02/23/2009

Clare Batty, Arnold Farr, and Eric Sanday Join The Department of Philosophy

Although the Philosophy Department has suffered some faculty losses through retirements or moves in the past few years (most recently Joan Callahan, Sandy Goldberg, Dien Ho, Harmon Holcomb, Bradley Monton), it is proud to welcome three new faculty.

Clare Batty (Ph.D., MIT, 2007) joined the faculty in 2007as an Assistant Professor. She has interests in the philosophy of mind, metaphysics, and the history of philosophy. Her current research is in the philosophy of perception, with a focus on olfactory experience. There has been very little discussion of the chemical senses in the philosophical literature, so Professor Batty’s work is unique in this regard. Her dissertation, entitled Lessons in Smelling: Essays on Olfactory Perception, grew out of asking how the sense modalities differ and considering the extent to which the insights we have gained in the visual case can be generalized to the other modalities. The status of this generalization is the running theme throughout the dissertation. Professor Batty argues that consideration of olfactory perception presents unique challenges to central debates in the philosophy of perception, including the debate about the nature and extent of representational content, the debate about qualia and the alleged transparency of experience, and the debate about the nature of the secondary qualities. She is currently preparing sections of her dissertation for publication.

Eric Sanday (Ph.D., The Pennsylvania State University, 2003) joined the faculty in 2007 as an Assistant Professor. He specializes in Ancient Greek philosophy. His dissertation, entitled Dialectic and the Turn Toward Logos in Plato’s Parmenides, made a close study of the hypotheses in Plato’s Parmenides to show that the philosopher’s understanding of non-being is both crucial to the understanding of what is, and that non-being cannot be properly grasped outside the experience of thinking. Professor Sanday is currently working on a book-length study of the relationship between politics and ontology in Plato, entitled Return to the Cave: The nature of Intelligibility in Platonic Philosophy. He is also working on the relationship between imagination and locomotion in Aristotle’s account of the soul, and has an ongoing interest in the relationship between violence and forgiveness in 20th century social and political philosophy. Before coming to UK, Professor Sanday taught and Vanderbilt University and Marquette University.

Arnold Farr (Ph.D., University of Kentucky, 1996) joined the faculty in 2008 as an Associate Professor. His research areas are 19th and 20th century Continental philosophy, with an emphasis on social and political thought, critical theory, German Idealism, the history of Marxism, and the philosophy of race. Professor Farr is the co-author and co-editor of Marginal Groups and Mainstream American Culture. His most recent book is Critical Theory and Democratic Vision: On Herbert Marcuse and Recent Liberation Philosophies. Before joining the department, Professor Farr taught in the Philosophy Department at St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia, and also served as the Director of Africana Studies.