Congratulations to Dr. Cheshire Calhoun, winner of this year’s Journal of Applied Philosophy Essay Prize.
The editors of the Journal of Applied Philosophy are pleased to announce that the winner of the 2015 essay prize is Cheshire Calhoun for her article, “Geographies of Meaningful Living“, published in the February 2015 issue.
The £1000 award is granted to the author of the best article published in that year’s volume. We offer Dr. Calhoun a hearty congratulations and are pleased to offer you free access to her winning article through the end of July.
About the Winner
Cheshire Calhoun, winner of the Journal of Applied Philosophy 2015 Essay Prize
Currently, Dr. Cheshire Calhoun teaches philosophy at Arizona State University and is serving as chair of the American Philosophical Association (APA) board of officers. She previously edited feminist philosophy journal Hypatia, and was chair of the APA’s LGBT Committee and the Inclusiveness Committee.
The majority of her work falls within normative ethics, moral psychology, philosophy of emotion, feminist philosophy, and gay and lesbian philosophy.
To learn more about her prolific career and work, please visit her website.
About the Journal
The Journal of Applied Philosophy provides a unique forum for philosophical research which seeks to make a constructive contribution to problems of practical concern. Open to the expression of diverse viewpoints, the journal brings critical analysis to these areas and to the identification, justification and discussion of values of universal appeal. The journal covers a broad spectrum of issues in environment, medicine, science, policy, law, politics, economics and education. Go here to subscribe today.
The SAP’s new logo
The journal is run by the Society for Applied Philosophy. Founded in 1982, the society aims to promote philosophical study and research that has a direct bearing on areas of practical concern. To learn about the society’s work and how you can become a member, please visit its website.
This year’s American Philosophical Association Pacific Division Meeting is drawing near. You’re likely combing through the program or app (yes, there’s an app!) squinting at the small font wishing you could split yourself in two in order to attend all the things you’d like AND be able to explore the beautiful city that is San Francisco.
We’re here to help. We’ve put together a list of our top picks – lectures, receptions, and more – to make sure you don’t miss out on any of the good stuff.
Or, sit in on the APA Committee on Lectures, Publication, and Research, chaired by Louise Antony (University of Massachusetts Amherst)
If those don’t suit your fancy, we recommend attending the Book Symposium on Lori Gruen’s Entangled Empathy, chaired by Shelley Wilcox (San Francisco State University). Gruen (Wesleyan University) and Wilcox have both worked as editors of Hypatia.
noon – 1pm
Grab some lunch, then head over to the Wiley-Blackwell stand in the exhibit hall. We’re offering 20% off books (to take away or ship directly to you!), free copies of our renowned philosophy journals, and more. Say hello to our acquisitions editor and tell us what you think about the future of philosophy to get a $5 Starbucks gift card.
Also at this time, an APA Committee Session on The Moral Significance of Shame and
Disgust: Chinese and Western Perspectives will take place. Arranged by the APA Committee on the Status of Asian and Asian American Philosophers and Philosophies, this session is chaired by Justin Tiwald (San Francisco State University).
And, you may not want to miss the APA Committee Session on Trends in Brazilian Epistemology, arranged by the APA Committee on International Cooperation. This session is being chaired by Sven Bernecker (University of California, Irvine), author of the book Reading Epistemology: Selected Texts with Interactive Commentary.
4-6 pm
There are several great options to spend your afternoon.
First, a Colloquium on Confucianism and Neo-Confucianism will be chaired for the first hour by Journal of Chinese Philosophy author Nathan Carson (Fresno Pacific University), then chaired by Robin Wang (Loyola Marymount University) for the last hour. Wang has contributed essays to Philosophy Compass (see here and here) and the Journal of Chinese Philosophy (see here and here).
Or, enjoy a lively debate organized by the North American Kant Society. An Author-Meets-Critics session featuring Henry Allison’s Kant’s Transcendental Deduction will be chaired by frequent Wiley philosphy contributor Lucy Allais (University of the Witwatersrand and University of California, San Diego). You can read her past work in the Winter 2008 issue of Philosophy and Public Affairs here and two of her essays featured in Philosophy and Phenomenological Research here and here.
Last but not least, we recommend the APA Committee Session on LGBT Metaphysics. Arranged by the APA Committee on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and
Transgender People in the Profession, this session is chaired by Ásta Sveinsdóttir (San Francisco State University). Sveinsdóttir recently wrote about the role of feminism in naturalism in The Blackwell Companion to Naturalism.
