NANJING, China - I must admit, I am a bit uneasy about delivering this talk on Plato and the Politics of Reading here at Nanjing University. You see, I am simply not sure what it…
NANJING, China - One of the challenges we face in higher education in the United States is how to ensure the academic success of the many new international students from China our universities are welcoming…
Mark Fisher, Lecturer and Director of Teaching and Learning with Technologies in the Philosophy Department and Assistant Director of the Rock Ethics Institute, joins me to talk about the vision and development of the Public…
As many of you know, I have long been experimenting with how to use twitter effectively in academic contexts. Many are skeptical of twitter's ability to add substantive value to academic conversations because of its…
Anne-Marie Schultz, Associate Professor of Philosophy and Director of the Baylor Interdisciplinary Core at Baylor University, joins me at the 13th annual meeting of the Ancient Philosophy Society She is author of many articles in Ancient Greek…
The Liberal Arts are not so much a set of disciplines to be studied as they are a set of habits to be practiced. This is the central point and main theme around which my…
Publicness and collaboration are two of the virtues we hope the Public Philosophy Journal will embody. To that end, we want the creation and development of the journal to put those virtues into practice. So,…
There is a difference between the ways Socrates turns those with whom he speaks in Plato's dialogues to consider questions of justice, beauty and the good and the ways Plato's writing turns his readers to…
As we begin to articulate the contours of the Public Philosophy Journal, some account of the meaning of the public philosophy the journal intends to practice may help us continue to cultivate the community on…
If, as Michael Bérubé suggested today in his Chronicle of Higher Education article "The Humanities, Unraveled," the situation in the humanities is "a seamless garment of crisis: If you pull on any one thread, the…
Philosophy is often mistakenly viewed as distant from public life, secluded in the Ivory Tower away from the public concerns of civil society. However, the affordances of digital scholarly communication have enabled philosophers increasingly to…
The Long Road at the BWVision On Saturday, January 19, 2013, I joined administrators, staff and members of the Penn State Board of Trustees for the Blue and White Vision Council Seminar at the Nittany…
6/365: Grandparents Clock Originally uploaded by cplong11 Today is Mack Brady's birthday; he would have turned 9. His father has recently written eloquently, even in his grief, about the theological questions the senseless death of…
Statuesque Originally uploaded by Targuman When the Collegian asked me to comment on the scholarship established in honor of Mack Brady for the article they published today, they could not integrate all I had written.…
Even as I press to finish an article on dogs and wolves in Plato's Republic for a volume entitled "Plato's Animals" edited by Michael Naas, it is worth returning for a moment to our ongoing…
Villemard 1910 - En L'An 2000 - At School Originally uploaded by amphalon As the debate over Massively Open Online Courses, also known by their unfortunate acronym: MOOC, rages on, I thought I would begin…
For episode 59 of the Digital Dialogue, I am joined at the 51st annual meeting of SPEP in Rochester, NY by Cynthia Willett and Shannon Winnubst to talk about the paper Cindy delivered entitled "Anarchy…
Words do things. What they do, depends on the manner in which they are said, written and received. What they did, and failed to do, last night is something that requires some reflection. That is…
From its earliest articulation in Ancient Greek thinking, the first principle and ultimate end of an education in the liberal arts has always been to live an excellent human life. Because, however, human life can…
As we pulled into our driveway after running errands preparing for her Monster High birthday party, DancinGirl, who was generally excited about the day, announced that she has been thinking a lot, recently, about death.…
For episode 58 of the Digital Dialogue I am joined at the 51st annual meeting of SPEP in Rochester, NY by Silvia Benso. She is Professor of Philosophy at Rochester Institute of Technology, where she…
Today, the girls and I, along with my colleague, Dan Letwin, and his son, Nick, took to the local streets to canvass for Barack Obama as we did four years ago. A lot has changed…
A collaborative lecture given by Professor Christopher Long at the University of San Francisco, Thursday, October 25, 2012. Here are the curated tweets and other artifacts related to the lecture and courses I taught designed…
SAN FRANCISCO, CA - To give a lecture on the politics of collaborative reading without inviting one's listeners to become active participants would be a performative contradiction. So, in this lecture, Plato and the Politics…
On Thursday, October 25th, at 4:30 PDT, I will read a paper entitled, Plato and the Politics of Reading at the University of San Francisco. One of the main points of the paper is that reading is fundamentally a…
John Protevi, Phyllis M. Taylor Professor of French Studies and Professor of Philosophy at Louisiana State University, joins me for episode 56 of the Digital Dialogue, God and the Organism. John's work focuses on Continental…
