2024-25 Department Activities and Events
Colloquia for 2024-25
18 October 2024 - Quayshawn Spencer, University of Pennsylvania, "A Metaphysical Mapping Problem for Race Theorists and Human Population Geneticists."
1 November 2024 - Jennifer Nagel, University of Toronto, "Common Knowledge and Curiosity-driven Conversation."
22 November 2024 - Ethan Nowak, Stanford University, "Creative Conception in Everyday Speech"
28 February 2025 - Rachel Fraser, Massachusetts institute of technology, "What Assertion is Not."
7 March 2025 - Whitney Schwab, University of Maryland, "Stability as an Epistemological Aim in Plato, Aristotle, and the Stoics."
4 April 2025 - Rachel Barney, University of Toronto, "Protagoras and the Measure of All Things."
11 April 2025 - Liz Jackson, Saint Louis University, "The Limitations of Evidence: Epistemic Ties, Parity, and Permissions."
12 May 2025 - Sasha Mudd, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, "Beyond Technocentrism: Kant's Humanism and the Ethics of Artificial Intelligence."
Chicago-Area Consortium in German Philosophy
DePaul hosted our annual CACGP workshop. Its theme was Nietzsche and we had presentations from Guy Elgat (School of the Art Institute of Chicago), Sean Kirkland (DePaul), and Claire Kirwin (Northwestern). We also had an exciting visit from the German philosopher Martin Saar (Frankfurt).
Eighth “Critical Theory in Critical Times” Annual Workshop
On November 1st, 2024, the department of philosophy together with the Center for Global Culture and Communication, the Critical Theory Cluster and other sponsors, hosted the eighth Critical Theory in Critical Times Annual Workshop: A Conversation with Fred Neuhouser on his book Diagnosing Social Pathology. This workshop series aims to bring to Northwestern the most distinguished critical theorists who have recently published a major work in the area for an in-depth discussion with experts in the field, interested faculty, and students. In preparation for the workshop a reading group with faculty and students from several departments (Philosophy, Political Science, Spanish & Portuguese, Communication Studies, German, etc.) met to discuss Fred Neuhouser’s book Diagnosing Social Pathology, in which he defends the idea of social pathology, demonstrating what it means to describe societies as ‘ill’, or ‘sick’, and explores the connections between societal illnesses and alienation, anomie, ideology, and social dysfunction. At the workshop, three commentators were invited to discuss his work: Rahel Jaeggi (Humboldt University, Berlin), Robert Pippin (University of Chicago), and Joshua Kleinfeld (George Mason University).
NUSTEP conference
The 17th annual NUSTEP conference brought rich discussion of moral and political philosophy to campus May 15-17, 2025. Keynote speakers Ryan Preston-Roedder (Occidental) and Andrea Westlund (Florida State) anchored an excellent program. Preston-Roedder reflected on James Baldwin’s concept of irony, and how it might help us flourish in difficult times. Westlund developed Kant’s conception of friendship, arguing that Kantian friends can be understood as fellow travelers. The philosophy was amazing, the food was great, and the participants sturdy as they weathered rain, hail, and even a dust storm between stretches of the sunny, calm May weather we always hope for. The conference is organized jointly by faculty and graduate students and is always both intellectually rewarding and great fun. To see the full schedule for this and past years’ conferences visit here.