Westphal earned a B.A. in
Social Theory from the
University of Illinois Urbana–Champaign in 1977. Following this, he pursued his graduate studies in Philosophy entering
University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1978, earning an M.A. in 1981 and a Ph.D. in 1986 with the dissertation "
Nietzsche on Truth and Knowledge (Realism, Perspectivism, Interpretation, Epistemology, Skepticism)". During his doctoral studies, Westphal also studied at the
Freie Universität Berlin (1983–84) and the
Ohio State University (1984–85). == Honors and awards ==