 So, once again, you all welcome to the second lecture in the Suas World Philosophies by monthly lecture series. Today we have the pleasure to listen to Dr. Ufo Shivasie. So I'll say just give a brief introduction, introductory mark for a guest speaker. Dr. Ufo Shivasie is a senior lecturer at the Department of Philosophy at the University of Pretoria. She is the seventh president of the Philosophical Society of Southern Africa. Her research interests include personhood, part of which we'll be hearing about into this lecture. Persona, uniqueness, themes of love, autonomy, authenticity, death and African ethics, as well as a space of race and feminism. She has authored in these areas, several academic papers as well, and she's also worked on different interdisciplinary institutional projects at the University of Pretoria that were mainly hosted by the Center for Human Rights. Dr. Ufo Shivasie was a member of the Moralities Research Group at the Beirut University in Germany, where she was invited as a visiting scholar. Ufo holds the 2018 Dean's Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Humanities Faculty and the 2019 Institute of People Management, CU's Excellence Award. She was also on the list of the 2019 Main and Guided and 20 Most Influential Young South African. So we are really pleased to have you with us today, Dr. Ufo. Before you begin your talk, just a little about the World Philosophies Program at Suas. The World Philosophies Program at Suas is a philosophy program that is primarily concerned with a decolonial approach to doing philosophy. So we have a lot within our curriculum on African philosophy, Indian philosophy and other world philosophical traditions. So the goal is to approach philosophy from a decolonial perspective, which is why we organize this lecture as part of a central to the way we approach philosophy within the World Philosophies Program at Suas. The subject head for the World Philosophies Program is Dr. Sean Hawthorne, who is here, just waving us, and we have a colleague here too, Dr. Andrew Hines. So with this team, we are really doing our best to help students realize that philosophy isn't just a Western enterprise, definitely, but a global and world enterprise. And there's so much rich traditional philosophy out there that we need to be aware of and we need to talk about and study about. And today we'll find it also very interesting to hear about concepts of personhood, particularly from the African perspective as Dr. Ufo discusses her paper. So, without wasting much time, we would like to now invite Dr. Ufo Shivasse to please go ahead and present her paper, which is titled Black Women Persons. You have our attention. Thank you so much, Elvis. Thank you for everybody here. Hello to all of you. And thank you really Elvis, Andrew and Sean for the invitation to come and speak at Suas today. I really appreciate it. In my talk, I'd like to put it out there as a conversation starter. These are ideas that have been going on in my mind and I think I was saying earlier to Andrew that they concretize as I think I have conversations with other people. So here it goes. Our Black Women Persons. At first glance that seems like a pretty straightforward question with a plain spoken answer which might read something like, yes, of course, Black women are persons. Well, this might be metaphysically true. I think there is an enormous gap when it comes to the recognition of the moral worth of Black women. I'm motivated to make this claim by the endless reports of the different forms of abuse that Black women suffer in the South African society today. Incidents of gender-based violence and genocide have become such an abnormal norm, so much so that our own political leaders think it is enough to verbally reprimand the society and just take no further action to curb violence against women. Or so, or at least, what's it? It's disheartening when we have fellow Black women in influential positions like our minister Angie Mutecha, who would present statements such as educated Black men don't rape. I often hear commentary at social gatherings about how much this is a problem, but hardly any work is done by our police services to stop this. It's obviously disheartening as it increases the racial hierarchy in valuing that has not been done away with even in the apartheid, although apartheid is done away with. There are several incidents that occur in society that make me wonder about the proper regard for the moral value of Black women. These incidents move me to question whether Black women are truly seen to have a status of personhood that affords them the dignity and respect. There are underreported cases of women suffering abuse in toxic work environments that exert violence on women in academic spaces. These forms of abuses, while not necessary physical, they wreak havoc in the mental welfare of women. Systematically, women are generally an underrepresented group in professional spaces. Apart from being underrepresented, they're also underappreciated, and this can be seen in the problem of gender pay gaps and what's it unequal appointment. Black women often share experiences about the exclusion, inferiorization and dispensability. Thinking about the experiences of Black women gave me the cause to consider whether academia can be exempt from discriminating against Black women, and I think not. To be brief, there are a few, there are different forms of abusive exclusions of Black women that form part of our everyday. These forms of exclusions are demeaning, and they indicate, at least to me, a level of disregard that knows away at the value of Black women. Black women in academia are not exempt from these kinds of exclusions that indicate the dispensability, inferiorization, and in many instances an unjustified trust deficit. In this presentation, I'm interested to analyze the place of Black women in society with the aim to understand their allegation to the position of knowledge consumers, rather than knowledge producers. I hope to do this through the lens of personhood and test whether part of the problem is the lack of moral regard for Black women, which results in the unwarranted trust deficit in their intellectual capacities that are responded to by emuting of Black female voices. I'll start by contextualizing the problem and then move on to illustrate the theories of personhood, especially the Kantian version of it, and how it fails Black women. Historically, women have been and continue to be racially and culturally discriminated against. Women in academia specifically have been relegated to the place of knowledge consumers rather than knowledge producers. In some questions regarding who is in the classrooms and which scholars are being taught, we find that it is mainly works produced by men that dominate the academy. This gives the fallacious view that Black women do not produce knowledge Black women cannot think. This view of Black women as consumers is also evident in the positions given to women in the academe. It is mostly white women who fill up the senior lecturer positions at least 46% in the South African higher education institutions. These are ships held mainly by men 71% in South African higher institutions. This indicates a low level of trust in the intellectual capabilities of Black women, I mean women, particularly Black women, which stands the development of Black women as well as their contributions towards transforming scholarship and institutional cultures that hinder gender class and racial equity. Gender inequity in academia subversed the diversity and uncovers the problem of epistemic injustice in the form of credibility deficit that is built on stereotypes and prejudices. Moreover, these stereotypes and prejudices appear to be a matter of misrecognition, which is far more damning when an oppressive system moves individuals to internalize misrecognized identities that in the case of women can be said to be grounded in Iris, Mary and Young's five phases of oppression, namely exploitation, marginalization, powerlessness, cultural imperialism and violence. My view is that these phases of oppression hinder considerations of diversity, which inadvertently have led to Black women not being acknowledged as competent scholars, teachers and producers of knowledge. So why do I approach the issue of Black women as knowledge consumers instead of knowledge producers through the lens of personhood? Well, it goes back to Emmanuel Kant. In a different paper where I addressed the uniqueness of women, I argued that it is difficult to speak about the identities of women, sorry, the identities that women foster as persons since it is unclear that they are considered full-fledged persons. The status as persons is important if we're to consider them responsible for themselves and others. In this particular paper, I blamed Kant for not theorizing appropriately about women so that we're able to view them as persons with dignity and to whom we owe respect. And I'll come back to this to say more about this in a moment. Personhood can be understood in the metaphysical and moral senses. And on the metaphysical view, personhood is generally a matter of displaying enough of a number of capabilities or capacities that grant humans personhood status. According to Michael Goodman, capacities include but are not limited to rationality, the ability for complex communication, consciousness, ability to take and reciprocate personal attitude towards another being, self-consciousness, the ability for self-motivated activity and freedom of the world. According to Goodman, we are to consider these conditions as necessary but not sufficient for moral personhood. While they're above mentioned, sorry, yeah, okay. Personhood is generally discussed in descriptive or prescriptive terms. And Afro-communitarianism offers a view of personhood that is understood to differ from the dominant view of personhood presented by Kant. Kant's view of personhood differs from the personalist approach that aims to show that personhood is an immortal aspect about humans that exalts their value above that of other species. Kant's view proposes the idea of persons as moral subjects whose personhood status involves moral and cultural education. Basically, Kant's view is that personhood is based on a certain human capacity such as rationality. A person according to Kant is a rational being and he champions the idea of rationality as a defining mark of personhood and places rationality as a requirement for the dignity. Full personhood status is only awarded to those who have the capacity for rationality. This way of thinking about persons is, in my view, exclusionary. It is common knowledge that Kant thought of women and children as beings who lack this rational capacity. This is a view that I criticized arguing that it places women and children outside the moral world, thus leaving them vulnerable to all sorts of moral violations. Moreover, such an exclusion prevents the society from holding women morally accountable for their actions. My concern follows the argument put forward by thinkers such as Susan Moeller Oaken, who reacts against philosophers such as Plato and Kant for relegating women so far outside the moral world that they render them a moral subject over whom males can claim ownership among many other unacceptable entitlements. The level of dehumanization that stems from such an exclusion, an exclusion based on the