Thinking in the Midst

Spurred by Adam Kotsko's piece on r eading habits among college students (a similar piece appeared just this week in the Chronicle of Higher Ed), Cara and I invited David Hansen and Claudia Ruitenberg -- both esteemed and thoughtful readers -- to talk to us about how they think about reading in their own lives and as part of what they teach their students. For David's books, click here and...

Morgan Anderson and Ken Saltman sit down with Cara and Derek to discuss ed tech's penchant for innovating new forms of much older problems, even as they are promoted as presenting solutions. Solutions for whom? See Morgan's critique of "technophilia" here . See Ken's recent books here , here , and here . Click here for the transcript. Use this form to recommend future guests...

Jess Calarco and Mark Nagasawa sit down with Cara and Derek to talk about public institutions and programs--and especially the lack thereof--for early childhood education, and the racialized and gendered ramifications of our policy choices. LINKS: Order Mark's collection, T ransforming Early Years Policy in the US . Preorder Jess's new book, Holding It Together: How Women Became America&#3...

Philosophical Studies in Education SIG officers Caitlin Murphy Brust, Jamie Herman, and Ka Ya Lee join Cara and Derek to share thoughts and advice about navigating conferences generally and AERA in particular. Two events for grad students to note at AERA: 1.) Mentoring coffee chat (Sat Apr 13th, Elixr Coffee , 3-4:30pm) 2.) Graduate student social (Sat Ap 13th, Victory Brewing , 5-6:30pm) LINKS Fo...

In this episode, we present a symposium on the idea of culturally just assessments proposed and led by Joy Dangora Erickson, and featuring Winston Thompson, myself, and Cara. It was convenient to put together because neither Cara nor Winston were able to be at PES in person and so had pre-recorded their comments already. LINKS! The two articles that started this conversation are here and here . He...

"If you really analyze it, all bullying is gender policing," says one of our guests this week. Cris Mayo and Elizabethe Payne join Cara and Derek to talk about the various forces at work making LGBTQ+ students and their institutional allies especially vulnerable in our current climate. LINKS: The transcript is here . For more of Cris's work, click here and here . For more of Elizabet...

Michaila Peters, Ksenia Filatov, and Yuya Takeda join Cara and Derek to talk about their work on conspiratorial thinking and media literacy. All three guests are presenting work on this topic at the 2024 PES annual meeting, and this conversation broadly covers the genesis and context of the arguments they will make next week. LINKS! A transcript is here ! For Ksenia's ongoing work, click here...

Virginia Dearani, Adi Burton, and Clarence Joldersma speak to Cara and Derek about the mutual implications and shared concerns, both real and possible, of these two massively complex regions of human experience. LINKS! A transcript of the episode is here . The form to recommend future guests/topics! The Masha Gessen piece we briefly discussed is here . Adi's dissertation is available here For...

Natasha Levinson and Chris Higgins join Cara and Derek to talk about the structures and practices of academic conferences--especially PES; registration remains open!--as well as the role of questioning in general and what makes for a good question in the context of PES, especially. LINKS: PES registration ! Transcript of the episode! Chris's forthcoming book is here ; see other good things her...

Bill Pinar and Sam Rocha sit down with Cara and Derek to talk about the role that philosophical thinking and curriculum studies has played, so far, in their intellectual lives and their academic careers. LINKS! Here is the transcript . For more of Sam's work, see here , here , and here For more of Bill's work, see here , here and here . To recommend guests and topics for future shows, use...

Laura D'Olimipio and René Arcilla sit down with Derek and Cara to talk about the aesthetic dimensions of educational experience and how to defend or articulate the value of the arts in schools. LINKS: Here is a transcript of the episode. You can find more of Laura's work here , here , here , and here . René's work is available here , here , and here. And here is the form you can use to...

Elham Kazemi and Kurt Stemhagen join Cara and Derek to talk about the democratic affordances of mathematics classrooms. LINKS: Find more of Elham's work here , here , and here . Find more of Kurt's work here , here , and here . Here is the transcript of the episode, and you can recommend future guests and topics with this form .

