The Philosophy of Oral History

This conversation will explore oral history and its role in producing empathy and compassion in its audience. The structure will allow Professor Lorraine Besser of the Philosophy department and Professor Don Wyatt of the History department to discuss these issues as they see fit and in accordance with the flow of the conversation. Possible topics will include Martha Nussbaum’s writing on emotional refinement, the limitations and danger of sentimental education, and the methods by which oral histories may best be leveraged to produce social good.

The conversation will be held over Zoom: RSVP at go/oralhistory/

Professor Lorraine Besser is Professor of Philosophy at Middlebury College. She has published widely on moral psychology, well-being, and virtue ethics, and is the author of Eudaimonic Ethics: The Philosophy and Psychology of Living Well (2014) and co-editor of The Routledge Companion to Virtue Ethics (2015).

Professor Don Wyatt is John M. McCardell, Jr. Distinguished Professor of History at Middlebury College. He specializes is in courses incorporating the discipline of philosophy as well as history. He is the author of “The Blacks of Premodern China” (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2010) and “Battlefronts Real and Imagined: War, Border, and Identity in the Chinese Middle Period” (Palgrave Macmillan, 2008).”