capacity for rationality, stretches over to affect intersectional issues relating to gender identity, mental health, sexuality and more. There is a distinction that Kant makes that is worth noting and this is namely the distinction between persons and things. The beings who exist, sorry, open quote, the beings whose existence rests not on our own will but on nature nevertheless have, if they are beings without reason, only a relative worth as means and are called things. Rational beings, by contrast, are called persons because their nature already marks them out as ends in themselves, that is, as something that may not be used merely as a means, hence to that extent limits all arbitrary choice. Close quote. This distinction is made based on value, where to think of persons and things as substances with different values, where the value of persons exalts them above that of things and animals. In the realm of ends, everything has either a dignity or a price. What has a price is such that something can also be put in its place as its equivalent. By contrast, that which is elevated about price, above price, and admits of no equivalent has dignity. That which refers to universal human inclinations and needs has a market price. And that which, sorry, even without presupposing any need is an accord with a certain taste and that is a satisfaction in the mere purposeless play of the powers of our minds and affective price. That which constitutes a condition under which alone something can be an end in itself does not have merely a relative worth and that is a prize, but rather an inner worth which is dignity. The value that persons have which stems from their capacity for rationality is dignity, which makes persons irreplaceable and incomparable. Contrary to persons things have the value of a price, which makes them replaceable. Unlike persons lack moral value and for Kant, the praiseworthy response is to value persons and that is their dignity through respect. This is an important distinction to note, since it complicates personhood in terms of what women and children are, since Kant does not recognize them as having the capacity for rationality, and so are not persons. Defending Kant, Lucie Alley argues that women and children, according to Kant, are not automatically subject to moral violations simply because he thinks they lack rationality. Kant affords them a kind of special protection that makes them, that makes moral care the responsibility of those with full personhood. Herein we're trying to understand women and children as moral patients, arguing in favor of recognition of all persons in society. Heiki Ikahemo makes a similar assertion with the aim to show that the socially politically and mentally vulnerable should not be abused, but rather they should be protected by those who have embraced their esteem as co-authors of social norms in society. The main view is that we are responsible for each other and so we should not take our privilege to marginalize and oppress others. Ikahemo's view differs from that given to us by Kant. Ikahemo does not depend, Ikahemo's view does not depend on individuals possessing rationality to deserve the same moral consideration. Kant's view does not protect the moral value of women and children directly, while Ikahemo's aims to do just that by placing an emphasis on dimensions of personhood that require recognition. The point I want to make here is that the idea that we should accept women and children as natural moral patients because of their gender and age respectively is morally unacceptable and it does not emancipate them from discrimination. Charles Mills offers a different category that has the potential to help us understand the logic of Kant's personhood as neither categorizing women as persons nor things. Mills introduces the idea of sub-persons. Although he creates this category in relation to the sub-personhood of black people, it does apply to black women as well. Mills' view is that Kant designed personhood to account for white people, hence it was okay for black people to be owned as slaves. What makes the category of sub-persons accommodating to women and children is that it is a category that sits between personhood and non-personhood. Women and children are characterized as neither persons nor things or animals, and so they fit into Mills' view of them as sub-persons. Much like Mills, I do not find this category morally acceptable as it privileges gender discrimination and ageism. At this point, I want to share an analysis on how Kant's theory of personhood is in general dehumanizing towards black people. I will share sections from a chapter I contributed to a book which is titled Toward an African Political Philosophy of Needs. Herein my aim is to show the place and impact of theories, particularly theories of personhood on exclusion and other forms of discrimination. My aim is to show that theories are not innocent tools. I want to implicate them on social and political problems with the ultimate aim to show that the failure to recognize black women as knowledge producers is not a problem that stems from nowhere. There are different criteria that seem to matter when it comes to the mechanisms of discrimination. These include but are not limited to class, race, gender, sexuality, religion and more. I think personhood should be added to this list of criteria for discrimination. I understand discrimination that dehumanizes individuals as an aspect of human experience, where Michael Clifford asserts that human experience is a matter of three axes, namely knowledge, power and ethics. I think personhood is a good topic from which to analyze the damage that comes with Kant's race theory and its implications for the personhood of black people, where in such implication is an undervaluing of black people's basic needs. The Kantian view of personhood is offensive on at least two accounts. The first is a matter of race and the other is a matter of gender. Both race and gender, as stated earlier, are relevant criteria for discrimination, which ultimately hinder the fair and just distribution of goods and values when responding to needs of people in society. For the moment, let me discuss Kant's racial offence on his conception of personhood. I'll start by explaining the theory and then illustrates how it is offensive to black people. According to Kant, this is going to sound a bit repetitive. According to Kant, a person is a rational being with a rational capacity. Rational capacity makes a person a being with moral worth. It is this moral worth that gives the value of dignity. Dignity exalts the value of persons above price, where price is understood to make it possible for things to be interchangeable in the same way that objects are. The idea of dignity makes persons irreplaceable and incomparable unlike objects or if we to for if we're to follow Kant's logic animals. Kant argues that the correct way to respond to a person's dignity is with respect and that is to say, harming or violating the well being of a person is considered immoral and that's unacceptable. It follows that those who lack the capacity for rationality are non persons. It may serve you well to keep in mind that Kant's aim in his theory of persons is to uncover what makes persons more valuable than non persons. His view is that persons are more valuable than animals, because persons have dignity, a value that animals lack. Given that it is rationality that gives persons dignity, this claim makes rationality an atomic feature that determines the difference between persons, animals and persons, where persons are moral beings with the value of dignity instead of interchangeable price. In short, rationality stands out in Kant's view as a distinguishing aspect between animals and persons. Furthermore, it is rationality that makes persons educable. Kant understands persons to be innately corruptible, and he thinks it is the moral education that saves that will save persons from their natural corruptible state. In order to master moral education persons have to overcome their egocentric delusions of self love. He claims that self love and moral law cannot be on par with each other. He insists that self love and the related inclinations must be so coordinated to the moral law as it is the job of moral law to correct self love and its tendency to deceive persons into thinking that they act impartially with the view that the interests of other persons in their community are equal to their own. This appears in Kant's writing as follows, open quote. We find our nature as sensuous beings so characterized that the material of the faculty of desire of objects of inclinations first presses upon us. And we find our pathologically determined self, although by its maxims, it is wholly incapable of giving universal laws striving to give its pretensions priority and to make them acceptable as first and original claims, just as if it were our entire self. This propensity to make subjective the determining ground of the will in the general can be called self love. When it makes itself legislative and an unconditional practical principle, it can be called self conceit close quote. Kant's view is that we, we delude ourselves into thinking that the principle of self love can bring about morally valuable outcomes. He maintains that it is only principles of moral law that maintain the moral world that matter in the moral world. The outcomes of such of actions born of our freedom are morally relevant, and those born of our sensuous nature are not. This idea of actions motivated by inclinations lacking in moral worth is also discussed in his groundwork for the metaphysics of morals. Jeremy argues that moral acts are those that are done from the motive of duty, the motive of duty requires autonomy, which one can only arrive at through rationality. Here in Kant uses rationality to distinguish between morally worthy actions and actions that lack moral words. He does this by means of showing how autonomy is instrumental in the world, in the moral world. In doing so, he connects personhood with autonomy, so that a person is understood as a rational being who's directed by autonomy to oblige to the principle of duty. The rationality then is not only the seat of personhood, it is also that which gives those their actions that gives actions their moral worth. Understood in this way, the fate of non persons lies outside the considerations inherent within the moral world. If you exist as a person, the fact of lacking, sorry, as a non person, the fact of lacking the value of dignity by virtue of not having the capacity for moral acts gives you vulnerable to all sorts of immoral acts. In other words, actions exerted upon non persons cannot be said to be morally blame worthy or praise worthy, since non persons are thought to lack moral worth. It is this status of non persons that Emmanuel is a argues black people are relegated to in Kant's work. It is the racial discrimination that is embedded in Kant's ideas, as they argues that Kant's racial taxonomy is racist and it champions the view that black people are an inferior people, because they lack the capacity for rationality. Apart from its deplorable claim Kant's racial taxonomy is quite primitive is quite a primitive view of black individuals. Discrimination against them is based on the fact of their dog pigmentation. They lack this capacity for rationality because of their dog pigmentation. In