We're happy to announce that the new year has seen two publications from Centre scholars hit print.
One of our PhD students, Patrick Keenan's "Solarpunk Contra Capitalist Realism" was published in the Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Nis's Sociology Yearbook (2022).
- Abstract: Mark Fisher expanded on the concept of capitalist realism as a socioeconomic order which stifles the imagination so deeply that we cannot imagine any alternative to it. To combat capitalist realism, Fisher believed we need an effective critique. If capitalist realism is an ideology, then an effective critique may come from a counterideology. I believe the speculative fiction and art movement known as solarpunk is the utopian premise we need to construct this counter-ideology. This essay will begin to construct a philosophy of solarpunk by primarily thinking of solarpunk as an ideology and showing its many advantages to past utopian conceptions of the future. Following Marx & Engels’ treatment of ideology, Gramsci’s cultural hegemony will also be considered in relation to Fisher’s capitalist realism. Given the concurrent existential crises of climate collapse, economic inequality, depression, and alienation – all of which are exacerbated by the capitalist model – something beyond ‘an effective critique’ is necessary to overcome these challenges. This essay hopes to better understand whether or not solarpunk can meet this challenge to provide a vision of a better future beyond capitalism.
Additionally, Lesley Jamieson (post-doctoral researcher) has edited a suite of papers for the Journal of Philosophy of Education entitled "Teaching, Learning and Philosophising as Metaphysical Animals" that appear in December 2022 issue. This suite consists of 4 papers exploring the relevance of the philosophy and educational experiences of the Wartime Quartet (Iris Murdoch, Elizabeth Anscombe, Philippa Foot, and Mary Midgley) to the philosophy of education. Her introduction can be read here. The suite includes:
- Nora Hämäläinen "Murdoch on Ethical Formation in a Changing World"
- David Bakhurst "Education for Metaphysical Animals"
- Clare Mac Cumhaill and Rachael Wiseman "Interrupting the Conversation: Donald MacKinnon, Wartime Tutor of Anscombe, Midgley, Murdoch, and Foot"
- Anne-Marie McCallion "Discovering Disagreement: The Story of an Undergraduate Wartime Quartet Reading Group"