TODAY: INVITATION TO UNIVERSITY OF PRETORIA PHILOSOPHY SEMINAR--AUG 2022 EDITION
Jonathan Okeke
Dear All,
Dr Freter's UP Lecture today promises to be an exciting one. Please, remember to register below and attend.
Date: Friday, Aug 19, 2022
Time: 13:00 PM SAST/ 12 PM West African Time
Registration: ZOOM: Please, click on the link to register. https://zoom.us/meeting/register/tJIkfu2hpj0oHdXeKPL-ArIvGs_kGUbnmVYW
Topic:
Andro-superiorism: Anti-female Violence in the Historical Canon of Western Philosophy
By Dr Björn Freter
Lecturer in World Philosophy
School of History, Religions and Philosophies,
The School of Oriental & African Studies (SOAS),
University of London
Abstract: Misogynist thought in Western thought is documented for roughly 2600 years and yet, as it seems, there has not been a single philosophical argument provided as to why any human being should consider the assertion that ‘male human beings are superior’ to be true. It seems the philosophers of the historical canon usually began philosophizing after the normative verdict was passed on the female human being. Andro-Superiorism is posited axiom. Superiorism is to be understood as the conviction of someone’s own normative superiority as an observable factual reality that entitles – without any further moral self-doubt – to dominate and suppress those who are not like this someone. The created Others are not embraced by the moral standards of the non-Others. The Others can be treated – without producing a contradiction – by divergent moral rules. Superiorism is an inability and/or unwillingness to accept the Other, to incorporate the Other into reality, to take the Other seriously. In the case of Andro-Superiorism, those who consider themselves to be male inferiorize or other all those whom they consider being female (or, in fact, all those who they consider being non-male). It is important to emphasize that andro-superiorist philosophy does not exist because it is factually superior to the philosophical endeavors of any other gender. There is furthermore no reason to believe, that human beings were necessitated in making andro-superiorism a factual reality. The factual reality of andro-superiorism is a phenomenon not necessarily connected with philosophy and not necessarily with the nature of the human being. Female human beings were violently excluded from the human endeavor of philosophy – because of nothing other than the will and the actions of certain philosophers, because of nothing other than certain philosophers violently willing them out of the human endeavor of philosophy. Andro-superiorism is indeed necessarily violent. However, this violence as violence is arbitrary violence, it only depends on whether the consequence suits the violator or not. We have to re-evaluate our understanding of the history of philosophy as a history of arbitrary, exclusionary, will-breaking violence. Anti-philosophical anti-female andro-superiorist violence has rarely (if at all) been acknowledged as a problem (often not even as a relevant phenomenon) that would affect the philosophical quality of a philosophical approach. Philosophy, as we find it today, is to a significant degree, the result of this violence. What is needed is thus a project of rehumanizing philosophy against the tendency to remain superiorist, to overcome what (western) philosophy is (to a large degree) today but the result of a self-aggrandized elite violently dominating the human endeavor of philosophy.
Jonathan O Chimakonam
Department of Philosophy
University of Pretoria
My latest book: Logic and African Philosophy: Seminal Essays on African Systems of Thought (Vernon Press, 2020)
Available at 24% discount (using code CFC171611B2 on checkout): https://vernonpress.com/book/944
or on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Logic-African-Philosophy-Seminal-Systems/dp/1622738829/
Jonathan O Chimakonam
Department of Philosophy
University of Pretoria
My latest book: Logic and African Philosophy: Seminal Essays on African Systems of Thought (Vernon Press, 2020)
Available at 24% discount (using code CFC171611B2 on checkout): https://vernonpress.com/book/944
or on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Logic-African-Philosophy-Seminal-Systems/dp/1622738829/