Interview with Colleen Hansen

CH: At the beginning of my first year of undergrad at University of Puget Sound, I was assigned to be the new work study student in the philosophy department. I was their office assistant, so through assisting faculty with various things, helping to organize department events, and other tasks, I was exposed to so many aspects of the department early on. At this point, I had not considered studying philosophy as my major, but it was on my radar. In fact, I was very lost during my first year of undergrad trying to figure out what to study. Every time I tried taking a class in a new major, I wasn’t satisfied. In the midst of my dissatisfaction, I remembered how much I enjoyed myself when attending philosophy events, talking to faculty and students, etc., so I registered to take Ancient Philosophy the following semester. I think I declared a philosophy major before the semester was over! Philosophy is everything I was looking for; I love the way it makes me think, I love the way it challenges me, I love just trying to understand the world. I believe the skills, concepts, and tools we learn in this discipline are immensely transferable to other parts of our lives, even outside of academia.

CH: The task of choosing where to attend graduate school is arduous and overwhelming – at least it was for me! There were so many factors to consider, and so many paths I could imagine myself going down. Ultimately, I chose UCLA because I felt that I would grow the most as a scholar, a philosopher, and a person here. I look up to everyone in the Department and it is such a privilege to be able to engage in philosophy alongside such talented and passionate people.

CH: So far, my favorite thing about this department is the supportive atmosphere. I find that everyone is approachable and willing to help in any way they can.

CH: This summer I am looking forward to working on expanding some work I’ve done in the past about epistemic injustice and contextualism. In the past, I worked on showing how David Lewis’ account of contextualism entails a particular form of epistemic injustice that was not accounted for in Miranda Fricker’s Epistemic Injustice: Power and the Ethics of Knowing. I want to push this further and explore what this means for Lewis’ account. That is, I want to make a claim about whether it is a virtue or vice for Lewis that his account of knowledge entails epistemic injustice.

CH: I have so many good memories from the first-year seminars, all of which were impactful in various ways. It was impactful to have that time together as a cohort and to jump into this experience together.

CH: I am fascinated by David Lewis’ account of contextualism in Elusive Knowledge.

CH: I think one reason that I loved my undergraduate philosophy experience so much was that I tried to be as involved as I could. I went to every event, I participated in Ethics Bowl, I helped organize the philosophy conference, all of which made my philosophy experience so much richer. I would say to get as involved as you can.

CH: My go-to recommendation is Being Mortal by Atul Gawande. It’s an absolute tear jerker, but it is a beautiful exploration and reflection of life, death, and how we approach our own mortality and well-being.