As work on the nature of understanding has expanded in recent years, there has been increasing interest in the question of what might be distinctive about our understanding of other people, or humane understanding.
Our conference will explore this question, and consider how recent debates might be enriched by insights from areas such as epistemology, the philosophy of science, the philosophy of social science, the hermeneutical tradition, and the “verstehen” tradition in Continental philosophy.
Confirmed Speakers:
Olivia Bailey (Tulane)
Kristin Gjesdal (Temple)
Stephen R. Grimm (Fordham)
Kareem Khalifa (Middlebury)
Michael Strevens (NYU)
Karsten Stueber (Holy Cross)
Call for Abstracts:
3-4 spots on the program will be filled via a call for abstracts. Submitted abstracts should be no longer than 500 words, and should be emailed to sgrimm@fordham.edu by December 1, 2018. Meals at the conference will be covered, but scholars whose abstracts are selected will cover their own travel and lodging costs. Abstracts should try to engage with the following questions:
How does understanding people differ from other kinds of understanding, such as the understanding of concepts, language, or natural phenomena? Do these various types of understanding bring different cognitive resources to bear, or have different epistemic profiles?
Is there a deep unity among these types of understanding, or not?
What are the distinctive ways in which the study of literature or art or history enhance our understanding of other people?
What role does the reenactment of another’s perspective play in humane understanding? Is it merely a heuristic for discovering a person’s mental states (as Hempel seemed to think) or does it play a more epistemically robust role? Is reenactment of this sort indispensable to intentional-action explanation?
How does recent research on social cognition and mindreading bear on older debates about Verstehen?
How does the hermeneutical tradition shed light on these issues? Is it engaged with different questions, or does it pursue them from a distinctively different angle?
How do we adjudicate between competing interpretations of people’s actions?
What contribution does memory make to humane understanding?
| 8:30 – 9 a.m. | Registration and coffee |
| 9 – 9:15 a.m. | Opening remarks: Shiloh Whitney, Conference Director |
| Session 1 – Organic Affectivity and Animality Moderator: Emilia Angelova, Concordia University |
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| 9:15 – 10 a.m. | Hermanni Yli-Tepsa, University of Jyväskylä: “How to feel like our eyes: tracing the theme of instinctive affectivity in Phenomenology of Perception” |
| 10 – 10:45 a.m. | Sarah DiMaggio, Vanderbilt University: “Flesh and Blood: Reimagining Kinship” |
| 10:45 – 11 a.m. | Break |
| Session 2 – Passivity Moderator: Philip Walsh, Fordham University |
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| 11 – 11:45 a.m. | David Morris, Concordia University: “The Transcendentality of Passivity: Affective Being and the Contingency of Phenomenology as Institution” |
| 11:45 a.m. – 12:30 p.m. | Rajiv Kaushik, Brock University “Merleau-Ponty on Passivity and the Limit of Philosophical Critique” |
| 12:30 – 2 p.m. | Lunch Break |
| Session 3 – Theorizing Emotion 1: Outside-in, Inside-Outside Moderator: Duane H. Davis, University of North Carolina at Asheville |
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| 2 – 2:45 p.m. | Ed Casey, Stonybrook University: “Bringing Edge to Bear: Vindicating Merleau-Ponty’s Nascent Ideas on Emotion” |
| 2:45 – 3:30 p.m. | Ondřej Švec, Charles University Prague: “Acting out one’s emotion” |
| 3:30 – 3:45 p.m. | Break |
| Session 4 – Theorizing Emotion 2: Intersubjective Dimensions Moderator: April Flakne, New College of Florida |
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| 3:45 – 4:30 p.m. | Jan Halák, Palacky University Olomouc: “On the diacritical value of expression with regard to emotion” |
| 4:30 – 5:15 p.m. | Corinne Lajoie, Penn State University: “The equilibrium of sense: Levels of embodiment and the (dis)orientations of love” Winner of the M. C. Dillon Award for best graduate essay |
| 5:15 – 5:45 p.m. | Snack Break (light refreshments provided) |
| Thursday Keynote Introduction: Shiloh Whitney, Fordham University |
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| 5:45 – 7:15 p.m. | Alia Al-Saji, McGill University “The Affective Flesh of Colonial Duration” |
