91探花

All are welcome to attend this talk by Mount Allison University Professor of Philosophy Jane Dryden. Her talk on 鈥淰ulnerability, Control, and the Gut as Ambiguous Other鈥� is aa paart of the 91探花 Department Of Philosophy 2017-18 Speaker Series. Abstract: Recent work in feminist philosophy as well as bioethics, sociology, and theology has taken up a re-evaluation of the concept of vulnerability, such that it is not merely understood as a risk of harm, but also as an openness to the world that can also be a source of care and solidarity. Many proponents of this account of vulnerability situate it against autonomy, which they describe as individualistic denial of interdependency. Feminist work on relational autonomy, of course, suggests that autonomy should be construed otherwise, and that self-determination can go alongside an acceptance of one鈥檚 social and relational connections. Autonomy is still frequently figured as control, however, and vulnerability connected to lack of control. This paper will turn this question toward our relationship to our gut. The gut can be described as a kind of ambiguous other. It is biologically and phenomenologically part of our core. It is also other to us in various ways: much of its functioning is accomplished through microbes, and it is often unruly, despite strong social imperatives to control it and stigmatization of failure of gut control. What would it mean to turn the discussion of relational autonomy toward our relationship with our gut? What would it mean to accept our bodily vulnerability in the context of the gut? This paper will take the gut as an important case study for discussions of vulnerability more generally.