Hello! I teach philosophy courses joyfully here at Elon University and sometimes at University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, where I began pursuing a PhD in philosophy in 2003. Before that, I received a BA in philosophy from the University of Wisconsin in Madison. As an undergraduate, I also spent time living and studying abroad in Israel and Australia. My philosophical interests center on young people and the ways they are oppressed. I believe that youth liberation holds awesome potential for social transformation. 

In addition to philosophy, I have a number of exciting projects underway. In 2004, I began working with LGBTIQSA (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer, questioning, straight, and anything else) teenagers. Together we founded iNSIDEoUT, a youth-run organization that networks youth and Gay-Straight Alliances.You can check us out here: www.insideout180.org.

I also write and sing fun, socially-conscious kids' music that respects young people's intelligence. I released my first album in July, 2012. You can listen to it here: www.kidsforpresident.com.

I reside in Durham with my dog, Mordecai, and my loving friends and neighbors. We get together frequently to share delicious food, and play and sing music on our front porches. I also enjoy playing capoeira, running 13.1 miles, and visiting my 7 (soon to be 8) neices and nephews.

University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Ph.D., philosophy (expected 2015)

University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, M.A., philosophy (2005)

                        Thesis: A Two-Dimensional Analysis of Ethical Language

                        Committee: Geoff Sayre-McCord (director), Jesse Prinz, Keith Simmons

University of Wisconsin, Madison, B.A., philosophy (2003)

                        Thesis: Where the ‘Ought’ is in the ‘Is’

                        Director: Russ Shafer-Landau

Sole Instructor

How Should We Live? (Elon University) A course about living well. Addresses the challenges we confront as individuals living among others, and how to navigate these challenges with deep care for ourselves, our communities, and the larger world. Develops the skills to think clearly, consistently, and creatively about some of the most central issues in our lives, including food, sex, money, relationships, religion and more. Explores abstract philosophical ethical theories (Mill, Kant, etc.) as well as more practical writing by a variety of authors. Takes a serious and sustained look at some of the world’s deepest problems and our individual roles in sustaining or solving them. Encourages students to be thoughtful and to take ownership over their lives, their choices and their values.

What Can We Know? (Elon Unversity) Provides practical tools for better, clearer thinking. Considers longstanding epistemological questions such as: What does it take to know something? Where does knowledge come from? What are we justified in believing, and what is it for a belief to be justified? Explores traditional epistemological theories, including rationalism, empiricism and skepticism, through authors such as Hume and Descartes. Examines ethical issues related to knowledge acquisition, including whether we have a right to knowledge about some subjects, and how social structures (especially race, class and gender) influence our access to information.

Critical Thinking (Elon University) A course on thinking clearly, carefully and creatively about issues that are central to one’s role as a student, community member, consumer, citizen and person. Provides the tools to recognize, construct and evaluate arguments, and attempts to make students aware of their own biases and unconscious patterns of thinking. Inspires students to think constructively about social problems, and to be proactive and aware people and consumers.

Philosophical Issues: Gender (3x - UNC-Chapel Hill) Explores the concepts of sex and gender and their ethical implications, and the challenges that gender-variant identities pose to traditional gender categories across cultures. Examines the nature and prevalence of sexism, as well as the relation between sexism and other forms of oppression.

Reference and Meaning (UNC-Chapel Hill) An advanced examination of developments within philosophy of language, incorporating Russell, Frege, Kripke, Putnam, psychologism, the referential theory of meaning, intensional semantics, two-dimensionalism, causal theories of reference, and internalism and externalism.

Making Sense of Ourselves (2x - UNC-Chapel Hill) Aims to develop critical and creative thinking around a number of life’s central issues including, but not limited to: religion, personal identity, egoism, normative theory and applied ethics.           

Introduction to Ethics (UNC-Chapel Hill) An introduction to topics in applied and normative theory, such as vegetarianism, global and environmental responsibility, feminism, utilitarianism, subjectivism, relativism, and ancient moral theory.

Bioethics (Online - UNC-Chapel Hill) Exploration of bioethical issues such as end of life care, abortion, and cloning.

Teaching Assistant

Making Sense of Ourselves (with C.D.C. Reeve - UNC-Chapel Hill) Examines great works and contemporary theory, including Plato, Aristotle, Ayn Rand, Dostoevsky, Hume.

Introduction to Philosophy (with Ram Neta - UNC-Chapel Hill) Introduction to philosophy’s basic problems with a focus on Hume and Descartes.                                                    

Introduction to Ethics (with William Lycan - UNC-Chapel Hill) A survey of normative theories including Kant, Mill and Hume.        

Philosophy of Sport (with Jan Boxill - UNC-Chapel Hill) Studies the nature of competition, personal excellence, and ethical issues related to sports, such as sexism and doping.

I have recently undertaken research related to the oppression and liberation of young people. I hope to demonstrate that youth are an oppressed group by illuminating the framework that constitutes their oppression, and to make the case that the liberation of young people is uniquely significant, given some features of this group and their power to create meaningful social change.

I believe that youth are oppressed, and that their oppression is far less visible and has received far less attention than any other form of oppression. It is also profoundly important since it is the only type of oppression that every human being has at one time experienced. My research in this area joins a struggle for youth liberation that gained momentum in the 1970s with groups such as Youth Liberation of Ann Arbor and writers such as John Holt and Richard Farson.

In contrast to this relatively new research project, I have for the past decade been working to defend moral realism, the view that there are real, objective moral properties in the world, and that these properties obtain independently of our thoughts and beliefs about them. For example, racism has the property of being morally bad, and this is true whether or not we believe that racism is bad, and indeed whether or not we even recognize the ways in which we as individuals and the social structures we maintain perpetuate racism. 

Specifically, I have been working to defend a "two-dimensional analysis" of ethical concepts. I have attempted to understand the normativity and objectivity of ethical language within a naturalistic framework by appeal to two-dimensional semantics. Ethical language is normative in the sense that it has implications for what to do, but objective in the sense that what we ought to do is independent of what we believe we ought to do. The normativity and objectivity of ethical language have long been thought to be in tension with one another. 2D semantics distinguishes two intensions that constitute the meanings of our words, one primary and the other secondary. I believe that we can accommodate the normativity and objectivity of ethical language by appeal to primary and secondary intensions, respectively.

Mary Taylor Williams Fellowship (2010, 2008, 2005, 2004)