Collective residencies / FEMINISMS / Olot
ERIKA RUONAKOSKI
From Monday, 23 October 2017 to Sunday, 12 November 2017
Bio
Erika Ruonakoski is a Finnish philosopher, who currently works at the University of Jyväskylä. Phenomenology of the body, existentialism and feminist philosophy form the theoretical basis of her work, which focuses on the themes of intersubjectivity, gender, embodiment, animality and temporality. Before her current project Gender and Philosophy she did research on Simone de Beauvoir’s philosophy and translated a number of Beauvoir’s works, including the Finnish versions of Must We Burn Sade? (2007), The Ethics of Ambiguity (2011) and of The Second Sex (2009 and 2011, with Iina Koskinen and Hanna Lukkari). Her co-authored book with Tua Korhonen, Human and Animal in Ancient Greece: Empathy and Encounter in Classical Literature, came out in 2017. It continued the theme of empathy with animals, which was already present in her doctoral dissertation Eläimen tuttuus ja vieraus (2011, Familiarity and foreignness of animals).
Project
During her residency, she will give the finishing touches to her book The Situated Student: Strategies of Inclusion in Teaching Philosophy. The book is a part of the Erasmus+ Strategic Partnership Gender and Philosophy, created to counteract the marginalisation of women and minorities in philosophy by means of pedagogy. It is written as a reference book on inclusive pedagogy, but it is also a philosophical inquiry into the possibilities and restrictions produced in the classroom.
Faber: Work, Friends and Mountains
My three weeks at Faber Residency were filled with intense work and numerous inspiring discussions with the other residents. Working at the residency leaves you a lot of choice with how to schedule your days, and each group can fashion their mutual activities quite freely. In the residency period of feminism, we organised round table sessions almost every evening to discuss our work and ideas. I found these informal discussions very fruitful, enjoying being exposed not only to different viewpoints of feminist scholars but also to the work of feminist poets, novelists and translators. For exercise, we went walking in the countryside and its forests and hills that started practically from the backyard of the residency. In this sense, the period at Faber Residency was a combination of solitary work, togetherness with the other residents, and experiencing the Catalonian nature, in particular the magnificent mountains that surround the Olot region and look different every day depending on the weather. I very much appreciated also the warm and welcoming attitude of the Faber staff, and especially Francesc Serés’ hospitality when he took us to many interesting sites in the comarca of Garrotxa.