About
Office Hours – 2022S term 2:
- Mondays and Tuesdays, 4:00pm – 5:00pm
- Location: BUCH E158
- Also available by appointment
Office Hours – 2022W term 1:
- Mondays and Wednesdays, 2:00pm – 3:00pm
- Location: BUCH E158
- Also available by appointment
Research
My areas of specialization are continental philosophy, the history of philosophy, feminist philosophy, philosophy and literature, the philosophy of sex and gender, and social and political philosophy. I am also interested in ethics and anti-racist philosophy.
I am currently a postdoctoral researcher with the Gendered Mimesis project at KU Leuven (http://www.homomimeticus.eu/gendered-mimesis-c1/). The Gendered Mimesis Project reframes dominant accounts of the subject of Enlightenment with the emerging and relational accounts of subjectivity offered by Adriana Cavarero (inclination), Judith Butler (performativity), and Catherine Malabou (plasticity). By drawing on a Nietzschean legacy in critical theory, I create a dialogue between this legacy and contemporary continental feminist philosophers working with recent notions of gendered mimesis. The result will be a manuscript provisionally titled Gendered Being: Ontology and Mimesis in the Post-Enlightenment Subject, and a series of related articles.
Publications
Book
Nietzsche and Friendship. London: Bloomsbury, February 2019 (https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/nietzsche-and-friendship-9781350047341/)
Articles
“A Feminist Genealogy of the Post-Enlightenment Subject,” Graduate Faculty Philosophy Journal, New School for Social Research, forthcoming 2022.
“On Love, Women, and Friendship: Reading Nietzsche with Irigaray,” Nietzsche-Studien 46.1 (2017): pp. 135–152.
“Transgendering Nietzsche: Male Mothers and Phallic Women in Derrida’s Spurs,” philoSOPHIA: A Journal of Continental Feminism 7.1 (Winter 2017): pp. 99-108.
“Nietzsche’s Joyful Friendship: Epicurean Elements in the Middle Works,” The Agonist Vol. X (Spring 2017): pp. 25-40.
“Nietzsche’s Agonistic Ethics of Friendship,” Symposium: Canadian Journal for Continental Philosophy 20.2 (Fall 2016): 22-41.
“Nietzsche’s Goal of Friendship,” Journal of Nietzsche Studies 45.3 (Autumn 2014): 279-291.
“Nietzsche on Love,” Philosophy Now 104 (September/October 2014): 14-16.
“Heroism in Sophocles’s Antigone,” Philosophy and Literature 38.1 (April 2014): 282-291.
Book Chapters
“Friedrich Nietzsche” in Reconsidering Political Thinkers, edited by Simon Choat and Manjeet Ramgotra. Oxford University Press, forthcoming 2022.
“Reification, Objectification, and Feminist Activism” in The Spell of Capital: Reification and Spectacle, edited by Samir Gandesha and Johan Frederik Hartle, pp. 149-162. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2017.
“Nietzsche’s Cruel Offerings: Friendship, Solitude, and the Bestowing Virtue in Thus Spoke Zarathustra” in Nietzsche’s Therapeutic Teaching: For Individuals and Culture, edited by Horst Hutter and Eli Friedland, pp. 61-72. London: Bloomsbury, 2013.
Recent Presentations
“On How to Rethink the Androcentric Subject of European Philosophy with Inclination, Mimesis, and Love.” Mimetic Inclinations: Gender, Philosophy, and Politics with Adriana Cavarero Conference. Institute of Philosophy, KU Leuven (November 19, 2021).
“Mimetic Inclination and the Limits of the Enlightened Subject.” Invited speaker at the School of Materialist Research (September 28, 2021).
“Gendered Mimesis: An introduction.” HOM Seminar, KU Leuven (June 24, 2021).
“On Sovereignty and the Universal: Rethinking the Dialectic in Enlightenment with Juliette.” Invited speaker at Theodor W. Adorno: Fifty Years After His Death, SFU Woodward”s (November 29, 2019).
“A community for those without? Love, death and solidarity in Bataille, Nietzsche and Derrida.” Invited speaker at the Philosophy Association, University of Fraser Valley (Nov 8, 2019).
“The Mimetic Subject: Identity, Gender, and Trauma in Continental Feminist Philosophy.” Invited speaker for research seminar, Department of Theology, Religion and Philosophy, the University of Winchester (February 12, 2019).
“Nietzsche and His Posthumous Friends.” PICT Faculty Lectures III, Goethe Institute Paris (January 31, 2019).
“Transmitting the Legacies of Philosophical Thought.” Critical Thought in and Beyond the University, Paris School of Arts and Culture, University of Kent, Paris (January 28, 2019).
“Philosophical Honesty and the Practice of Changing Values: Thinking with James Baldwin.” Invited speaker at The Price of the Ticket with 198 Arts and Learning. Tate Modern, London (May 20, 2018).
“On the Reception and Transmission of Philosophical Legacies.” Invited speaker at Symposium: A New Ethics. The evolving responsibilities of creative practices in a changing world. Stanley Picker Gallery, Kingston, UK (January 20, 2018).
“Aristotle and Nietzsche on Greatness of Soul.” Invited speaker at international workshop, Subject, Character, Habit, University of Cologne (November 16, 2017).
“The Body as Force in Performance Art.” Invited speaker for master class at performing arts school Forum Dança, Faculty of Fine Arts Lisbon (November 9, 2017).
“The Sovereign Individual in Nietzsche and Sade.” Invited speaker for departmental seminar at Royal Holloway, University of London, Philosophy Department (October 18, 2017).
“On Sovereignty and Female Power: Juliette and Antigone as Dissonant Exemplars.” Society for European Philosophy and Forum for European Philosophy Joint Annual Conference (SEP-FEP 2017), University of Winchester (September 5, 2017).
“Reinterpreting Philosophy: Questioning Universality with Exemplarity and Difference.” Invited keynote speaker at Feminist Utopias: Transforming the Present of Philosophy, Historical and Contemporary Perspectives Conference, University of Iceland (March 30- April 2, 2017).
“Friendship, Love and Women.” Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy 2016/17 Research Series, Chelsea Lecture Theatre, University of the Arts London (March 9, 2017). Listen: https://backdoorbroadcasting.net/2017/03/willow-verkerk-friendship-love-and-women/
“On Communication: Bataille’s Friendship with Nietzsche.” Invited speaker for workshop on Bataille’s Nietzsche, Centre for Philosophy and Critical Thought, Goldsmiths, University of London (November 11, 2016).