Christopher P. Long, "Socrates: Platonic Political Ideal," Ideas y Valores, 61, 149: 2012. This essay articulates the differences and suggests the similarities between the practices of Socratic political speaking and those of Platonic political writing.…
Larry Hatab joins Emanuela Bianchi, Erick Jimenez and me in beautiful Umbria, Italy in Citta di Castello, at the Collegium Phaenomenologicum, for episode 55 of the Digital Dialogue. Larry Hatab is Louis I. Jaffe Professor…
CITTÀ DI CASTELLO, Umbria, Italy - Late last year, I received a very kind set of questions from Matteo Cosci, a PhD student in Italy at the University of Padua, about my book Aristotle on…
Consider this an invitation to continue along a path we have traversed together over the past three years. This path, which began in the wake of my 2009 Summer Faculty Teaching and Learning with Technology Fellowship,…
As spring rolls into summer, it is time for another appraisal of my digital research ecosystem. For a brief history of my reflections on digital scholarly research, I invite you to take a ride on…
DancinGirl has fallen in love with words. Actually, she has always loved to play with words, singing, rhyming, mimicking. But now her love of the verbal has exploded into literacy. She is reading voraciously; book…
Christopher P. Long, "Attempting the Political Art," Proceedings of the Boston Area Colloquium in Ancient Philosophy, 27 (2012): 153-74. The main thesis of this essay is that the practice of Socratic political speaking and the…
Villemard 1910 - En L'An 2000 - At School Originally uploaded by amphalon My most recent blog post over on the Wonders and Marvels blog considers what Plutarch has to teach us about teaching and…
University budgeting and strategic planning was the focus of the final Academic Leadership Program (ALP) sponsored by the Committee on Institutional Cooperation (CIC) held at Penn State, April 12-14, 2012. No two topics have more…
At the 2012 Teaching and Learning with Technology Symposium at Penn State, I had the honor of introducing Jane McGonigal, Creative Director of Social Chocolate, and game designer extraordinaire. In his book, The Grasshopper, Bernard…
For episode 54 of the Digital Dialogue, I am joined via Skype by Catherine Zuckert, Nancy Reeves Dreux Professor of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame. Professor Zuckert is the author of many…
In her address to the Committee on Institutional Cooperation's Academic Leadership Program at the University of Chicago last Thursday, Martha Nussbaum offered a compelling defense of a liberal arts education. She advocated for an education…
Christopher Moore joins me for Digital Dialogue, episode 53. He received his PhD from the University of Minnesota in 2008 and is currently Lecturer in Philosophy and Classics at Penn State. His areas of specialization…
LITCHFIELD, SC - Vacation can be a time for moments of insight and tenderness. One such moment came this week for me at a restaurant here in South Carolina called Studio Café. (You can see…
ANN ARBOR, MI - The story I told at the 2011 meeting of the Humanities, Arts, Science, and Technology Advanced Collaboratory (HASTAC) conference is rooted in my pedagogical practices of using digital media technology to…
Sometimes without looking, one finds a paradigm - an example that can serve as a model. Last week I visited Indiana University as a one of Penn State's Academic Leadership Fellows in the Academic Leadership Program of…
Dear Liberal Arts Student Colleagues: As we process the events of the past week, it is difficult to grapple with what we and others are thinking and feeling. Each of us responds to these events…
Episode 52 of the Digital Dialogue was recorded at the 50th Anniversary Meeting of the Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy. I was joined by Sara Brill, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Fairfield University and…
Facebook Originally uploaded by laikolosse A number of recent changes to the social media technologies I use daily force me again to reflect on the habits design decisions cultivate in us. The decisions made by…
Episode 51 of the Digital Dialogue was recorded in Washington, D.C. at the Advancing Public Philosophy conference. Joining me are: Mark Fisher, Assistant Director of the Rock Ethics Institute, Penn State, Ronald Sundstrom, Associate Professor…
Rembrandt's Philosopher in Meditation WASHINGTON, DC - Today at the Advancing Public Philosophy Conference hosted by the Public Philosophy Network, Cori Wong, a graduate student in the Philosophy Department at Penn State, and I are…
Student Panel at LASTS11 Originally uploaded by LAUSatPSU On Wednesday, September 28th at 4pm eastern, we in the Liberal Arts Undergraduate Studies office will take another step out into the great technological unknown by recording…
West End of Bloomsburg, PA Originally uploaded by colecamp I have long had the vague idea that newspapers need to recognize that the core of their business is the business of their communities. Sometimes the…
Dear DancinGirl: Do you know why I call you DancinGirl when I write about you here? It is because, from the moment I met you, now almost six years ago, you were dancing. At first,…
Chris and Emma STATE COLLEGE, PA - In my keynote address at the inaugural Liberal Arts Scholarship and Technology Summit, I discuss how the transition from print literacy to digital literacy is transforming the nature…
