Leigh M. Johnson

The Problem With Echo Chambers

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Philosophy, Politics, RMWMTMBM Archive 0 Comments

Here’s one thing I will presume that we can all agree upon: every single one of us likes to have our views, positions, arguments and preferences confirmed by others.  (If you don’t, then those aren’t your views, positions, arguments or preferences in any really defensible sense, are they?)  Of course, because we live in a…

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Grading War Letters to Home, Day 2

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson GradingWarLetterstoHome, Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching 0 Comments

These are the letters from the second day of the Grading War.  If you landed here by accident and don’t know what you’re reading, click here for the backstory. 6 December 2013, 10:05amDearest Marcus, I take up my pen this morning to inform you once more of my disconsolate station. Please pardon the poor condition…

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Grading War Letters to Home, Day 7

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson GradingWarLetterstoHome, Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching 0 Comments

These are the letters from the seventh day of the Grading War.  If you landed here by accident and don’t know what you’re reading, click here for the backstory.11 December 2011, 9:09am  Dearest Leigh, I know not whether this missive will find you, but I pray that, if it does, it finds you well. The…

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Grading War Letters to Home, Winter 2013 (The Unabridged Collection)

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson GradingWarLetterstoHome, Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching 0 Comments

Preliminary note: If you’re here because you’re checking back for updates on the Grading War archive, rest assured that new letters are still being added as they appear.  However, this was getting a bit on the long side for a single post, so I’m breaking up the letters by day now.  Click the following links…

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Philosophy’s Next Generation of Auteurs

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Digital Humanities, Film, Open Source Pedagogy, Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching, Thinking in Images 0 Comments

Once again this semester, I assigned short-film projects to the students in my Existentialism course.  And once again, the products of that assignment (which I only just finished grading) were amazing.  I’ve employed this assignment in select courses for the last several years and each year the students’ films have gotten more and more impressive. …

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Grading War Letters to Home, Day 3

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson GradingWarLetterstoHome, Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching 0 Comments

These are the letters from the third day of the Grading War.  If you landed here by accident and don’t know what you’re reading, click here for the backstory. 7 December 2013, 11:20am Dearest Marcus, Oh Happy Day! This morn found my heart both gladdened and relieved after procuring news that Providence continues to shelter…

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Help Stop the Hastening of Death in Tennessee

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Memphis, Philosophy, Politics, RMWMTMBM Archive, Weak Humanism 0 Comments

I was recently asked by a colleague, Dr. Lisa Guenther (Philosophy, Vanderbilt University), to add my signature to an open letter to Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam, petitioning him to suspend the scheduled execution of 10 inmates beginning in January.  I agreed to lend my name to the petition alongside several others in a coalition named…

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Grading War Letters to Home, Day 4

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson GradingWarLetterstoHome, Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching 0 Comments

These are the letters from the fourth day of the Grading War.  If you landed here by accident and don’t know what you’re reading, click here for the backstory. 8 December 2013, 11:35pm My Dearest Leigh,  It is my sincere hope that these few words find you well. I have had no time to write,…

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Female Brains Are Prettier, More Fun At Parties, Less Tasty

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Philosophy, Politics, RMWMTMBM Archive, Women and Gender Issues 0 Comments

I almost titled this “Once More Into The Breach, Part Deux” in reference to my Once More Into The Breach, Dear Friends post from last week, which criticized the way in which conversations about gender disparity in professional Philosophy continue to be framed by concept-distorting and argument-disfiguring gender essentialism.  My targets today are not “philosophers”…

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Remember Who The Enemy Is

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Philosophy, Politics, Pop Culture/Film/Literature, RMWMTMBM Archive 0 Comments

[Disclaimer: I haven’t read any of the books in Suzanne Collins’ wildly popular Hunger Games trilogy, though I did see the first movie version of that trilogy (The Hunger Games) last year and I just saw the second film, currently out in theaters, Catching Fire.  I’ll go ahead and stipulate that the books are probably…

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