Recently, Luvell Anderson and I agreed that sometime in the near future we would attempt to coauthor an article on disability and humour. While disability is my jam, Luvell is an expert on aesthetics and in particular philosophical approaches to humour. Humour (unlike the apparatus of disability) has long been regarded as an important topic […]
Dialogues on Disability on Wednesday, May 20, 2026, at 8 a.m. ET
“I have read almost all of your interviews and they are always wonderful. … I am really looking forward to the next installment of Dialogues on Disability.” — Adrian Piper “… a major contribution to our understanding of the field and the people in it.” — Vanessa Wills “I’ve learned so much about ableism in philosophy […]
Bioethics as Eugenic Mechanism: A Précis
Below I have copied the text of a presentation that I am giving (via Zoom) to “The Body in Extremis: Fascism, Health, and the Auto-Immune State” Workshop (U of Illinois-Urbana Champaign) today. In this context, I want to send out the presentation to the tenured liberal Canadian philosophers who—apparently uninformed about ableism and the apparatus […]
Acknowledging and Celebrating the Indisputable Importance of Michel Foucault
As friends of BIOPOLITICAL PHILOSOPHY by now know, 2026 is the centenary of Michel Foucault’s birth in 1926. In a recent post, I wrote: Facebook is buzzing in anticipation of the publication of The Foucauldian Mind in September to commemorate the centennial anniversary of Michel Foucault’s birth. Edited by the illustrious Daniele Lorenzini, this landmark text has […]
Proposal for Oxford Handbook of Feminist Philosophy of Disability
As I noted in last week’s anniversary installment of Dialogues on Disability, Katie Staal, Senior Acquisitions Editor at Oxford University Press, recently encouraged me to submit a proposal for a handbook on feminist philosophy of disability. I submitted the proposal, about which Katie was very enthusiastic and has sent out for review, earlier today. It […]
A Gender Icon Strikes Back
The latest issue of Weekend Reads, the supplement of The Chronicle of Higher Education, includes an episode of College Matters, the publication’s podcast, with Judith Butler. In the podcast, Butler gives a brief synopsis of their groundbreaking characterization of gender as performative and its impact on gender studies and queer theory, and then goes on […]
Dialogues on Disability: Shelley Tremain With Élaina Gauthier-Mamaril and Emily R. Douglas
Hello, I am Shelley Tremain and I would like to welcome you to the eleventh-anniversary installment of Dialogues on Disability, the series of interviews that I am conducting with disabled philosophers and post to BIOPOLITICAL PHILOSOPHY on the third Wednesday of each month. The series is designed to provide a public venue for discussion with disabled philosophers about […]
Philosophy and Theory of Disability in The Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Disability Studies!
On April 9, The Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Disability Studies (ORE) — a mammoth project whose contents will appear online on a rolling basis — was launched! As readers/listeners of BIOPOLITICAL PHILOSOPHY may recall, I edited/curated the Philosophy and Theory of Disability Area of the ORE (go here). Yesterday, several authors who wrote for the […]
Quote of the Week: Katy Fulfer on Aph Ko on BIOPOLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
As readers/listeners of BIOPOLITICAL PHILOSOPHY may recall, I am guest editing an issue of Feminist Philosophy Quarterly to commemorate the centennial anniversary of Foucault’s birth on October 15, 1926. If all goes as planned, the issue will appear in September 2026. In my role as guest editor, I am working with FPQ editor Katy Fulfer, […]
The Making of Oppression and Another (Outdated and Outmoded) SEP Entry on Disability that You Should Ignore
In a recent post on BIOPOLITICAL PHILOSOPHY, Mich Ciurria wrote: To regard race, animality, and disability as “intersecting” oppressions rather than one and the same oppression is, on [Aph] Ko’s view, politically and epistemically harmful, because it sows divisions, precludes solidarity, and obscures a deeper understanding of domination. “Animal,” she clarifies, “is a label. It’s […]
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