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Books by Shelley Park

Research paper thumbnail of Mothering Queerly, Queering Motherhood: Resisting Monomaternalism in Adoptive, Lesbian, Blended and Polygamous Families

Bridging the gap between feminist studies of motherhood and queer theory, Mothering Queerly, Quee... more Bridging the gap between feminist studies of motherhood and queer theory, Mothering Queerly, Queering Motherhood articulates a provocative philosophy of queer kinship that need not be rooted in lesbian or gay sexual identities. Working from an interdisciplinary framework that incorporates feminist philosophy and queer, psychoanalytic, poststructuralist, and postcolonial theories, Shelley M. Park offers a powerful critique of an ideology she terms monomaternalism. Despite widespread cultural insistence that every child should have one—and only one—“real” mother, many contemporary family constellations do not fit this mandate. Park highlights the negative consequences of this ideology and demonstrates how families created through open adoption, same-sex parenting, divorce, and plural marriage can be sites of resistance. Drawing from personal experiences as both an adoptive and a biological mother and juxtaposing these autobiographical reflections with critical readings of cultural texts representing multi-mother families, Park advocates a new understanding of postmodern families as potentially queer coalitional assemblages held together by a mixture of affection and critical reflection premised on difference.

Guest Edited Journal Issue by Shelley Park

Research paper thumbnail of Contested Terrains: Women of Color, Third World Women, Feminisms and Geopolitics

Hypatia, 2017

Guest edited special issue of Hypatia (Summer 2017)

Papers by Shelley Park

Research paper thumbnail of Uncomfortably Close to Human

DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals), Nov 30, 2022

Research paper thumbnail of Family Pictures: A Philosopher Explores the Familiar

Journal of the Motherhood Initiative for Research and Community Involvement, Nov 1, 2001

Research paper thumbnail of Naked Motherhood: Shattering Illusions and Sharing Truths

Journal of the Motherhood Initiative for Research and Community Involvement, Nov 1, 2002

Research paper thumbnail of Universitas: The Social Restructuring of American Undergraduate Education

The Journal of Higher Education, 2000

Preface: A Young Man's Death in the Desert Foreword by John M. Carfora Introduction: Educatio... more Preface: A Young Man's Death in the Desert Foreword by John M. Carfora Introduction: Educational Agnostics: The America Campus in Crisis The Search for First Principles Back to Basics: Revisiting Plato's Republic The Languaged Life of Learning: The Intersubjective Imperative Reconceiving the University: The Great Books versus the Great Debate Rediscovering Atlantis: A Navigator's Guide to Western Civilization Restructuring Higher Education in America Slaying the Sacred Cows: The Restructuring of the University Returning Home: The Odyssey of Learning The Coming Global Campus: The Intercultural Imperative The Groves of Akademos: The Campus as Community A Vision of the University A Vision of the University: The Importance of Leadership on Campus "The Illimitable Freedom of the Mind": Jefferson's University and the Federalist League Conclusion: Universitas: Restoring the Whole Postscript Select Bibliography Index

Research paper thumbnail of Uncomfortably Close to Human: Robots and the NeoColonial Politics of Care

Feminist Philosophical Quarterly, 2022

Social robots are marketed as human tools promising us a better life. This marketing strategy com... more Social robots are marketed as human tools promising us a better life. This marketing strategy commodifies not only the labor of care but the caregiver as well, conjuring a fantasy of technoliberal futurism that echoes a colonial past. Against techno-utopian fantasies of a good life as one involving engineered domestic help, I draw here on the techno-dystopian television show Humans (stylized HUMⱯNS) to suggest that we should find our desires for such help unsettling. At the core of my argument is a return of the “uncanny valley” problem, from its reformulation as an engineering/design problem to its origins as a psychosocial symptom of an unresolved, traumatic past. I conclude that our sense of the uncanny may be best understood as a moral capacity that should be honed rather than evaded.

