Dear philosophers of the South, I am hosting the Georgia Philosophical conference at Spelman this semester. I need you assistance, if you can. Let me explain: Last semester I attended the Fall conference. Over the course of the day, I was the only female faculty member in attendance. One female grad student dropped by for a talk. The only other women there were my students (and a lot of them too!). The only faculty or grad student of color there was a faculty member of a college in North Carolina, who was visiting Atlanta at the time. The only other people of color there were, again, my students. All presenters were white males. As you can imagine, my students were very aware of this lack of representation. I had to have a serious chat with my students about the climate of philosophy. I also explained to them that the lack of marginalized folks present is often times not a lack of interest, but rather a lack of feeling welcome or invited, given the repeated absence of such members at conferences. When I was asked to host the Spring meeting, I agreed. BUT I put my foot down. I insisted that there was no way I would allow this problem to occur on the Spelman campus. I made three stipulations: 1) there is not to be only white male presenters 2) they need to reach out to marginalized philosophers and 3) they need to include a variety of branches since the conference is open topic. I've made it very clear, and I have also told my chair, that should the program come out and fail to include a range of philosophers, that I will cancel the conference by revoking the use of our facilities. Now, given that I'm committed to pursuing diversity in philosophy and I'm making these stipulations, it becomes partially my responsibility to try to bring folks in and together. When I brought up these problems, it was embedded in the discussion that it wasn't the organization's fault if Others didn't want to attend. (That was how it sounded to me.) Now, the person I have been communicating with is most certainly female-friendly. However, even the most female-friendly colleagues can miss the most obvious underlying problems that we, as women and philosophers of color, have been pointing to for quite some time. This is where you all come in. If you are in or near Georgia and have a conference paper lying around, PLEASE submit it to the call for papers. If you are in or near Georgia and do not have a paper ready, PLEASE consider attending the meeting. I am forwarding the call for paper and it is attached to this email. We have all been fighting against and trying to correct the problem of all male speaker lists as of late. Please help me in my goal of preventing another conference of this sort. Please help me make this conference, which is being held at an all-women's HBCU, a success. If you have any questions, please contact me. Also, let's keep this between us. I'm already rocking the boat enough. (Please note the inclusion of undergrads. I was in a group discussion and told them that I reserved an auditorium because my students would be there. One of the members tried to object to the inclusion of undergrads because the material would "go over their heads". I lost my tempter- Spelman is a liberal arts college and has only undergrads. This would implicitly entail holding the conference on the Spelman campus but exclude its students! I made it very clear that it is my job to introduce my students to philosophy in action. So I'm glad to see that the tone is much more welcoming.) Call for papers: I’ve attached the program for the March 24th meeting of the Georgia Philosophical Society at Spelman College. Please circulate the attachment to interested parties. If you are receiving this material in error, please let me know how to contact interested persons so that information about the Georgia Philosophical Society can reach them. We have had very poor attendance at recent meetings. The officers of the society believe that Georgia Philosophical Society is an important society that needs the support of philosophers in Georgia. Please encourage your colleagues and your students to attend. The society’s meeting would give grad students and even undergrad students a sense of one of the things that professional philosophers engage in. You might even want to arrange for transportation for your students. And of course, please attend yourself . Thank you, Raymond Woller Secretary, Georgia Phil -- All my best, Shay Welch Assistant Professor of Philosophy Spelman College ############################ To unsubscribe from the FEAST-L list: write to: mailto:[log in to unmask] or click the following link: https://listserv.jmu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=FEAST-L&A=1