University of Glasgow October 2018 Gifford Lectures: Judith Butler [aun]

> The University of Glasgow announces the 2018 Gifford Lectures > Professor Judith Butler: ‘What does inequality have to do with non-violence?’ > 1st-4th October 2018 > > About the Gifford Lectures > The prestigious Gifford Lectures are a series of talks delivered annually at the universities of Glasgow, Edinburgh, St. Andrews and Aberdeen. They were established by Adam Lord Gifford (1820–1887), a senator of the College of Justice in Scotland. The purpose of Lord Gifford’s bequest to the four universities was to sponsor lectures to “promote and diffuse the study of Natural Theology in the widest sense of the term.” (www.gla.ac.uk/events/lectures/gifford/about/) > > Since the first lecture series in 1888, delivered at the University of Glasgow by Max Müller, Gifford Lecturers have been recognised as pre-eminent thinkers in their respective fields. Some of the many notable speakers to have delivered lectures include: Henri Bergson, William James, Hannah Arendt, Noam Chomsky, Paul Ricoeur, Stanley Hauerwas, Martha Nussbaum, Jean-Luc Marion, Iris Murdoch, Eleonore Stump, Charles Taylor, Alfred North Whitehead, Rowan Williams, Gianni Vattimo, Bruno Latour, and Gabriel Marcel. > > About the Speaker > This year’s speaker is Judith Butler, Maxine Elliot Professor in the Department of Comparative Literature and the Program of Critical Theory at the University of California, Berkeley. > In her lectures, Professor Butler will suggest that a philosophy of non-violence has to take into account forms of inequality that value certain lives more highly than others. So the task is to develop a philosophy of non-violence that allows the moral questions usually associated with non-violent practice to be seen as bearing on questions of political inequality as well. The purpose would be to show that the defence of non-violence cannot be successful if it does not take this kind of differential valuing of life into account, which means that a philosophy of non-violence is only possible within a broader commitment to equality. These questions bear as well on the concepts of grievable and ungrievable life that Professor Butler has developed elsewhere as well as a conception of livable life at work in her critique of precarity. > > Details of the Event > The lectures will take place on October 1st, 2nd, and 3rd at 18.00 at the Bute Hall, University of Glasgow. > This is a free but ticketed event. To register for any of the three lectures please visit: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/glasgow-gifford-lectures-2018-judith-butler-tickets-43085964279 > > Professor Butler will also lead a seminar on the 4th of October, the details of which will be announced in a subsequent communication. > The Gifford Lectures Committee of the University of Glasgow > > www.gla.ac.uk/events/lectures/gifford/ > > gifford-lectures@glasgow.ac.uk >