6 – 9pm
If you’re still up for more, the Experimental Philosophy Society is hosting a session on Experimental Work in Formal Semantics, chaired by Philosophy Compass author Seth Yalcin (University of California, Berkeley).
Or, the International Society for Comparative Studies of Chinese and Western Philosophy is hosting a session on Skepticism, Friendship, Perception, and Home: Views from Zhuangzi, Confucians, Montaigne, and Heidegger. This session is chaired by Eirik Lang Harris (City University of Hong Kong). Harris has contributed works to the Philosophy Compass and the Journal of Chinese Philosophy.
Our last pick in this timeslot is a session hosted by the Society for German Idealism. Chaired by Hypatia author Jeff Gauthier (University of Portland), this session will feature the presentation of papers such as, “Du Bois and Hegel on Social Freedom,” “Liberal Naturalism in the Post-Kantian Tradition,” and more.
Day 2 // Thursday
9am-noon
Start your morning off right with a Book Symposium centered around Stephen Palmquist’s Comprehensive Commentary on Kant’s Religion Within the Bounds of Bare Reason, chaired by Robert Gressis (California State University, Northridge). See critics and author Palmquist (of Hong Kong Baptist University) discuss this new work, the first definitive, comprehensive commentary on Kant’s Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason.
Alternatively, we recommend the APA Committee Session on Justice in the City, arranged by the APA Committee on Public Philosophy. This session will be chaired by Shelley Wilcox (San Francisco State University).
noon – 1 pm
Don’t forget to stop by the Wiley-Blackwell booth in the exhibit hall! We’d love to chat with you about how you can be published in our journals. In fact, the European Journal of Philosophy is now publishing more pages in each issue – submit your paper ASAP.
1 – 4pm
Next, we recommend seeing the Invited Symposium on Post-Kantian Theories of concepts. Chaired by Mind & Language author Richard Zach (University of Calgary), we’re sure there will be lively discussion around papers such as, “Bolzano on Representations in Logic, Cognition, and Action,” and “The Abstractionist Theory of Concept Formation After Kant.”
Alternatively, observe the Invited Symposium on Women in the History of Philosophy of Religion. This session, chaired by Kristen Irwin (Loyola University Chicago), will debate papers such as, “17th Century Women on God’s Existence and Nature,” and the amusingly titled, “Medieval Women Didn’t Do Philosophy of Religion: So Why Am I Still Talking?” Irwin has contributed work to the Philosophy Compass.
4 – 5pm
Take a break at the Bay Area Feminism and Philosophy Reception taking place in the Italian Room at the Westin St. Francis. A selection of vegetarian canapés will be served, and everyone is welcome. This reception is made possible by the generosity of the Mortimer Fleishhacker Fund for Philosophy at the University of San Francisco.
4 – 6pm
We next recommend the Colloquium on Cognition and the Nature of Acts. Split into two, the first hour will be chaired by Journal of Social Philosophy contributor Jason Kawall (Colgate University), and discuss papers such as, “Knowledge in Action.” The second half of the session will be chaired by David Beglin (University of California, Riverside) and discuss the paper, “‘Philosophy of Action’ Is Not a Philosophy of Acts.”
Or, visit the session hosted by the Society for Philosophy of Creativity. There, you’ll discover a likely fascinating discussion on, “Why Does Art Matter? Reflections on an NEH Enduring Questions Grant,” chaired by Raymond D. Boisvert (Siena College). Boisvert has contributed pieces to The Southern Journal of Philosophy and Journal of Philosophy of Education.
6 – 9pm
The Society for Applied Philosophy is hosting an Author-Meets-Critics session featuring Leif Wenar’s Blood Oil: Tyruants, Violence, and the Rules That Run the World. Gillian Brock (University of Auckland) is chairing. (By the way, their February issue featuring a Singer and Kagan debate of speciesism is available now!)
For those interested in the philosophy of history, the Society for the Philosophy of History is hosting a session on “The Philosophy and Political Thought of Mark Bevir,” chaired by Robert Piercey (University of Regina). Piercey is a contributing author to the new A Companion to Hermeneutics.
