philosophy Archives | Research & Innovation

91��ɫ to honour two professors for their scholarship and contribution

fmaquito — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 08:00:00 +0000

91��ɫ will honour two of its professors during Convocation ceremonies for their scholarship, teaching and participation in University life and contribution to it as a community.

Professors Stanley Tweyman (right) of 91��ɫ’s Department of Philosophy in the Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies (LA&PS) and Jan Rehner of 91��ɫ’s Writing Department in LA&PS have been selected by the Senate Committee on Awards to receive the title of University Professor.

A brief summary of Tweyman’s contributions to the University is impossible given his extraordinary involvement in many areas of campus life, as well as his distinguished record of research and publication.

As Chair of the Philosophy Department at Glendon, graduate program director in philosophy and Master of Vanier College, Tweyman has not only proved to be a creative and able administrator, but an inspiration to students and colleagues alike.

His work is focused on students; whether as adviser and mentor, both formal and informal, or in his development of college programs and activities, he has worked to engage students fully in the life of the University. Tweyman will be awarded the title of University Professor during the LA&PS Spring Convocation ceremony on Wednesday, June 13 at 3:30pm.

Jan Rehner

Rehner has made stellar contributions to the growth and development of 91��ɫ. The range and depth of her service to the collegium is impressive. In addition to active involvement in YUFA and generous contributions to teaching development programs at the Centre for the Support of Teaching, she was a well-respected associate dean in the Faculty of Arts and chair of the Faculty of Arts Council.

A highly effective administrator, she played an important role in the transformation of the Centre for Academic Writing into the Writing Department. The recipient of Canada’s most prestigious teaching award, the 3M Fellowship, as well as the Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations teaching award and numerous awards internal to 91��ɫ, Rehner is applauded as a captivating lecturer, encouraging tutor and thoughtful mentor to both students and colleagues.

She is a widely respected international authority on various aspects of the pedagogy of critical thinking, reading and writing, and has also written several novels. She has indeed made extraordinary contributions to the University as a colleague, teacher and scholar. Rehner will receive her title during the Fall Convocation ceremonies.

Republished courtesy of YFile– 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

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AGYU launches its new season with the Raqs Media Collective

fmaquito — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 08:00:00 +0000

Tricky math and haunting messages accumulate in unresolved poetics this fall at the Art Gallery of 91��ɫ (AGYU).

The AGYU invites you to "surge out there" as it joins with Raqs Media Collective: technological poets for an India in transition, to present their newest exhibit Surjection.

Of the current generation of Indian artists, the from New Delhi (Jeebesh Bagchi, Monica Narula, Shuddhabrata Sengupta) are among the best known and most widely exposed in the west – and certainly the most media conscious. Having started as documentary filmmakers, over the past 20 years they have evolved a sophisticated, and sometimes performative, practice that combines film, media, audio and text, all of which draw upon philosophy and political theory, in installations of an unresolved poetics.

Right: Members of the Raqs Media Collective, from left, Shuddhabrata Sengupta, Jeebesh Bagchi and Monica Narula

The Raqs Media Collective exhibition, Surjection, opens with a free public reception tonight, from 6 to 9pm at the Art Gallery of 91��ɫ. The artists will be at the reception.

The collective describes their AGYU exhibition this way: “Raqs Media Collective delights in transposing the plenitude of the incalculable onto the fabric of the ordinary. By counting to infinity, sensing animation in stillness and speaking in the language of silence, Raqs will breathe numbers, figures, proverbs and stories into the galleries of the Art Gallery of 91��ɫ.”

In this exhibition of entirely new work, the artists start with traces that are minimal but that contain great amplitude within them, such as the palm print of Raj Konai – the ancestral trace (from 1859) of the entire history of forensic identification – that hovers over the exhibition. Now animated, this image of a counting hand initiates a series of moves that the viewer animates through the exhibition. At the same time, the viewer witnesses other evolutions in video projection where stillness itself slowly is animated. Surjection begins outside, in AGYU Vitrines and occupies both galleries.

The elements of the exhibition are in a surjective relationship to each other. “Surjection” is a mathematical concept devised by the Bourbaki Group, whereby the elements of one set are applied, transposed, or mapped onto those of another set. Surjection continues until Sunday, Dec. 4.

