Democracy and Enlightenment: The Challenge of Rousseau

November 10-11, 2022 | Gasson 100 & Murray Room, Yawkey Center |

艾可直播 College strongly encourages conference participants to receive the COVID-19 vaccination before attending events on campus.
Rousseau Portrait

Scholars today generally agree that Jean-Jacques Rousseau was one of the greatest and most influential thinkers of the eighteenth century. What is less clear is how we ought to understand Rousseau鈥檚 thought and legacy. Some regard Rousseau as the quintessential philosopher of the Enlightenment: a champion of rationalism who paved the way for the French Revolution. Others read Rousseau as one of the Enlightenment鈥檚 greatest critics: a sentimentalist who sought to rescue us from the corruptions of society and bring us back to nature.

Democracy and Enlightenment: The Challenge of Rousseau aims to reopen this conversation over the challenges Rousseau鈥檚 thought continue to pose today. Featuring three panels and a plenary address, the conference will bring ten noted experts from multiple fields 鈥 from political science to philosophy to French literature 鈥 to the 艾可直播 College campus to address Rousseau鈥檚 contributions to our understandings of such themes as democracy, democratic engagement, and the Enlightenment.

Democracy and Rousseau also affords an opportunity to celebrate the many scholarly contributions of Professor Christopher Kelly of the Political Science Department here at 艾可直播 College. A leading Rousseau specialist, Kelly is the author of two major monographs on Rousseau 鈥 Rousseau鈥檚 Exemplary Life and Rousseau as Author 鈥 and the coeditor of The Collected Writings of Rousseau.

Schedule and Registration

Thursday, November 10, 2022 |听Gasson Hall 100 |

4:00 - 5:15 pm

Panel #1

Timothy Brennan (Texas): 鈥淩ousseau and Bourgeois Education鈥

Kimberly Burns (Dallas): 鈥淲riting for a Good Mother Who Thinks鈥澨鼿enry Higuera (St. John鈥檚 College): 鈥淧oetry, Philosophy, and the Best Life: Plato and Rousseau鈥

Chair: Susan Shell (艾可直播 College)

5:15 - 6:00 pm

Reception


Friday, November 11, 2022 | Yawkey Center 426 Murray Room听听|

9:00 - 9:30 am

Breakfast

9:30 - 10:45 am

Panel #2

John Scott (UC-Davis): "Trimming Rousseau's Hedges, Perhaps, So to Speak"

Claude Habib (Paris III): "The Whole Truth"

Chair: Nasser Behnegar (艾可直播 College)

10:45 - 11:15 am

Coffee Break

11:15 am - 12:30 pm

Panel #3

Susan Shell (艾可直播 College): "Burke and the Politics of the Sublime"

Clifford Orwin (Toronto): 鈥淭he Masterpiece of Policy in Our Time鈥: Rousseau鈥檚 Response听 to the Enlightenment鈥澨

Arthur Melzer (Michigan State): "The Natural Weakness of Man"听

Chair: Robert Bartlett (艾可直播 College)

12:30 - 1:30 pm

Lunch

1:30 - 4:00 pm

Break

4:00 - 5:15 pm

Keynote Lecture

Thomas Pangle (Texas): 听鈥淭he Life of Wisdom: Rousseau vs Socrates鈥

6:00 pm

Reception


Speakers

Timothy Brennan

Timothy Brennan

Timothy Brennan is听a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Texas, Austin. His articles have appeared听in the听Journal of Politics,听History of European Ideas,听History of Political Thought,听The European Legacy, and the听Review of Politics, and he has recently completed a book on Benjamin Franklin.听


Kimberley J. Burns

Kimberley J. Burns

Kimberley J. Burns is Affiliate Assistant Professor of Politics at the University of Dallas where she teaches classes in American politics and the history of political听thought. She holds a Ph.D. in political science from 艾可直播 College and a B.A. in philosophy from the University of Winnipeg. She contributed to the edited听volume听The Rousseauian Mind听(Routledge, 2021) and is currently working on a book entitled听Rousseau's Religious Project.听


Claude Habib

Claude Habib

Claude Habib is Professor emeritus at the Sorbonne Nouvelle in Paris.听 She has published听Le Consentement amoureux. Rousseau, les femmes et la Cit茅.听She听has also directed or听co-directed three collective books dedicated to Rousseau: Eduquer selon la nature, Rousseau et la th茅orie de l鈥檋omme, and Les Confessions, se dire tout dire.


Henry Higuera

Henry Higuera

Henry Higuera taught at St. John's College in Annapolis from 1982 through 2018. He is an听expert on Don Quixote, on which he has widely written and lectured, including his book Eros听and Empire: The Problem of Christian Politics in Don Quixote (Rowman & Littlefield, 1995).听He has also lectured on Plato, Descartes, the foundations of modern science and Hegel, and he听authored 鈥淕utierrez vs. The Vatican鈥 (This World, 1989). From 1990-1997 he was a member of听the National Council for the Humanities, the presidentially appointed advisory board for the听National Endowment for the Humanities; in 1993-1995 he was Chair of its Public Programs听Committee. His B.A. is from Cornell University (1974) and his M.A. and Ph.D. are from the听University of Toronto (1976 and 1983).


