Heather Stewart

Over the past decade, feminist philosophers have gone a long way toward identifying and explaining the phenomenon that has come to be known as epistemic injustice. Epistemic injustice is injustice occurring within the domain of knowledge (e.g., knowledge production and transmission), which typically impacts structurally marginalized social groups. In this paper, we argue that, as they currently work, algorithms on social media exacerbate the problem of epistemic injustice and related problems of social distrust. In other words, we argue that algorithms on social media recreate and reify the conditions that lead to some groups being systematically denied the full status of knowers, thereby corrupting the epistemic terrain and, with it, systems of social trust and cooperation. We argue that algorithms do this in two ways—namely, via what we are calling algorithmic targeting and algorithmic sorting.

As the other entries in this section have surely made clear, Carolyn McLeod's outstanding monograph, Conscience in Reproductive Health Care: Prioritizing Patient Interests, is fertile ground for fruitful philosophical analyses of issues pertaining to conscience, trust, autonomy, and more, all of which are sure to be of great interest and benefit to scholars in areas such as bioethics, health policy, and feminist ethics. Conscience in Reproductive Health Care provides a compelling response to a timely bioethical dilemma: What do we do when healthcare providers refuse certain health services to patients on grounds of conscience? McLeod contends that healthcare providers, in light of their fiduciary...

In this paper, I argue that purely quantitative understandings of Aristotle's concept of "the mean" are oversimplified, and I make this argument by analyzing the particular emotion of anger. Anger, I contend, helps to complicate the purely quantitative understanding of the mean, insofar as, I argue, the amount of anger experienced is not the morally salient feature in determining whether or not the anger is virtuous. Rather, anger is one example of an emotion or trait for which other, non-quantitative parameters of the mean are more salient, giving us a more nuanced understanding of what the mean is. Anger is virtuous not when it is in the right measurable degree, but rather when it is directed at the proper target. In this way, the virtue-making property of anger is distinctly qualitative. Examining anger provides insight into the concept of the mean and its role in Aristotle's ethics, and also helps to shed light on contemporary debates about political anger.

RésuméCet article met en évidence trois pratiques épistémiques qui, prises ensemble, créent des conditions qui aggravent le problème de « l'effacement de la bisexualité ». Bien que les personnes bisexuelles constituent une portion significative de la communauté LGBTQ+, leurs identités et leurs expériences sont régulièrement effacées, autant au sein des communautés queer que dans la société au sens large. Cet article soutient que nous avons une obligation à la fois épistémique et morale de nous préoccuper des conditions épistémiques créées pour les personnes bisexuelles, et de travailler pour rendre ces conditions plus justes. Plus précisément, je souligne l'influence néfaste de l'injustice testimoniale, de l’étouffement testimonial et des micro-agressions épistémiques sur la capacité des personnes bisexuelles à défier et à résister à leur propre effacement.

Taking seriously the notion that diversifying our philosophical pedagogy is of both intrinsic and instrumental importance, this paper offers a defense of, and model for, a pedagogical approach aimed at making canonical philosophical texts more appealing—and more useful—for diverse students. Specifically, taking Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics as a case study, this paper considers how we might make this text more engaging for students from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds. It does so by offering a five-step model, which involves: situating the text in its historical context; acknowledging and addressing problematic content in the text; drawing out novel or underexplored themes and questions from the text; bringing the text into dialogue with diverse and contemporary philosophical approaches and issues (e.g., feminist philosophy, philosophy of race, and non-Western philosophies); and applying issues, themes, and concepts from the text to contemporary matters or current events as much as possible. Specific examples are offered regarding how to achieve each of these steps when teaching the Nicomachean Ethics.

This dissertation offers a robust philosophical examination of a phenomenon that is morally, socially, and politically significant – microaggressions. Microaggressions are understood to be brief and routine verbal, behavioral, or environmental indignities that, whether intentional or unintentional, convey hostility toward or bias against members of marginalized groups. Microaggressions are rooted in stereotypes and/or bias (whether implicit or explicit) and are connected to broader systems of oppression. Microaggressions are philosophically interesting, since they involve significant ambiguity, questions about speech and communication, and the ability for our speech to encode and transmit bits of meaning. Microaggressions prompt reflection about the nature of blameworthiness and responsibility, especially for unintended acts and harms. They involve questions about how we perceive and treat one another, and whether or not people are treated as true equals in our social and political worlds. For all of these reasons, microaggressions are a critical area in need of philosophical reflection, specifically reflection in feminist philosophy, philosophy of language, moral philosophy, and social and political philosophy. This dissertation seeks to advance the philosophy of microaggressions through three distinct aims: a conceptual aim (chapters 2 and 3), an epistemological aim (chapters 1 and 2), and a moral aim (chapters 4 and 5). The conceptual aim involves clarifying how we should understand and categorize microaggressions. The epistemological aim involves identifying some of the epistemological assumptions undergirding discussions of microaggressions in the literature, including assumptions made by critics of microaggression theory, and arguing for an alternative epistemological framework for theorizing about microaggressions. The moral aim involves better understanding the harms of microaggressions, including their role in reinforcing structures of oppression and unjust social hierarchy. Taken together, these chapters make some progress on the conceptual, epistemological, and moral questions that microaggressions generate, and which philosophers have not yet adequately analyzed. It thus offers a meaningful contribution to the conversations philosophers are beginning to have about the morally and politically salient phenomenon of microaggressions.

Damon Tweedy is a psychiatrist, lawyer, and writer. He's also Black. While in his first year as a medical student at Duke University, one of his professors approached him in the classroom and asked why the light bulb in the room hadn't been changed, as requested. Tweedy realized that his professor assumed he was a maintenance worker, not a student. Tweedy never took up this incident with the professor, nor did the professor ever apologize. Tweedy recounts that his best "revenge" would be to excel in the class, which he ultimately did. At the end of the semester, upon learning that Tweedy received the second highest grade of over one hundred students, this professor invited him to work as a research assistant in his...