Surject yourself onto the Performance Bus

It’s an entirely different experience of numbers and letters on the Bingo Dilemma Bus. The game starts tonight at 6pm sharp when the Performance Bus departs the Ontario College of Art & Design University campus at 100 McCaul St.. Riders gather the clues to the game on the way to the Raqs Media Collective exhibition opening at the AGYU. Artist and game host Oliver Husain will be on the bus calling out the game clues. Performance Bus returns downtown at 9pm.

Math too tough for you? Go back to school with AGYU @ Art Toronto

The AGYU tricks or treats fair patrons with one of its specially commissioned installations featuring Toronto novelist Derek McCormack and Toronto artist Ian Phillips. The haunted schoolhouse is the outcome of an four-year project supported by the AGYU of H.A.M.S. (Holiday Arts Mail-Order School), which is a correspondence course (for the 1936-1937 school year) devoted to the holiday arts. Hallowe’enologists will be on hand to take your questions and offer demonstrations. Alumni are welcome.

Virtually AGYU

The surjective relations continue online with the as independent Toronto curator Su-Ying Lee visits the studio of New 91��ɫ-based artist Alexandre Singh, whom she met in Paris this past summer while travelling in Europe. on her travels through Europe.

Writing from the ash-filled Grimsvötn sky, Toronto artist counts down the rest of her days in Iceland as she writes about contemporary art and generous helpings of never-ending splendour, mind-blowing sunsets, migratory birds, half-shorn sheep, geothermal pools and more.

For more information, visit the AGYU website.

Republished courtesy of YFile– 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

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Three-way legal philosophy partnership between Osgoode, 91��ɫ and McMaster promises new research collaborations

fmaquito — Tue, 10 May 2011 08:00:00 +0000

91��ɫs's Osgoode Hall Law School and the departments of philosophy at 91��ɫ and McMaster University have recently joined forces to facilitate academic collaborations in the field of legal philosophy.

The Ontario Legal Philosophy Partnership (OLPP), which celebrates its founding with a launch reception on Friday, May 13 in the Great Hall of McMaster’s University Club, is the brainchild of three internationally recognized legal philosophy professors who will be the partnership’s administrators. (Osgoode); Michael Giudice (91��ɫ Philosophy); and Wil Waluchow (McMaster Philosophy and the Senator William McMaster Chair in Constitutional Studies) are the brain trust behind the partnership.

Above: From left, OLPP founders and administrators Michael Giudice (91��ɫ), Wil Waluchow (McMaster) and François Tanguay-Renaud (Osgoode)

"Through the OLPP, Osgoode, as well as McMaster's and 91��ɫ's departments of philosophy confirm their status as international leaders in legal philosophy and associated dimensions of political and moral philosophy,” said Tanguay-Renaud, co-director with Giudice of the new combined Juris Doctor/Master of Arts in Philosophy (JD/MA) program offered by Osgoode and 91��ɫ’s philosophy department, and acting director of the at Osgoode.

“This collective effort, which builds on solid pre-existing relations between the partners, promises to enable new ambitious research collaborations and grant applications, allow for the development of cutting-edge opportunities for our JD and graduate students, and project even further the partners' already well-established reputations in the field."

Tanguay-Renaud said the OLPP formalizes existing links between the three partners that have become increasingly solid and fruitful since the beginning of the millennium.

“The OLPP will create even further opportunities for each institution and their students,” said Tanguay-Renaud, noting that it has already helped to inspire and dynamize the Nathanson Centre’s Legal Philosophy between State and Transnationalism international seminar series, Osgoode’s ’Or ’Emet annual public lecture, the Transnational Legal Theory Journal, the McMaster visiting speakers series, Osgoode’s recent criminal law theory international conference, and other prominent legal philosophy initiatives at McMaster and 91��ɫ.

The OLPP’s latest initiative sees McMaster’s philosophy department, under the leadership of Waluchow and fellow OLPP member Professor Stefan Sciaraffa, hosting an international conference on “The Nature of Law: Contemporary Perspectives” May 11 to 15, with most of the biggest names in general analytical jurisprudence present.

The OLPP, which is also composed of a large contingent of faculty members from the three partner institutions, will be strongly represented in the conference program with Giudice delivering one of the keynote addresses. One of Osgoode’s newest hires, Professor l (hired from the University of Warwick in the UK), and Distinguished Research Professor (now serving as acting dean of 91��ɫ’s Faculty of Graduate Studies) will also be presenting papers.

