The Flipped Classroom

My university is all about flipped classrooms. All the teaching awards and grants are going to people who "flip" their classrooms.

From what I can tell, this indicates a willingness to dumb down material as far as you possibly can. Instead of asking students to read and write, you ask them to watch some music videos at home (but not more than 5 to 7 minutes at a time) and then entice them to come play video games in class.

Want to know more about flipping classrooms? Here's the top link from a Google search for "flipped classroom." True to style, it explains pedagogy through clip art (including an image of a student doing work from bed--with the covers pulled up!), a flow chart that never uses a concept requiring more than three words to explain, and information transfer which approaches zero.

I call it "flipping the class" for the "flipped-off classroom."

Education and Breadth

I'm one week into my spring term. It's the time of the teaching season when profs ask each other "Did you get a good start? What are you teaching? Is it interesting?"

We all mean: can you make it through the next 10 weeks with enough vim and vigor to start your summer research plans without first going on a bender?

When I answer the question by saying that I'm lucky to be teaching an upper-division course on John Stuart Mill, I get blank stares. I expected my friends and colleagues, none of them philosophers but most with advanced degrees--even PhD's--to have a sense of who Mill was. At least to know that this course has to do with 19th century history, maybe ethics or something like that.

In fact, the classes' first reading assignment started like this:

Who wrote On Liberty? Nearly everyone with a college education could tell you – well – should be able to tell you that the author is John Stuart Mill.

But no. My well-educated, inquisitive, politically-informed friends give me blank stares. They have advanced degrees in physics, chemistry, biology, business, engineering. (Business, even! No matter that Mill's Principles of Political Economy was influential in its time.) Mentioning utilitarianism or "the greatest good for the greatest number" does not jar something loose or get a glimmer of recognition.

Here I've been down on "No Child Left Behind" and its effect on my current students. But if the intellectuals around here--the ones in their 30s, 40s, and 50s with the benefit of good college educations and post-grad education on top of that are absolutely unaware of one of the leading intellects of the 19th century, then my expectations must be completely out of line.

Let's talk about the important stuff going on in our own times instead.

On a side note, when given the argument below and asked to categorize it as valid or invalid, true premises or not, my students want to know if they're going to be held responsible for all kinds of arcane literary and historical facts which have nothing to do with philosophy!

Since Moby Dick was written by Shakespeare, and Moby Dick is a science fiction novel, it follows that Shakespeare wrote a science fiction novel.

Re-reading the Canon Series

The Re-reading the Canon Series from Penn State Press has become much larger than I realized! And it's been growing for nearly 20 years.

The titles are "Feminist Interpretations of X," and they cover the canon stalwarts (Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Hume, Kant, Hegel) as well as some surprises (Emma Goldman, Ayn Rand). Some recent additions include Thomas Hobbes, Jane Addams, and Richard Rorty.

The essays from the mid-1990's, e.g. in the collection on Plato, are delightfully, charmingly po-mo. I assigned the collection on Quine to a seminar once, and have drawn on the essays about Dewey for classes as well.

As I prepare my spring quarter seminar, I turned to the series to see if there is a collection on Mill. Apparently not! Quel dommage.

Collaboration

I'm preparing to teach an undergraduate course on John Stuart Mill. This is an excuse for me to spend 10 weeks re-reading some of my favorite history of philosophy. It's also part of my program to teach in ways that highlight women philosophers--contemporary and historical. I came across this little piece (from 2009) by Jo Ellen Jacobs about the nature of John Stuart Mill's collaboration with Harriet Taylor.

"The Second Scribe"

The abstract (from PhilPapers):
On Liberty celebrates a collaborative theory of knowing exemplified in the way Harriet and John worked together. They believed fervently in the power of individuals struggling together to grasp the truth – including both the “idealistic” belief that there is truth as opposed to mere subjective opinion, and a deep scepticism about the beliefs accepted by the majority.

Data, yes. But values first.

By David Brooks in the New York Times.

What Data Can't Do

Toward the end:

Data obscures values. I recently saw an academic book with the excellent title, “ ‘Raw Data’ Is an Oxymoron.” One of the points was that data is never raw; it’s always structured according to somebody’s predispositions and values. The end result looks disinterested, but, in reality, there are value choices all the way through, from construction to interpretation.

(from Will Krieger)

Intended insult gone awry

First-grade child, in the car: Mom!

Me: What?

Child: Dad!

John: What?

Child: Ha-ha, what's a nerd word!

