Letitia Meynell is a Canadian philosopher who is a Professor of Philosophy at

Dalhousie University Dalhousie University (commonly known as Dal) is a large public research university in Nova Scotia Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the fou ...

. Her work concerns

philosophy of science Philosophy of science is a branch of philosophy concerned with the foundations, methods, and implications of science. The central questions of this study concern what qualifies as science, the reliability of scientific theories, and the ultim ...

epistemology Epistemology (; ), or the theory of knowledge, is the branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge. Epistemology is considered a major subfield of philosophy, along with other major subfields such as ethics, logic, and metaphysics. Episte ...

, feminist philosophy, and human/animal relationships.

Career

Meynell read a

BA (Hons) Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...

in Theatre at

York University York University (french: Université York), also known as YorkU or simply YU, is a public university, public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is Canada's fourth-largest university, and it has approximately 55,700 students, 7,0 ...

(1989-93), and then a MA in Philosophy at the

University of Calgary The University of Calgary (U of C or UCalgary) is a public research university located in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. The University of Calgary started in 1944 as the Calgary branch of the University of Alberta, founded in 1908, prior to being ins ...

(1995-8). She submitted her thesis, ''Picture hooks: prelude to an aesthetic epistemololgy'' (which was supervised by Brian Grant), in January 1998. She went on to read for a

PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * ''Piled Higher and Deeper'', a web comic * Ph.D. (band), a 1980s British group ** Ph.D. (Ph.D. albu ...

in Philosophy at the

University of Western Ontario The University of Western Ontario (UWO), also known as Western University or Western, is a Public university, public research university in London, Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada. The main campus is located on of land, surrounded by resident ...

. Her thesis, ''Representing, imagining and understanding: The aesthetics and epistemology of images in science'', was supervised by Kathleen Okruhlik; the other

committee A committee or commission is a body of one or more persons subordinate to a deliberative assembly. A committee is not itself considered to be a form of assembly. Usually, the assembly sends matters into a committee as a way to explore them more ...

members were Patrick Maynard and Wayne Myrvold. Kendall Walton was the external examiner. After completing her PhD and working as an

instructor Instructor may refer to: Education * Instructor, a teacher of a specialised subject that involves skill: ** Teaching assistant ** Tutor ** Lecturer ** Fellow ** Teaching fellow *** Teaching associate *** Graduate student instructor ** Professor S ...

at Western Ontario, Meynell took on a limited-term assistant professorship at

's Department of Philosophy, with a cross appointment in the

Gender Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to femininity and masculinity and differentiating between them. Depending on the context, this may include sex-based social structures (i.e. gender roles) and gender identity. Most cultures u ...

and

Women's A woman is an adult female human. Prior to adulthood, a female human is referred to as a girl (a female child or adolescent). The plural ''women'' is sometimes used in certain phrases such as "women's rights" to denote female humans regardl ...

Studies Programme. She took on a

tenure track Tenure is a category of academic appointment existing in some countries. A tenured post is an indefinite academic appointment that can be terminated only for cause or under extraordinary circumstances, such as financial exigency or program disco ...

assistant professorship at Dalhousie in 2008. Shortly afterwards, Meynell's first book, ''Embodiment and Agency'', was published by

Penn State University Press The Penn State University Press, also known as The Pennsylvania State University Press, was established in 1956 and is a non-profit publisher of scholarly books and journals. It is the independent publishing branch of the Pennsylvania State Uni ...

. This

collection Collection or Collections may refer to: * Cash collection, the function of an accounts receivable department * Collection (church), money donated by the congregation during a church service * Collection agency, agency to collect cash * Collectio ...

was co-edited with Sue Campbell and

Susan Sherwin Susan Sherwin (born 6 June 1947) is a Canadian philosopher. Her pioneering work has shaped feminist theory, ethics and bioethics, and she is considered one of the world's foremost feminist ethicists. Education Sherwin received a B.A. (Hons.) in ...

. Meynell was subsequently promoted to

associate professor Associate professor is an academic title with two principal meanings: in the North American system and that of the ''Commonwealth system''. Overview In the ''North American system'', used in the United States and many other countries, it is a ...

and

full professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who professes". Professors ...

. Her second book, ''Thought Experiments in Science, Philosophy and the Arts'', was co-edited with Melanie Frappier and James Robert Brown and published by

Routledge Routledge () is a British multinational publisher. It was founded in 1836 by George Routledge, and specialises in providing academic books, journals and online resources in the fields of the humanities, behavioural science, education, law, and ...

in 2012. Her third was ''Chimpanzee Rights: The Philosophers' Brief'', which was co-authored with Kristin Andrews, Gary Comstock, G. K. D. Crozier,

Sue Donaldson Sue Donaldson (also known as Susan Cliffe; born 1962) is a Canadian writer and philosopher. She is a research fellow affiliated with the Department of Philosophy at Queen's University, where she is the co-founder of the Animals in Philosophy, ...

, Andrew Fenton, Tyler M. John, L. Syd M. Johnson, Robert Jones,

Will Kymlicka William Kymlicka (; born 1962) is a Canadian political philosopher best known for his work on multiculturalism and animal ethics. He is currently Professor of Philosophy and Canada Research Chair in Political Philosophy at Queen's University ...

, Nathan Nobis, David Peña-Guzmán, and

Jeff Sebo Jeffrey Raymond Sebo (born February 24, 1983) is an American philosopher. He is clinical associate professor of environmental studies, director of the animal studies MA program, and affiliated professor of bioethics, medical ethics, and philosop ...

Selected publications

*Letitia Meynell (2008). "Why Feynman diagrams represent". ''International Studies in the Philosophy of Science'' 22 (1): 39-59. . *Sue Campbell, Letitia Meynell, and Susan Sherwin, eds. (2009). ''Embodiment and Agency''. Penn State University Press. *Melanie Frappier, Letitia Meynell, and James Robert Brown, eds. (2012). ''Thought Experiments in Science, Philosophy and the Arts''. Routledge. *Letitia Meynell (2014). "Imagination and insight: a new account of the content of thought experiments". '' Synthese'' 191 (17): 4149-68. . *Kristin Andrews, Gary Comstock, G. K. D. Crozier, Sue Donaldson, Andrew Fenton, Tyler M. John, L. Syd M. Johnson, Robert Jones, Will Kymlicka, Letitia Meynell, Nathan Nobis, David Peña-Guzmán, and Jeff Sebo (2019). ''Chimpanzee Rights: The Philosophers' Brief''. Routledge. *Letitia Meynell and Andrew Lopez (2021). "Gendering animals". ''Synthese'' 199 (1-2): 4287-311. .

References

External links

Personal websiteLetitia Meynell
at

PhilPeople PhilPapers is an interactive academic database of journal articles in philosophy. It is maintained by the Centre for Digital Philosophy at the University of Western Ontario, and as of 2022, it has "394,867 registered users, including the majority ...

Letitia Meynell
at

Google Scholar Google Scholar is a freely accessible web search engine that indexes the full text or metadata of scholarly literature across an array of publishing formats and disciplines. Released in beta in November 2004, the Google Scholar index includes p ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Meynell, Letitia Living people Year of birth missing (living people) Women philosophers Epistemologists Canadian philosophers of science Scholars of feminist philosophy Animal ethicists Academic staff of Dalhousie University York University alumni University of Calgary alumni University of Western Ontario alumni Canadian academics of women's studies Gender studies academics