other words, black people lack rationality because they are non Europeans. The analysis of Kant's work asserts three arguments that Kant makes that turn out to exclude black people from the category of persons, ultimately rendering them lacking things, lacking an agency and moral value. In other words, that Kant's view aims to illustrate black that black people have no rationality are replaceable because they lack dignity, and so their value is that of price. And lastly, that they're not moral. Each of these claims has implications that are detrimental to the moral and political status of black beings. Talking about the lack of rationality involves the idea that the capacity for rationality is natural. One is supposedly born with it. Kant calls this a natural talent, a natural gift, and his view is that black people are not favored by nature as nature did not endow them with this gift of rationality. Kant's logic implies that rationality is physiologically determined as a physiologically determined aspect about persons. Kant's claims is claimed by arguing that black people do not possess rationality because they are non European by virtue of not giving having rationality then black people are not educable that is to say black people have no rational rationality valuable intelligence. They are capable of learning and day I say they're incapable of law of learning and day I say creating knowledge. This idea that black people cannot learn or create knowledge as over the centuries enabled the erasure of African knowledge systems. It is this very contemptible idea that black people have no rationality that thinkers such as Maboh-Mure and Mokhobe-Ramosy have tried to dispel. The danger of the statement has shown its influence in academic discipline such as philosophy where African philosophy was not recognized as philosophy proper. This was not because Africa has no knowledge systems. This was because of the belief that Africans lack rationality and so they cannot create knowledge. The assumption here is obviously that it is only Europeans who can create knowledge. Ramosy blames Aristotle's assertion that man is a rational animal for the exclusion of African philosophy and Africans learning and practicing philosophy. Ramosy identifies rationality as the aspect about humanity that has been sorry that has been used to maintain elitist principles in philosophy. His conclusion is that this assumption that philosophy cannot be learned and taught by Africans is in itself a crime against philosophy since the discipline of philosophy is about wisdom in general and not wisdom from one continent. As a second charge against Kant, which is black people do not have the value of dignity and are thus replaceable, implies that the moral worth of black people is tantamount to that of things that can be owned, discarded and replaced. This is quite worrying since in his groundwork for the metaphysics of morals, Kant argues that it is non-persons who lack the value of dignity. Here in dignity is to be understood as the value that exalts the worth of persons above that of animals and objects. We are to understand anything that is classified as non-persons to be interchangeable in the same way that we think of objects being interchangeable and replaceable. By interpretation, non-persons cannot be considered irreplaceable because they cannot be bought. Think of houses, food and other objects in the world that have a price. These things are manufactured in numbers and so if you lose one or break one today, you can in most cases buy another one to replace it the next day. Unlike persons with dignity, objects of price are replaceable and comparable. On the contrary, persons have dignity and the correct response to persons is respect. This idea of dignity of persons is supported by one formulation of his Katz Gorkal Imperative which calls upon individuals to refrain from treating persons instrumentally but rather to treat them as ends in themselves. This imperative applies only to persons. It is designed to protect the dignity of persons. A person is expected to live a life that prevents one from harming oneself and others. The respect owed to persons is not the kind that only others must show the person but the person in question is expected to also treat him or herself with respect. A person is not allowed to harm oneself nor is an individual allowed to harm others. According to Charles Mills, the Katz Gorkal Imperative would not apply to black persons thereby limiting the value of dignity to capturing only the moral value of white persons. The third assertion that black persons lack morality follows logically from his ideas about personhood, from Kant's ideas about personhood and dignity. Kant thinks that it is rationality that gives people the value of dignity and affords them moral value. It follows then that if one lacks rationality, one lacks moral worth. As it argues that what Kant says about black people does not even give them the status of a moral patient. The view portrays black people as incapable of moral actions as well as lacking in moral worth. It makes sense that Kant would not find anything wrong with prescribing that black people should be whipped till they bleed if one is to teach them anything at all. Apart from violating one's well-being, it is quite dehumanizing in the sense that it strips black humans of moral value which protects them from kinds of abuses, which is meant to protect them. And this is incompatible with the social and political aim to respond to individuals fairly. The assertions that Kant makes preclude black people from learning and creating knowledge, from receiving recognition and respect as persons, and from participating in the society as moral agents or patients who can become co-authorities of the norms that guide the society. One way to understand his view, this is Kant, is that because black people have no rationality, they are unable to learn anything, even moral principles, and that they are not worthy of respect and can thus be appreciated only for their instrumental value since they lack dignity. Black people are not persons, put differently, Kant devalues black bodies to the point of dehumanizing them as it strips them of any value that would empower them to judge others as morally blameworthy or praiseworthy. Kant's exclusion of black people from the moral world denies black people proper humanitarian consideration. Naturally, it is not all thinkers who agree with Ezra's view that Kant was racist in his work. Thomas Hill and Bernard Boxle defend Kant's, Kant against the charge that he was a racist. One of their arguments is that Kant was not a racist is simply adopted the prejudices of his time, that is the enlightenment period. They assert that what we can glean from this is that Kant underestimates it the strong influence of inclinations when individuals consider what it what is permissible and impermissible. Kant champions the idea that we should overcome inclinations as they interfere with acting rightly. When acting rightly it is our moral strength that should guide us to act right, not our desires, emotions, or attitudes. He considers overcoming inclinations and desires to be relatively easy. Open quote. That's in the moral cognition of common human reason we have attained to its principle, which it is, which it obviously does not think abstractly in such a universal form, but actually has always before its eyes and uses its standard of judgment. It would be easy here to show how with the, with this compass in its hand, it knows its way around very well in all cases that come before it, how to distinguish what is good, what is evil, what conforms to duty, or is contrary to duty. Without teaching it, it, at least in the least new thing, one only makes it aware of its own principle, as Socrates did, and thus that it's, it's, it needs no science and philosophy to know what one has to do in order to be honest, good, or indeed, even wise and virtuous. Close quote. It would appear that in overestimating rationality, Kant took the strength of inclinations and desires for granted. At least this is what Boxle and Hill would like to argue. But there is something hypocritical in Kant champion in rationality and then excluding black people from personhood based on his prejudices, which are themselves a matter of inclinations. Kant's own theory about the primacy of rationality is itself not based on rationality. His prejudice against black people is what motivates him to argue that black people are not persons, his prejudice is not a matter of rational judgment. Given that his moral theory promises to act rightly, and that acting rightly is a matter of moral strength, then one can say that Kant failed to act morally in judging black people as non persons. Identifying right from wrong is not an easy matter and Kant himself seems to have failed to get it right. Hill and Boxle further, their further argument in defense of Kant is that those who consider Kant a racist have simply not considered his larger body of work, and have isolated one part of his work to muddy the rest of his canon. They find it hypocritical to want to dismiss Kant because of the racial prejudice found in his work. Their view is that Kant is not a racist and neither is his work. They argue that Kant's work actually provides a framework for morality that applies to all human beings, that we should consult his framework to fight racism in our societies, instead of accusing Kant of being a racist. Herein one is to believe that Kant's racism is based on the implications of what he writes, but that the deeper principle in his work itself is not racist. Racist. Hill and Boxle submit that Kant had racial prejudice, but urge critics to separate the thinker from his work because Kant's prejudice was not part of his central philosophy. The overall suggestion made in defense of Kant requires critics of Kant to simply accept Kant's ignorance and how it endorsed or supported the racial views or attitudes without affecting the core of his moral philosophy. My view here is that Kant constructs a race theory that is based on the idea that black people are inferior. And according to Robert Benosconi, he's even credited for giving philosophy the first systematic writings on race. The fact that Kant is credited for creating the first philosophical theory of race nullifies the charge that racial discrimination is not an important part of his work. Following the place of his race theory in philosophy, one can argue that the principle of universalism that he champions in his work is that's a particularized form of universalism that excludes blacks from the category of human beings, queer rational beings. In other words, Kant's universalism is a kind of universalism, but does not recognize black people as persons or as Mills mightly puts it, sabotages itself in contradictions. Kant's defenders call upon one to consider Kant's work in totality in order to save him from the racist and sexist accusations. However, I'm not sure why Kant's work deserves such courtesy when it is written in acquiescence to a stereotypical and prejudicial view that non-Europeans in order to about non-Europeans in order to denigrate their moral worth intelligence and character. The things about the above mentioned defense is that it glosses over the fact that Kant tried to universalize a theory that discriminates against a group of people without a rational basis. A