Addyson Frattura and Kierstin Giunco speak with Cara and Derek about the best things they've read in recent years -- including things they discovered through assigned coursework, independent research, and for pleasure. LINKS! The list of books we recommended and discussed The transcript of the episode (with plenty of proper-name misspellings) The form to recommend guests and topics for future...

Historians Matthew Kelly and Andrew Kahrl join Cara and Derek to talk about racialized land values, the definition of "property" for the purposes of taxation, the history and power of local tax administration, and inequities in the funding of public services, including schools. For Matthew's forthcoming book -- preorders available now -- click here . For Andrew's forthcoming book...

Continuing a conversation that took place at OVPES 2023, Gabe Keehn, Kenneth Driggers, and Deron Boyles join Cara and Derek to discuss novel (as well as hackneyed) concerns around grading -- how worried should we be about grade inflation, and what does ChatGPT mean for us as teachers and learners? We've solved our transcription issue! Here is a transcript of the ep. For more of Deron's wor...

So as to avoid dropping a regular episode during the US's thanksgiving holiday, Cara and I sit for an interview by one of the podcast's listeners--all about how doing the podcast influences our scholarship, how we hope that it is received, and where we hope it goes in the future.

Cristina Cammarano, Shapel LaBorde, and Ariana Gonzalez-Stokas join Cara and Derek to reflect on the theme of the 2023 North Eastern Philosophy of Education Society (NEPES), which was held on October 7th. Relatedly, the Southeast Philosophy of Education Society will meet in February 2024; their call is here , submission deadline Nov. 15. For Ariana's recent book, click here . And for some of C...

Meira Levinson and Harry Brighouse join Cara and Derek to talk about their work in clarifying "equity" as it appears in policy documents and popular discourse -- the conversation ranges across the role of analytic philosophy in educational discussions, the nature and purpose of normative case studies, and whether we should just go ahead and drop the "practical implications" que...

Annie Schultz and LeAnn Holland join us to discuss education in its ecological valence, which includes conversations about anthropocentrism and animality, aesthetics, the weather, and the crucial issue of whether Timothy Morton's work counts as "accessible" philosophy. For more of LeAnn's work, click here and here . For more of Annie's work, click here and here . Here is the...

Jen Logue and Sarah Stitzlein join Cara and Derek to talk about the theme of the 2024 PES conference, to be held in Salt Lake City, March 7th-11th. See the conference website and submit a session or paper here . Submission deadline is November 1st, 2023. Meanwhile, for more of Sarah's work, see her website . And Jen's work is similarly findable on her website , as well. To recommend guests...

Samantha Deane and Bryan Warnick sit down with Cara and Derek to discuss the manifold overlap between schools, violence, and guns, which opens up onto the manifold ways that education reflects, reinforces, and potentially alters the way that we live with objects and with one another. For more of Sam's work, click here and here . For more of Bryan's work, click here , here , and here . As a...

Thea Abu El-Haj and Carla Shalaby sit down with Cara and Derek to discuss, in broad terms, what models of community-building might look like that do not strive to identify and accommodate exceptions to some presumed norm, but are rather oriented toward the various needs of all; and what efforts to imagine and practice such community building might teach us about our concepts of freedom and belongi...

Sarah Campbell and Doris Santoro join us to talk about philosophy's place in the lives of working teachers, the kinds and origins of pressures that make thoughtful practice and reflection difficult, and the importance of creating and maintaining the space necessary to stop and think. For more of Sarah's work, click here . For Doris's book, click here .

Dave Waddington and Gideon Dishon speak with Cara about the educational uses and various misuses of games and gaming. What is the value, from a learning perspective, of structured play -- whether of sports, or cooperative tabletop games, or video games? For more of Dave's work, click here and here and here . For more of Gideon's work, click here and here and here . To suggest future topics...

Marek Tesar and Karin Murris join Cara and Derek to discuss the nature of childhood, the nature of philosophy, and what it might mean to allow children's views of the world to instruct us rather than the other way around. For more of Marek's recent work, please click here and here and here . For more of Karin's work, please click here and here and here . To recommend future topics and/...