Philosophy Colloquium Series
Fall 2025
MEETING TIME: 3:00 PM-4:30 PM
MEETING LOCATION: MAN 107
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Fall 2025
Date: November 7, 2025
More information is below.
If you have any questions, please contact Professor David Vessey [email protected]
November 7
Mary McLeod Bethune: Pragmatism and Social Rights
Judy Whipps (GVSU Professor Emerita)
TALK DESCRIPTION
Dr. Judy Whipps returns to GVSU to give a colloquium on Mary McLeod Bethune. Although Bethune is not a traditional philosopher, Whipps read Bethune’s activism as philosophy, positioning her in the feminist pragmatist dialogue by demonstrating her core pragmatist and feminist philosophies. The history of Bethune’s civil rights activism adds an essential dimension to the fifty-year story of feminist pragmatist judicial and legislative activism for social rights. Bethune’s history also demonstrates how relational power was a force in political change, both in her leadership of African American women’s clubs and through the relationships she developed with Eleanor and President Roosevelt.
Mary McLeod Bethune Bio
Mary McLeod Bethune, educator, women’s club leader, and political activist, was a forerunner in the civil rights movement. In the 1930s, she became the first African American woman to head a federal department.
Speaker Bio
Judy Whipps (Professor Emerita)
Dr. Judy Whipps is a GVSU Professor Emerita of Philosophy and Interdisciplinary Studies. She was a professor at GVSU for nearly 25 years and was chair of Liberal Studies (now Interdisciplinary Studies). She recently published a new book, Feminist Pragmatism and Social Rights from Jane Addams to Frances Perkins. Her paper on Mary McLeod Bethune won the Addams prize at the Society for the Advancement of American Philosophy conference last spring.