rational basis would make it morally acceptable, but his defenders would at least be able to argue that it meets his own rational standards of scrutiny. It is not the charge of racism that is hypocritical. It is this defense of it that is hypocritical, as it urges us to preserve the fruits of a poisonous tree so to speak. The arguments advocate the brilliance of Kant's work and let him off the hook for his racial prejudices. What seems to be prioritized here is Kant's body of work over its devastating racial implications that it holds for black people. It is as though the brilliance of Kant's work is more sacred in comparison to the value and by extension the needs of black people. I think that Kant's defenders find it more devastating to question the racism in Kant's work because the unity of the body of his work might not fully survive the charge of racism. He builds his egalitarian and inclusivist moral and political ideas on rationality, yet he states that certain people, that his black people lack such rationality. The implication here is that all that is moral, all that is good, all that is right matters only when we're speaking about Europeans. This implies that Kant's work is designed to explain the superiority of Europeans and their moral worth, intelligence and their character. Perhaps the problem here is the overly inflated centrality of rationality. If rationality were to be removed from the pedestal that makes it the marker of moral worth and intelligence, then perhaps there would be a sense of inclusion in the moral community that would be of no offence to black people. However, the real issue here may be Kant's irrational application of rationality as a tool to exclude black people. Black people are not irrational, and so it is irrational and morally deplorable for Kant to imply that they are. In an effort to find a compromise, Thomas and Boxell argue that the idea that the solutions to the problems of racism in Kant's work should not involve abandoning rationality, as that would be like throwing the baby out with the bathwater. They say, open quote, it is reason that led us to appreciate that the emotions, passions and attitudes can distort the results of reasons efforts to determine what is right. And it is reason that has led us to see that rational self examination alone may not always enable us to bring all the morally relevant facts vividly before us. Finally, it is reason that will enable us to solve the problem, which in general is to find some way to bring morally relevant facts before common human reason. Close quote. The recommendation from Hill and Boxell involves not abandoning reason as a solution to racial discrimination. That depends on reason. Although the problem may lie with the role given to reason in Kant's work, the solution is not to rid his work of reason. This anxiety about letting reason go is an understand is understandable since the reason, or since reason is the bedrock of Kant's central philosophy. It may be greatly weakened without the idea of rationality. One can understand this, however, to suggest the prioritization of theory over the value of person seems irresponsible. Re-reading major texts allows for different interpretations and these interpretations and their implications should not be precluded due to the fear that the reinterpretations could be damning to the theory. I reject Hill and Boxell recommendation that we should disregard the charge of racism against Kant, because his attitude towards non-Europeans is not central to the core of his theory, and that we should look to Kant's reason to resolve the problem that is brought about by the prioritization of reason. Here I follow Charles Mills, who argues that we should not accept and teach sanitized versions of theories as they often present misconceptions of Western political theories such as liberalism, humanism and egalitarianism as racially inclusive and without contradictions, which is not the case. Open quote, political struggles around race, conquest, slavery, imperialism, colonization, segregation, the battles for abolition, independence, self governance, equal rights, first class citizenship, the movements of Aboriginal peoples, slaves, colonial populations, Black Americans and other subordinated people of color. The texts of all and the texts of all these movements vanish into a conceptual abyss, papered over by the seemingly minor but actually tremendously question begging assumption that all humans are and have been recognized as equal persons. Close quote. Ceciline Hill suggests that we should endeavor to rebuild institutions and encourage dialogue among people with different views and urge those who feel superior to listen to their inferiors sympathetically. Open quote. Listening to others with different viewpoints, different emotions and attitudes and consequently different blind spots as the beginning but not enough. And complacent do not listen sympathetically to those they feel to be their inferiors, even when they invite these inferiors to speak. Somehow we must design institutions that will help us to listen to others sympathetically close quote. I set aside the assumption that part of the solution in dealing with racism and cancework is expressed in positionalities of those who feel superior, who must listen to those whom they feel are inferior as kind as this kind of expression. Sorry, in some way maintains the very binary created by cancer racial taxonomy. What is useful here is the view that the problem of racism does not lie only with the theorists and those who defend him, but also with the institutions that do not challenge racial prejudices in the text presented. This has recognized who has been recognized as the philosopher who brought the theory of race into fruition. Therefore, the view that we have to consider cancer work in its entirety to realize that it is not racist implies that we should read everything, but his racial theory. We cannot cherry pick and ignore texts that have damning racial views, especially since cancer racial theory, among many others has had far reaching consequences that continue to plague black people in our society. The main reason for exploring cance moral theory has been to show that the type of personhood that he provides carries a danger of inferiorizing black people in academia in society and in society in general, black women exist as victims of racial prejudice. While they're said to be considered full fledged persons there's evidence in academic spaces that indicates the general failure or refusal to recognize black women as full members of a moral community. This is most evidence in exclusions as knowledge producers. Kristen Borgwald blames patriarchy for withholding the epistemic personhood of women. Borgwald understands the muting of women, not only in professional spaces but in personal spaces too, as a great contributor to women's lack of self trust. She argues that the muting of the muting that occurs in these spaces leads to the women's cognitive deferrence. She writes open quote. The patriarchal pressure and expectation for women to be selfless to always focus on caring for others and not themselves creates a neglectful attitude towards women's happiness and well being. More normatively, women have been treated with lack with a lack of respect and therefore unjustly. This lack of respect is why women do not trust their own judgment. Women self neglect and lack of self care stems from their lack of self trust brought on by the patriarchal oppression. Patriarchy silences women's voices causing them causing women with cognitive difference. If a woman does not trust her judgment she cannot successfully assert to those judgments. She cannot trust that her thoughts are reasonable and dismisses them internally or she communicates her thoughts with hesitation causing others to doubt her. Patriarchy has a crippling effect on women's voices, causing self distrust and selfless and selflessness in women. Close quote. Wargwald helps to create a link between respect and women's self esteem, where self esteem is understood as a recognitive attitude that one holds for oneself but it can also be influenced by the way that others treat you. Although she does not address black women directly her view about silencing women is relevant to black women. Add that to the dehumanizing logic of Kantian personhood for black people. This seems apparent that black women by virtue of not being considered rational, and that's worse off in terms of lacking epistemic personhood. In the sense black women are not only excluded from the moral world so that they're viewed mainly as moral patients they're also excluded from contributing to knowledge. Wargwald's view is that without self trust there is no way that a woman can confidently contribute to the world as knowledge production begins with one trusting the ideas and judgments. Borgwald's argument helps me to frame the epistemic oppression of black women. There is a sense in which rationalities used to maintain intellectual imperialism, so that black scholarship becomes an anomaly. I'm sorry questioning the person of black people, not only cast doubt on the intellectual brilliance, but also the status as moral agents. Black women face many struggles in academia and yet they expected to compete at an equal footing with their counterparts including black males. The muting of black women of women voices is detrimental both personally and professionally. When women's voices are muted what is being silenced is an expression of their own intelligence, their interests, their desires and their needs. I see the muting of black women's voices, whether by their male by males or fellow females as an affront first to the women and secondly to the moral and intellectual communities. Muting the voices of black women renders their knowledge, which is informed by the experiences unimportant and gives an inaccurate view that it is only male perspectives on humanities and all that surrounds it that is worthy of dissemination as the only truth. The point I'm trying to make here is that the lack of failure to or refusal to recognize the epistemic personhood of women is a double-edged sword that harms women, the academic community and society at large. Are black women persons? Naturally, I think they are. Well, this is indeed the case, my question remains then why is it that black women's dignity continues to be undermined across different spaces including academia. My hunch is that this is an issue, not of the, sorry, this is, sorry, my hunch is that the issue is not the fact of their metaphysical or moral personhood, but rather recognition of it by others with whom they interact in society. Icahema speaks about recognition in relation to full-fledged persons and I would like to apply his logic to illustrate the significant role of recognition and personhood of women. Before I speak about Icahema, allow me a brief moment to explain art to Leightinen's view that constitutes which explains what constitutes a full-fledged person. Leightinen writes about personhood as a matter of capacities that ground normative value, the correct response to which is recognition of the individual's normative value by others in society. An individual's normative value is grounded in the person making capacities, the recognition of which includes the individual in the moral community. Here in Leightinen offers a view of a fully-fledged person as an