The Department of Philosophy at the University of Texas at Austin has made two senior hires:  Galen Strawson (metaphysics, philosophy of mind and action, history of early modern philosophy, Nietzsche), currently Professor of Philosophy at the University of Reading, will take up a new Chair in philosophy at Texas; and Michelle Montague (philosophy of mind, metaphysics), currently at the University of Bristol, will come in as an Associate Professor with tenure.  Montague and Strawson are teaching at UT in 2012-13, will be back at their UK institutions in fall 2013, and then return to UT full time in spring 2014.

In addition to these hires, UT made two additional junior appointments, and a lateral junior hire of Katherine Dunlop (Kant, philosophy of math) from Brown University.  Taken together, these five appointments will probably push UT back towards the overall top 15 in the US.