Tom Tuozzo, Professor of Philosophy at Kansas University, joins me for episode 50 of the Digital Dialogue. Professor Tuozzo is author of the forthcoming book with Cambridge University press entitled "Plato's Charmides. Positive Elenchus in a…
Earlier this week, Frank Gonzalez published a review of my book, Aristotle on the Nature of Truth, in the Bryn Mawr Classical Review. His review is the latest contribution to a decade's long dialogue we…
Today in the Foster Auditorium of the Pattee/Paterno Library, my undergraduate research assistant, Lisa Lotito, and I gave a presentation about the workflow we use in doing philosophical research. I have written in some detail…
The Wind is Beautiful Originally uploaded by cplong11 Nicolas Carr's article in The Atlantic, Is Google Making Us Stupid?, considers the impact new media technologies are having on human cognition. Although he recognizes the reciprocal nature of…
FREIBURG, GERMANY - Today at the Freiburg Institute of Advanced Studies, I presented a paper entitled The Politics of Finitude in Plato's Phaedo at the 2011 Freiburger Hermeneutisches Kolloquium, whose theme was Hermeneutik (in) der…
This episode of the Digital Dialogue was recorded at the 11th annual meeting of the Ancient Philosophy Society in Sundance, UT. On it, I am joined by Karen Gover and Kalliopi Nikolopoulou. Karen is an…
St. Andrew's Preschool Originally uploaded by cplong11 It happened without warning, without any hint that the end was at hand. Suddenly, there it was: May 27th, the day after the last day of the preschool…
STONE HARBOR, NJ - Just midway through my week vacation, I am beginning to learning the art of relaxation. As a faculty member, when the semester of teaching is over, a span of summer begins…
John Lysaker, Professor of Philosophy at Emory University, turns the tables on me for this episode of the Digital Dialogue. As promised in episode 16 in which John and I discussed his book, Emerson and…
This summer John Dolan, Director of Digital Media and Pedagogy, and I are heading up a summer digital research project in the College of the Liberal Arts. For a description of the project, check out…
In my response to the generous, thoughtful and provocative commentaries of Will McNeill, Drew Hyland and John Lysaker, I attempted to perform the methodological approach I adopted in Aristotle on the Nature of Truth. John…
Lysaker Animated Originally uploaded by cplong11 John Lysaker, Professor of Philosophy at Emory University, commented on my book, Aristotle on the Nature of Truth, at the 2011 meeting of the Ancient Philosophy Society.John's comments invited me…
Drew Hyland Originally uploaded by cplong11 Drew Hyland, Charles A. Dana Professor of Philosophy at Trinity College, commented on my book, Aristotle on the Nature of Truth, at the 2011 meeting of the Ancient Philosophy Society.Drew's…
Claire Colebrook, Edwin Earl Sparks Professor of English here at Penn State joins me for episode 47 of the Digital Dialogue. Claire received her doctorate from the University of Edinburgh and was a Professor of…
LAWRENCE, KS - The paper I presented here today, entitled The Politics of Truth, argued that Socratic politics is a matter of speaking truth with a concern for justice and the good. I suggested further…
Pharmakon Originally uploaded by cplong11 STATE COLLEGE, PA - These remarks were delivered at the 2011 Symposium of the Center for American Literary Studies: Crisis? Whose Crisis? What Crisis? Imagine that you are a graduate…
Drew, Chris, Will and John Originally uploaded by cplong11 William McNeill, Professor of Philosophy at DePaul University, commented on my book, Aristotle on the Nature of Truth, at the 2011 meeting of the Ancient Philosophy Society.Will's…
SUNDANCE, UT - Today there was a panel on my book, Aristotle on the Nature of Truth, at the Ancient Philosophy Society held this year at Sundance in Utah. The panel included Will McNeill, Professor…
Cori Wong who is a graduate student in the department of Philosophy here at Penn State working on affective embodiment and oppression. I invited her to the Digital Dialogue because she and I have been…
Socrates, Alcibiades and Agathon Originally uploaded by cplong11 WACO, Texas -- During my visit to Baylor this week, I guest taught Anne Schultz's class on Plato's Symposium and joined the Academy for Teaching and Learning to speak…
The annual Teaching and Learning with Technology Symposium held yesterday at the Penn Stater had an intensity to it that I had not experienced in years past. The energy and excitement we felt so palpably…
Aristotle, of course, famously said: "For it is by way of wondering that people both now and at first began to philosophize ..." (Metaphysics, I.2, 982b13-4). Tonight, ArtGirl began to philosophize. She wondered so eloquently…
For episode 45 of the Digital Dialogue, I am joined by Josh Hayes who is currently a Lecturer at Santa Clara University. He has been a Visiting Assistant Professor at Loyola Marymount University and Post-doctoral…
BOSTON, MA - The main thesis of the paper I delivered today at the Boston Area Colloquium for Ancient Philosophy is that the practice of Socratic political speaking and the practice of Platonic political writing…
Next week I am giving a lecture on Plato's Gorgias at Boston College for the Boston Area Colloquium for Ancient Philosophy. The title of the lecture is Attempting the Political Art. Prior to the lecture,…
