Philosophy relies on precise and nuanced language to articulate complex concepts, yet the academic vocabulary in western philosophy research articles (WPRAs) remains underexplored. This study addressed this gap through a corpus-based analysis of WPRAs published from 2010 to 2025, aiming to develop a Western Philosophy Word List (WPWL) and evaluate its distinctiveness from general academic word lists. A 4-million-token corpus of 407 open-access research articles (henceforth, RAs), sourced from PhilPapers.org, was compiled and analyzed using #LancsBox X corpus software. Frequency (>233 occurrences) and range (>3 articles) thresholds yielded a 424-word WPWL, organized into six frequency bands for pedagogical utility. The WPWL was further analyzed for overlaps with established lists using frequency distributions, chi-square test, and the Jaccard index. Results revealed philosophy-specific terms like "ontology," "epistemology," and "moral" (3,202 occurrences), with limited overlap to West's (1953) General Service List (4.90%, 112 words) and Coxhead's (2000) Academic Word List (12.11%, 69 words). These findings underscore the inadequacy of general lists for philosophy's specialized lexicon, enriching Nation's (2001) vocabulary framework and offering tailored resources for English for Academic Purposes (EAP) instruction, particularly for non-native English-speaking students. Despite limitations in corpus scope—restricted to English-language Western philosophy—this pioneering study can establish a discipline-specific lexical foundation, paving the way for future research into philosophical discourse and enhancing EAP instructional practices.
