Sign up to save your podcasts
Or
Share Charlotte Witt, “The Metaphysics of Gender” (Oxford University Press, 2011)
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Or
Charlotte Witt, “The Metaphysics of Gender” (Oxford University Press, 2011)
Is your gender essential to who you are? If you were a man instead of a woman, or vice versa, would you be a different person? In her new bookThe Metaphysics of Gender (Oxford University Press, 2011), Charlotte Witt found that most people answered that obviously they’d be different if their gender differed – even though many feminist philosopher friends considered gender essentialism to be false. Thus a philosophical inquiry was born: what is gender essentialism, why might it be true, if it is true, and what consequences does this answer have for ourselves and societies?
In this engaging volume, Witt – who is Professor of Philosophy and Humanities at the University of New Hampshire – argues that a certain form of gender essentialism is true. Gender is the social role that unifies us as social individuals, an ontological category distinct from both human organisms and persons. By distinguishing social individuals from persons, Witt hopes to promote the idea that the point of feminism is not giving women more choices, but about reconfiguring social roles so that they no longer oppress and exploit women.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/philosophy
View all episodes
By New Books Network
4.2
109109 ratings
Is your gender essential to who you are? If you were a man instead of a woman, or vice versa, would you be a different person? In her new bookThe Metaphysics of Gender (Oxford University Press, 2011), Charlotte Witt found that most people answered that obviously they’d be different if their gender differed – even though many feminist philosopher friends considered gender essentialism to be false. Thus a philosophical inquiry was born: what is gender essentialism, why might it be true, if it is true, and what consequences does this answer have for ourselves and societies?
In this engaging volume, Witt – who is Professor of Philosophy and Humanities at the University of New Hampshire – argues that a certain form of gender essentialism is true. Gender is the social role that unifies us as social individuals, an ontological category distinct from both human organisms and persons. By distinguishing social individuals from persons, Witt hopes to promote the idea that the point of feminism is not giving women more choices, but about reconfiguring social roles so that they no longer oppress and exploit women.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/philosophy
More shows like New Books in Philosophy
View all
Entitled Opinions (about Life and Literature)
493 Listeners
Philosophy Bites
1,531 Listeners
New Books in History
209 Listeners
The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast
2,089 Listeners
History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps
1,587 Listeners
New Books in Psychoanalysis
193 Listeners
New Books in Military History
162 Listeners
New Books in Islamic Studies
30 Listeners
New Books in African American Studies
161 Listeners
New Books in Environmental Studies
18 Listeners
New Books in Political Science
63 Listeners
New Books in Literary Studies
22 Listeners
In Our Time: Philosophy
864 Listeners
The LRB Podcast
292 Listeners
New Books in Critical Theory
143 Listeners
New Books in Intellectual History
61 Listeners
Jacobin Radio
1,397 Listeners
Philosophy For Our Times
304 Listeners
Why Theory
562 Listeners
Hermitix
339 Listeners
Theory & Philosophy
339 Listeners
Acid Horizon
175 Listeners
What's Left of Philosophy
260 Listeners