Paul Fairfield

Introducing Dewey. Bloomsbury, 2024.
Publisher's description: "This introduction to one of the most influential philosophers in American history examines every major dimension of John Dewey's philosophy, from his early post-Hegelian idealism to pragmatic experimentalism, as well as his views on ethics and political theory, philosophy of education, aesthetics, and philosophy of religion. It situates Dewey's thought in the context of his time (1859-1952) and personal biography while also discussing his considerable work as America's foremost public intellectual through the first half of the twentieth century. With a particular focus on how Dewey's thought can be applied to real life and its particular relevance to the contemporary moment, Introducing Dewey is the ideal starting point for anyone with an interest in this seminal figure in American philosophy."
Contents:
1. Dewey’s Context
2. Post-Hegelian Idealism and the Concept of Experience
3. Pragmatic Experimentalism
4. Ethics
5. Liberal Politics
6. Philosophy of Education
7. Philosophy of Religion
8. Aesthetics
9. Dewey's Legacy

Historical Imagination: Hermeneutics and Cultural Narrative. Rowman and Littlefield, 2022.
Publisher's description: "Historical Imagination defends a phenomenological and hermeneutical account of historical knowledge. The book’s central questions are what is historical imagination, what is the relation between the imaginative and the empirical, in what sense is historical knowledge always already imaginative, how does such knowledge serve us, and what is the relation of historical understanding and self-understanding? Paul Fairfield revisits some familiar hermeneutical themes and endeavors to develop these further while examining three important periods in which historical reassessments or re-imaginings of the past occurred on a large scale. The conception of historical imagination that emerges seeks to advance beyond the debate between empiricists and postmodern constructivists while focusing on narrative as well as a more encompassing interpretation of who an historical people were, how things stood with them, and how this comes to be known. Fairfield supplements the philosophical argument with an historical examination of how and why during late antiquity, early Christian thinkers began to reimagine their Greek and Roman past, followed by how and why renaissance and later enlightenment figures reimagined their ancient and medieval past."
Contents:
Introduction: Changing the Record
1. Historical Imagination I: Interpretation, Narrative, Constructivism
2. Historical Imagination II: Evidence and Intentionality
3. Early Christian Reimaginings
4. Renaissance Reimaginings
5. Enlightenment Reimaginings
6. Historical Imagination and Cultural Studies
7. Conclusion

Essays: The Philosophy Crush Podcast. Outskirts Press, 2021.
Publisher's description: "This [self-published] book comprises the complete essays from the Philosophy Crush podcast, a miscellany of reflections and intellectual venturings that hopefully hold some relevance for our times. With topics ranging from 'Philosophy as a way of life' to 'Bring back the existentialists,' 'The importance of reading books,' 'Free speech 101,' 'What makes innovation possible?,' 'The individual against the mass,' 'Where are we going?,' 'The search for meaning,' and 'Why is Bob Dylan the greatest songwriter?,' the 75 essays that make up this book are 'essais' in Montaigne’s sense—'attempts,' with an emphasis on brevity, subjectivity, and accessibility to a general audience."

Philosophical Reflections on Antiquity: Historical Change. Lexington (Rowman and Littlefield), 2020.
Publisher's description: "Is there a logic of historical change, and must the collapse of teleology deter us from inquiring anew whether any recurring patterns and themes show themselves amid the complexity of historical life? If any conception of universal history remains possible, Paul Fairfield argues, it is one that rejects teleology and causal laws while identifying thematic tendencies which afford some semblance of unity, including the enduring phenomena that are interlocution, the struggle for predominance, and the endless back and forth that plays out between them. Philosophical Reflections on Antiquity focuses on the transitional periods of archaic Greece and late antiquity, the ostensible birth and death of the ancient western world. A careful interpretation of the social, political, and intellectual history of these important turning points brings to light some philosophical understanding of the dynamics of change itself. The transition from archaic to classical Greece was no miracle story, while the end of the Roman era can no longer be conceived as a decline and fall story. These were not complete breaks but relative beginnings and endings in narratives that are ongoing."
Contents:
Part I: Transitions
1. Introduction: On Universal History
2. Nomenclature
Part II: The Birth of the Ancient World
3. A Miracle Story: On Social History
4. Power and Reason: On Political History
5. From Mythos to Mythos: On Intellectual History
Part III: Late Antiquity
6. Civilizational Collapse? On Social History
7. Decline or Transformation: On Political History
8. Christianization: On Intellectual History
9. Conclusion: Marching in Place