interpersonal being whose capacities in isolation from society or interactions with others in society are not sufficient to account for one's normative value. Leightinen is careful not to exclude those who are not yet adults, and so he makes provision for potential persons to account for humans who have inalienable rights but have yet to develop their moral consciousness so they can join the moral community. What is important to take from Leightinen is that being a full-fledged person is a matter of psychological and interpersonal aspects. Icahemo maintains the combination of the theme of personhood being a personal and interpersonal process in his expression of recognition. Icahemo provides an interesting view of recognition as inclusion in personhood, wherein he captures the three dimensions of personhood, namely the axiological, the deontic and the cooperative dimensions. The deontic dimension of personhood involves both psychological capacities and the interpersonal status that enable one to be a co-authority in norm administration and being respected by others as that co-authority respected me. Here, there is an assumption of equality among persons so that the norms that govern society are a collaborative aspect of humanity, rather than an authoritarian interchange based on hierarchical arrangements that breed inferiorization. Further, there is an axiological dimension of personhood that is concerned with the values that persons recognize themselves in themselves and others. Icahemo makes it clear that the developing into a person is a matter of personal and social aspects. Herein to see one's value makes sense in relation to how one relates to oneself before others express their values of the person in question. In this sense, Icahemo takes his cue from Harry Frankfurt, who looks in part into what it is that makes you value yourself and how others value you. In addition to how you value yourself as well as how others value you, Frankfurt inquires about how you value others and the reasons for that valuing. What Icahemo aims to reveal to us is that valuing is not a matter that is concretized only by the manner in which others perceive and recognize you, but that it involves a way in which a person values herself. Such valuing, whether of oneself or others, invokes the capacity for loving, where such loving is a matter of intrinsic valuing rather than instrumental valuing. Dehumanizing or the dehumanization of another individual involves a sense of entitlement that is founded on the view that one is superior to another. What is at play here is in part misrecognition and non-recognition. Misrecognition of one's personhood and the non-recognition of another individual's personhood. Misrecognition of one's personhood is evident in instances of subjugation when one overestimates or overly exerts what one considers to be one's power. Clifford, following Foucault, rightly points out that the power involved in every, there is power involved in every aspect of experience. Power corrupts relationality when it is used to oppress others. Oppression denies people their humanity and it does so in systematic ways that know at their dignity by means of subtracting the opportunities that grant them access to education, shelter, freedom, dignity, and other values of inclusion in participation in society as full humans. Oppressors directly and indirectly create a superficial hierarchy by identifying some social factor to discriminate against another person. These social factors vary from physiological aspects such as race and gender to spiritual ones such as religion, notwithstanding the linguistic aspects that relate to culture and tradition. The point is that dehumanization is a result of oppression that stems from discrimination which presents as an assault on one's dignity thereby diminishing one's capacity for freedom to participate in society as a full human being. The idea of dignity coupled with epistemic personhood is necessary to show the epistemic oppression of black women, which is most evident in their misrecognized placements as knowledge consumers. As a last word, I think we need to be careful with the theories that we teach and apply when trying to make sense of humanity. Loyalty to theories that discriminate in dehumanizing ways do not contribute to social reform. I want to agree with Kwame J. Che, who argues that philosophical ideas, no matter how abstract they are, should be constructed and shared with the aim to contribute to social reform. When looking at theories of personhood, we grant that it is not the duty of theories to force people to follow their prescriptions. But what does that say about their failure to reform society? Should we simply accept that they are unable to account for the personhood of women? So what becomes of the function and significance of personhood theories when they seem not to address the moral value of women, black women in particular, using the freedom of the will of the people to defend this idea that black women and women in general being morally devalued in society. I'd like to end the talk. Yeah, that was a brilliant presentation. Thank you so much, Dr. We really benefited a lot from that. I mean, it was really interesting, particularly the way you draw attention to the fact that beyond issues of race, gender, theories of personhood does play a crucial role in the criteria for discrimination. Thank you so much for that. So the floor is now open for questions. Just raise your hand. And we hope to. So, sorry, you, you please excuse me if I do pronounce your name wrong. So Zamele. Yeah. Let's go ahead. Thank you very much. Yes, that is actually the name. Okay. Thank you also to Dr. Shiva for the perfect presentation. It is lovely to once again see you after seeing you from Fortale. My, I guess I've got some few questions, but then I'll try to limit them, given that your topic, right? I was quite interested, for instance, in the, in the silence of Kant in your, in your title, right? As to why is that the case that you given the fact that it seems like the paper or I guess the presentation is more towards a critique of Kant's theory of personhood, right? But with that being said, though, right? Even if then there's that silence from Kant, but I'm also interested in your take, for instance, from African scholars, especially with the theory of personhood, right? How would they or how do you see the conversations regarding, you know, personhood in the sense maybe I don't know if you also it depends as well as to how you then mitigate this question of personhood in relations to women, right? Or women's, right? Or female body subjects, right? So my question then will be what is your take or how do you see the conversations, you know, between JJ, you know, as they're maybe, you know, up here, maybe my solo in terms of identity, you know, and in respect to, because some friends of mine would normally say that there's a limit or in terms of their language as the language that is being used in understanding personhood or identity or African personhood and identity, right? So maybe there's like a lack of, you know, the inclusion or at least the language is not necessarily soothing or welcoming to the female, you know, their female counterparts. So for now it is, let me just be straight there. But if there's some time, maybe I can also come in again. Thank you. Thank you. You could respond to that. Hi, once again, it's nice to meet you here. Thank you so much for your questions and comments. No one. I'll admit I'm not fantastic with with creating titles, whether to talks or two chapters or whatever the case may be. And I think I submitted the abstract for the talk before I completed the paper. So that's why I think there was no cant in the, in the title. I think it's a noteworthy comment for maybe, you know, when I revise the paper and so forth. I like your second question about the African voices in this topic of personhood in relation to gender issues. And rightly so, you know, you've got the Mankitis the jaches and my solos on them, who write about this and incidentally, the second half of the of the chapter that I referred to speaks to that. And in that section. I show that we cannot level the charge of racism against the Africa, African communitarian writers on personhood. And then a theory that also seems to be gender neutral and inclusivist, but they're actually not quite gender neutral, and you get arguments from someone like Zendtler Manzini, I can share that article with you. And she argues that the theory discriminates against not just women, but queer folk as well, and people with disabilities. So she, she actually uses the Mankitis exclusion of biological criteria as sufficient criteria for personhood to argue that that celebrates rights of passage, I actually heavily grounded in ideas of gender binaries that exclude women, intersexed people, and, and so forth. So the scholarship on the African communitarian view of personhood has done well to respond to the racial issues that come from, for instance, Kantian work, but they've not, they don't seem to have done enough so far to address the issues of gender. And when you do sort of ask the question about and I think Mulefe, Mutamaya Mulefe addresses this in one of his books. And what what seems to be happening here is that there is a hiding behind the theory. So that the dominant, or the most, yeah, the most dominant response when you are asking about how African to your African view of personhood responds to issues of gender. Part of what she gets is that well it is not the job of a theory to make people behave in a particular way. The theory itself is gender neutral, but how it arrives to people and prescribes to people how they should behave. There is a disjuncture there. But I think in short, there's not, I think there's not enough that's been done. The conversation is starting. The challenges are being posed to African communitarian thinkers about the place of patriarchy, you know, you'd know the African, the African communitarian view of personhood is about social unity, harmony, the relationality among persons that my personhood depends on how I treat you so there's actually an expectation of moral perfectionism, and it is that moral perfectionism that makes you a person, a good person. There's also an assumption that personhood is already automatically good. So if you're a person, it's really a judgment about you being a good human being who has perfected your moral stance in society. So the challenges are starting to arise as more and more of us are working on the African communitarian view of personhood. But I think more has to be done to expand the discussion of the debates on commentary from humanitarianism on gender. I hope that answers you, Tosami. That was an interesting response. Thank you. So we'll have Andrew Heinz and then Beth Vane. After those two questions, then you respond again before we take some of our questions. So, Andrew first. Thank you so much, Dr. Shivas. I found that incredibly powerful and lucid. So thank you. You kind of began to answer this at the end and you dealt with it a bit when you were critiquing Hill and it was a boxhole. Is that right? Okay, yeah. But I just wanted to kind of maybe clarify for myself. Is the lack of being able to kind of affirmatively answer that question or black women persons? Does that have to do with the criteria of rationality itself? Or is it the lack