Research paper thumbnail of Queer Possibilities

Research paper thumbnail of Trump is Gross: Taking the Politics of Taste (and Distaste) Seriously

Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal, 2017

This paper advances the somewhat unphilosophical thesis that “Trump is gross” to draw attention t... more This paper advances the somewhat unphilosophical thesis that “Trump is gross” to draw attention to the need to take matters of taste seriously in politics. I begin by exploring the slipperiness of distinctions between aesthetics, epistemology, and ethics, subsequently suggesting that we may need to pivot toward the aesthetic to understand and respond to the historical moment we inhabit. More specically, I suggest that, in order to understand how Donald Trump was elected President of the United States and in order to stem the damage that preceded this and will ensue from it, we need to understand the power of political taste (and distaste, including disgust) as both a force of resistance and as a force of normalization

Research paper thumbnail of Adoption in Philosophy

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Confronting Postmaternal Thinking

Research paper thumbnail of Classic Media review of Hedwig and the Angry Inch

Research paper thumbnail of Blended: Writers on the Stepfamily Experience

Journal of the Motherhood Initiative for Research and Community Involvement, 2016

reviewed by shelley m. park In Blended: Writers on the Stepfamily Experience, Samantha Waltz brin... more reviewed by shelley m. park In Blended: Writers on the Stepfamily Experience, Samantha Waltz brings together over thirty writers to speak on their experiences inhabiting blended families. The constituent pieces are brief, autobiographical reflections, ranging from three to twelve pages. The brevity of the pieces does not allow for sustained analytical development of any one writer's experiences but does result in a relatively expansive collection of familial snaphots that, cumulatively, provide a kaleidoscopic portrait of the blended family. Greater cross-cultural diversity would be welcome (only two of the stories explicitly deal with the ways in which cultural differences may present unique challenges for stepfamilies), as would a greater representation of non-white authors. However, the range of experiences and perspectives represented here is otherwise broad. A primary strength of the collection is that the reflections of biological parents are intermixed with the reflections of stepparents and the reflections of adult children to yield colorful, multidimensional patterns that do not allow one perspective to dominate the others. Some common themes that run through the essays in Blended include the problem of naming, holiday stresses, struggles over different parenting styles, and relations with exes. The language of "stepfamilies" ("stepmothers," "stepchildren," "half siblings") troubles several contributors who comment on how such terms connote a less than "real" familial relationship. Part of the lived reality of many members of stepfamilies is not knowing what to call one another. Mother's day is a particularly vexed holiday for stepchildren and stepmothers for this reason, as contributor Melissa Hart poignantly observes in her recollection of the annual struggle inscribing Mother's Day (or is it Mothers' Day?) cards ("Tales of a Confused Apostrophe"). Other holidays also include struggles over kinship boundaries, as sacred family traditions and McRobbie, Angela. "Yummy Mummies Leave a Bad Taste for Young Women." The Guardian.

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Queering Freedom

Research paper thumbnail of Association for Feminist Ethics and Social Theory (FEAST) Conference: Contested Terrains: Women of Color, Feminisms, and Geopolitics

The Association for Feminist Ethics and Social Theory is a professional organization dedicated to... more The Association for Feminist Ethics and Social Theory is a professional organization dedicated to promoting feminist ethical perspectives on philosophy, moral and political life, and public policy. Through meetings, publications, and projects, we hope to increase the visibility and influence of feminist ethics, as well as feminist social and political theory, and to provide support to emerging scholars from diverse and underrepresented populations. Our aim is to further the development and refinement of new understandings of ethical and political concepts and topics, especially as these arise out of feminist concerns.