Artistic Creation: A Phenomenological Account. Co-authored with Jeff Mitscherling. Lexington (Rowman and Littlefield), 2019.
Publisher's description: "Artistic creation has proven remarkably resistant to philosophical analysis. Artists have long struggled to explain how they do what they do, and philosophers have struggled along with them. This study does not attempt to offer a comprehensive account of all creativity or all art. Instead it tries to identify an essential feature of an activity that has been cloaked in mystery for as long as history records. Jeff Mitscherling and Paul Fairfield argue that the process by which art is created has a good deal in common with the experience of the audience of a work, and that both experiences may be described phenomenologically in ways that show surprising affinities with what artists themselves often report."
Contents:
Preface: Tracking Intentions
1. What Artists Tell Us
2. Some Central Concepts and Theories
3. More Clues from Plato and Aristotle
4. A Model of the Work of Art
5. Structural and Hermeneutic Considerations
6. Implications
7. Conclusion

Hermeneutics and Phenomenology: Figures and Themes. Anthology co-edited with Saulius Geniusas. Bloomsbury, 2018.
Publisher's description: "The relationship between these two central theoretical and philosophical approaches, which we thought we knew, is more complex and interesting than our standard story might suggest. It is not always clear how hermeneutics—that is, post-Heideggerian hermeneutics as articulated by Hans-Georg Gadamer, Paul Ricoeur, and a large number of thinkers working under their influence—regards the phenomenological tradition, be it in its Husserlian or various post-Husserlian formulations. This volume inquires into this issue both in general, conceptual terms and through specific analyses into questions of ontology and metaphysics, science, language, theology, and imagination. With a substantial editors' introduction, the volume contains 15 chapters, from some of the most significant scholars in this field covering the essential questions about the history, present and future of these two disciplines. The volume will be of interest to any philosopher or student with an interest in developing a sophisticated and nuanced understanding of contemporary hermeneutics and phenomenology."

Relational Hermeneutics: Essays in Comparative Philosophy. Anthology co-edited with Saulius Geniusas. Bloomsbury, 2018.
Publisher's description: "Investigating connections between philosophical hermeneutics and neighbouring traditions of thought, this volume considers the question of how post-Heideggerian hermeneutics, as represented by Gadamer, Ricoeur and recent scholars following in their wake, relate to these traditions, both in general terms and bearing upon specific questions. The traditions covered in this volume—existentialism, pragmatism, poststructuralism, Eastern philosophy, and hermeneutics itself—are all characterized by significant internal diversity, adding to the difficulty in reaching an interpretation that is at once comparative and critical. None of these traditions represent a unified system of belief; all are umbrella terms which are at once useful and imprecise, and the differences internal to each must not to be understated. An innovative work of comparative philosophy, this volume avoids oversimplification and offers specific analyses that treat hermeneutics in relation to particular themes and key figures in each of these traditions of thought. Philosophical hermeneutics is explicitly dialogical, and it is in this spirit that the authors of this book approach their subjects, revealing the important affinities and opportunities for mutually enriching conversations which have until now been overlooked. "

Teachability and Learnability: Can Thinking Be Taught? Routledge, 2016.
Publisher's description: "Deep disagreements exist regarding what thinking and critical thinking are and to what extent they are teachable. Thinking is learned in some measure by all, but not everything that is learnable is also teachable in an institutional setting. In questioning the relationship between teachability and learnability, Fairfield investigates the implications of thinking as inquiry, education as the cultivation of agency, and self-education. By challenging some of the standard conceptions of thinking, the author explores the limits of teachability and advances critiques of standardized tests, digital learning technologies, and managerialism in education. "
Contents:
1. Introduction
2. Teachability, Learnability, and Agency
3. What Is Education?
4. The Promise and Limits of Educational Technology
5. Thinking as Inquiry
6. From Reflective to Meditative and Critical Thinking
7. The Educated Mind
8. Self-Education
9. Conclusion