John: No, why's a nerd word.

Me: Non-linear's a nerd word.

John: Ontological's a nerd word.

Me: DEontological's a nerd word. Epigenetic's a nerd word. Etiology's a nerd word.

John: We're very proud of our nerd words, son.

Me: Nerd words? Now you're speaking my language.

Is this the same dialogue I read?

Exam Question:
Describe Meno's paradox, also called the Paradox of Inquiry. What solution to the paradox is proposed by Socrates in the dialogue? Do you think this is a satisfactory solution to the puzzle? If not, how would you resolve the paradox? (15 pts.)

Student answer:
"This is the paradox of a slave boy who went to Meno to recollect taxes."

Ann Cahill at 3am

Ann Cahill of Elon University interviewed at 3AM magazine--on feminist philosophy, on intersubjectivity, and on a phenomenology of pregnancy loss.

The only thing is, I'm not so sure that the interviewer is right that women in philosophy have it worse than women in other academic subjects. I cringe at the stories I hear from engineering and computer science. But then again, there are also some strong forms of recognition of gender-based disparity in those areas, and we should hope to learn from the strategies STEM disciplines have developed.

Undergrad tips for participation

One of my new undergrad advisees asked me how to participate in a philosophy discussion class. This is not something I usually teach explicitly, and it was never taught to me explicitly, and why not? Because a discussion with skilled participants makes all the difference.

This particular student is not shy--he's an officer in his fraternity. So he's not asking for help with that. He's asking about quality, and he pointed out that he doesn't want to imitate what some students do because he thinks the way they participate wastes class time. He might be right! But he also might have a mistaken idea about what a good or bad comment is.

Since I wrote a lot for him, I thought it would be worth copying here:

If you go to a public lecture, you will see that our faculty members each have their own style for asking questions. Actually, most of us have a toolbox that includes a few different question types. For instance, one of us usually asks an apparently simple question of clarification which he has carefully planned so that the speaker will say something controversial, and he follows up with the question "So do you realize that the implication of what you're saying is the usually undesirable outcome X?" Others often ask the speaker if they have examined the connection between what they're saying and some other philosopher. One of us comes right out and says "I disagree with your starting assumptions."

So developing a style for engaging in public is a good thing to think about—we've all done that, maybe explicitly or maybe we just let our style emerge over time.

The first thing to do, then, is to watch what other students (and professors) do, and start evaluating the kinds of questions/comments and the ways of saying them which you think are especially effective or ineffective. Then practice one kind of question yourself. Even if you just have one kind of question/comment that you feel comfortable making, and which you can fashion to fit different circumstances, then you're in good shape.

One of the things you should ask yourself is whether you are better at reacting to other people or better at expressing a thought that is independent of what other people have said. Because depending on the answer, you'll need to be mentally prepared to jump in in different ways. Usually professors give an opening for the latter strategy. Either at the beginning or at the end, they ask "Is there anything about this reading you didn't understand?" or "Is there something else about this debate that we should cover?" And that's your cue.

If you're better at reacting, then you just have to be ready to let your spring-loaded question get tripped and come out your mouth. For instance, I'm better at reacting than starting a conversation, but as an undergrad I used to be really, really slow to respond, and then I would leave every class thinking "Why didn't I just say what I was thinking?" I had to practice being faster, and that's how I developed the bad habit of talking over other people. In some circumstances, it's rude, and in other circumstances, it's how to get heard.

The second thing to do is to have a couple of strategies and types of questions in mind, and the kind that you start developing will depend on the above choice. If you can react, professors LOVE it when one student calls another student out (but in a gentle, respectful, kind way) for saying something that doesn't make sense. Your participation goal is not necessarily to interact with the professor—it's just as good (and probably better) to interact with other students. For instance: "Pat, I think what you just said about the evil demon is really interesting, but you also said that Descartes is an empiricist. I'm curious if you could say more about that because I think of Descartes as a rationalist."

Another thing that professors LOVE is if you can make a connection with a different class day. This is something that can sometimes be prepared ahead of time. "I found myself following along with Marx when he makes a point about the power of the proletariat. But just last week I had a positive feeling toward Nietzsche when he wrote about the powerful individual. Yes, I want to be a powerful individual, but I also want to stand in solidarity with my people. Professor, is there a tension here? What do you make of it?"

Which reminds me—some but not all professors like to be asked what they think about a controversy or interpretation. Well, really everyone likes to be asked, but some will refuse to say.

