Day: March 2, 2016

Incident at KU Leuven Philosophy Department

jennysaul

From the KU Leuven Feminist Society:

 

On 15 Feb, a female teaching assistant was physically assaulted by a professor (her Phd supervisor) within the campus’ premises due to an argument regarding a paper she had written. Witnesses in the neighboring offices had to separate the fight as the victim yelled for help. The police was called but the professor had already left by the time they arrived. The dean for the Institute heard a statement from the professor acknowledging the assault, yet took absolutely no actions hoping the incident would go unnoticed. Furthermore, the following day after the assault, the accused professor, who was allowed to teach, has falsely informed the students that the TA in question has left the university.

We, the students (initially a group of approximately only 30 people and now much more), protested this class by confronting the professor and argued that the university should take the impartial position towards the incident and to suspend the aggressor until all investigations are carried through, as this is usually the normal stance expected from an institution when facing accusations of this severity. One of the professor’s classes did get suspended (the one we occupied), however, the professor is still teaching other classes in the institute. The number of students who are standing against this injustice within the institute has multiplied since the incident.

 

CFA: Reconsidering the Philosophical Canon (Duquesne)

Louie Generis

April 23, 2016
Duquesne University

Keynote Speaker: Penelope Deutscher, Professor of Philosophy, Northwestern University

Duquesne Women in Philosophy (D-WiP) and the Duquesne chapter of Minorities and Philosophy (MAP) invite philosophical papers on the question of reconsidering the philosophical canon. Given the recent discussions on the limitations of the philosophical canon, we aim to facilitate a discussion on the future directions of philosophy, how we may reconsider our reading of the history of philosophy and the question of canonicity. Papers are welcome from historical perspectives as well as from within contemporary philosophical discourse. We invite abstract submissions of maximum 500 words to dwipcontact@gmail.com by March 7, 2016. Allotted presentation time will be 20 minutes.

Possible areas of exploration include:

  • women in the history of philosophy
  • philosophy done from minority perspective in the history of philosophy
  • intersection of race and gender in the history of philosophy
  • attempts in contemporary philosophy of reformulating the North American and European philosophical canon
  • historical or critical approaches to the modernity in terms of canonization of philosophical texts
  • feminist writings on the philosophical canon
  • problems of race and racism in Modern philosophy

This conference is generously sponsored by Minorities and Philosophy (MAP), Duquesne Programming Council (DPC), and the McAnulty College and Graduate School of Liberal Arts.

Men, sexual assault, and the military

magicalersatz1 Comment

GQ has published an in-depth report on male sexual assault (that is, the sexual assault of men) in the US military. The piece is long, but very much worth reading in all of its horrifying detail. Here’s the abstract:

Sexual assault is alarmingly common in the U.S. military, and more than half of the victims are men. According to the Pentagon, thirty-eight military men are sexually assaulted every single day. These are the stories you never hear—because the culprits almost always go free, the survivors rarely speak, and no one in the military or Congress has done enough to stop it