Research paper thumbnail of Gendered Divisions of Labor in the Twenty‐First‐Century Academy

Research paper thumbnail of Tim R. Johnston, Affirmation, Care Ethics, and LGBT Identity. New York: Palgrave, 2016, ISBN 978-1-137-59408-2

Hypatia Reviews Online, 2018

Research paper thumbnail of Normativity and Belonging: Reflections about Critical Adoption Studies

Adoption & Culture, 2021

Research paper thumbnail of Gendered Divisions of Labor in the 21ST Century Academy

International Handbook of Gender Equity in Higher Education, 2020

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Philosophical Inquiries into Pregnancy, Childbirth, and Mothering: Maternal Subjects

Research paper thumbnail of Mothering Queerly, Queering Motherhood: Resisting Monomaternalism in Adoptive, Lesbian, Blended and Polygamous Families

Bridging the gap between feminist studies of motherhood and queer theory, Mothering Queerly, Quee... more Bridging the gap between feminist studies of motherhood and queer theory, Mothering Queerly, Queering Motherhood articulates a provocative philosophy of queer kinship that need not be rooted in lesbian or gay sexual identities. Working from an interdisciplinary framework that incorporates feminist philosophy and queer, psychoanalytic, poststructuralist, and postcolonial theories, Shelley M. Park offers a powerful critique of an ideology she terms monomaternalism. Despite widespread cultural insistence that every child should have one—and only one—“real” mother, many contemporary family constellations do not fit this mandate. Park highlights the negative consequences of this ideology and demonstrates how families created through open adoption, same-sex parenting, divorce, and plural marriage can be sites of resistance. Drawing from personal experiences as both an adoptive and a biological mother and juxtaposing these autobiographical reflections with critical readings of cultural texts representing multi-mother families, Park advocates a new understanding of postmodern families as potentially queer coalitional assemblages held together by a mixture of affection and critical reflection premised on difference.

Research paper thumbnail of Contested Terrains: Women of Color, Third World Women, Feminisms and Geopolitics

Hypatia, 2017

Guest edited special issue of Hypatia (Summer 2017)

Research paper thumbnail of Uncomfortably Close to Human

DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals), Nov 30, 2022

Research paper thumbnail of Family Pictures: A Philosopher Explores the Familiar

Journal of the Motherhood Initiative for Research and Community Involvement, Nov 1, 2001

Research paper thumbnail of Naked Motherhood: Shattering Illusions and Sharing Truths

Journal of the Motherhood Initiative for Research and Community Involvement, Nov 1, 2002

Research paper thumbnail of Universitas: The Social Restructuring of American Undergraduate Education

The Journal of Higher Education, 2000

Preface: A Young Man's Death in the Desert Foreword by John M. Carfora Introduction: Educatio... more Preface: A Young Man's Death in the Desert Foreword by John M. Carfora Introduction: Educational Agnostics: The America Campus in Crisis The Search for First Principles Back to Basics: Revisiting Plato's Republic The Languaged Life of Learning: The Intersubjective Imperative Reconceiving the University: The Great Books versus the Great Debate Rediscovering Atlantis: A Navigator's Guide to Western Civilization Restructuring Higher Education in America Slaying the Sacred Cows: The Restructuring of the University Returning Home: The Odyssey of Learning The Coming Global Campus: The Intercultural Imperative The Groves of Akademos: The Campus as Community A Vision of the University A Vision of the University: The Importance of Leadership on Campus "The Illimitable Freedom of the Mind": Jefferson's University and the Federalist League Conclusion: Universitas: Restoring the Whole Postscript Select Bibliography Index

Research paper thumbnail of Uncomfortably Close to Human: Robots and the NeoColonial Politics of Care

Feminist Philosophical Quarterly, 2022

Social robots are marketed as human tools promising us a better life. This marketing strategy com... more Social robots are marketed as human tools promising us a better life. This marketing strategy commodifies not only the labor of care but the caregiver as well, conjuring a fantasy of technoliberal futurism that echoes a colonial past. Against techno-utopian fantasies of a good life as one involving engineered domestic help, I draw here on the techno-dystopian television show Humans (stylized HUMⱯNS) to suggest that we should find our desires for such help unsettling. At the core of my argument is a return of the “uncanny valley” problem, from its reformulation as an engineering/design problem to its origins as a psychosocial symptom of an unresolved, traumatic past. I conclude that our sense of the uncanny may be best understood as a moral capacity that should be honed rather than evaded.