| 8:30 – 9 a.m. | Registration and coffee |
| Session 5 – Affective Pathologies and Empathy Moderator: Lisa Käll, Stockholm University |
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| 9 – 9:45 a.m. | Ståle Finke, Norwegian University of Science and Technology Trondheim: “Structuring Affective Pathology: Merleau-Ponty and Psychoanalysis” |
| 9:45 – 10:30 a.m. | Catherine Fullarton, Emory University: “Empathy, Perspective, Parallax” |
| 10:30 – 10:45 a.m. | Break |
| Session 6 – Eating and Breathing Moderator: Ann Murphy, University of New Mexico |
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| 10:45 – 11:30 a.m. | Whitney Ronshagen, Emory University: “Visceral Relations: On Eating, Affect, and Sharing the World” |
| 11:30 a.m. – 12:15 p.m. | Amie Leigh Zimmer, University of Oregon: “Rethinking Chronic Breathlessness Beyond Symptom and Syndrome” |
| 12:15 – 2 p.m. | Lunch Break (and graduate student Mentoring Session in Lowenstein 810) |
| Session 7 – Critical Phenomenologies 1: Work and Freedom Moderator: Whitney Howell, La Salle University |
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| 2 – 2:45 p.m. | Talia Welsh, University of Tennessee Chattanooga: “Toward a Critical Phenomenology of Work and Its Discontents” |
| 2:45 – 3:30 p.m. | Laura McMahon, Eastern Michigan University: “The ‘Great Phantom’: Merleau-Ponty on Habitus, Freedom, and Political Transformation” |
| 3:30 – 3:45 p.m. | Break |
| Session 8 – Critical Phenomenologies 2: The “I Can” Moderator: Cheryl Emerson, SUNY Buffalo |
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| 3:45 – 4:30 p.m. | Kym Maclaren, Ryerson University: “Criminalization and the Self-Constituting Dynamics of Distrust” |
| 4:30 – 5:15 p.m. | Joel Reynolds, University of Massachusetts Lowell and Lauren Guilmette, Elon University: “Rethinking the Ableism of Affect Theory with Merleau-Ponty” |
| 5:15 – 5:45 p.m. | Snack Break (light refreshments provided) |
| Friday Keynote Introduction: Shiloh Whitney, Fordham University |
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| 5:45 – 7:15 p.m. | Matthew Ratcliffe, York University “Towards a Phenomenology of Grief: Insights from Merleau-Ponty” |
| 8:30 – 9 a.m. | Registration and coffee |
| Session 9 – Feeling Beyond Humanism Moderator: Wayne Froman, George Mason University |
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| 9 – 9:45 a.m. | Marie-Eve, Morin, University of Alberta. “Merleau-Ponty’s ‘cautious anthropomorphism’” |
| 9:45 – 10:30 a.m. | Jay Worthy, University of Alberta: “Feelings of Adversity: Towards a Critical Humanism” |
| 10:30 – 10:45 a.m. | Break |
| Session 10 – Art and Affect Moderator: Stephen Watson, Notre Dame |
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| 10:45 – 11:30 a.m. | Veronique Foti, Pennsylvania State University. “Body, Animality, and Cosmos in the Art of Kiki Smith” |
| 11:30 a.m. – 12:15 p.m. | Rebecca Longtin, State University of New York New Paltz: “From Stone to Flesh: Affect and the Poetic Ambiguity of the Body” |
| 12:15 – 2:15 p.m. | Lunch Break (and Business Lunch at Rosa Mexicano, 61 Columbus Ave) |
| Session 11 – Voice and Silence Moderator: Gail Weiss, George Washington University |
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| 2:15 – 3 p.m. | Susan, Bredlau, Emory University. “Losing One’s Voice: Merleau-Ponty and the Lived Space of Conversation” |
| 3 – 3:45 p.m. | Martina, Ferrari, University of Oregon. “The Laboring of Deep Silence: ‘Conceptless Opening(s),’ the Suspension of the Familiar, and the Dismemberment of the Ego” |
| 3:45 – 4 p.m. | Break |
| Session 12 – Affectivity and Language Moderator: Galen Johnson, University of Rhode Island |
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| 4 – 4:45 p.m. | Silvana de Souza Ramos, University of São Paulo. “Merleau-Ponty and the Prose of Dora’s World” |
| 4:45 – 5:30 p.m. | Katie Emery Brown, University of California Berkeley. “Queer Silence in Merleau-Ponty’s Gesture” |
| Banquet | |
| 7 – 10 p.m. | At Salam, 104 W 13th St. |
Meetings are held on Tuesdays at Fordham’s Lincoln Center campus in Manhattan in the Plaza View Room on the 12th floor of the Lowenstein Building (113 W 60th St).We meet from 5:30 to 6:45 and papers are read in advance. If interested in attending, contact sahaddad@fordham.edu, swhitney@fordham.edu, or jeflynn@fordham.edu.
