Anbar Lecture: Kristie Dotson

NOTICE: After an unforeseen flight cancellation, this event will now be held on Zoom. If you wish to participate, please email Alanis Hamblin at aehambli@syr.edu.

Kristie Dotson (University of Michigan)

The SU Philosophy Department is pleased to welcome Professor Kristie Dotson for the 2024 Anbar Lecture. Professor Dotson will deliver a lecture entitled: “Dear Toni Morrison: Notes Towards a Sustainable, Black Sovereignty.”

Abstract:

“My current book project is a collection of philosophical love letters to notable, infamous and/or unknown Black women in the United States. Tentatively entitled, Love Politic, it is a Black feminist world building project. Each letter in this volume tackles some topic that emerges periodically as part of existing as a Black woman in the United States of America. The letter I will present for this lecture is to Toni Morrison. In it, I ask and explore the question, “What does a sustainable, Black sovereignty look like here?” This is a question Morrison devoted a great deal of her work to exploring. In this letter, I sketch an intergenerational “dream session” between Morrison and myself about questions concerning a Black sovereignty on this land.”

Speaker Bio:

Kristie Dotson is a University Diversity and Social Transformation Professor of Philosophy and Afroamerican and African Studies at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor. She specializes in epistemology, metaphilosophy and Black feminist philosophy. She has published numerous journal articles. Her work explores a range of topics, from exploring the ways knowledge-related concerns impact and reinforce oppression to diversity in the profession of philosophy to Black feminist, social epistemology. She is currently working on a monograph aimed at, what she calls, Black girl world building. Through a series of writings to famous and infamous Black women from the United States ofAmerica, Dotson sets philosophical investigation according to ideas and concerns that emerged from having lived as a Black girl in the U.S. (from the Aristotelian Society).