Research paper thumbnail of Queer Possibilities

Research paper thumbnail of Trump is Gross: Taking the Politics of Taste (and Distaste) Seriously

Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal, 2017

This paper advances the somewhat unphilosophical thesis that “Trump is gross” to draw attention t... more This paper advances the somewhat unphilosophical thesis that “Trump is gross” to draw attention to the need to take matters of taste seriously in politics. I begin by exploring the slipperiness of distinctions between aesthetics, epistemology, and ethics, subsequently suggesting that we may need to pivot toward the aesthetic to understand and respond to the historical moment we inhabit. More specically, I suggest that, in order to understand how Donald Trump was elected President of the United States and in order to stem the damage that preceded this and will ensue from it, we need to understand the power of political taste (and distaste, including disgust) as both a force of resistance and as a force of normalization

Research paper thumbnail of Adoption in Philosophy

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Confronting Postmaternal Thinking

Research paper thumbnail of Classic Media review of Hedwig and the Angry Inch

Research paper thumbnail of Blended: Writers on the Stepfamily Experience

Journal of the Motherhood Initiative for Research and Community Involvement, 2016

reviewed by shelley m. park In Blended: Writers on the Stepfamily Experience, Samantha Waltz brin... more reviewed by shelley m. park In Blended: Writers on the Stepfamily Experience, Samantha Waltz brings together over thirty writers to speak on their experiences inhabiting blended families. The constituent pieces are brief, autobiographical reflections, ranging from three to twelve pages. The brevity of the pieces does not allow for sustained analytical development of any one writer's experiences but does result in a relatively expansive collection of familial snaphots that, cumulatively, provide a kaleidoscopic portrait of the blended family. Greater cross-cultural diversity would be welcome (only two of the stories explicitly deal with the ways in which cultural differences may present unique challenges for stepfamilies), as would a greater representation of non-white authors. However, the range of experiences and perspectives represented here is otherwise broad. A primary strength of the collection is that the reflections of biological parents are intermixed with the reflections of stepparents and the reflections of adult children to yield colorful, multidimensional patterns that do not allow one perspective to dominate the others. Some common themes that run through the essays in Blended include the problem of naming, holiday stresses, struggles over different parenting styles, and relations with exes. The language of "stepfamilies" ("stepmothers," "stepchildren," "half siblings") troubles several contributors who comment on how such terms connote a less than "real" familial relationship. Part of the lived reality of many members of stepfamilies is not knowing what to call one another. Mother's day is a particularly vexed holiday for stepchildren and stepmothers for this reason, as contributor Melissa Hart poignantly observes in her recollection of the annual struggle inscribing Mother's Day (or is it Mothers' Day?) cards ("Tales of a Confused Apostrophe"). Other holidays also include struggles over kinship boundaries, as sacred family traditions and McRobbie, Angela. "Yummy Mummies Leave a Bad Taste for Young Women." The Guardian.

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Queering Freedom

Research paper thumbnail of Association for Feminist Ethics and Social Theory (FEAST) Conference: Contested Terrains: Women of Color, Feminisms, and Geopolitics

The Association for Feminist Ethics and Social Theory is a professional organization dedicated to... more The Association for Feminist Ethics and Social Theory is a professional organization dedicated to promoting feminist ethical perspectives on philosophy, moral and political life, and public policy. Through meetings, publications, and projects, we hope to increase the visibility and influence of feminist ethics, as well as feminist social and political theory, and to provide support to emerging scholars from diverse and underrepresented populations. Our aim is to further the development and refinement of new understandings of ethical and political concepts and topics, especially as these arise out of feminist concerns.

