Wednesday Dialogues to resume at SMPL

The Texas State Department of Philosophy announced that its Wednesday community outreach dialogues at the San Marcos Public Library have resumed after a pandemic-induced hiatus beginning in March 2020.

The Dialogues at the San Marcos Public Library are part of the Philosophy Dialogue Series at Texas State. Now celebrating its 26th year, the series enriches the cultural and academic life of both the university and community by providing an open forum for the lively exchange and critical evaluation of diverse ideas. From its inception in 1995, the series has grown from a few presentations a month to more than 50 events each semester. All events are free and open to the public. The current dialogue calendar can be found at the philosophy website txstate.edu/philosophy/dialogue-series/Dialogue-Schedule.html

In 2012, the series began offering dialogues at the San Marcos Public Library to extend its community outreach. These well-attended dialogues provide a bridge between the university and the community and stimulate intergenerational conversation between students and residents of Central Texas. They have been popular, with a diverse “town-gown” audience of students and library patrons ranging in age from 18 to 80-plus years.

Each semester, philosophy faculty, majors, and graduate students from the Master of Arts in Applied Philosophy and Ethics (MAAPE) program choose a set of eight topics and design an interdisciplinary series of lectures, interactive presentations and discussions around them. Selection of the topics is based on intellectual and moral import, general interest and contemporary relevance, and often involve controversial topics that are “in the news.” A goal of the series is to deepen understanding of these difficult subjects and to enable participants to connect them with their underlying assumptions and philosophical roots. In addition, the series cooperates with the Texas State University Common Experience program to include many topics that harmonize with the current theme, which for this year is “Compassion.” The eight weekly topics for this semester are:

• Dazed and Confused: Reflections on the Plague Year and Beyond

• Compassion and Empathy

• The Other

• Critical Race Theory and Education

• Compassion and Community

• Masked or Unmasked?

• God and Nature

• Conspiracies

The first Wednesday philosophy dialogue at the San Marcos Public Library took place on Oct. 6. Focused on the sensitive and timely topic “What and How Should We Teach Our Children about Race and Racism?” it featured a panel of scholars — Goyland Williams, Frank de la Teja and Dwonna Goldstone — followed by a deliberative dialogue with participants. The deliberative dialogue approach involves people in active conversation rather than expecting them to passively listen to what “experts” have to say on an issue. It uses critical thinking and reasoning, honest and respectful communication, and careful listening to enhance understanding and search for common ground on contentious issues. Panelist Goyland Williams, a Texas State alumnus, Ph.D. candidate and W.E.B. Du Bois scholar at The University of Massachusetts-Amherst, was featured in several other dialogues that same week sponsored by Humanities Texas.

A second library dialogue Oct. 13 focused on “Compassion, Voting, and Community Building” and was led by Developmental Education graduate students Jonathan Lollar and Sam Owens.

Three library dialogues remain. On Oct. 20 “Grief, Spirituality, and Anger After a COVID-19 Loss” will be the focus of Natasha Mikles (Philosophy and Religious Studies). On Oct. 27, Sean Daniel Johnson (Texas State Philosophy Alumnus) will discuss “Spinoza’s Ethics and Its God.” Nov. 3 will feature Jonathan Surovell (Philosophy) on the topic “Ideological Pathogens and Propaganda.”

The Texas State Philosophy Department invites all readers to participate in these interesting and important dialogues.