Martha Nussbaum | |
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Martha Nussbaum in 2008
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Born |
Martha Craven May 6, 1947 New York City |
Alma mater |
New York University Harvard University |
Era | 20th-century philosophy |
Region | Western Philosophy |
School | Analytic |
Institutions |
University of Chicago Brown University Harvard University |
Main interests
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Political philosophy, ethics, feminism, liberal theory |
Notable ideas
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Capability approach |
Influences
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Martha Craven Nussbaum (/ˈnʊsbaʊm/; born May 6, 1947) is an American philosopher and the current Ernst Freund Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Ethics at the University of Chicago, where she is jointly appointed in the Law School and the Philosophy department. She has a particular interest in ancient Greek and Roman philosophy, political philosophy, feminism, and ethics, including animal rights. She also holds associate appointments in classics, divinity, and political science, is a member of the Committee on Southern Asian Studies, and a board member of the Human Rights Program. She previously taught at Harvard and Brown.
Nussbaum is the author of a number of books, including The Fragility of Goodness (1986), Sex and Social Justice (1998), Hiding From Humanity: Disgust, Shame, and the Law (2004), and Frontiers of Justice: Disability, Nationality, Species Membership (2006). She received the 2016 Kyoto Prize in Arts and Philosophy.
Nussbaum was born in New York City, the daughter of George Craven, a Philadelphia lawyer, and Betty Warren, an interior designer and homemaker; during her teenage years, Nussbaum attended the Baldwin School in Bryn Mawr. She described her upbringing as "East Coast WASP elite...very sterile, very preoccupied with money and status". She would later credit her impatience with "mandarin philosophers" as the "repudiation of my own aristocratic upbringing. I don't like anything that sets itself up as an in-group or an elite, whether it is the Bloomsbury group or Derrida".