Arthur Melzer

Arthur Melzer

Arthur Melzer, Professor of Political Science at Michigan State University, is also co-founder and Executive Director of MSU鈥檚 LeFrak Forum on Science, Reason, and Modern Democracy. He received his B.A. from Cornell University and his Ph.D. from Harvard University. He is a winner of an Outstanding Academic Title Award from the journal Choice, the MSU Social Science Alumni Outstanding Teaching Award, and William J. Beal Outstanding Faculty Award. He has been awarded research fellowships by the Mellon Foundation, the Institute for Educational Affairs, the Earhart Foundation,the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Program on Constitutional Government at Harvard University. His writings include: Philosophy Between the Lines:The Lost History of Esoteric Writing (University of Chicago Press, 2014) and The Natural Goodness of Man: On the System of Rousseau鈥檚 Thought (University of ChicagoPress, 1990).


Clifford Orwin

Clifford Orwin

Clifford Orwin is Professor of Political Science, Classics, and Jewish Studies at the University of Toronto. He is also Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University and a Founding Senior Fellow of the Berlin/Bochum Thucydides Center in Germany. He is the author of The Humanity of Thucydides (Princeton University Press, 1994; 5 th Ed. 2020, Mandarin translation 2015) and of many articles on the history of political thought as well as essays and columns on current issues. His major current project is a book on the thought of Flavius Josephus.


Thomas L. Pangle

Thomas L. Pangle

Thomas L. Pangle is the Joe R. Long Chair in Democratic Studies, Department of Government, and Co-Director, Thomas Jefferson Center for the Study of Core Texts and Ideas, at The University of Texas at Austin; prior to 2004, Prof. Pangle held the University Professorship in the Department of Political Science at the University of Toronto. He is a lifetime Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. In 1987 he delivered at the University of Chicago the Exxon Distinguished Lectures in Humane Approaches to the Social Sciences. In 2004 he was a featured speaker at the first Cultural Summit of the European Union, in Rotterdam, The Netherlands. In January 2007 he delivered the Werner Heisenberg Memorial Lecture, in Munich, Germany, at the invitation of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences. He has won Guggenheim, Killam-Canada Council, Carl Friedrich von Siemens, and four National Endowment for the Humanities fellowships. He has been awarded the Robert Foster Cherry Great Teacher of the World Prize, by Baylor University, and the Outstanding Graduate Teaching Award, Univ. of Texas.听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听

He is the author of articles in听Journal of Politics,听American Journal of Political Science,听Canadian Journal of Political Science,听Polity,听Political听Theory,听Review of Politics, Review of Metaphysics, and听American Political Science Review; among his books are听听(U. of Chicago Press, 1973);听听(U. of Chicago Press, 1988);听and听(U. of Chicago Press, 2010). He has forthcoming from Cornell U. Press a book entitled听The Life of Wisdom in Rousseau鈥檚听Reveries of the Solitary Walker.


Susan Shell

Susan Shell

Susan Shell is Professor of Political Science at 艾可直播 College.听 Her most recent book is The Politics of Beauty: A Study of Kant's Critique of Taste (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022).


John T. Scott

John T. Scott

John T. Scott is Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Davis. He received his PhD from the University of Chicago in 1992. Most of his research is on the thought of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and he is past President of the Rousseau Association. In addition to numerous articles in leading journals and chapters in edited volumes, he is the author of Rousseau鈥檚 God: Theology, Religion, and the Natural Goodness of Man (Chicago, 2023), Rousseau鈥檚 Reader: Strategies of Persuasion and Education (Chicago, 2020), The Philosophers鈥 Quarrel: Rousseau, Hume, and the Limits of Human Understanding (Yale, 2009) and The Routledge Guide to Machiavelli鈥檚 鈥淭he Prince鈥 (Routledge, 2016). He is the editor of Jean-Jacques Rousseau: Critical Assessments (Routledge, 2006) and Rousseau and l鈥橧nf芒me (Rodopi, 2009). He has translated and edited the Essay on the Origin of Languages and Writings Related to Music (Dartmouth, 1998) and Jean-Jacques Rousseau: Major Political Writings (Chicago, 2012).

Campus Map and Parking

Parking is available at the nearby Beacon Street and Commonwealth Avenue Garages.

艾可直播 College is also accessible via public transportation (MBTA B Line - 艾可直播 College).

Directions, Maps, and Parking

Visitor Parking Information

艾可直播 College strongly encourages conference participants to receive the COVID-19 vaccination before attending events on campus.