Education and Conversation: Exploring Oakeshott's Legacy. Anthology co-edited with David Bakhurst. Bloomsbury, 2016.
Publisher's description: "Since Michael Oakeshott spoke of education as initiation into 'the conversation of mankind' more than fifty years ago, the idea has inspired a diverse array of thinkers and continues to be invoked today by those seeking to resist the influence of managerialism and narrow instrumentalism in educational policy and practice. Education and Conversation draws together papers written by scholars from both the analytic and continental philosophical traditions to offer a variety of perspectives on the implications of Oakeshott's educational ideas. The metaphor of the conversation of mankind is explored, together with the roots of Oakeshott's thinking in his early philosophical work, the relevance of his ideas to the concept of Bildung, and the significance of his political conservatism in evaluating the seemingly progressive potential of his educational ideas. In addition, concepts prominent in Oakeshott's thought are taken up and brought to bear on contemporary philosophical discussions about education, learning and development, including the nature of initiation, the phenomenology of listening, and the value of the liberal arts tradition. Education and Conversation shows how the idea of conversation illuminates both the character and the ends of education, yielding insight into the scope and limits of the philosophy of education and the character of philosophical inquiry more generally. "

Death: A Philosophical Inquiry. Routledge, 2014.
Publisher's description: "From Nietzsche's pronouncement that 'God is dead' to Camus' argument that suicide is the fundamental question of philosophy, the concept of death plays an important role in existential phenomenology, reaching from Kierkegaard to Heidegger and Marcel. This book explores the phenomenology of death and offers a unique way into the phenomenological tradition. Death: A Philosophical Inquiry is essential reading for students of phenomenology and existentialism, and will also be of interest to scholars and students in related fields such as religion, anthropology and the medical humanities."
Contents:
Introduction: Death and Existence
1. The Denial of Death
2. Death Rituals
3. Voluntary Death
4. Being-Toward-Death
5. Openness to Mystery
6. On Speculation and Hope

Philosophical Hermeneutics Reinterpreted: Dialogues with Existentialism, Pragmatism, Critical Theory, and Postmodernism. Bloomsbury, 2011.
Publisher's description: "In this important new study, Paul Fairfield examines a number of issues of central importance to philosophical hermeneutics. His aim is less to reexamine the basic hypotheses of hermeneutics (Gadamer's hermeneutics in particular) than to understand it in relational terms, by bringing it into closer association with existentialism, pragmatism, critical theory, and postmodernism. Fairfield contends that there are important affinities and areas for critical exchange between hermeneutics and these four schools of thought which have, until now, remained underappreciated. Philosophical Hermeneutics Reinterpreted examines several of these connections by interpreting hermeneutics in relation to specific themes in the writings of key figures within each of these traditions. In so doing, he both clarifies some outstanding issues in hermeneutics and advances the subject beyond what Heidegger, Gadamer, and Ricoeur have given us."
Contents:
Introduction: Hermeneutical Engagements
1. Perspectivism: Friedrich Nietzsche
2. Reason as Boundless Communication: Karl Jaspers
3. The Thou and the Mass: Gabriel Marcel
4. Truth After Correspondence: William James
5. The Theory of Inquiry: John Dewey
6. Practice, Theory, and Anti-Theory: Richard Rorty
7. Interpretation and Criticism: Max Horkheimer
8. Deliberative Politics: Jurgen Habermas
9. Discourse Ethics: Karl-Otto Apel
10. Genealogy and Suspicious Interpretation: Michel Foucault
11. Radical Hermeneutics: John Caputo
12. Unprincipled Judgments: Jean-Francois Lyotard

Education, Dialogue, and Hermeneutics. Anthology. Continuum, 2010.
Publisher's description: "Philosophical hermeneutics has rich implications for the theory and practice of education, yet the topic has often been ignored. Education, Dialogue and Hermeneutics takes a variety of principles and themes from philosophical hermeneutics, drawing on insights from major figures such as Martin Heidegger, Hans-Georg Gadamer and Paul Ricoeur, and applies them to issues in education and the philosophy of education. Topics covered include the relevance and nature of dialogue and understanding in an educational setting, the nature of educational experience and the concept of Bildung, narrative and tradition. Timely and original, Education, Dialogue and Hermeneutics draws together eight original chapters written by leading scholars in the field of hermeneutics."

