Our Graduate Students
Last quarter we restarted two dormant events: Teatime and Graduate Works in Progress. We received plenty of wisdom from professors at the former and made collaborative progress on our research at the latter. Thanks to Gabriel Sanchez Ainsa and Isaac Shur for organizing those, respectively, and to all of the attendees.
Our graduate students continue to represent the department at professional conferences. Nathaly Garcia presented at the 2025 Bled Philosophical Conference; Carlos Coronado presented at the 82nd Annual Meeting of the American Society for Aesthetics; Mauricio Maluff Masi presented at the 31st annual Critical Theory Roundtable; April Chan presented at the 8th annual meeting of the Politics, Philosophy, and Economics Society; Gabriel Sanchez Ainsa and Carlos Schoof both presented at the North American Kant Society (alongside Northwestern’s own Kyla Ebels-Duggan); and Abigail Iturra and Mark Gorthey both presented at the Philosophy and Social Science conference in Prague, where they happened to run into a former grad student, Kurt Mertel, who is now an Associate Professor at the American University of Sharjah in the UAE! [Picture 1, attached.]
We also had a strong contingent of graduate students presenting at the three major meetings of the American Philosophical Association, with Kenni Zellner, Claire Becerra, Abigail Iturra, Sydney Maxwell, Hande Akyar, Eskil Elling, and Bella Braxton presenting work at various divisions of the APA.
Our graduate students also continue to help organize conferences and workshops right here at Northwestern. Abigail Iturra organized three meetings of the Post-Kantian and Continental Philosophy Workshop, bringing prestigious speakers to campus for each. Sam Filby brought Brian Leiter to discuss his new book on Marx for the Practical Philosophy Workshop. And of course, special thanks to the graduate students who play pivotal roles in organizing the two annual conferences held here at the department. The 16th annual meeting of the Northwestern Society for the Theory of Ethics and Politics (NUSTEP) would not occur without the hard work Christiana Eltiste and Sam Filby. And the 16th annual epistemology conference held jointly between us and the University of Notre Dame would not occur without the hard work of Beth Barker.
Last but not least, a number of graduate students received awards, published work, or achieved other accomplishments. Isaac Shur and Maddy Roffey jointly received the McCarthy Award for Excellence in Teaching. Beth Barker received an honorable mention for the 2025 Philosophy of Animal Minds and Behavior Association Prize for her paper ‘Intellectualism and Nonhuman Animal Knowledge.’ Bernardo Barzana was featured in the Museum Hegel-Haus’ ‘30 around 30’ series for recognition of his dissertation research. Calvin Bell co-authored a piece for the Brookings Institute, titled “Community Perspectives on Well-Being for Black Boys.” Abigail Iturra won the Theodore Kisiel Junior Scholar Essay Award for her paper “Heidegger and Marx: Estrangement in the Face of Modern Production” delivered at the Heidegger Circle. Sam Filby received the Barbara Stevens Heusel Fellowship from the Iris Murdoch Society. And to cap everything off, the graduate students would like to highlight Spencer Nabors, who will be joining the philosophy department at Georgetown University in the fall as an Assistant Professor.
Finally, some joyous news: Noam Weinreich and his wife Britt welcomed a new edition to their family this past year, Shabtai! Shabtai has begun his philosophical education early by attending a recent reading group on Evidence and Agency. His contributions to the discussion do not yet make much sense, but he is already an excellent listener. [Picture 2, attached.]