Research paper thumbnail of Gendered Divisions of Labor in the Twenty‐First‐Century Academy

Research paper thumbnail of Tim R. Johnston, Affirmation, Care Ethics, and LGBT Identity. New York: Palgrave, 2016, ISBN 978-1-137-59408-2

Hypatia Reviews Online, 2018

Research paper thumbnail of Normativity and Belonging: Reflections about Critical Adoption Studies

Adoption & Culture, 2021

Research paper thumbnail of Gendered Divisions of Labor in the 21ST Century Academy

International Handbook of Gender Equity in Higher Education, 2020

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Philosophical Inquiries into Pregnancy, Childbirth, and Mothering: Maternal Subjects

Research paper thumbnail of Re-viewing the Memory Wars: Some Feminist Philosophical Reflections

Research paper thumbnail of Multiculturalism: A Challenge to Two Myths of Liberalism

This paper sketches a brief account of multiculturalism in order to distinguish it from other pos... more This paper sketches a brief account of multiculturalism in order to distinguish it from other positions that have been under attack recently. Following this, we address two prevalent and diametrically opposed criticisms of multiculturalism, namely, that multiculturalism is relativistic, on the one hand, and that it is absolutist, on the other. Both of these criticisms, we argue, simply mask liberal democratic theory's myth- begotten attempt to resolve the tension between the one and the many. Multiculturalism challenges the myths of meritocracy and abstract individualism which underlie liberalism; properly understood, it evades the criticisms often hurled at it.

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Affirmation Care Ethics and LGBT Identity by Tim Johnson

Hypatia Reviews Online, 2018

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Blended: Writers on the Stepfamily Experience

Journal of Motherhood Institute, 2016

In Blended: Writers on the Stepfamily Experience, Samantha Waltz brings together over thirty writ... more In Blended: Writers on the Stepfamily Experience, Samantha Waltz brings together over thirty writers to speak on their experiences inhabiting blended families. The constituent pieces are brief, autobiographical reflections, ranging from three to twelve pages. The brevity of the pieces does not allow for sustained analytical development of any one writer's experiences but does result in a relatively expansive collection of familial snaphots that, cumulatively, provide a kaleidoscopic portrait of the blended family. Greater cross-cultural diversity would be welcome (only two of the stories explicitly deal with the ways in which cultural differences may present unique challenges for step-families), as would a greater representation of non-white authors. However, the range of experiences and perspectives represented here is otherwise broad. A primary strength of the collection is that the reflections of biological parents are intermixed with the reflections of stepparents and the reflections of adult children to yield colorful, multidimensional patterns that do not allow one perspective to dominate the others. Some common themes that run through the essays in Blended include the problem of naming, holiday stresses, struggles over different parenting styles, and relations with exes.

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Against Marriage: An Egalitarian Defence of the Marriage Free State

Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews, 2018

Clare Chambers provides a clear, lucid and timely argument against state-recognized marriage base... more Clare Chambers provides a clear, lucid and timely argument against state-recognized marriage based on the liberal principles of liberty and equality. Canvassing a broad range of philosophical literature on marriage, she argues persuasively that state-sponsored "marriage regimes" violate core principles of liberalism including value neutrality and non-discrimination, and should be replaced with piecemeal regulations of relationships that protect vulnerable parties from injustice without privileging particular relationship statuses. The book has two parts, each with three chapters. In Part I, Chambers offers her critique of marriage as a state-sponsored institution conferring a package of rights and responsibilities on all and only those who are legally recognized as married. Chapter 1 argues that marriage regimes violate liberalism's commitment to equality by, at best, ignoring and, at worst, perpetuating the sexist and heterosexist foundations of marriage. Chambers also argues here that civil unions (or other "reformed" versions of marriage) "enact inequality between those who have and those who lack the relevant status" (4). Chapter 2 argues that marriage regimes violate liberty by promoting a particular conception of the good without sufficiently weighty public reasons for doing so. Chapter 3 considers several putative liberal justifications for state-recognized marriage including arguments based on improved communications, gender equality, caregiving, child protection, and social stability. In each case, Chambers contends, the arguments fail to show that state-sponsored marriage is both a necessary and an acceptable means of achieving the public good in question. In Part II, Chambers unpacks her positive vision for a marriage-free state, distinguishing it from alternatives to marriage that have been suggested by other critics of traditional state-sponsored marriage. Chapter 4 considers and rejects "contract regimes" as a replacement for marriage regimes, arguing that relationship contracts can undermine liberty and are difficult to enforce. Chapter 5 distinguishes Chambers' own approach to the marriage-free state from the approach of other feminist critics of marriage. Here she argues that caring relationships should be regulated (1) in a piecemeal rather than holistic fashion; (2) with a focus on relationship practices rather than status; and (3) with the freedom to opt out of default regulations rather than the necessity of opting in. Chapter 6 distinguishes the marriage-free state from the marriage-free society and considers the circumstances under which the state might be justified in intervening in private marriages. Here Chambers clearly distinguishes her own position from a libertarian one by focusing on the state's role in preventing harm to vulnerable populations and to ensuring discriminatory practices are prohibited in the private sector.