John Dewey and Continental Philosophy. Anthology. Southern Illinois University Press, 2010.
Publisher's description: "John Dewey and Continental Philosophy provides a rich sampling of exchanges that could have taken place long ago between the traditions of American pragmatism and continental philosophy had the lines of communication been more open between Dewey and his European contemporaries. Since they were not, Paul Fairfield and thirteen of his colleagues seek to remedy the situation by bringing the philosophy of Dewey into conversation with several currents in continental philosophical thought, from post-Kantian idealism and the work of Friedrich Nietzsche to twentieth-century phenomenology, hermeneutics, and poststructuralism. John Dewey and Continental Philosophy demonstrates some of the many connections and opportunities for cross-traditional thinking that have long existed between Dewey and continental thought but have been under-explored. The intersection presented here between Dewey's pragmatism and the European traditions makes a significant contribution to continental and American philosophy and will spur new and important developments in the American philosophical debate."

Education After Dewey. Continuum, 2009.
Publisher's description: "This study re-examines John Dewey's philosophy of education and asks how well it stands up today in view of developments in continental European philosophy. Do Martin Heidegger’s statements on the nature of thinking compel a re-examination of Dewey's view? Does Hans-Georg Gadamer's philosophy of experience advance beyond Dewey’s experimental model? How does a Deweyan view of moral or political education look in light of Hannah Arendt's theory of judgment, or Paulo Freire's theory of dialogical education? Part One of Education After Dewey looks at Dewey's conceptions of experience and thinking in connection with two of the most important figures in twentieth-century phenomenology and hermeneutics, Heidegger and Gadamer. It also returns to an old distinction in the philosophy of education between progressivism and conservatism, in order to situate and clarify Dewey's position and to frame the argument of this book. Part Two applies this principled framework to the teaching of several disciplines of the human sciences: philosophy, religion, ethics, politics, history and literature. These are discussed with reference to the writings of Friedrich Nietzsche, John Caputo, Hannah Arendt, Paulo Freire, Michel Foucault, and Paul Ricoeur."
Contents:
Introduction: An Enigmatic Transition
1. Beyond Progressivism and Conservatism
2. Dewey's Copernican Revolution
3. What Is Called Thinking?
4. Teaching Philosophy: The Scholastic and the Thinker
5. Teaching Religion: Spiritual Training or Indoctrination?
6. Teaching Ethics: From Moralism to Experimentalism
7. Teaching Politics: Training for Democratic Citizenship
8. Teaching History: The Past and the Present
9. Teaching Literature: Life and Narrative

Why Democracy? State University of New York Press, 2008.
Publisher's description: "While much of the world now embraces the democratic idea—that the people must rule—the philosophical case for democracy has yet to be made convincingly. Why Democracy? not only reexamines current debates in normative democratic theory, but also challenges popular conceptions that tend toward an uncritical idealization of popular rule. It is not enough to call for more extensive public deliberation, or for greater participation and inclusion in the democratic process, or for a radical extension of the scope of the process. Making the case for democracy requires examining its imaginative and rhetorical dimensions as well. The democratic idea of 'rule by the people' must be understood less as a definition than as an aspiration, a trope, and the beginning of a narrative that includes, while extending beyond, the domain of government."
Contents:

