Professor Jennifer Saul

MA, PhD Princeton; BA Rochester

Department of Philosophy

Honorary Professor

j.saul@sheffield.ac.uk
45 Victoria Street

Full contact details

Professor Jennifer Saul
Department of Philosophy
45 Victoria Street
Sheffield
S3 7QB
Profile

Jenny's primary interests are in Philosophy of Language, Feminism, Philosophy of Race, and Philosophy of Psychology.  She is currently working on racism in political speech, a topic which has kept her extremely busy recently.  (In addition to academic papers (which can be found at her academia.edu page, she has written many articles on this topic for a broader audience.)

Research interests

Jenny's most recent book was Lying, Misleading and What is Said: An Exploration in Philosophy of Language and in Ethics (Oxford University Press 2012). This argues that considering the distinction between lying and misleading-- which seems to many an ethically significant one-- can help to shed new light on methodological disputes in philosophy of language over notions like what is said, semantic content, assertion, impliciture, and expliciture. She also argues that careful attention to the way that communication works can shed new light on the ethical issues. (And she considers some fascinating real-world cases, feeding her lifelong obsession with political scandals but also branching out into such excellent topics as the Jesuit doctrine of Mental Reservation.)

With Helen Beebee, she published a report for the British Philosophical Association and SWIP UK entitled "Women in Philosophy in the UK: A Report". This report presents the first ever study of the gender imbalance in UK philosophy and provides a list of recommendations to combat it.  Also with Helen Beebee, she authored guidelines for good practice on gender issues in philosophy-- these can be found at the BPA website, as the BPA/SWIP Good Practice Scheme.

Publications

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Research group

Jenny has supervised PhD students working on names, indexicals,implicature, gender, sexual objectification, vagueness, indexicals, reference, justice, cosmopolitanism and feminism, epistemic/communicative injustice, semantic minimalism, lying, feminist philosophy of science, the family, philosophy of sex, and autonomy.

Professional activities and memberships

Jenny was Director of the (2011-2013) Leverhulme-funded Implicit Bias and Philosophy Project (link at the right).  She has published two co-edited volumes on implicit bias with Michael Brownstein. and she continues to lecture widely on this topic to a range of audiences.  She is especially interested in helping academic institutions find methods to combat both implicit and explicit biases, and she frequently advises on this topic.

Jenny is Director of the Society for Women in Philosophy UK, Chair of the Analysis Committee, and Co-Chair of the British Philosophical Association's Women in Philosophy Committee.  She is on the Editorial Board for Symposia in Gender, Race, and Philosophy, and on the Analysis Committee.

Jenny is honoured to have received the 2011 Distinguished Woman Philosopher Award in Washington, DC; and to have been chosen as Mind Association President for 2019-20.  But her proudest accomplishment is nonetheless having been a consultant on a zombie movie script.

Media

Links

Symposia on gender, race and philosophy  Implicit Bias and Philosophy project  Sheffield Tree Saga blog  Society on Gender, Race and Philosophy