2019-20
- September 24 – Rosaura Martínez (UNAM) “Alterability and Writing. Rethinking an Ontology of Dependency”
- October 15 – Jesús Luzardo (Fordham) “The Wages of the Past: Whiteness, Nostalgia, and Property”
- November 19 – Verena Erlenbusch-Anderson (Syracuse) “Conceptualizing Terrorism ‘From Below’: Lynching as Racial Terrorism”
- February 11 – Jill Stauffer (Haverford)
- March 10 – Sina Kramer (Loyola Marymount), “How to Read a City: Toward a Political Epistemology of Gentrification.”
- April 7 – David Lay Williams (DePaul) “’Too much abundance in one or a few private men’: Hobbes on Inequality and the Concentration of Wealth”
Contact Crina Gschwandtner for more information.
Meetings are held on Tuesdays at Fordham’s Lincoln Center campus in Manhattan in the Plaza View Room on the 12th floor of the Lowenstein Building (113 W 60th St).We meet from 5:30 to 6:45 and papers are read in advance. If interested in attending, contact sahaddad@fordham.edu, swhitney@fordham.edu, or jeflynn@fordham.edu.
2019-20
- September 24 – Rosaura Martínez (UNAM) “Alterability and Writing. Rethinking an Ontology of Dependency”
- October 15 – Jesús Luzardo (Fordham) “The Wages of the Past: Whiteness, Nostalgia, and Property”
- November 19 – Verena Erlenbusch-Anderson (Syracuse) “Conceptualizing Terrorism ‘From Below’: Lynching as Racial Terrorism”
- February 11 – Jill Stauffer (Haverford)
- March 10 – Sina Kramer (Loyola Marymount), “How to Read a City: Toward a Political Epistemology of Gentrification.”
- April 7 – David Lay Williams (DePaul) “’Too much abundance in one or a few private men’: Hobbes on Inequality and the Concentration of Wealth”
Meetings are held on Tuesdays at Fordham’s Lincoln Center campus in Manhattan in the Plaza View Room on the 12th floor of the Lowenstein Building (113 W 60th St).We meet from 5:30 to 6:45 and papers are read in advance. If interested in attending, contact sahaddad@fordham.edu, swhitney@fordham.edu, or jeflynn@fordham.edu.
2019-20
- September 24 – Rosaura Martínez (UNAM) “Alterability and Writing. Rethinking an Ontology of Dependency”
- October 15 – Jesús Luzardo (Fordham) “The Wages of the Past: Whiteness, Nostalgia, and Property”
- November 19 – Verena Erlenbusch-Anderson (Syracuse) “Conceptualizing Terrorism ‘From Below’: Lynching as Racial Terrorism”
- February 11 – Jill Stauffer (Haverford)
- March 10 – Sina Kramer (Loyola Marymount), “How to Read a City: Toward a Political Epistemology of Gentrification.”
- April 7 – David Lay Williams (DePaul) “’Too much abundance in one or a few private men’: Hobbes on Inequality and the Concentration of Wealth”
Meetings are held on Tuesdays at Fordham’s Lincoln Center campus in Manhattan in the Plaza View Room on the 12th floor of the Lowenstein Building (113 W 60th St).We meet from 5:30 to 6:45 and papers are read in advance. If interested in attending, contact sahaddad@fordham.edu, swhitney@fordham.edu, or jeflynn@fordham.edu.