We’re also looking forward to the session hosted by the Society
Image from the New York Times
for Women in Philosophy. There, “Confronting Racism and Violence: Philosophical Research and Teaching” will be chaired by Hypatia contributor Emily S. Lee (California State University, Fullerton). Papers discussed will include, “A New Paradigm of Anti-Racism: Why Discourses of White Privilege, Justice, and Equality Do Not Work,”, “The Revolution Will Not Be Journal(ized): Blogs, Op-eds, and Podcasts as Timely Philosophical Tools,” and more. This session is sure to be fascinating and timely.
8 – 10pm
The Society for the Philosophy of Human Rights is hosting a late evening session with several speakers: Elizabeth Ashford (University of St. Andrews), Adam Etinson (University of Chicago), Robert Simpson (Monash University), and James Nickel (University of Miami). Clearly this is to be a debate of the utmost relevance and is not to be missed!
10pm – midnight
Then, the APA Annual Reception will take place in the Colonial Ballroom (Mezzanine). Grab a glass or three, say hello to all your friends, and talk about what a wonderful time you’re having at the conference.
Day 3 // Friday
9am – noon
Start your morning off with Aristotle. A Colloquium on the Ethics and Politics in Aristotle will feature three parts. The first hour will cover “Aristotle’s Thumos as Dunamis and Pathos” and be chaired by Michael Ferejohn (Duke University), contributor to the Wiley-Blackwell A Companion to Plato. Hour two will be chaired by Bjorn Wastvedt (University of Arizona) and cover, “Aristotle’s Conception of the Political Life as an Imitation of the Divine.” Finally, the session will conclude with an hour discussing, “Aristotelian Sunaisthesis: A Synoptic View of Life” chaired by Emily Perry (University of California, Berkeley).
noon – 1pm
We invite you to stop by the Wiley-Blackwell table in the exhibitor’s hall. Leaf through the newest edition of Bioethics: An Anthology edited by Helga Kuhse, Udo Schuklenk, and Peter Singer.
1 – 4pm
Look no further than the Book Symposium on Duncan Pritchard’s Epistemic Angst: Radical Skepticism and the Groundlessness of Our Believing. This session will be chaired by Chienkuo Mi (Soochow University), with noted speakers such as Ram Neta (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill) and Ernest Sosa (Rutgers University). Neta and Sosa are the esteemed editors of Noûs.
4 – 6pm
You won’t want to miss this year’s annual Dewey Lecture, chaired by editor of Virtue and Vice, Moral and Epistemic Heather Battaly (California State University, Fullerton). Linda Zagzebski (University of Oklahoma) will be speaking on “The Joys and Sorrows of Philosophy.” The reception will take place during the last thirty minutes.
7 – 10pm
Don’t miss the Society for Applied Philosophy’s second session, “Corruption and Accountability: Theory and Practice” chaired by Gillian Brock (University of Auckland). Subtopics to be discussed are “Corruption of Knowledge and the Pharmaceutical Industry,” “Think Tank Ethics: Theory Meets Practice,” and more.
Day 4 // Saturday
9am – noon
You’ll want to give yourself major kudos for having made it this far; you will surely be exhausted. Sleep in, get some breakfast – you’ll have earned it.
1 – 4pm
We’re excited about the Invited Symposium: Normativity of Meaning and Content. This session will be chaired by Kirk Ludwig (Indiana University Bloomington), editor of Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, and feature editors of Thought: A Journal of Philosophy Asa Wikforss (Stockholms Universitet) and Ralph Wedgwood (University of Southern) as speaker and commentator, respectively.
4 – 6pm
For your early evening, we recommend the Colloquium on Moral Normativity and Its Relation to Epistemic Normativity. The first half of this session will be chaired by Hypatia author Sharyn Clough (Oregon State University), and discuss, “Knowledge as Ability: A Constructive Critique.”
6 – 9pm
The International Society for Chinese Philosophy is hosting its second session on “Virtues, Roles, and Self-Cultivation in Confucianism”, and will discuss papers such as, “Agent and Deed in Confucian Thought” and more.
Or, see the International Society for Environmental Ethics’s second session chaired by Chris Cuomo (University of Georgia). Cuomo guest edited a special issue of Hypatia in 2014 on climate change. This session will debate environmental ethics, species extinction, and more.
