Philosophy Adventures in Sweden!
The International Association of Women Philosophers (IAPh) June 17-19, 2004


 
Monday morning, June 15:
Jon and I packed up and drove to Portland
embarking on a 23 hour trip to Gothborg, Sweden, 
flying coach.* 
Why did we do it you ask? 
Because we're philosophers and we have a job to do!
Of the job description, more later.
*Sharyn Clough and Jonathan Kaplan gratefully acknowledge 
the financial support of the Oregon State Philosophy Department.

In retrospect I was looking tired 
before we even started...

 

It's hour 18. 
There's no sleeping without encouraging bloodclots 
where the seat cuts into the fleshiest bits of your thigh.
And we're running out of things to watch on tv. 
Starsky and Hutch was awesome, 50 First Dates wasn't. 
(I decided to save Scooby Doo II for the trip home.) 

 

 
 
 

Stopping briefly in the airport in Amsterdam, excitement filled the air as crowds waited for the Holland football team to return home. 
The orange, my god, the orange! 
I can't get away from it!
(No disrespect intended to the Tennessee Volunteers and/or the OSU Beavers. Honest).

After arriving in Gothberg,  we found a Thai restaurant right across from the hotel - things were finally looking up.

 
 
A sunny day in downtown Gothborg, the day before the conference. 
So yes, the conference. 
Two years earlier, Kristina Rolin, a fabulous philosopher from Finland, had emailed me to ask if I was interested in getting a panel together on feminist epistemology at the next meeting of the IAPh. In the meantime my book Beyond Epistemology had been published. Kristina and sister philosophers stateside, Kristen Intemann and Sharon Crasnow, signed up to re-examine my claim that epistemology was no longer the best focus for feminist science studies. 
And finally, here we were!

 
 
 

Here's Jon and I on the first day of the conference, having a happy reunion with Kristina Rolin and Kristen Intemann  - all of us had met originally at a conference on science and values three years earlier in Birmingham, AL.

Naomi Scheman, the chair of our session, invited our panel to a pre-session lunch at her university residence, where she was visiting from the University of Minnesota.  Here's Kristina and Kristen joined by the fourth member of our team, Sharon Crasnow. 

 
 

Team Sweden in action!

 
 
 

Blondes in Sweden showing them how it's done :)

Celebrating a great session! 

 
 

Ok, with our session over, I was free to pursue the real reason for my trip to Sweden... 
My trip to the IKEA motherland.

The highlight of any IKEA visit: the "As is" section (known affectionately by me and my Philly friend Paul Crowe as the "As if" section. Now we can just call it FYND!)

 
 

Here I am at the conference dinner with the fabulously charming Christine Hauskeller, visiting from the University of Exeter.

Here's Sharon Crasnow with Kimberly Leighton from Cornell. Kimberly and Christine helped us all recover from the "entertainment" provided over dinner - folk songs about the suffering of women from around the world - I wish I was kidding. (This is why some folks think feminists are no fun. Luckily, our table of feminist filosofers had other ideas...)

 
 
 

Jon found a great restaurant for our last night in Sweden. Here's Kristina extremely pleased with an amazing chocolate tower for dessert.

Exhausted but happy, we try not to think about the *26* hour trip home. Scooby Doo II awaits! Ruh roh!
 

 

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