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Queering Freedom by Shannon Winnubst

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Philosophical Inquiries into Pregnancy, Childbirth, and Mothering: Maternal Subjects by Sheila Lintott and Maureen Sander-Staudt, eds.

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Confronting Postmaternal Thinking: Feminism, Memory and Care by Julie Stephens

APA Newsletter on Feminism and Philosophy, 2013

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Blended: Writers on the Stepfamily Experience by Samantha Waltz

Journal of Motherhood Initiative, 2016

Seal Press, 2015 reviewed by shelley m. park

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Universitas: The Social Restructuring of American Undergraduate Education by Thomas Boudreau

The Journal of Higher Education, 2000

Research paper thumbnail of Reviews of Mothering Queerly by Park and Mad Mothers by LaChance Adams

APA Newsletter on Feminism and Philosophy, Spring 2015 containing a reviews of Mothering Queerly,... more APA Newsletter on Feminism and Philosophy, Spring 2015 containing a reviews of Mothering Queerly, Queering Motherhood by Shelly Park (reviewed by Sarah LaChance Adams)
and a review of and Mad Mothers, Bad Mothers, and What a 'Good' Mother Would Do by Sarah LaChance Adams (reviewed by Dana Belu)

Research paper thumbnail of Commentary on Nancy Nicol's Politics of the Heart: Recognition of Homoparental Families

Florida Philosophical Review, 2008

This paper comments on the strategies and goals of a politics of recognition as celebrated by Nan... more This paper comments on the strategies and goals of a politics of recognition as celebrated by Nancy Nicol’s important documentary coverage of the gay and lesbian movement for family rights in Quebec. While agreeing that ending legal discrimination against lgbt families is important, I suggest that political recognition of same-sex families and their children is a too limited goal for queer families and their allies. Moreover, it is a goal, I argue, that often trades on trades on troublesome assumptions about gender, class, race, age and normative commitments to monogamy as these relate to distinctions between, for example, “fit” and “unfit” parents.

Research paper thumbnail of Classic Media Reviews: Hedwig and the Angry Inch

Queer Studies in Media & Popular Culture, 2015

Research paper thumbnail of Study Questions for Philosophies of Pregnancy, Childbirth and Mothering course

Research paper thumbnail of Okaeri: Living with your favorite character

In Media Res, 2019

“Okaeri” is a promotional video for an augmented reality technology produced by the Japanese comp... more “Okaeri” is a promotional video for an augmented reality technology produced by the Japanese company Gatebox. The video markets a holographic anime character, Azuma Hikari (“East light”) who “lives” with and “cares” for you. The Japanese Gatebox product, like smart home technologies situated in the West (e.g. Nest, Alexa), is geared toward bourgeois consumers and raises questions about surveillance and digital labor.

Research paper thumbnail of Helicopter Parents: Posthuman Tropes of Bad Mothering

In Media Res, 2019

The renewed dialogue about overparenting taking place in the wake of the 2019 U.S. college admiss... more The renewed dialogue about overparenting taking place in the wake of the 2019 U.S. college admission scandal requires an intersectional cyberfeminist lens attentive to the race, class, gender, and ability of parents and children as these are embodied in posthuman tropes of bad parenting.