Society for Analytical Feminism

Feminist Philosophy in the Analytic Tradition

                                               

 

TO: Members of the Society for Analytical Feminism

 

FROM:  Sharon Crasnow, President

Society for Analytical Feminism

Riverside Community College-Norco Campus

2001 Third Street

Norco, CA 92860-2600

                       

 

July 3, 2006

 

Dear members of the Society for Analytical Feminism,

 

It is my pleasure to once again send our yearly newsletter, call for papers for the Central Division meeting, and membership form.  We have had a very successful year with two sessions at the Central Division APA (one on autonomy and one the result of our annual Call for Papers) and a panel session on feminist virtue ethics at the Pacific.  Robin Dillon organized both the Pacific session and the Central session on autonomy. Kristen Intemann chaired the CFP session and the Executive Board reviewed the submissions from which the papers were selected.  The details of these sessions are below.

 

The current executive board is as follows:

 

Sharon Crasnow, SAF President, Riverside Community College, Norco (2005-2007)

Sharon.crasnow@rcc.edu

 

Robin Dillon, Lehigh University (2005-2007)

rsd2@Lehigh.EDU

 

Jennifer Faust, California State University, Los Angeles (2005-2007)

jfaust@calstatela.edu

 

Kristen Intemann, Montana State University, Bozeman (2005-2007)

intemann@montana.edu

 

We encourage you to contact any of us on the executive committee if you have ideas for future panels or sessions, or any other thoughts or questions about SAF.

 

Remember also that information on the Society can be found on our website:  http://www.ku.edu/~acudd/safhomepage.htm

Thanks again to Ann Cudd for continuing to maintain this site for us.

 

 

2005-2006 in review:

 

Pacific Division Meeting:  In Portland, the SAF sponsored a session on Feminist Virtue Ethics.

           

Chair:                           Robin S. Dillon, Lehigh University

 

Speakers:                     Robin S. Dillon, Lehigh University

                                     “On Feminist Virtue Ethics”

 

                                    Nancy Nyquist Potter, University of Louisville

            “Defiance and Other Virtues of the Ruled”

 

            Marilyn Friedman, Washington University

            “On Being Bad and Feeling Good”

 

            Anne E. Barnhill, New York University

            “Feminist Sexual Virtue and Feminist Sexual Vice”

 

 

Central Division Meeting: In Chicago, the SAF sponsored two sessions. The first was the result of our annual call for papers.

 

Chair:                           Kristen Intemann, Montana State University-Bozeman,                                                 

 

Speaker:                       Devora Shapiro, University of Minnesota “Knowledge of ‘What it’s like’: Introducing non-propositional, x-                                                                                                                                                   experiential, knowledge”

Commentator:               Deborah Heikes, University of Alabama-Huntsville                                                       

Speaker:                       Evelyn Brister, Rochester Institute of Technology “The Skeptical Ploy and a Feminist Response”

Commentator:               Joanne Waugh, University of South Florida

 

Speaker:                       Sophie Fortin, Washington University in St. Louis, “Rawls, Family, Limits of Political Liberalism

Commentator:              Elizabeth Brake, University of Calgary

 

We were fortunate in being able to aware two $200 graduate student travel awards this year to Devora Shapiro and Evelyn Brister.  These stipends come directly out of your dues, our only source of funds, so thanks to everyone for those dues.  I would like to acknowledge the University of Minnesota’s support for Sophie Fortin’s travel.  All three papers were given by graduate students this year, which was an unusual circumstance.

 

 

 

 

The second session was on autonomy.

 

Chair:                           Sharon Crasnow, Riverside Community College,                                                                      

Speaker:                       Diana Tietjens Meyers, University of Connecticut, Storrs, “Two Models of Autonomy: Identity-Based Versus Action-Centered”

 

Commentator:               Marilyn Friedman,Washington University in St. Louis

                                               

A brief business meeting followed the session and is summarized here.

 

There is continued interest in organizing a Society for Analytical Feminism conference but our key potential organizers have been working on books and other time consuming projects this year.   Additionally, we discussed the possibility of a journal that would be affiliated with the society.  At this time, there is strong support for starting a journal, however, there was a general perception among the members that I spoke with that affiliating it with the society might signal too narrow a focus.   At a recent session on publication sponsored by the APA Committee on the Status of Women, Hilde Lindemann, the current editor of Hypatia, expressed strong support for a new feminist philosophy journal. At the moment, Hypatia is turning away a large percentage of the work received.  Hilde’s report of the number of submissions to Hypatia and informal conversations with feminists who have had difficulty placing their work indicate that it is indeed time for another journal.  Louise Antony, Charlotte Witt, and Anita Superson have been working on the idea off and on for a while and it seems pretty clear that there are publishers who are interested.  Charlotte has tentatively offered to be a co-editor (she does not want to do it alone) and so, though it has been slow to materialize, it is an idea that is not going away.

 

2006-2007 plans:

 

APA:  This year we will have a session at the Eastern APA in Washington, D.C., in keeping with our tradition of alternating between the Eastern and Pacific meetings.

 

Topic:  Panel discussion – “Is Standpoint Theory a Resource for Feminist Epistemology?”

 

Chair: Sharon Crasnow, Riverside Community College-Norco

 

Panelists:

 

Alison Wylie, University of Washington

Miriam Solomon, Temple University

Janet Kourany, University of Notre Dame

Joseph Rouse, Wesleyan University

Kristina Rolin, Helsinki School of Economics

 

We have occasionally held sessions at all three meetings, so if any of you has a great idea for a session for the Pacific, let’s talk about it.  The deadline for group meetings for the Pacific is November 1 and for the Central December 1, though we need to know if we are going to be requesting a second session by October 1.

 

Our Central Division session will once again feature papers selected from the submissions we receive from the enclosed Call for Papers. I encourage SAF members to submit papers and/or encourage other colleagues and graduate students to submit papers. The postmark deadline is Monday, October 9th, 2006. Although I will send out an email reminder, this is the only hard copy of the call for papers that you will receive, so please post and make another copy for yourself if you need a reminder. The committee will accept full papers, or extended abstracts with an attached bibliography. Should graduate students or underfunded professionals have a paper accepted, they will be considered for our Travel Stipend to help defray travel costs to the conference.

 

 

Dues and Memberships

 

We have also reached that time of year when you need to renew your SAF membership and pay your dues for 2006-2007. I have indicated on your mailing label the last year for which you have paid dues, so please check your envelope (if the date is not listed, we don’t have it on record, and it’s not recent). Payments made July 1st and later will be applied to 2006-2007.  Those of you who have sent or handed me applications at the Central APA or the P-SWIP have already paid for 2006-2007 and that should be noted on your envelope.  It would be very helpful if you renewed your membership before September 1st. Enclosed is a membership form (with my address).  There are four membership categories:   $15 employed, $5 unemployed/underemployed, $5 student, and $5 retired. The dues are small, but they are important in funding our mailings, travel stipends and sponsorship for conferences such as the one at the University of Western Ontario in June 2004 and perhaps one in the future. In order to save on postage costs, I will continue the practice of emailing out a receipt for dues, but I am happy to send out a hard copy receipt to anyone who needs it.

 

Notice that I have also asked for volunteers for commentators for the Central Division sessions.  Of course, we will not know until after the papers are all in what areas we will need commentators in but if you are interested please let us know so that we can update our database of volunteers and their areas of expertise.

 

I hope you are all enjoying a restful and productive summer and wish you the best for the upcoming academic year. 

 

Regards,

 

 

Sharon Crasnow

President, Society for Analytical Feminism