Philosophy is one of the least inclusive disciplines in the humanities and this situation is changing only very slowly. In this article I consider how one of the women of the Wartime Quartet, Iris Murdoch, can help to challenge this situation. Taking my cue from feminist and philosophical practices, I focus on Murdoch's experience of being a woman and a philosopher and on the role experience plays in her philosophical writing. I argue that her thinking is best characterised with the (...) notion of common sense orsensus communis. This term recognises her understanding of philosophy as based in experience and as a shared effort ‘to make sense of our life’, as Mary Midgley puts it. (shrink)

In this paper we connect diversity with being on the margins of philosophy. We do this by reflecting on the programme that we, as diverse philosophers, designed and taught in a small university. Recently, the programme was closed. We examine some of the circumstances for the closure, in particular the impact of league tables. We argue that an idea (or ideal?) of objectivity, as a method in both science and philosophy, plays a role in establishing and maintaining the outsider status (...) of the philosopher at the margins of the discipline. As a counterpoint to objectivity, we offer concrete examples of our experiences to illustrate what it is like to be at the margins of philosophy. We end with an examination of topics that are common to academics, i.e. issues of time and resources, that are compounded at the margins. Our paper seeks to show what is lost by the closure of our programme, and what philosophy loses when marginalised philosophers are silenced and/or excluded from key academic discourse. We argue that the particular contribution of the philosopher at the margin offers an important and irreplaceable contribution to discourses on the identity of philosophy and on the value of diversity. (shrink)

This article starts from the observation that Socratic dialogues in the Nelson–Heckmann tradition can create a sense of belonging or community among participants. This observation has led me to the current argument that Socratic dialogue offers an alternative to more prominent forms of conversation, which I have called ‘discussion’ and ‘discourse of uncritical acceptance.’ I explain the difference between these forms of conversation by considering the role of experience in Socratic dialogue and the requirement that participants put themselves in each (...) other’s shoes. My argument is structured according to the different phases in a Socratic dialogue and placed within the literature on this method, as well as Hannah Arendt’s writing on imagination. (shrink)

This article starts from the observation that Socratic dialogues in the Nelson–Heckmann tradition can create a sense of belonging or community among participants. This observation has led me to the current argument that Socratic dialogue offers an alternative to more prominent forms of conversation, which I have called ‘discussion’ and ‘discourse of uncritical acceptance.’ I explain the difference between these forms of conversation by considering the role of experience in Socratic dialogue and the requirement that participants put themselves in each (...) other’s shoes. My argument is structured according to the different phases in a Socratic dialogue and placed within the literature on this method, as well as Hannah Arendt’s writing on imagination. (shrink)

Footnotes to Plato. A plea for writing philosophical dialogues This article aims to encourage writing philosophical dialogues. Its main focus is education. Writing philosophical dialogues introduces students to a genre that was once widely practiced. It can teach philosophical skills, such as the ability to put oneself in the position of another. Yet, writing philosophical dialogues is not as common as it used to be and this creates difficulties when teaching students to write such dialogues. In order to deal with (...) these difficulties I first consider reasons for the contemporary scarcity of philosophical dialogues. I then provide possible ways to help students write philosophical dialogues. I show that writing philosophical dialogues today can benefit from working with other disciplines, especially creative writing and it thus has the additional benefit of encouraging reflection on philosophical practices. My argument is based on my own experience of writing (and failing to write) philosophical dialogues and as well as the experience of teaching philosophical dialogue writing to students. (shrink)

If you ask people ‘What does a philosopher look like?’, their first response is often an image of an elderly man with a beard. This image can be explained by looking at philosophy's history, which has been dominated by a very select group of men. Yet, in recent years it has become obvious that the history of philosophy is not as monochrome as is often assumed. In this article, I consider how the inclusion of different voices in the history of (...) philosophy should impel us to rethink the ways in which the history of philosophy is told. (shrink)

Yasemin J. Erden, Hannah M. Altorf ABSTRACT: In this paper we connect diversity with being on the margins of philosophy. We do this by reflecting on the programme that we, as diverse philosophers, designed and taught in a small university. Recently, the programme was closed. We examine some of the circumstances for the closure, in ….