2019-20
- September 24 – Rosaura Martínez (UNAM) “Alterability and Writing. Rethinking an Ontology of Dependency”
- October 15 – Jesús Luzardo (Fordham) “The Wages of the Past: Whiteness, Nostalgia, and Property”
- November 19 – Verena Erlenbusch-Anderson (Syracuse) “Conceptualizing Terrorism ‘From Below’: Lynching as Racial Terrorism”
- February 11 – Jill Stauffer (Haverford)
- March 10 – Sina Kramer (Loyola Marymount), “How to Read a City: Toward a Political Epistemology of Gentrification.”
- April 7 – David Lay Williams (DePaul) “’Too much abundance in one or a few private men’: Hobbes on Inequality and the Concentration of Wealth”
We all find ourselves already subject to some educational program and routinely invited into learning and teaching relationships with one another. We are inviting papers that engage philosophy and education from a wide range of perspectives. We welcome both papers that focus on philosophies of education as well as projects which engage the practice of teaching philosophy. Our conference aims to bring together graduate students that work in different areas of philosophy in order to think together about teaching and learning in a warm and convivial environment.
Possible topics may include, but are in no way limited to:
o How views of education affect how we conceive of what philosophy is
o The relation between philosophical wonder and learning
o Normative questions of what role the teacher ought to play in the student’s education
o How to best approach teaching texts from in and outside the canon
o Innovative teaching ideas or activities you have used in the classroom
o Earnest convictions about why we should teach philosophy
Please send abstracts of no more than 300 words in a doc file with name and affiliation in the header to Fordhamgradconference@gmail.com no later than Monday, December 2, 2019. Authors of selected papers will be notified by Monday, December 30, 2019.
Meetings are held on Tuesdays at Fordham’s Lincoln Center campus in Manhattan in the Plaza View Room on the 12th floor of the Lowenstein Building (113 W 60th St).We meet from 5:30 to 6:45 and papers are read in advance. If interested in attending, contact sahaddad@fordham.edu, swhitney@fordham.edu, or jeflynn@fordham.edu.
2019-20
- September 24 – Rosaura Martínez (UNAM) “Alterability and Writing. Rethinking an Ontology of Dependency”
- October 15 – Jesús Luzardo (Fordham) “The Wages of the Past: Whiteness, Nostalgia, and Property”
- November 19 – Verena Erlenbusch-Anderson (Syracuse) “Conceptualizing Terrorism ‘From Below’: Lynching as Racial Terrorism”
- February 11 – Jill Stauffer (Haverford)
- March 10 – Sina Kramer (Loyola Marymount), “How to Read a City: Toward a Political Epistemology of Gentrification.”
- April 7 – David Lay Williams (DePaul) “’Too much abundance in one or a few private men’: Hobbes on Inequality and the Concentration of Wealth”
Meetings are held on Tuesdays at Fordham’s Lincoln Center campus in Manhattan in the Plaza View Room on the 12th floor of the Lowenstein Building (113 W 60th St).We meet from 5:30 to 6:45 and papers are read in advance. If interested in attending, contact sahaddad@fordham.edu, swhitney@fordham.edu, or jeflynn@fordham.edu.
2019-20
- September 24 – Rosaura Martínez (UNAM) “Alterability and Writing. Rethinking an Ontology of Dependency”
- October 15 – Jesús Luzardo (Fordham) “The Wages of the Past: Whiteness, Nostalgia, and Property”
- November 19 – Verena Erlenbusch-Anderson (Syracuse) “Conceptualizing Terrorism ‘From Below’: Lynching as Racial Terrorism”
- February 11 – Jill Stauffer (Haverford)
- March 10 – Sina Kramer (Loyola Marymount), “How to Read a City: Toward a Political Epistemology of Gentrification.”
- April 7 – David Lay Williams (DePaul) “’Too much abundance in one or a few private men’: Hobbes on Inequality and the Concentration of Wealth”