Brian Keenan (1938-?) grew up in Ontario where he attended Lakehead University, Mc Master and The University of Toronto, before ultimately receiving a PhD in political philosophy from the University of Waterloo. His first and only teaching position was at the University of Winnipeg beginning in 1972 and culminating, after 37 years of service, with his retirement in 2009. Twenty years of Dr. Keenan’s service was providing leadership as the Chair of the Department of Philosophy.

Although he published a bit, mainly on the alleged neutrality of Political Science, the ultimacy of liberalism as the account of political reality, and the historicity of human consciousness, Keenan's overriding concern was undergraduate teaching. The University of Winnipeg's stress on liberal arts education thus made for a happy relationship.

Dr. Keenan's virtue as a professor was, in the eyes of many students, quite simply unmatched. Noted for his razor sharp wit, keen analytic mind and thoughtful regard for the intrinsic value of Education, Dr. Keenan inspired generations of students at the University of Winnipeg to recognize themselves as critical thinkers. It is Keenan's settled belief that philosophy not only enables students to integrate the various subjects they study, but also brings to bear a critical intelligence on extant social reality.

Brian Keenan was the 2005 recipient of the Clifford J. Robson award for excellence in teaching and is currently Senior Scholar in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Winnipeg.

A Colleague’s Reflection

The U of W’s department was unique among undergraduate programmes in Canada during Dr. Keenan’s tenure. While the course offerings appeared in the catalogue to match the offerings of other institutions in Canada and the United States, the idea that history provides an essential mode of human self-understanding shaped the development of curricula and as a consequence the intellectual development of the student body. While not solely responsible for the department’s unique character, Dr. Keenan’s own commitment to teaching and history, and his leadership, made the department an important alternative to the largely ahistorical orthodoxies of the well discussed analytic-continental divide. Even while important voices in philosophy decried the reified status of the divide in contemporary philosophy, the department at the U of W did for many years soldier on without such crass encumbrance. Teachers taught; students wrote papers and engaged important philosophical ideas. Their education not mirroring programmes in Canada, students were not in philosophy solely for a promise of graduate study, but because philosophical questions had to be engaged for higher purposes. This was the Department’s inheritance to Dr. Keenan. While Dr. Keenan was a full-time faculty member and Chair, the department became well known as having an historical orientation unique in the Canadian context.

Dr. Keenan is a teacher. He has never called himself a philosopher. From Members of Parliament to Rhodes Scholars, Dr. Keenan is thought of as a teacher and, indeed, a teacher’s teacher. For those of us who have worked alongside Dr. Keenan, he is a philosopher—a philosopher’s philosopher.

Karim Dharamsi, Ph.D.

Formerly of University of Winnipeg