of the extension of rationality? And I was just thinking about this being aware that, you know, an international community, national law like the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that criteria of rationality is kind of enshrined in those key assumptions. I'm curious if you could talk a bit more about that distinction, that criteria of rationality versus its extension, because I thought you had some really interesting things to say that I wasn't able to quite right by head around. So thank you very much. Thanks. Beth. So thank you for that. By the way, it was very, very interesting. And I was just wondering, and this might be one of those philosophical questions, which doesn't have an answer. So sorry. But you were talking about reason being the solution to racism, I guess. But then, and how obviously black women are excluded. So the question is, how can we apply our non-discriminary definition of reason into what is necessarily like the white man's philosophy and language when they have a different definition of reason? How, how can there be any action? Thank you. Thank you for those questions. I'll start with yours, Andrew. I think that's such a good question. And I think I tried to answer it in terms of the recognition and perhaps it speaks to the extension of rationality, rather than the lack of rationality. So my thing is, it is not true that black women do not have rationality. It is not true that black people in general do not have rationality. This is an issue of perception. There's a group of people who want to think that. And in my mind, this kind of thinking allows them or affords them certain privileges or certain powers, but enable them then to oppress, marginalize and keep a particular type of status quo. So in answering that question, it's not that they lack the rationality is that I think by extension, there's an extension of rationality in a sense that people refuse to recognize that because it serves a particular purpose. Yeah, the limiting or the limited view of black persons, black women included is one where it is useful. It is instrumental to those who oppress to keep these people at a certain level in society. It is not official to them, but it is not the metaphysical fact of black people that they lack rationality. And I think this leads into your question, Beth, which is, you know, the differences in how people understand rationality that today we might have a race neutral gender understanding of rationality, whereas before, for instance, with Kant, he purported a view that was not race neutral. And the danger in that is, is how we then bring this to the classroom. How we bring this to the development of scholarship, how we bring this to debates about our current states now we understand better we know better. And we continue and this is the hard part in relation to Kant, we continue to teach his view as if it's Senate and this is what Charles Mills is is fighting that we need to stop teaching views as if they are sanitized views that come with equality inclusion and so forth, in a way that they were written in the time that they were written with the aim with which they were written, they were not egalitarian inclusivist and equal and so forth. So, so I think the, the, you know, your question brings up the, the very important question of how we use language, how we use words and how we transpose ideas from different times to current times and what the implications of that could be for our discussions. But yeah I think you're very right to say it becomes complex when we have one word that is taken to mean something in a different time to what we are now. Thank you for those beautiful questions and the comments to from the touch first. I have killed baby and ishmael as well. So kill first and then ishmael before you respond. Thank you Dr. C. was a presentation. I think the previous speaker questioner. I asked something very similar to what I want to ask, but I'll expand on it for clarity so which rationality is in question exactly do you want black people to be considered rational according to Kantian norms, or to a different form of rationality, or accepted definition of rationality in any context, which would obviously put it in the danger of a hegemonical account of rationality, and how exactly a black women unique in this respect from black men in terms of how they're treated by Kantian norms in academia. Thank you. Hi, so just building on what you're saying at the beginning of the Q&A about sort of African humanitarianism and the need to kind of develop that. I'm sort of in a slightly sort of parallel way, but sort of related, is there a need to sort of take a more nuanced approach to sort of black philosophy in general. One which kind of facilitates a less personistic sort of ideology. I'm thinking maybe my example would be finance black skin and white masks, which is a great book I think but nevertheless, I feel you get the chapters. I think what they called the black man the white woman and the white woman and the black man. And I feel the latter of the two is far more sympathetic to the black individual than the former chapter. I feel yeah it's a similar to what you're saying about Kant is there a need when studying Fanon to then highlight this misogyny and his impact in his wider philosophy. Thank you. Thank you both for your questions really good questions. Your question is multi layered right so which rationality. I think there we might be talking more about conceptual analysis about what rationality is what it means and so forth. But I don't think, and I say it in one of my paragraphs in the paper presented that we actually should be questioning why rationality is the mark for humanity. Why do we have to think of one aspect about humanity that marks persons. What is so important about rationality what is so beautiful or unique or brilliant about rationality that makes it the mark and I think for me and I think I said it also in relation to someone else that it is not that black women don't have rationality. It is just that in the way if we want to understand personhood, and I think it is very important to ask about the personhood of black women, and maybe even women in general but for the purposes of my talk today black women in particular, because there are many atrocious things that happen in in society that seem to put when black women at the black back burner, and my inquiry is why, why is it that women are always at the bottom of the the barrel. If it comes to things that are beneficial. Why is it that they are the ones with the highest statistics in South Africa, when we talk about gender based violence and genocide. Why is it that there aren't enough I mean, if you look at our own field, why is there not enough black people in philosophy in South Africa. So, what is it then about black women that makes them so easy to exclude. This is why I use the lens of personal to try and understand. And it's just, it happens that the lens of personhood is based or founded on the idea of rationality. I wouldn't say it's which rationality for me it's really just, how do we make sense of what we are observing in society or how we can make sense of what's what we observe being done to black women in society. How what theories are can be applicable what theories can help us to understand why women are treated the way they are in society. In relation to black men how are they different and black men in academia. I think politically they have a bit more and I think you see this even in our affirmative action hierarchy. You find that black women are really at the bottom. Why they're at the bottom, I cannot tell you, I don't know. But there is a sense in which there's something about the gender of women that makes them this target for not being taken seriously for not being whatever. And even if we look at the way society is structured. And here I think I agree with Kristen bog world who says, we got to look at patriarchy as one of the problems and if we compare women black women to black man, then somehow there's an aspect of patriarchy that I think puts them at some advantage I cannot measure the advantage but I think there is, in that sense, a way in which they get. What is this, they get, I don't know, less oppressed if I can say that in comparison to women in academia. And then the question about the need and I hope I understood your question properly. Is there any need to take a nuanced approach, you know, with the categories of black men white women black women. You know, I think about it differently. So I had a conversation with a with a colleague the one time and we're talking about this binary of black and white. And why it comes out so strongly in society. And in South Africa it's a very different political play field or ground. And so you have black. I mean, sorry, you've got white, and then you've got anything else that is non white, you've got it as under the category of black. So it brings the question, because we are what's it a nation filled with different cultures different races and so forth. So it brings into question why it is that the ethnicities of the thing, anything that matters in those terms is only captured in black and white. In that sense, I think to be able to account for a nuanced view or nuanced approach to humanity that does not limit the binaries to simply black and white is a view that I would actually support I think there's something about this black and white view that might be that shades or throws a shade or overshadows everything else that's in between. And I think for the moment. The discourse forces us to continue talking in terms of race. There's a way in which the idea that we should not talk about race in these binary terms is tend to mount to a kind of, of ignorance of the real social problems because it seems that a lot of the problems in societies are founded on this discrimination of different races. And so, in a way, while we want to maybe move apart or aside from it, or move above it, we stuck there because the reality of our everyday experiences are still determined or influenced by these racial categories. There was a question in the chat from Zander. I think it's not just the questions and analysis as well. So I'll just try to read the part that summarizes it says is the race that black women face really so simple as saying that racists just think of black people as less than persons. I would say that such a view cannot account for the racist phenomenon against black people and black women that we see on our doorsteps. Take for instance, Jacob Zuma's Miss again, or the Zulu King's homophobia. Do they like can't hold their prejudices simply because they believe women can't think like persons. Those discrimination that is almost exclusively faced by black women, like so called corrective rape, boiled down to a simple question of perceived personal inferiority. It's pretty complex. I guess you respond to that first before we take a few more questions. You know, it's a very good analysis you have there and I think what you're asking me is what grounds different forms of discrimination. And I'm not one to say that in every instance. It's always rationality that grounds the form of discrimination. So in the examples that you cite I was trying to read the full comment. You know, in the misogyny, for instance, it could be that the issue there. Let's use the idea of corrective rape. Corrective rape is such a violent form