Daily Dialectic

So you’re giving a keynote presentation at a major conference? Great! Got something interesting to say about your favourite dead white guy from centuries ago? Not a problem! Hang on though, philosophers who are not cis-men-centric will be listening. Oh no, what to do about the unreconstructable misogyny embedded in your life’s work? Don’t worry about it! Just note at the start of your talk that your old-timey source document was always only meant to be applicable to a certain sub-category of men. That’s good! How about a note at the end of your talk that the entire theory just discussed relies on the subjugation of women as a structural condition? Nice honesty! But be mindful not to mention gender ANYWHERE else in your talk, because you don’t want to make a big deal about it do you? Now, just to make sure that nobody makes trouble for you in the Q&A, you should make all your examples and case studies use female protagonists/subjects, right? No, please don’t, but thanks for asking! Unfortunately, a bit of linguistic politeness isn’t going to excuse you from facing the hard realities of our discipline’s history. Non-male pronouns do need to be included our narratives, but in your case the examples you use will just illuminate the limits/archaicness of the theory, instead of supporting it. Won’t your talk just be absurd? Or is that your point? Have you jumped the feminist shark on this one? Or do you just not get it because you live in the land of the dead white guys? This and other rude questions arising from my unexpectedly gender-conscious experience at the 2015 AAP Conference!