Dept. of Philosophy Presents: Hasana Sharp, "The Strange Companionship of Spinoza and Feminism"

Hasana Sharp is Associate Professor of Philosophy at McGill University in Montreal.  She earned her PhD from the Pennsylvania State University (2005) and a diplôme (pensionnaire scientifique étranger) from the Ecole Normale Supérieure des Lettres et Sciences Humaines (2004). Her research is in the history of political philosophy with a focus on Spinoza.  Her recent book, Spinoza and the Politics of Renaturalization, examines the implications of Spinoza's denial of human exceptionalism for ethics and politics, with consideration of recent arguments in feminist and race theory.

"The Strange Companionship of Spinoza and Feminism"

Public Lecture, Mon., Nov. 2, from 2-3:15 PM in Winningham 107. Free and open to the public.

Abstract: Spinoza was generally silent on the topic of women. When he was not silent, feminists wish he had been. Nevertheless, despite Spinoza’s noxious remarks on women in, for example, his Political Treatise, several feminist theorists, including myself, have found resources and inspiration in his philosophy. The aim of this essay is to describe the bases in Spinoza’s philosophy that account for its strange companionship with feminism. In doing so, I will point to how Spinoza has been taken up by feminist thinkers, but also propose further possible avenues for exploration. It is my view that feminists interested in drawing upon the history of ideas to understand domination and emancipation, there are few thinkers in the western canon as useful as Benedict de Spinoza

Cosponsored by the Chancellor's Diversity Challenge Fund