Finally, you can always ask questions of clarification. "I didn't really get how the revolution is supposed to happen, especially if the ruling class controls the means of public communication. What am I missing?" Or more simply "What is the proletariat? I read this but I'm still confused." Or an interesting one "Is this idea supposed to apply to our time? And if it does, who would the proletariat be right now? The 99%? The 47%? Just people who are homeless?" Asking these kinds of questions does not make you look stupid (although you should do the reading and not just ask basic questions without reading). It makes you look like you're paying attention to details.

So the summary is:

You can improve participation by 

1. planning ahead

2. recognizing the openings and invitations that apply to the kind of comment/question you're best at

3. practicing one particular kind or style of comment/question over and over again until it feels natural to you.

Anne Jaap Jacobson interview

Anne Jaap Jacobson is interviewed at 3AM Magazine, called "the neurofeminist philosofunkster."
I'm not exactly sure what a Philosofunkster is, but I'm quite sure that the world needs more of them!

The interview ranges across intentionality (skepticism but not eliminativism), neuroscience, experimental philosophy, what makes certain forms of analytic philosophy so excruciatingly tedious, what feminist philosophy adds to other approaches, David Hume, and the roadblocks put down for women in philosophy and science.

One part worth noting quotes a report from the AHA:

People seem to be uncertain about whether a woman can do science, and dead certain that a female philosopher has no place in that world.

I could recount a host of other insults, some quite large and some small, and the very worst of it all is that it accomplishes just about nothing, saps one’s strength and weakens one’s morale. This is happening to women in philosophy across the country. When I recently felt I was being done substantial harm, I hired a lawyer. I have since learned I know a number of successful women who have finally gone the same route. The American History Association’s 2005 report on the Status of Women notes that among senior women in their field:

“There is more than enough resignation, bitterness, disillusionment, and discouragement to warrant a more serious and extensive consideration of gender in the profession than we were able to carry out in this survey. … The profession as a whole should be concerned that so many successful women feel they have suffered from gender discrimination. Female talent is being squandered in fights over large and small issues that could be ameliorated by the attentiveness of administrators, department chairs, and colleagues, and the establishment of more transparent institutional procedures.”

And history is supposed to be much better than philosophy. As numerous studies are pointing out, we badly need administrators who will not accept what can amount to a prolonged harassment of women.

Twin-Earth, Hilary Putnam, and the 47%

Philosophy of science exam question:

What does a theory of reference aim to give an account of? Why is a theory of reference relevant for philosophy of science?

An exam answer:

A theory of reference aims to provide a guide for finding the source for entitlement. 

Women in Politics = Women in Philosophy

Sam, a student in my Feminist Theory course, points out that the percentage of people with full-time teaching jobs who are women is about 17% and that the percentage of people in Congress who are women is also about 17%.

No claim about magic numbers here, but just an interesting mirroring.
17% of U.S. Senators are women.
16.6% of the members of the U.S. House of Representatives are women.

In both cases, there is nothing about the work that's done that would predispose women to have less ability or experience than men. (Indeed, in both cases isn't the work related to universals? That is, in the political body, a single representative stands for all constituents, and in philosophy, the philosopher identifies universal truths.) Also in both cases, the methods involve adversarial discussion, and the field's history is predominately male and symbolically masculine.

But it's a Design school!

My university is not just an engineering school, it's a design school, too. We have very good programs in film, in fine art photography, in industrial design. (We're also getting an architecture program, in spite of having no architects on the faculty.)

But here we are, #9 on the Princeton Review's list of 10 UGLY campuses! Hey, they picked one of the nicest shots they could for the slide show!

Recent Chronicle Articles on Women in Academe

Two articles about women's representation in the sciences and philosophy have come out in the last week. One is behind a paywall and focuses on women in philosophy and history: http://chronicle.com/article/In-Terms-of-Gender/135306/

The other tracks women's publishing records in the sciences and makes a few nice points which can be generalized to other areas of research: http://chronicle.com/article/The-Hard-Numbers-Behind/135236/
(The most interesting parts of this article come toward the end, so it's worth reading it in full.)

The first of these, which features Sally Haslanger in a photo, goes over familiar ground. For instance, the speculation that women are turned off by the male canon, but with no explanation of why that would hold in philosophy but not English. And the Rutgers female graduate students' defense of their department, in which they say

their views are taken seriously, they are supported by faculty, and they in turn are role models for undergraduate women. 

