Responses to a Pandemic

Philosophical and Political Reflections

Edited by Anna Gotlib

What does it mean to be in the middle of a pandemic—for me, for my country, for the world? How do our current inequalities and injustices become amplified by the demands of the pandemic and what, if anything, can be done? Who is most impacted—and why does it seem that so many of the same people are, once again, deemed expendable and less-than? How do we explain COVID-19 and its attendant traumas to our children, and what do we teach them about hope, justice, grief, and the role of imagination in survival? And once the worst has passed, how to we start again, and what should we care about as we contemplate individual and collective repair?

In this collection of public and political philosophy, both well-established and up-and-coming philosophers come together to address these and other questions born of a devastating pandemic to which they are neither objective spectators nor observers, insulated by the passage of time. Indeed, the contributors to this volume are both grounded in, and immediately affected by, their own lived realities as source material for the questions that move and motivate them.

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers / Rowman & Littlefield International

• Trim: 6 x 9

978-1-5381-5404-5 • Hardback • July 2022 • $115.00 • (£88.00)

978-1-5381-5405-2 • eBook • July 2022 • $45.00 • (£35.00) (coming soon)

Subjects: Philosophy / Ethics / Bioethics, Philosophy / Social, Social Science / Anthropology / Medical

Responses to a Pandemic

Philosophical and Political Reflections

Hardback

Summary

What does it mean to be in the middle of a pandemic—for me, for my country, for the world? How do our current inequalities and injustices become amplified by the demands of the pandemic and what, if anything, can be done? Who is most impacted—and why does it seem that so many of the same people are, once again, deemed expendable and less-than? How do we explain COVID-19 and its attendant traumas to our children, and what do we teach them about hope, justice, grief, and the role of imagination in survival? And once the worst has passed, how to we start again, and what should we care about as we contemplate individual and collective repair?

In this collection of public and political philosophy, both well-established and up-and-coming philosophers come together to address these and other questions born of a devastating pandemic to which they are neither objective spectators nor observers, insulated by the passage of time. Indeed, the contributors to this volume are both grounded in, and immediately affected by, their own lived realities as source material for the questions that move and motivate them.

Details

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers / Rowman & Littlefield International

• Trim: 6 x 9

978-1-5381-5404-5 • Hardback • July 2022 • $115.00 • (£88.00)

978-1-5381-5405-2 • eBook • July 2022 • $45.00 • (£35.00) (coming soon)

Subjects: Philosophy / Ethics / Bioethics, Philosophy / Social, Social Science / Anthropology / Medical

Author

Anna Gotlib is associate professor of philosophy at Brooklyn College CUNY. Her areas of research and teaching include bioethics/medical ethics, moral psychology, social and political philosophy. She serves as one of the chief editors of IJFAB (International Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics). Her work has appeared in Hypatia, The International Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics, Journal of Bioethical Inquiry, Humana Mente, Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal, and a number of edited collections. She has published two edited volumes in moral psychology on the emotions of sadness and regret.

Table of Contents

1. Editor’s Introduction:
In Medias Res: Philosophers as Witnesses to Disaster
Anna Gotlib

II.Pandemic and Personal and Collective Identity
1. How Has the Pandemic Affected Our Relationships to Our Bodies?
Vanessa Wills
1. COVID-19 and the Politics of Home
Corey McCall

3. Waiting to Say Goodbye
J.S. Biehl

III. Pandemic, Illness, and Disability
1. Sometimes Life Gives One Way Too Many Lemons: Dealing with Cancer in a Time of Pandemic
Ruth Groenhout
1. Don’t Leave Persons With Disability Behind When Triaging Medical Scarcity
Eva Feder Kittay
1. Disability and Disproportionate Disadvantage
Kevin Timpe

IV.Pandemics and Social Justice
1. Transgender, Trump and the Public Health
Jamie Lindemann Nelson
1. The Lifeblood of the Body Politic
Jesi Taylor Cruz
1. New Labors, New Burdens, Care Work Re-narrated
Jennifer Scuro

V.Pandemic, Philosophy, and Meaning
1. Boundaries in a Time of Pandemic
Alexios Alexander
1. Science Will [Hopefully] Get Us Out of the Pandemic, But the Humanities Will Get Us Through It
Claire Katz
1. Disorientation, Liminality, and Hope in the Time of COVID-19
Barrett Emerick
1. The COVID-19 Guidebook for Living in an Alternate Universe
Eyja M. Brynjarsdóttir

VI. Pandemic and the Future
1. A Letter to My Nieces on Connecting the Dots
Gaile Pohlhaus
1. Viral Hope: When Quarantine Comes Home
Daniel Conway

VII. Index

VIII. Contributor Biographies

Responses to a Pandemic

Philosophical and Political Reflections

Edited by Anna Gotlib

Responses to a Pandemic

Philosophical and Political Reflections

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