that a form is a form of treating another person that speaks to an entitlement over a woman's body. That men think they can. First of all, that they understand what the correct gender or the correct sexuality is to the point that they see themselves as authorities over women's body to choose for women, what kind of partners sexual partners they should have. There's an entitlement that they, they can do as they wish with that woman's body. That because of their authoritarian view that they understand what is acceptable in terms of sexuality that gives them the right to then do as they wish with a woman's body. I wouldn't say in that instance or in that event, what does it play is a discrimination based on rationality that is a discrimination based on some type of hierarchy let's call it patriarchy actually. So the foundation of different forms of discrimination are based on different principles. And what I'm presenting today is not a theory that covers all forms of discrimination. It's a theory that covers what's a view or paper that covers one particular form that I find problematic in the Kantian view of personhood. I hope that helps. Thank you for. So, let's hear from Patrick Ben and Jonathan though. So, after the other questions, then you respond before we take to Zamele again and Beth. So Patrick Ben and Jonathan. Hello, is it my turn or is Patrick. It's okay. Jonathan, you can go ahead. Then Patrick and let's go to you. Yeah, thank you very much. And greetings from Ghana. Hey. Okay. All right, so it's, it's been a wonderful presentation I enjoy every aspect. What I'm actually striking for me is what are the sort of things we are likely to miss if we focus on the Russian Kantian idea of, of, of reason about persons. And what kind of justice or restorative measures that can be brought to bear to women. And, and then I will then force to look at the biological conditions and account for these things in a way. And is that also problematic because the circumstances that women have to struggle through, you know, have to be accounted for in a certain way to bring some form of justice. So I'm wondering if you can reflect on that a little bit further. Thank you. Patrick, can you ask your question? Hello, can you hear me? Yeah, sure. Okay, thank you. I think I had a little net of issues so. My question comes in of comments. Black people really have a moral obligation or some sort of necessity to prove their existential worth to brilliant racists like Emmanuel Kant and his likes. I think when black people are people of non-European designs, for example, they are engaging people like Emmanuel Kant and trying to prove to him why black people are rational, why black people can reason, why they can create knowledge and all those stuffs. I think these proves that black people are trying to offer is going to be inevitably trying to fit into a certain Eurocentric structure that Kant himself and his brilliant acolyte created. So what happens is, by so doing, black people are not defining themselves as human beings but they are defining themselves in a way that Europeans want them to define themselves. I don't think that is a model for humanity. Humanity shouldn't be Eurocentric. Humanity should be centered around human beings of all race irrespective of class, region or continent. So I think, is this not the form of what Jennifer Vest will call perverse dialogue for us to be engaging in this kind of discussion of trying to prove ourselves worth to Europeans in the first place? Is it necessary? That's basically my question. Thank you. Thank you, Ben. I'll start with Jonathan. Jonathan, your questions are really profound and I like them because they look into the very foundation of why we discuss these issues. So I'll start with the one about the biological aspects of women and why we should actually be paying attention to them or even talking about the do we actually need to take them into account when we're doing this work. I think, I'm not sure we can escape it and part of the problem, part of the reason I think we can't escape it is because the very form of discrimination is bound to the women's body. So even if you think about the woman's body is not just the foundation of discrimination, but it is also the object of violence when people want to express their entitlement over women. So it is difficult for me to say I see why maybe there's a benefit to not seeing women only as biological entities of a particular sex, but at the same time, how do we then respond to the issues that are brought about as where people use women's biology as a weapon. So that goes to your first one. And the second one is what kind of justice can be brought to bear to women. And a tough one also because there are of course different approaches to responding to, to, to, to justice or in, what do you call it, bringing about justice for women. I think before we would, I could answer that question. I'd have to, we'd have to think as a community as a moral community, we'd have to think about what counts as just for women. So we, we have justice. But do we have a view or is there a way in which we can understand justice in relation to women. And what would that justice look like so what is just in relation to women and how do we determine that whatever it is we considered considered to be just in relation to women is indeed fair and equitable. And I think it's a tough topic, a tough issue about, you know, justice for for women and their biological appearance, or their biological reality, and its place in discussions about justice but I think before one answers I think about what is that justice in relation to women. And would those theories of justice requires to look at them as sexed beings. Patrick, you know, I like your, your question very very much and thank you for being here just for everybody Patrick is a student in my department. So, the thing about the question about do black people need to constantly remind the Europeans or white people that they're intelligent or, you know, constantly justify their intelligence. The simplest answer is no we don't, we don't need to keep doing that. However, we exist in a society that is built on certain theories. And here the role of theories is a dangerous one in my mind, because it perpetuates views that we constantly need to argue against or dismiss or whatever the case may be because, as I said in my paper theories are not innocent tools. It's like thinking that there's a victimless crime. There is there are victims to the theories that are perpetuated in the classrooms and so forth. And if you look at the development of history or the development of education in our country. It was about seven years ago that people started talking or challenging philosophy to teach or take African philosophy seriously. It was about seven years ago that students started to challenge universities to teach theories of Africa by Africans. So, in one sense, yes, black people don't have to constantly remind people that they're intelligent but on the other, it is taking so such a long time for people to understand or to even accept this and it's in the theories it's in the everyday treatment of what's happening in America if you look at what's happening even in our own country in South Africa. It's proof that this brilliance that black people have is still not recognized. It's still not accepted, and it's still not strongly or commonly seen as as part and parcel of our moral community. So for that reason, I think, yes, humanity is not Eurocentric. Yes, theories should not be Eurocentric, but we have to talk about these things because the damage done by the theories perpetuated from a particular century are still harming humanity today. Elvis, I think you're on mute. Sorry. Yeah. Thank you. For a million Beth, I think you're back with some new questions. So let's have you first. For the million then. No, thank you very much. Well, I've got this question in mind, right? I mean, we've been talking about this. And it kind of struck some chord in me really. This question of language, right? And this question of language also and its influence to our own identity, right? Or how we ascribe ourselves or identify ourselves, right? So, I mean, coming from like a torso background, so to speak, right? I mean, if we look into our language to identifying people, for instance, based on their gender, you know, yes, now obviously there's like new terminologies that are being useful, like individuals, right? Because of their sexuality and stuff like that. But, you know, the question, I guess, I'm more interested in, you know, it's one of Oyeronka's, you know, debates, right? Concerning language and how the language constructs this understanding of how then we take this language, right? This Western language, and then we try by all means to identify ourselves through it to make sense of our own reality, right? And, you know, because I was supposed to do also a reading on introduction to philosophy, I was introducing feminism as well, right? And while I was doing my own readings, you know, I found a paper which is also in African gender studies by Oyeronka, right? There was this chapter that I kind of liked, right, Decolonizing Feminism by Marnia Lazaric, right? There she was also depicting this notion of, you know, the notion that, you know, black women in the US always have this form of identifying themselves as colored women, right? Or women of color. And though not understanding its colonial, you know, manifestations in one calling themselves a person of color and all sorts of things, therefore becomes this, you know, you know, perpetual or perpetuation of colonialism in and of itself by virtue of identifying oneself in a particular language that also suppresses that person, right? So I was quite interested in seeing perhaps your ideas around that. Do you think perhaps, you know, women today, should they still identify themselves as African women, for instance, or should they rather reconstruct another understanding to understand their own selves? Because for instance, in Posa, we would say there's no sort of male-female binary between one to identify one person for instance, right? We only categorize animals, right? And in Kunzi or Imaz, then you know that that's a female cow and all sorts of things, but that would be mostly basically on animals. Not to say though that these identities or rather the bodies that, you know, different people do have also subject them to, you know, oppression and sexism and all sorts of things, right? But I was just trying to see your thoughts around this question of the language and how we then identify ourselves, but trying by all means to stay true to our own experiences and trying this, you know, the colonial move in, you know, expressing ourselves nonetheless. Yeah, thank you. Thank you for the middle, Beth. My question is about something you mentioned in the lecture that was basically that sensuality is not regarded as morally relevant. And that made me think about the projection of sensuality onto the female subject and how that could be an indicator of a male repression and that obviously being taken the toll on women. And that made me think about that would be really interesting to research and look into. But I was wondering if you think that actually is interesting, or whether it's another example of how, for instance, in a court of law, female trauma is used as an indicator to destabilize their