If this is true, then what more could one want? One may doubt their word, but it seems entirely conceivable to me that a department may be woman-friendly without anyone doing specific work in feminist philosophy. Feminist work is important, but it needn't be done everywhere--there are good reasons for a department specializing. The proof is in the success and well-being of the women faculty and students.

Another familiar idea to explain the absence of women makes its appearance:

"Philosophy, in the English ­speaking world, has migrated closer to the sciences, and places a high premium on technical skills, logic, and dividing problems into lots of small pieces," Mr. Leiter says. 

But this ignores the prevalence of women in the sciences, including in those areas, such as molecular biology, biochemistry, and chemical engineering, which use technical skills and highly specialized problem areas. Women make up over 50% of undergrads in the life sciences and a larger proportion of majors in chemistry than in philosophy. What it does do is to put the blame on women for being underprepared or selling themselves short. What it doesn't do is take responsibility for the social environment, which is a sufficient explanation for philosophy's shortfall.

The article on women's record of publishing in the sciences is more sophisticated and offers a more complex picture of women's changing status. Women are not let off the hook--the article suggests that they submit fewer papers to journals. But this observation is situated in the complex social setting women find themselves in, for instance with obligations for childcare and eldercare and different expectations for non-research academic work.

The article also shows some of the simplistic thinking that comes to the fore when we discuss the status of women in research, even by people whose other professional work is supremely complex and nuanced. For instance, there is often an assumption that if women aren't facing active, open hostility and obvious discrimination, then nothing is wrong. In that case, any choices they make to cluster in subfields, to publish at lower rates, to collaborate less, or to accept a lower author ranking are chalked up to their own lack of proficiency rather than the social setting.

John J. Siegfried, a professor emeritus of economics at Vanderbilt University who has worked with the economic association, says there is not much that academe can do about gender imbalances, short of forcing women into subfields that may not interest them. "What's the solution?" he asks. "Should I tell women starting a Ph.D. that they should only study finance or econometrics?"

It can seem obvious to the women who consider work in certain subfields that it is controlled by crony networks, or that newcomers are more or less welcomed. This is one of the phenomena which is the target of the Gendered Conference Campaign.

Markets, and also Media Influences on Thought

This post is about Pornography. But I've learned better than to put that in the post title, or it attracts all kinds of comments which then have to be deleted for the sake of decency.

My Feminist Theory course has been discussing pornography, and the reading assignment last week was a well-structured examination of the issues that Catherine MacKinnon raised in the mid-1980s. The pornosphere was so different then, though, that my students had a hard time understanding what the debate was about.

Their obtuseness didn't just seem a result of different experiences with porn than the easy access to Playboy and little else that was a feature of life before the internet. Their premises about cultural influence seemed markedly different from mine and from those of the textbook chapter we read. Most of the students weren't disagreeing with MacKinnon's point. Beyond disagreement, there seemed to be a failure of comprehension. Some of the sticking points:

1. MacKinnon and other feminists started by formulating a definition of porn that differed from the Supreme Court. While the Supreme Court's definition uses criteria such as 'obscenity,' 'prurience,' and 'community standards,' the feminists don't mind materials that are sexually explicit or unusual ("kinky"). Their problem is with violence and with acts and attitudes which are dehumanizing. My students' response was that "you can't change a definition--just look it up in the dictionary." What's going on here? A failure to understand philosophical methods? A failure to see the role of law in changing culture? A failure to accept that culture can change and be changed, that it's not simply given? I don't have a sense of the reason for the strenuous opposition to MacKinnon's move of using a term ("porn") to specify a category different from the category the term usually specifies.

2. Once they understood that MacKinnon was only talking about a subset of porn, the students' response was "don't watch what you don't like." And also, "if enough people like her want more sex-positive porn, then the market will respond." Thus, all culture and all means of controlling culture were reduced to markets. And furthermore, there was the unstated belief that markets are responsive and can't (or shouldn't) be controlled.

3. Finally, the majority of the class resisted the idea at the heart of MacKinnon's critique--that the content of porn could shape how people think about sexual possibilities. That is, though they agreed that many young people look to porn as a form of sex ed, they disagreed that porn influenced how people think about what's appropriate or inappropriate behavior in sexual relationships. Further, there seemed to be general disagreement with the statement that media affect how people think. Instead, they believe that viewers exercise free choice in what they watch, and they only choose to watch things that reflect what they already think. There was strong resistance to the idea that what you watch can change your perception of the world.