Long, Christopher P. "Crisis of Community: The Topology of Socratic Politics in the Protagoras," Epoché: a Journal for the History of Philosophy, 15, 2 (2011): 361-377. In Plato's Protagoras Alcibiades plays the role of Hermes,…
I first met Ruth Canagarajah in an honors course I taught a few years ago. She already struck me then as a thoughtful, engaged and creative student. She wrote an excellent paper for that course…
For Digital Dialogue episode 44, I have joined Nicolas Parra, Norman Mora and Sergio Ariza in their home city of Bogotá, Colombia to discuss the seminar we held today on Plato's Apology and a paper…
Digital media technology, when deployed in ways that cultivate shared learning communities in which students and teachers are empowered to participate as partners in conjoint educational practices, can transform the way we teach and learn…
Seminar on the Apology Originally uploaded by cplong11 BOGOTÁ, COLOMBIA - Today I gave a seminar on Plato's Apology at the Universidad de los Andes to graduate and undergraduate students and faculty. The seminar was…
At the Universidad de los Andes Originally uploaded by cplong11 BOGOTÁ, COLOMBIA - This evening I gave a public lecture at the Universidad de los Andes entitled Aristotle's Phenomenology of Truth in which I articulate…
In episode 43 of the Digital Dialogue, I am joined by Ryan Drake, Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Fairfield University and graduate of the Pennsylvania State University's Department of Philosophy. This is Ryan's second time…
Deliberative Democracy Flash Forum Panel Originally uploaded by cplong11 This image captures a poignant moment in the Flash Forum in Response to the Arizona Shootings held by the Center for Democratic Deliberation on January 21…
Final Edits Originally uploaded by cplong11 In the months since my last posts on using Mendeley, Zotero and the iPad for academic research, my experience has been more fully informed by practice. This fall I was…
Walter Brogan, Professor of Philosophy at Villanova University, editor of Epoché: Journal for the History of Philosophy and a founding member of the Ancient Philosophy Society joins me for episode 42 of the Digital Dialogue.…
July 2010 029 Originally uploaded by Penn State Smeal MBA Today I venture outside of my comfort zone in talking about teaching and learning with technology in the Liberal Arts to address a group of…
CpL Holding the Book Originally uploaded by cplong11 Today I received a box, and in that box were six objects with a certain degree of heft, a solidity I did not quite expect. The objects…
Writing Three Ways Originally uploaded by cplong11 New media technologies are transforming the practice of education, and our practices of education must change in the wake of the emergence of new media technologies. In this…
Little Girl by a Little Girl Originally uploaded by cplong11 Today is DancinGirl's birthday and it has been a day of well, dancing. And on Saturday, at her princess dance party, we will dance some…
Christopher P. Long, Aristotle on the Nature of Truth, 1st ed. (Cambridge University Press, 2010). This book reconsiders the traditional correspondence theory of truth, which takes truth to be a matter of correctly representing objects.…
Francisco Gonzalez, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Ottawa. Frank's work centers on ancient philosophy, contemporary heremeutics and the relation between metaphysics and ethics/politics. His first book, Dialectic and Dialogue: Plato's Practice of Philosophical…
journalism students using macs apple Originally uploaded by chris.corwin In my ongoing attempts to think more reflectively and act more deliberately about teaching and learning with technology, I am speaking with a group of graduate…
Vincent Colapietro, Liberal Arts Research Professor of Philosophy here at Penn State, joins me for episode 40 of the Digital Dialogue. The depth and breadth of his scholarship can hardly be touched upon in any…
On Sunday, ArtGirl stood in front of the mirror looking at herself. I noticed two things: she seemed bigger to me and she was not holding her favorite stuffed animal, Jelly Dog. It was then…
Colorful Prometheus Originally uploaded by Allison Harger This workshop, for graduate students in the Philosophy Department at Penn State, focuses on using social media technologies to cultivate cooperative communities of learning in Philosophy courses. Its…
On Digital Dialogue episode 39, I am joined by the co-directors of the World in Conversation Project, Sam Richards and Laurie Mulvey. Their work explores the multifaceted relationship between people from different cultural and ancestral…
In Civilization and Its Discontents, Freud writes: With every tool man is perfecting his own organs, whether motor or sensory, or is removing the limits to their functioning (43). The passage touches on something I…
Cole Camplese is the Director of Education Technology Services, Allan Gyorke, Assistant Director of Education Technology Services, and Sam Richards, Senior Lecturer in Sociology and Crime, Law and Justice and co-director of World in Conversation…
Four Running 2 Originally uploaded by cplong11 My father taught me to appreciate the subtle joys of photography back before everything went digital. In our basement darkroom, we used to develop the black and white…