mental capacity. Whereas male trauma is used as a tool to humanize them when they've actually broken the law. And as to whether feminist and intellectual intersectional scholars should actually bother to investigate the projection of sensuality onto women, or it's actually just, it doesn't matter because the result is racism, sexism, and humanizing the perpetrator doesn't actually address the problem. Interesting question. Thank you both for that question. Yo, the one about language it's such a big, such a big one because even when, for instance, my experience about language or the limitation of language was when I was trying to explain to my grand, my late grandmother that I'm studying philosophy and I was trying to, you know, I could capture it so perfectly in English. And then when I had to do it in Chavenda I was like, hmm, you know, so. But, you know, in that moment I was trying to figure out, okay, is it, does it mean because philosophy, there is a phrase for it in Chavenda. Is it about, does that, would that indicate that if there's no word in a particular language that captures the nature of something, does that mean it doesn't exist for that group of people. You know, or do things exist and we try to, as we encounter them, we name them, right. And here, I think my feeling was language evolves. And as you experience new things you try to make sense of them. And sometimes in a lot of African languages is an appropriation. And I was, I was having this conversation with somebody just about a day or two ago about how sometimes we don't have a word for it. So, if someone asked me in Chavenda what is philosophy, I would say, and the philosophy, which is really just an appropriation of the English and then using it in the vendor context. And I think what's interesting or what's fascinating here is the capturing of the human experience and how it is only language and even in the metaphysical sense of personhood, the ability to communicate, which, you know, complex communication, which in the context of personhood is not limited to just spoken word, but to actions too. So think about an experience where you meet someone who doesn't speak Estrosa, but somehow with your, with your, with your hands with your facial expressions you're able to express to them, whether you know what you need or what you're looking for or where you want to go if you need directions and so forth. So while there are historical social experiences that encourage us to start talking in certain ways. There's still a way in which language, the whole evolution of language doesn't doesn't always come as a barrier between people. So when we're thinking about the use of the phrase or the word black in South Africa and in America, for instance, I'm very aware that in America they talk about women of color. And so it reminds me for instance of let's call it the beaker black right which is more a matter of the internalization of inferiority rather than the pigmentation of your, of your skin. So that black is not about whether you are, you are fairer or darker or whatever in pigmentation, but rather how you see yourself in relation to, to, to, to the white race actually. Right. And in a way when you say this is like a perpetuation of colonialism. If you look at it through the beaker lens, then you see how in fact it is, right, that you are taking this category. And in using it while we might change it from black to the phrase women of color to capture the very same thing. At the end of the day there's something about maintaining the colonial powers. At that time I'm thinking, but what else and maybe this speaks to the limitations of language. Should we create a new word, instead of me talking or asking our black women persons, should I should be to the be another word that captures black. But even if there is that other word, does black change because now we call it something else. You know, so, so this is a very interesting one because it is true that we construct our reality using words. And sometimes we fail to transcend even the negative implications of that reality, because we we trapped in using the same words that actually exist rather than, rather than emancipate. I don't have like a direct answer to that or you know, but I think it is difficult, it is complex to capture our humanity to capture our identities without using the words that are already in place from the established forms. However, I do think that we should maintain the flexibility of language and allow it to evolve with time so that it's more inclusive and so we ought to start maybe using languages or language to include rather than exclude faith. Sensuality. That is such, you know, I think you've just exposed me to an interesting way of looking at the role of sensuality in what do you call this in, in thinking about morality, the moral world, the relationality among persons, and the appearance, the very ontology of women and what sensuality means when we try to understand the nature of women. And that I can I can I can tell you now that's a very interesting question. So I have this thing and I always tell my students that in philosophy questioning is key questioning is important. And when you question the sensuality of women in relation to their trauma and the outcome of recognition of that trauma from others, which turns them into a weaker sex so to speak. But when we see the same issue in relation to man, there is a do you and there's a humanizing aspect to it. Then for me, there's already a problem. And I think that problem is one that is definitely worthy of worthy of investigation. But just to explain how I can't uses a sensuous nature of humans. He doesn't mean it in the way that we think of, we're talking about sensuality in now, he's just talking about the, he tries to differentiate desires from, sorry, inclinations from rationality. And all he says is that anything that we do that is not motivated by by rationality, which, which, which gives rise to autonomy lacks that moral, moral worth. So you, we think so for him rationality is something we think through we understand and once we understand it, we are called to duty to treat others well. But what you are introducing when you talk about sensuality is how the body, the inclinations actually complicate this process from thinking to living morally. So yeah, great. That helps. I think we've had a very brilliant discussion first of all. I'm presenting a keynote on personhood and health care in June, and I'm sure I'm going to be playing the recorded lecture one of again to steal some points. Yeah, I found it very interesting. Personally, I wanted to see if you could say a bit more about the issue of the politics of recognition, knowing fully where that well. Black women are persons by the issue isn't about the metaphysical or normative aspect of their personhood about the politics of recognition. It just brings to my mind what, how exactly can the problem of recognition be dealt with. Because it's so it permits the system permits society. How can it be dealt with, where do we start from basically. Yeah, any ideas and thoughts you, you have on that. So recognition for me is so important and I see some of my students are actually here and we, we've been working with the theme of recognition and it resonates so much with with the individuals in society because it and I think this is where I like to see Cajemos framing because he sees it as a two way street. But first the aspects he talks about aspects in the person so the psychological and how from the psychological one is able to make sense of the social. But he also talks about the impact of the social on one psychological, so that the recognition is not just the one way streets of expecting others to recognize you, but you recognizing yourself as well. But the way things are in society at the moment, there is a need to to impose recognition to fix social ills to fix social harms, because what is most harmful to to black bodies in general is the fact that they're not recognized as humans who feel pain as humans who need protection as humans who need to be respected as humans who you know, and when you talk about this and this is another form of muting. Right. Because when you talk about this and hear the reception from from our white counterparts needs to come more openly is that once you start saying black people are in danger black people are not morally valued black people at this. One of the immediate responses is, yeah, but I treat you well. I've never harmed you. I don't do this. And there I think is a clear indication of people having missed the systematic problem of recognition in society. And it's not about the one person getting it right, is that the dominant view of a group of peoples is seen as inferior, but so that that inferiorization sometimes gets internalized, which is why it can handle says we need to work on ourselves. And in part it is from that recognition of, of knowing that there's a problem that we are motivated to act to fix it. But I think part of what goes wrong is when there are no conversations we need those dialogues, but we need also those dialogues to to to be around. What do you call it some altruistic attitude towards those that are saying they are suffering. And an understanding of that suffering without wanting to impose once judgment of whether it counts as suffering or not. So I think the politics of recognition of a very I mean even if you what's his name. Charles Taylor also writes on this and it's so it's so important to valuing oneself and expecting others to value you as a person who forms part of a moral community, and most importantly, is seen as a, an equal co author of the norms that that govern the society. We really want to say thank you. We've given a brilliant lecture. It is raised a lot of questions and discusses. And I'm sure will have benefited one way or the other from it. Of course I'm sure if we call on you so what that time. Yeah, so as you would honor our call and we'll still have the pleasure for with you in the future. And I want to say thank you all for those who attended and for your beautiful questions and comments. And we look forward to seeing you in the next edition of the lecture which will be on June 25 the last Friday of June. We're looking forward to that as we have yet another interesting guest speaker lined up for that as well. At this point, I'll stop recording. Sorry, I'll just say those of you who have attended if you would like to join our mailing list so that you get notification of our seminars, then please just email me I'm just putting it in the chat. Now, and I will make sure that you are included. Oops, in all of our mailings we will overwhelm you with them and we will of course protect your data. So I'm having trouble typing it in and talking at the same time. So, yes. SH729, I saw us. Sorry, that's what it is. So I believe we have Hema Dabashi in our next session. Yeah, another provocative and interesting talk coming up. But thank you so much and for a really fantastic conversation. Elvis didn't recognize that I was trying to ask a question. Oh, sorry, I didn't. That's fine we are quite out of time and I mean in any case, there's really nothing more to be said it was so good. So thank you so so so much. Thank you so much for having me. Thank you everybody for questions and comments. Thank you, I appreciate that. Thank you so much for for taking the time to write such a beautiful paper.