After Catherine Hundleby’s death on August 26th was announced, I wanted to write a post about my sentiments and interactions with her, in part because they seemed distinct from the sentiments that other feminist philosophers began to express.

Prominent among the remarks that others made in memory of Catherine were testaments about the foundational role that she played in the formation and growth of the Association for Feminist Epistemologies, Methodologies, Metaphysics and Science Studies (FEMMSS) and its public listserv, as well as the value and importance of FEMMSS and its crucial role in helping feminist philosophers of science connect with each other. In other words, these remarks elevated the association’s profile and the profile of Canadian feminist philosophers in general, in addition to the ways in which they memorialized Catherine herself.

Yet Catherine was critical of how FEMMSS had developed in ways in which other members of the association were not.

A number of years ago, Catherine asked me to join the FEMMSS Steering Committee, which I did. The Steering Committee, which had its own listserv, was designed to brainstorm about the biannual conferences of the association, choose conference themes, discuss issues arising on the public listserv, and so on.

For a variety of reasons, I felt that the Steering Committee and the larger FEMMSS association reproduced ableism in feminist philosophy, not least because of the composition of the committee itself: the committee comprised Northern nondisabled cis white women almost exclusively. After a few years of ableist dismissals on the Steering Committee and some bad experiences of ableism at a FEMMSS conference, I emailed Catherine and told her that I wished to quit the Steering Committee and asked her to remove me from its listserv. Somehow, she managed to convince me to stay on with the group.

Last year, I quit the FEMMSS Steering Committee. While Catherine was committed to addressing the ableism and racism of the committee, others were less concerned to do so. I sent an email to the Steering Committee listserv, informing the committee members that I was leaving the group due to ableism and the nondisabled and white constitution of the group, that I wanted to focus my research and activist activities on efforts in philosophy that would advance the interests and situation of disabled philosophers, especially disabled feminist philosophers.

Catherine was the only member of the Steering Committee who contacted me directly to express regret that I wanted to leave the group. I appreciated this gesture. Catherine is/was also one of only two feminist philosophers in Canada who once expressed deep regret that she had not done more to help me get a job in (Canadian) philosophy. I appreciated Catherine’s admission in this latter regard too, as well as the fact that she had made the admission publicly.

At some point in the last year, I received an email from Catherine that was intended for the FEMMSS Steering Committee. The email had mistakenly been sent to the public FEMMSS listserv rather than the Steering Committee’s own listserv. As I recall the contents of the email, Catherine suggested that the entire Steering Committee of nondisabled white feminist philosophers (including herself) should be replaced, should relinquish its control of the organization. I do not know the outcome of this pronouncement since the exchange amongst the Steering Committee was returned to its own listserv.

Canadian feminist philosophers in permanent positions–almost all of whom are nondisabled (or have passed as such) and white–have played and continue to play a significant part in the exclusion of disabled philosophers in Canada. Indeed, the active and passive, direct and indirect complicity of Canadian feminist philosophers in the exclusion of disabled philosophers was yet again thrown into relief last week when a job ad was posted in the Canadian Society for Women in Philosophy (CSWIP) Facebook group. The job ad seeks applications for a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair (CRC) in Critical Disability Studies and Social Justice (with a cross-appointment in a home department such as philosophy) from applicants across the humanities. Several Canadian feminist philosophers quickly “liked” the post, implicitly proclaiming their active support for (Canadian) disabled philosophers of disability.

Yet both the act of posting the job ad in that context and the act of “liking” it there should be regarded as non-performatives (to use Sara Ahmed’s evocative term). For no disabled philosopher in Canada will be eligible for the position. “Why so?,” you might ask. “Aren’t you, Shelley Tremain, a perfect candidate for such a position, given the number and significance of your publications, your public profile as a leader and mentor of disabled philosophers, your work on BIOPOLITICAL PHILOSOPHY, and so on?”

The answer to these queries is quite simple: the ableist exclusion of disabled philosophers from philosophy in Canada is a gift that just keeps on giving. In order to be eligible for a Tier 1 CRC, one must be a full professor or an associate professor within a year of promotion to full professor. Guess what? There are no disabled philosophers of disability in Canada who meet the criteria!

Why? Because Canadian philosophy departments (including the departments of the poster and likers) have repeatedly denied disabled philosophers of disability employment opportunities at the entry level. If a philosopher is taken seriously for the job at all, that philosopher will be nondisabled or a disabled philosopher who resides outside of Canada. (Given the entrenched preference of Canadian philosophy departments for candidates with degrees and other credentials from American and Oxbridge universities, the latter would in fact likely be regarded as a desired outcome.)

It’s incredible to me that prominent Canadian feminist philosophers would continue to be so uninformed about the ongoing ableism and legacy of exclusion that disabled philosophers in Canada–including their own disabled students–confront or will confront. How, if at all, can they give pertinent advice and counsel to these disabled students? Who is caring about the futures of disabled philosophy students in Canada?

Of course, insofar as I am (according to one Canadian feminist philosopher) a “big mouth,” I wrote several comments on the post about why the job ad excluded disabled philosophers in Canada, including remarks that tied the exclusionary nature of the job ad to a study in which I participated that identified mechanisms of exclusion in the CRC program more generally. No feminist philosopher in the CSWIP Facebook group (Canadian or otherwise) commented on the post nor even sent me a message privately to express frustration or embarrassment or regret about this grievous state of affairs. But I bet Catherine Hundleby would have done so.