8 – 10pm
Where did the time go? Stop by the Philosophy of Time Society’s session chaired by A Companion to the Philosophy of Time editor Adrian Bardon (Wake Forest University). Ask yourself, “Does It Really Seem to Us That Time Passes?” (A real paper title to be presesnted by Natalja Deng of University of Cambridge.)
Day 5 // Sunday
9am – 6:30pm
Still wanting more philosophy? ArtSense Taste and Community project have organized open workshops that will analyze how cultural artifacts acquire meaning and value as an example of the process by which communities establish shared terms of reference.
Each year on International Women’s Day, we are reminded to celebrate the social, economic, cultural and political achievement of women worldwide.
This year, the theme is #pledgeforparity, a call for all to champion gender parity. Please take a moment to visit the official International Women’s Day site to make your #pledgeforparity, read pledges from global leaders, and more.
Yesterday, we hosted a webinar called Women’sRights are Human Rights, covering topics like women’s participation in politics, violence directed at women, unpaid care workloads, and access to equal education across all geographies, classes, races and ethnicities, ages, and cis and transgender rights. The three person panel included Dr. Ranjoo Herr, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Bentley University and frequent contributor to Hypatia. We will post a link to the recording when it is available.
For now, we at Wiley have updated a special collection of scholarly works across the Social Sciences and Humanities to support awareness and equality amongst genders, blog posts from thought leaders spanning fields from philosophy to gender statistics, and more. We welcome you to check it out, and to tell us your story on how you’re supporting gender parity.
DID YOU KNOW?
The Akkadian/Sumerian poet Enheduanna (2285-2250 BCE) is believed by scholars to be the world’s first author and poet known by name.
Our condolences go out to the surviving family and colleagues of noted Dr. Claudia Falconer Card, who passed away September 12, 2015.
Card was the Emma Goldman Professor of Philosophy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and her research interests included ethics and social philosophy, including normative ethical theory; feminist ethics; environmental ethics; theories of justice, of punishment, and of evil; and the ethics of Kant, Schopenhauer, and Nietzsche. Her work also deeply involved Women’s Studies, Jewish Studies, Environmental Studies, and LGBT Studies.
Additionally, philosopher Kate Norlock, a former student of the professor, beautifully reflects on the life and work of Dr. Card here.
Instead of mourning her death per her own request, the University of Wisconsin-Madison will honor Dr. Card with A Celebration of Life, which will take place Sunday, Oct. 11 from 1:00pm-4:00pm at the Pyle Center Alumni Lounge.
We have joined in celebrating the life and career of Claudia Card by making free a special collection on her articles.
It was 1969, I was just 12 years old, and Stonewall had not yet happened. My best friend Linda and I hung out at the local schoolyard wearing army jackets with male names emblazoned on the pocket. She was not just my friend, though I had no name for what we were.
When I smacked a boy upside the head who tried to grab my breasts, the home economics teacher said if I couldn’t stop acting like that no boy would ever marry me. I had no vision of what life could be without marrying a boy and gay marriage was still an oxymoron; I decided that marriage was a trap that I would never willingly step into. I mostly still think that.
I discovered feminism with an insatiable hunger. I read every book, bought every woman’s music album and joined consciousness raising groups, and coming out groups.
Today my female students often insist they are not feminists. My feminism is quaint to them, not the radical edge of human transformation, but nostalgia from a bygone generation. In their eyes I am a woman who still thinks that gender matters. Of course they believe in equal rights and equal pay for equal work. Of course they think that “girls” should go to college and become doctors. Their definition of feminism is: a woman who hates men. I try to explain that it was actually men who hated women, and we rebelled, us feminists. I tell them that all they have in their lives today is the fruits of a movement that women planted with our own hands, the soil was our very bodies. Gender, I insist, still matters.
The lesbian-feminist community that reared me does not exist anymore. The small coffee houses, the sense of commonality are relics of another day. Partially the movement that was, has been absorbed into the larger LGBTQQI-alphabet soup movement for queer civil rights. Partially it became transformed into academic women’s studies programs. Partially it has been co-opted, sold out to the dazzle of consumer capitalism and the lure of romantic security, represented by gay business and gay marriage. A friend smiles and says, “We really thought we could change the world,” and I remind her: we did. We changed the world.
I work for transgender rights and argue queer theory, and insist that it is feminism which was the mother of these freedoms. I give credit to women’s liberation for not only changing my world, but for changing the whole world, for starting a dialogue about rethinking gender that continues on today. Like all important tasks, dismembering patriarchy is the work of my many lifetimes.
