An interdisciplinary quarterly journal dedicated to philosophical bioethics.

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Special Issue

Call for Papers: Chronic Pain & Social Justice

Call for Papers: Chronic Pain & Social Justice A special issue of the Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal Edited by Jada Wiggleton-Little and Daniel Buchman Chronic pain is a major public health issue. Globally, it is estimated that approximately 20% of adults live with chronic pain, with a debilitating impact on personal relationships, employment, quality […]

Book Reviews

Sarah Richardson, The Maternal Imprint: The Contested Science of Maternal-Fetal Effects, University of Chicago Press, 2021. Review by Quill R Kukla (Georgetown Univ ...

I had been eagerly anticipating the release of Sarah Richardson’s meticulously researched The Maternal Imprint: The Contested Science of Maternal-Fetal Effects (2021) for several years, and I was not disappointed. A leading feminist scholar of the history and philosophy of science, Richardson traces the scientific history of the idea that pregnant people’s bodies control the future health, character, and […]

Book Reviews

Danielle Spencer, Metagnosis: Revelatory Narratives of Health and Identity, Oxford University Press, 2020

Danielle Spencer’s book, “Metagnosis: Revelatory Narratives of Health and Identity,” does many things. It is a work of autotheory, putting Spencer’s own embodied narrative in constant conversation with the testimony of others along with a remarkably diverse set of critical and theoretical approaches. In the book, Spencer coins a new term, “metagnosis”, which occurs when […]

Book Reviews

Firmin DeBrabander, Life After Privacy: Reclaiming Democracy in a Surveillance Society, Cambridge University Press, 2020

In “Life After Privacy: Reclaiming Democracy in a Surveillance Society,” Firmin DeBrabander proposes that the stakes associated with the loss of personal privacy are even higher than is generally acknowledged. Personal privacy is a compelling issue, and his review of it is engaging and accessible. He is successful in demonstrating that powerful forces—corporations, governments, and […]

Book Reviews

Jane Ward, The Tragedy of Heterosexuality, NYU Press, 2020

THE STRAIGHTS ARE NOT OKAY. The tragedy of heterosexuality is this: modern straightness dooms once-hopeful, loving couples to share dull, frustrating, and lonely lives together. After all, men are from Mars, women are from Venus, and what’s a heterosexual to do about it? Against this dismal state of affairs, Jane Ward’s The Tragedy of Heterosexuality […]