Public/Private. Rowman and Littlefield, 2005.
Publisher’s description: “As impressions grow that privacy is under increasing threat, the sphere of private life has needed to reassert itself, yet efforts to this end are beset with numerous difficulties, including the ways in which the private sphere has for centuries been understood and misunderstood. While Public/Private takes up a broadly liberal perspective, it endeavors to reach beyond an audience of liberal theorists to include other political orientations and philosophical traditions. Fairfield examines the ethical-political significance as well as the policy implications of a right to privacy. Discussing the different applications of privacy laws, technology, property, and relationships, Fairfield writes in a style accessible to specialists and students alike.”
Contents:
1. Negotiating a Distinction
2. Privacy in an Age of Information
3. Political Philosophy in the Bedroom
4. Property and the Private Sphere
5. Revelation

The Ways of Power: Hermeneutics, Ethics, and Social Criticism. Duquesne University Press, 2002.
Publisher's description: "The Ways of Power advances a hermeneutical conception of ethics, one oriented particularly toward questions of power and the critique of power in the aftermath of foundationalism. Bringing into mutual interrogation such disparate traditions as hermeneutics, liberalism, critical theory and postmodernism, and such figures as Gadamer, Ricoeur, Habermas, Foucault, Nietzsche, and Artistotle, Fairfield argues that the principal question of ethics is no longer how to ground practices and judgments on a secure epistemological foundation. Rather, what is of importance is how normative discourses rooted in tradition and invested with power may adopt a critical posture toward these same conditions without generating an impossible circularity. "
Contents:
Introduction: The Ways of Power and the Question of Critique
1. The Will to Power and the Politics of Ressentiment
2. Power/Knowledge
3. The Critique of Ideology
4. The Practice of Criticism
5. Hermeneutical Ethical Theory
6. Conclusion

Moral Selfhood in the Liberal Tradition: The Politics of Individuality. University of Toronto Press, 2000.
Publisher's description: "Recent critiques of the foundations of liberalism from communitarian, socialist, postmodern, and other philosophical circles have served to remind liberals of several problematic assumptions at the heart of liberal doctrine from its inception to the present day. Such critiques necessitate a rethinking of the foundations of liberalism, and in particular those regarding the self and rationality that liberal politics presupposes. Beginning with a wide-ranging discussion of liberal philosophers—including Hobbes, Locke, Kant, Green, Mill, and Rawls—Paul Fairfield proposes that liberalism requires a complete reconception of moral selfhood, one that accommodates elements of the contemporary critiques without abandoning liberal individualism. The model that emerges is one of situated agency—of a historically and linguistically constituted being who is never without the capacity for individual and autonomous expression. Fairfield defends a narrative conception of moral selfhood in the tradition of phenomenological hermeneutics, one that affords a proper vantage point from which to support and interpret liberal principles."
Contents:

Theorizing Praxis: Studies in Hermeneutical Pragmatism. Peter Lang, 2000.
Publisher's description: "Theorizing Praxis investigates the theory/practice relation in philosophy, particularly within the fields of hermeneutics, ethics, and the philosophy of education. In so doing, it uncovers important areas of common ground between hermeneutical and pragmatist philosophy. Paul Fairfield defends a 'practice-immanent' method of theorizing which is indebted to both traditions and aims to explicitly articulate the spontaneously emergent constitutional dynamics of social practices rather than continue the project of transcendental theory construction."
Contents:

Is There a Canadian Philosophy? Reflections on the Canadian Identity. Co-authored with G. B. Madison and I. Harris. University of Ottawa Press, 2000.
Publisher's description: "Is There a Canadian Philosophy? addresses the themes of community, culture, national identity, and universal human rights, taking the Canadian example as its focus. The authors argue that nations compelled to cope with increasing demands for group recognition may do so in a broadly liberal spirit without succumbing to the dangers associated with an illiberal, adversarial multiculturalism. They identify and describe a Canadian civic philosophy and attempt to show how this modus operandi of Canadian public life is capable of reconciling questions of collective identity and recognition with a commitment to individual rights and related principles of liberal democracy. They further argue that this philosophy can serve as a model for nations around the world faced with internal complexities and growing demands for recognition from populations more diverse than at any previous time in their histories."

