Cfp: "Writing Philosophy's History," Department of Philosophy, Mary Immaculate College, University of Limerick, Irish Philosophical Society, April 15-16, 2011.

Keynote speaker: Professor Jonathan Rée

The conference addresses questions concerning philosophy's relationship to its own past. This should not to be seen as an opportunity for historians of philosophy to focus narrowly upon specific questions relating to texts or thinkers in the history of philosophy, nor should it be seen as an engagement with the philosophy of history. The purpose of the conference is much broader and more evidently methodological. It is designed to consider the ways philosophers conceptualize their own past and how this influences their interpretations of past texts (and their conceptions of the current tasks of philosophy). Amongst other things the conference focuses upon the following topics and questions:

* The relationship between philosophy and the history of philosophy.
* Methodological issues relating to the ways the history of philosophy is conceived.
* The history of philosophy as a hermeneutical task.
* Why is philosophy concerned with its past?
* Which theories of history are appropriate to the history of philosophy?
* Can one do philosophy without doing the history of philosophy?
* How is the philosophical canon constituted?
* How central figures in the history of philosophy have conceived of the history of philosophy.
* The history of philosophy as either a rationally or historically reconstructive enterprise.
* The history of the history of philosophy.
* The philosophy of the history of philosophy.
* Marxist and psychoanalytic approaches to the history of philosophy.
* The history of philosophy and postmodernism
* The history of philosophy in relation to issues of gender, class, and race.
* The role of biography and autobiography.

Send an abstract of up to 750 words, formatted for anonymous review, and sent by email to Dr. Chris Lawn (chris.lawn@mic.ul.ie) and Dr. Catherine Kavanagh (Catherine.Kavanagh@mic.ul.ie) by MARCH 11, 2011. In addition, on a separate sheet please include contact details. Notification of the committee's decision regarding submissions will be emailed no later than MARCH 25, 2011.