Inaccurate term used, often polemically, to refer to writings influenced by European political philosophers such as Hegel, Marx, or Heidegger, by phenomenology and existentialist schools, or by poststructuralist French philosophy. Writing in this vein is often politically engaged and aspires to large-scale praxis and social critique. It also contains examples of writing that does not aspire to any great clarity, which writers in this tradition are apt to mistrust or even to despise. Generally contrasted with analytical philosophy, thought to be more the preserve of Anglo-American and Australian philosophers, although a great many practitioners of analytical philosophy themselves originated in Europe.