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This is the first book to offer a philosophical engagement with microaggressions. It aims to provide an intersectional analysis of microaggressions that cuts across multiple dimensions of oppression and marginalization, and to engage a variety of perspectives that have been sidelined within the discipline of philosophy. The volume gathers a diverse group of contributors: philosophers of color, philosophers with disabilities, philosophers of various nationalities and ethnicities, and philosophers of several gender identities. Their unique frames of analysis articulate both how the concept of microaggressions can be used to clarify and sharpen our understanding of subtler aspects of oppression and how analysis, expansion, and reconceiving the notion of a microaggression can deepen and extend its explanatory power. The essays in the volume seek to defend microaggressions from common critiques and to explain their impact beyond the context of college students. Some of the guiding questions that this volume explores include, but are not limited to, the following: Can microaggressions be established as a viable scientific concept? What roles do microaggressions play in other oppressive phenomena like transphobia, fat phobia, and abelism? How can epistemological challenges around microaggressions be addressed via feminist theory, critical race theory, disability theory, or epistemologies of ignorance? What insights can be gleaned from intersectional analyses of microaggressions? Are there domain-specific analyses of microaggressions that would give insight to features of that domain, i.e. microaggressions related to sexuality, athletics, immigration status, national origin, body type, or ability.
Microaggressions and Philosophy features cutting-edge research on an important topic that will appeal to a wide range of students and scholars across disciplines. It includes perspectives from philosophy of psychology, empirically informed philosophy, feminist philosophy, critical race theory, disability theory, philosophy of language, philosophy of science, and social and political philosophy.
List of contents
- Introduction: Microaggressions and Philosophy
Lauren Freeman
- Sticks and Stones Can Break Your Bones and Words Can Really Hurt You:
A Standpoint Epistemological Reply to Critics of the Microaggression Research Program
Lauren Freeman and Heather Stewart
- Microaggressions, Mechanisms, and Harm
Cameron Evans and Ron Mallon
- Psychological Research on Racial Microaggressions: Community Science and Concept Explication
Morgan Thompson
- Taking the Measure of Microaggression: How to Put Boundaries on a Nebulous Concept
Regina Rini
- Escalating Linguistic Violence: From Microaggressions to Hate Speech
Emma McClure
- Outing Foreigners: Accent and Linguistic Microaggressions
Saray Ayala-López
- I Know What Happened to Me: The Epistemic Harms of Microaggression
Saba Fatima
- A Defense of Intentional Microaggressions and Microaggressive Harassment:
The Fundamental Attribution Error, Harassment, and Gaslighting of Transgender Athletes
Christina Friedlaender & Rachel McKinnon
- Microaggressions as a Disciplinary Technique for Fat and Potentially Fat Bodies
Alison Reiheld
- The Message in the Microaggression: Epistemic Oppression at the Intersection of Disability and Race
Jeanine Weekes Schroer and Zara Bain
- Racial Methodological Microaggressions: When Good Intersectionality Goes Bad
Tempest M. Henning
About the author
Lauren Freeman is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Louisville, USA. Her research interests span the areas of analytic feminist philosophy, philosophy of medicine, and philosophy of emotion. She has published articles on microaggressions, implicit bias, and stereotype threat, and is currently writing a book on microaggressions in medicine.
Jeanine Weekes Schroer is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Minnesota, Duluth, USA. Her research areas include social philosophy, feminist theory, critical race theory, and epistemologies of ignorance.
Summary
This book offers a comprehensive philosophical treatment of microaggressions. Its aims are to provide an intersectional analysis of microaggressions that cuts across multiple groups and dimensions of oppression and marginalization, and to engage a variety of perspectives that have been sidelined within the discipline of philosophy.
Report
"This book provides an important critique of some common conversations about micoaggressions, but it also shows us what more informed and more interesting conversations about them look like." - Stacey Goguen, Northeastern Illinois University, USA
"Microaggressions and Philosophy is a bold volume whose contributions span the scope of the structural, the interpersonal, and the scientific. It is essential reading for anyone interested in philosophy that engages with oppression and social justice." - Nora Berenstain, University of Tennessee, USA