Suzanne Crosta, dean of McMaster’s Faculty of Humanities, and Osgoode Hall Law School Dean both have high praise for the OLPP. “We look forward with great anticipation to the rich intellectual synergies that will result from the new partnership,” Crosta said.

“The partnership brings together internationally recognized scholars to explore a shared passion for the philosophy of law and will provide a unique experience for the law and philosophy graduate students involved,” noted Sossin.

What’s more, Brian Leiter, professor of law and philosophy at the University of Chicago and one of the most eminent legal philosophers of our day, has written glowingly about the OLPP on his philosophy . "This will be of interest to students of legal philosophy, involving 91��ɫ, Toronto (and its law school, Osgoode) and McMaster University," writes Leiter, "which, together, comprise probably the strongest legal philosophy cohort in Canada and one of the best ones in North America."

For more information, visit the website.

Republished courtesy of YFile – 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

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Audio: Professor Stuart Shanker says self-regulation a growing trend in child and adult psychology

fmaquito — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 08:00:00 +0000

, Distinguished Research Professor of Psychology and Philosophy and director of the , spoke about the concept of self-regulation – managing our inner emotional life – and its increasing role in treating children with mental disorders, such as autism, and adults on CBC Radio’s “Ideas” program July 15.

The interview runs over 53 minutes and is available on the .

Republished courtesy of YFile– 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

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Professor Alice MacLachlan on Air India, public inquiries, morality and search for truth

fmaquito — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 08:00:00 +0000

The release of the Air India inquiry report Thursday will help solidify a public narrative around the deadliest terrorist attack perpetrated in Canada, wrote June 16:

As it was with Britain’s Bloody Sunday report and apology on Tuesday, or the residential schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada event launched Wednesday, or the inquiry report into the death of Polish immigrant Robert Dziekanski to be released Friday, this is a moment when the public will be forced to come to terms with its past.

, a philosophy professor in 91��ɫ’s Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies, says these concluding chapters share an important undercurrent: a recognition that the past must be dealt with. There’s no statute of limitations on moral responsibility, and the traditional mechanisms of justice aren’t able to deal with these ruptures satisfactorily.

“The wrongs of the past, whether it’s Air India or Bloody Sunday or the residential schools, can’t always be measured out materially or legally…. Part of dealing with the past means negotiating our moral and political relationships with each other, so we find ourselves taking up a language like apologize, forgive, reconcile, come together,” MacLachlan said.

There has been an accelerating trend around the world in the last three decades in which dozens, if not hundreds, of official apologies have been issued by various heads of government or churches, MacLachlan said. “An apology is still about maintaining control of a story,” she said. It offers a sense of closure or finality, at least in theory. The response to apologies among victims is usually mixed, she said, but it’s often much more positive with the public.

Republished courtesy of YFile– 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

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Audio: Stuart Shanker on how edutainment is changing the way children learn

fmaquito — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 08:00:00 +0000

, Distinguished Research Professor of Psychology and Philosophy in the and director of the , was featured on "The Hurried Infant," an audio documentary that ran on April 22 and 23, 2010.

The message? Mozart, and indeed any classical music will stimulate the infant brain. Science says it’s so. Soon, other brain enrichment practices were encouraged. Parents were told to set up black and white squares around baby’s crib, this will enhance visual development. A multi-textured blanket will provide sensory stimulation.In the past 10 years though, the brain claims have intensified, fuelled by commercial forces. It’s called “edutainment”, the multi-billion dollar educational toy market has products designed to accelerate an infant’s growth with names like: Baby Einstein, Brainy Baby, Jumpstart Baby, Baby Genius.

Part of what’s fuelling the billion dollar baby is brain science. Studies over the decades claim that baby’s brain is a vast resource that can be enriched through stimulation. So a young child can learn colours, count and even read earlier than ever before. The explosive growth of baby learning products has sent parents scrambling to ensure their baby is as bright as bright can be. So, are the scientific studies behind this social force real or exaggerated? In this series, Ideas producer Mary O’Connell explores what some are calling a brave new age of infant determinism.

Shanker's segment . His commentary on his concerns about how edutainment products are changing the way children learn continues throughout the program.

Posted by Elizabeth Monier-Williams, research communications officer.

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