My final few weeks in New York were frantic. I submitted a paper for review, began to think about Winter syllabi, and finished (mostly) the massive pile of books I had checked out from the library. But, I managed to have some downtime too. Challenging borders I attended a few events at Where No Wall Remains, the 2019 biennial Live Arts Bard festival at the Fisher Center for the Arts. I like the intellectual grounding of the festival. Artists submit items for inclusion in the festival syllabus, … [Read more...]
Arendt and outer space
In the span of a month I'll have been to Washington DC, Guelph, Atlanta, and Edmonton. I'm half-way through what I'm jokingly referring to as my "Spring Speaking Tour." Both my rats and my students might forget what I look like. This post is less of a blog and more about what-I've-been-up-to. Mostly I've been thinking about Arendt and science fiction, both separately and together. I wrote about these two together in the first entry to this blog, focusing on the task of philosophy as Arendt … [Read more...]
Science fiction versus history in feminist classrooms
Teaching with science fiction I’m a fan of using science fiction in my teaching, probably because I’m a fan of science fiction. After all, Star Trek: The Next Generation was one of my earliest philosophical influences! Craig B. Jacobsen suggests that science fiction’s “generation of cognitive estrangement makes it perhaps uniquely qualified to provide college students with the critical distance necessary to recognize the complexity of the worlds that they must learn to navigate.” [1] By … [Read more...]
Reading Indigenous Writes by Chelsea Vowel
Preamble Below, I have re-blogged a post I wrote for the University of Waterloo Faculty Association's blog. It's the first in a series of posts from faculty members about books we've been reading relating to Indigenization. When we were divvying up books to read, I jumped at the chance to read Vowel's non-fiction, as I am a huge fan of the Métis in Space podcast, which she co-hosts with Molly Swain. Between the time I wrote this post and its publication, I've also had the pleasure of … [Read more...]
Are tribbles trivial?
I’m disturbed by the trivial way in which tribbles are treated within the Star Trek universe. The Tribble Handbook describes these creatures as “the most fabulous furballs in the galaxy!” (p. 1). Further, Star Trek supposedly represents a futuristic society that has solved many of the ethical, social, and political challenges we face today. Despite these points, Star Trek’s treatment of tribbles tends to parallel contemporary problems with how we human animals conceptualize and treat … [Read more...]