"Hermeneutical Pragmatism." In Relational Hermeneutics: Essays in Comparative Philosophy, eds. Paul Fairfield and Saulius Geniusas (London: Bloomsbury, 2018).

"Lords of Mendacity." In America's Post-Truth Phenomenon, ed. C. G. Prado (Santa Barbara: Praeger, 2018).

"Nietzsche and Self-Education." In Encyclopedia of Educational Philosophy and Theory, ed. Michael A. Peters (New York: Springer, 2017).

"Make It Scientific: Education as a Social Science." In Hermeneutic Philosophies of Social Science, ed. Babette Babich (Berlin: de Guyter, 2017).

"Social Media and Communicative Unlearning: Learning to Forget in Communicating." In Social Media and Your Brain, ed. C. G. Prado (Santa Barbara: Praeger, 2016).

"Artistic Creation: On Mitscherling and Dylan." In Essays on Aesthetic Genesis, eds. Charlene Elsby and Aaron Massecar (Lanham: University Press of America, 2016).

"A Phenomenology of Listening." In Education and Conversation: Exploring Oakeshott's Legacy, eds. David Bakhurst and Paul Fairfield (London: Bloomsbury, 2016).

"Rationality, Knowledge, and Relativism." In The Blackwell Companion to Hermeneutics, eds. Chris Lawn and Niall Keane (London: Blackwell, 2016).

"Hermeneutics and Education." In The Blackwell Companion to Hermeneutics, eds. Chris Lawn and Niall Keane (London: Blackwell, 2016).

Teaching

The focus of my teaching at Queen's is philosophy in the continental European tradition. I teach the following undergraduate courses more or less annually: "Continental Philosophy 1800–1900" (Philosophy 273); "Continental Philosophy 1900–1960" (Philosophy 373); and "Continental Philosophy 1960–The Present" (Philosophy 374). Each course examines three philosophers, to each of whom is devoted about four weeks of class time. Authors and texts vary from year to year. My somewhat lengthy lecture notes are published here (below) rather than on the Queen's University website onQ. For the September 2024 through Winter 2025 teaching year I will be offering Philosophy 374 in the fall semester and Philosophy 111 through both semesters.

Most years I teach a seminar course for graduate students and (sometimes) fourth-year philosophy majors, either "Hermeneutics" or "Major Figures." In recent years I have offered seminars on John Dewey, Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, and Hans-Georg Gadamer. During the winter of 2025 I will once again be offering a graduate seminar on Hermeneutics (Philosophy 867); this time we shall concentrate on a couple of recent books by Jeff Mitscherling: Aesthetic Genesis and Artistic Creation (coauthored by myself).

Continental Philosophy 1960–The Present (Philosophy 374)
Philosophers and texts covered:
Hannah Arendt, Between Past and Future
Hans-Georg Gadamer, Reason in the Age of Science
Jeff Mitscherling and myself, Artistic Creation: A Phenomenological Analysis
Lecture notes here

Continental Philosophy 1900–1960 (Philosophy 373)
Philosophers and texts covered:
Martin Heidegger, "Introduction to Being and Time," "Letter on Humanism," and "What Calls for Thinking?"
Edith Stein, On the Problem of Empathy
Gabriel Marcel, Man Against Mass Society
Lecture notes here

Continental Philosophy 1800–1900 (Philosophy 273)
Philosophers and texts covered:
Søren Kierkegaard, Concluding Unscientific Postscript
Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil
Wilhelm Dilthey, Introduction to the Human Sciences
Lecture notes here

Ancient Greek Philosophy (Philosophy 233)
Philosophers and texts covered:
Plato, Republic
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics
Lecture notes here

What Is Philosophy? An Historical Introduction (Philosophy 111)
Philosophers and texts covered:
Plato, "The Apology of Socrates" and "Symposium"
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
Augustine, Confessions (selections)
Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica (selections)
Michel de Montaigne, Essays (selections)
René Descartes, Meditations
Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan (selections)
Henry David Thoreau, Walden; or, Life in the Woods (selections)
Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols
Lecture notes here

Some tips for undergraduates on writing essays in philosophy: here