K. Anthony Appiah

Courses

• Life of Honor Seminar

  Honor is especially interesting as a challenge for the law, because it is, among other things, a normative system that competes with the law for allegiance. It is a familiar idea that morality can come into conflict with law, raising questions about civil disobedience. We often think that a person may reasonably decide that a non-legal normative system, morality, requires them to reject the demands of the law. But the analogous thought about the honor, though widely accepted in practice, is less widely discussed. People will often do what honor requires even when it is illegal. And many people regard the decision to do so as reasonable. In the first part of the course we will map the contours of honor and try to develop a systematic account of what it is. This will involve historical, anthropological, and psychological inquiries. Beginning with the role of honor in the heroic cultures of the ancient Mediterranean world, we’ll go on to discuss its significance in a number of African societies, and the connection between foot binding and women’s honor in China. We’ll learn in these cases how honor is related to social identity—class, age, gender, ethnicity, nationality—and can be both individual and collective. Individual honor makes different demands on men and women, young and old, high and low, slave and free. We’ll then discuss socio-psychological approaches, and, building on this body of information we’ll be able to explore critically the outlines of a theory of honor. The basic thought will be that honor codes assign differential rights to respect to individuals and groups of different identities and determine what it takes to keep those rights and what leads people or groups to lose them. These codes work by drawing on a basic feature of normal human psychology, which makes people care about whether they receive the forms of respect they believe are due to them. In the second part of the course we’ll look more specifically at two cases—dueling and honor-killing—where legal regulation was for long periods relatively unsuccessful; and then discuss, briefly, at the end, ways in which honor can serve the laws purposes, as it does, for example, because the threat of loss of honor and the experience of shame are among the disincentives to criminal behavior.

• Life of Honor Seminar: Writing Credit

  Honor is especially interesting as a challenge for the law, because it is, among other things, a normative system that competes with the law for allegiance. It is a familiar idea that morality can come into conflict with law, raising questions about civil disobedience. We often think that a person may reasonably decide that a non-legal normative system, morality, requires them to reject the demands of the law. But the analogous thought about the honor, though widely accepted in practice, is less widely discussed. People will often do what honor requires even when it is illegal. And many people regard the decision to do so as reasonable. In the first part of the course we will map the contours of honor and try to develop a systematic account of what it is. This will involve historical, anthropological, and psychological inquiries. Beginning with the role of honor in the heroic cultures of the ancient Mediterranean world, we’ll go on to discuss its significance in a number of African societies, and the connection between foot binding and women’s honor in China. We’ll learn in these cases how honor is related to social identity—class, age, gender, ethnicity, nationality—and can be both individual and collective. Individual honor makes different demands on men and women, young and old, high and low, slave and free. We’ll then discuss socio-psychological approaches, and, building on this body of information we’ll be able to explore critically the outlines of a theory of honor. The basic thought will be that honor codes assign differential rights to respect to individuals and groups of different identities and determine what it takes to keep those rights and what leads people or groups to lose them. These codes work by drawing on a basic feature of normal human psychology, which makes people care about whether they receive the forms of respect they believe are due to them. In the second part of the course we’ll look more specifically at two cases—dueling and honor-killing—where legal regulation was for long periods relatively unsuccessful; and then discuss, briefly, at the end, ways in which honor can serve the laws purposes, as it does, for example, because the threat of loss of honor and the experience of shame are among the disincentives to criminal behavior.

• The Ethics of Identity Seminar

  Ethics, in its broadest sense, is the study of what it is to live a good life. This course will explore the role of social identities—such as gender, race, ethnicity, profession, religion, and nationality—in shaping and evaluating a person's life. We shall discuss both the nature of social identities and the ways in which identities affect what we owe both to ourselves and to others.

  We’ll begin with a quick discussion of the nature of ethics, discussing Aristotle’s definition of the subject matter in the first book with that word in its title, the Nicomachean Ethics. Though there are many controversial claims in this book, the fundamental framing of the question, “What is it to live a successful life?” and the notion of success that he discusses still seem remarkably helpful. Next we will consider a modern articulation of the liberal idea of individuality, which will be a useful background when we turn to thinking about the ethical bearing of social identities, and a modern interpretation of Aristotle’s Ethics, due to the philosopher Ronald Dworkin. With these philosophical ideas in hand, we can turn to discussing various ways in which identity might matter for ethics. Our focus will not be on legal or political questions—non-discrimination, affirmative action—but some legal and political issues will arise on the way, since, if the state is interested in protecting or advancing the interests of its citizens, it will need to understand the ways in which their identities matter for their well-being.

• The Ethics of Identity Seminar: Writing Credit

  Ethics, in its broadest sense, is the study of what it is to live a good life. This course will explore the role of social identities—such as gender, race, ethnicity, profession, religion, and nationality—in shaping and evaluating a person's life. We shall discuss both the nature of social identities and the ways in which identities affect what we owe both to ourselves and to others. We’ll begin with a quick discussion of the nature of ethics, discussing Aristotle’s definition of the subject matter in the first book with that word in its title, the Nicomachean Ethics. Though there are many controversial claims in this book, the fundamental framing of the question, “What is it to live a successful life?” and the notion of success that he discusses still seem remarkably helpful. Next we will consider a modern articulation of the liberal idea of individuality, which will be a useful background when we turn to thinking about the ethical bearing of social identities, and a modern interpretation of Aristotle’s Ethics, due to the philosopher Ronald Dworkin. With these philosophical ideas in hand, we can turn to discussing various ways in which identity might matter for ethics. Our focus will not be on legal or political questions—non-discrimination, affirmative action—but some legal and political issues will arise on the way, since, if the state is interested in protecting or advancing the interests of its citizens, it will need to understand the ways in which their identities matter for their well-being.