We have the pleasure to invite you to another research seminar. Emily McTernan will deliver a talk "Two conceptions of recognition respect: More Goffman, less Kant". The meeting will take place on October 23 at 5:00 PM in room 25 at 52 Grodzka Street and via the MS Teams platform.

Abstract

Our everyday social interactions are filled with small gestures of respect and regard for others and, sometimes, the opposite. We shake hands, listen attentively, or make brief polite eye contact with those we pass in the street. But other times, we interrupt, stare too long, or affront. What significance do these gestures have? What do we owe each other, and how might we wrong each other, in the details of our face-to-face interactions?
To describe the respect we owe each other, philosophers usually turn to Kant, and talk of respect for persons as persons, or as moral agents. In this paper, first I argue that the Kantian framing of recognition respect best captures and explains only a narrow subset of the ways in which we can fail to respect others in our everyday interactions. Second, drawing on the work of the sociologist Erving Goffman, I offer an alternative conception of recognition respect as respect for personas: that is, for the ways in which a person presents herself in the interaction. I argue that this Goffman-inspired alternative better captures the variety of everyday ways in which we can fail to offer others respect when interacting, and the reasons why such failures matter.