Danielle Petherbridge
PhD (UCD)
E-mail: danielle.petherbridge@ucd.ie
Research interests: German Idealism, Social Philosophy, Political Philosophy, Feminist Theory, Contemporary French Philosophy (especially Foucault), Critical Theory (esepcially Habermas and Honneth)
Teaching 2011-12
PHIL40190 Paradigms of Socio-Cultural Criticism
PHIL30320 Contemporary Social Theory: Foucault on Agency & Power
PHIL30300 Critical Theory
PHIL20330 Foucault & Critical Social Theory
Current Research
One of my major current research projects is focused around critical theory, particularly the work of Axel Honneth and recognition theory. I am also working on questions related to the analysis of power employed in critical social theory and the work of Michel Foucault. I am particularly interested in debates about foundational issues and questions regarding the differences between immanent and context-transcending approaches to critique.I am also co-principle investigator with Luna Dolezal and Tim Mooney, on the New Ideas research project Recognition, Identity and Cultural Encounters, which is funded by the Irish Research Council for Humanities and Social Sciences. Website: www.ucdrecognitionproject.com
The Recognition, Identity and Cultural Encounters research project draws on both critical theoretical and phenomenological perspectives to investigate modalities of social and cultural interaction. It takes into account the experiential content and materiality of social encounters while at the same time considering the broader normative frameworks within which these interactions take place. An initial workshop focusing on the theme of recognition will be held in March at University College Dublin, entitled: Encountering the Other: Philosophical Perspectives on Recognition.
The workshop contrasts recognitive perspectives on social interaction, particularly from the German critical theory tradition, with a range of alternative philosophical perspectives, particularly drawn from contemporary French philosophy and phenomenology, which explore alternative understandings and modalities through which social interaction is experienced. Participants in the workshop seek to explore critical perspectives on the concept of recognition understood as the basis of normative interaction and the condition of social freedom. The workshop will focus on issues such as recognition and embodiment, recognition and the politics of needs, reification, experiences of misrecognition and the ways in which recognition might be imbued with power, and the implications of a theory of recognition for collective action, democratic citizenship and participation.
Books
(Monograph) The Critical Theory of Axel Honneth, Lexington Books, (forthcoming).
Axel Honneth: Critical Essays, with a Reply by Axel Honneth, Brill, 2011.
(Co-editor) Recognition, Work, Politics: New Directions in French Critical Theory, Brill, 2007.
Grants
Recognition, Identity and Cultural Encounters, New Ideas Grant, Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences, 2011-2012.
Editor
Co-ordinating Editor, Critical Horizons: A Journal of Philosophy and Social Theory, Equinox Publishing, UK.