Teaching

My teaching interests are in ethics, the history of philosophy, the philosophy of emotions, and philosophy as a way of life. I have several years of experience teaching undergraduate philosophy courses. Below are some descriptions of courses I have taught, along with descriptions for courses I have prepared syllabi for that I would like to teach in the future.

Courses taught (syllabi available upon request)

Philosophy of Human Nature / Introduction to Philosophy
A general education course aimed at freshman, introducing them to what philosophy is through an investigation of the nature of the human person. Readings include Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Aquinas, Descartes, bell hooks, and Søren Kierkegaard, among others. A central focus of the course is equipping students to use the tools of reasoned argument and close-reading of difficult texts to reflect critically on their beliefs in dialogue with others. Topics include the nature of knowledge, concepts of love, the mind-body relationship, existential commitment, and responsibility for others.

Philosophical Ethics
A general education course aimed at juniors and seniors, introducing them to the major normative ethical theories, including virtue ethics, deontology, and consequentialism. The course also contained units on care ethics and on love as an ethical ideal. Readings include texts by Aristotle, Kant, J.S. Mill, Peter Singer, Carol Gilligan, Martin Luther King, Jr., Fyodor Dostoyevsky, among others.

Senior Values Seminar: Freedom and Responsibility
A course aimed at seniors, focused on questions about the relation of freedom to moral responsibility, including free will and determinism, political freedom and action, the implications of human embodiment for both the limits of and the possibilities for freedom. Authors read include Kant, Hegel, Marx, Franz Fanon, Harry Frankfurt, Charles Taylor, Simone de Beauvoir, James Baldwin, K.E. Løgstrup, among others.

Select other courses prepared to teach (syllabi available upon request)

Philosophy of Love with Literature, Film, and Music
A course aimed at philosophy and/or literature majors focused on major topics in the philosophy of love such as the grounds of love, desires of love, and the relationships between different types of love. These questions are pursued and developed through combining philosophy readings with close readings of three novels, five films, and select poetry and popular music. Materials include Plato, Mengzi, Audre Lorde, Annette Baier, Simone Weil, Toni Morrison, Milan Kundera, Sally Rooney, the films A Short Film About Love, Miller’s Crossing, and Past Lives, among other materials.

Philosophy of Religion
A course aimed at philosophy and/or religion majors. The course takes its cue from something Frederick Buechner once wrote about systems of religion, that, “if you press them far enough, even at their most cerebral and forbidding, you find an experience of flesh and blood, a human face smiling or frowning or weeping or covering its eyes before something that happened once.” The course considers many of the classic problems and technical questions in the philosophy of religion, such as arguments for and agains the existence of God, the nature of divinity, the problem of evil and suffering, all while keeping in view the existential import religion has for human beings. Readings include Robert Bellah, Clifford Geertz, Rudolf Otto, Thomas Aquinas, David Hume, James Cone, Abraham Joshua Heschel, Barbara Hilkert Andolsen, among others.

K.E. Løgstrup Workshop Organizer

In addition to my college teaching, I also lead a free weekly online reading workshop on the works of Danish philosopher-theologian K.E. Løgstrup (1905 –1981), which is open to the public. We have regular participants joining from several countries around the world. You can learn more about this workshop in the Løgstrup materials tab here.