet-ups for impromptu seminars, and more. PEL Citizens also have free access to podcast transcripts, guided readings, episode guides, PEL music, and other citizen-exclusive material. Click here to join.

Blog Post Categories

  • (sub)Text
  • Aftershow
  • Announcements
  • Audiobook
  • Book Excerpts
  • Citizen Content
  • Citizen Document
  • Citizen News
  • Close Reading
  • Combat and Classics
  • Constellary Tales
  • Exclude from Newsletter
  • Featured Ad-Free
  • Featured Article
  • General Announcements
  • Interview
  • Letter to the Editor
  • Misc. Philosophical Musings
  • Nakedly Examined Music Podcast
  • Nakedly Self-Examined Music
  • NEM Bonus
  • Not School Recording
  • Not School Report
  • Other (i.e. Lesser) Podcasts
  • PEL Music
  • PEL Nightcap
  • PEL's Notes
  • Personal Philosophies
  • Phi Fic Podcast
  • Philosophy vs. Improv
  • Podcast Episode (Citizen)
  • Podcast Episodes
  • Pretty Much Pop
  • Reviewage
  • Song Self-Exam
  • Supporter Exclusive
  • Things to Watch
  • Vintage Episode (Citizen)
  • Web Detritus

Follow:

Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | Apple Podcasts

Copyright © 2009 - 2023 · The Partially Examined Life, LLC. All rights reserved. Privacy Policy · Terms of Use · Copyright Policy

Copyright © 2023 · Magazine Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in