I am nearly a crone now — more than half a century on this blessed planet, and I’m still doing my work. I still devour feminist books, but I do not allow feminism to devour me. I am critical of some of what has been done in the name of feminism, but I will not let other women define feminism for me, or dictate which acts of mine are feminist and which are colonized. I keep insisting that feminism is not a dirty word, but is a movement that has made possible all that has come since.
I embrace the queer youth of today, and I know they can do what they are doing precisely because we did the work of feminism. I plan to get old, grow my facial hair, get another tattoo, and wear bright red lipstick. Feminism has given me the freedom to be fully myself.
By Arlene Istar Lev LCSW, CASAC
Arlene Istar Lev is a social worker, family therapist, activist, and mother. She is the Founder of Choices Counseling and Consulting (www.choicesconsulting.com), and The Institute for Gender, Relationships, Identity and Sexuality (TIGRIS – www.tigrisinstitute.com). She can be reached at 518-438-2222 or Arlene@choicesconsulting.com.
The focus of Journal of Religious Ethics 43:2 is a conversation at and about the interface of feminist ethics and religious ethics, in order to show what these multifaceted fields of intellectual endeavor and practical import have to say to each other, to teach and to learn. The seven essays approach that dialogue from a variety of angles and traditions, reflecting the fecundity of both fields and the wide-ranging concerns of colleagues in religious ethics who share commitments and methods with feminist ethics.
Throughout these articles, themes and methods characteristic of feminist thought prevail, perhaps especially feminism’s insistence on the crucial value of a particularist perspective for moral deliberation. From Hille Haker’s powerful story of Valentina, a Moldovan mother who fell prey to sex traffickers, to the voices of young black lesbians, in the essay by Thelathia N. Young and Shannon J. Miller, mourning the disruption of formative relationships with their mothers and their church communities, the focus on particulars afforded by narrative methods stands out. One consistent result of this attention is the readiness to interrogate arguments that seem to “work” in the theoretical realm but threaten harm when put into practice.
These essays make clear that feminist ethics and religious ethics not only have much of value to say to each other, but also have ways of holding each other accountable for blind spots and errors that arise from too narrow a focus on one or another method or conviction, errors that can have undesirable, even immoral results in practice. In addition to the fruitfulness of the dialogue, however, feminism also offers something new: previously unacknowledged fields to explore, novel perspectives on areas of ethical thought that may have seemed to have been conclusively settled, and fresh examinations of long-shelved topics and thinkers.
The call to be “finely aware and richly responsible”—issued by feminist philosopher Martha Nussbaum (1985), using words of Henry James that also echo in the work of religious ethicist H. Richard Niebuhr (1963)—knows no disciplinary boundary. It’s time to talk.
Embodiment has been a central theme in feminist philosophy from its early days. The essays selected here illuminate how the topic of embodiment in general has been broached over the years by Hypatiaauthors, how it has developed, and what topics have received the most focus. Hypatia has been the site of some of the most innovative feminist theorizing on this subject, from the groundbreaking early work of Luce Irigaray and Ann Ferguson to the innovative developments of Kelly Oliver, Lois McNay, Margaret Whitford, and Alison Stone, just to name a few.
There are many ways to define what embodiment has meant in feminist philosophy, and this collection showcases the expanse of issues that the concept of embodiment has engendered. In general, embodiment has signaled the idea that there is a constitutive relationship of the lived body to thought, to knowledge, and to ethics, taking leave of the modern idea that bodies can be left behind as the mind does its work. Such dualism was rarely allowed women, after all. But, beyond thinking our way past dualism, feminist philosophers have also sought new ways to conceptualize the materiality of bodies, the discursive nature of embodied experience, and the contested figure of the maternal body. Within feminist theory itself there has occurred a lively debate over dualism, naturalism, essentialism, and gender normativity in relationship to embodiment.
Read Linda Martin Alcoff’s complete Introduction here.
The editors of the Journal of Applied Philosophy are pleased to announce that the winner of the 2015 essay prize is Cheshire Calhoun for her article, “Geographies of Meaningful Living“, published in the February 2015 issue.
Or, see the International Society for Environmental Ethics’s second session chaired by Chris Cuomo (University of Georgia). Cuomo guest edited a 
The Philosopher's Eye 
