Fanen Chiahemen
It was
the late 1960s, and Christopher Morris found himself caught up in the spirit
of the era: complex issues like war and abortion were gnawing at his mind.
Over three decades later, Morris can distinctly attribute the inception
of his career in philosophy to these turbulent times.
Morris is the newest addition to the team of faculty members in the philosophy department. He has spent the past 15 years as a professor at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. His interests are in moral, political, and legal philosophy.
Although Morris did not major in philosophy in college, he studied the subject intently during his final year as an undergraduate. At the time, he was perplexed by several moral and social questions, particularly abortion, the justice of war and the demands of morality. Morris thought that studying philosophy might help him get a clearer picture on these topics, and it did.
"The writings of philosophers both contemporary and classical were very helpful. Most of us were opposed to the war, but we were also relativists of some kind. I was puzzled how one could condemn US policy as unjust and also believe that 'everyone should do their own thing'. In many ways it was Plato who was most helpful, much more than Marx or Marcuse," he says.
But reading was not the only thing Morris did as an undergraduate that shaped his career in philosophy. Morris was active in the anti-war movement of the late 60s and 70s. He was a member of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), an organization that emerged out of the civil rights movement in the south. He was also a draft counselor.
"My activities were mostly limited to organizing anti-war demonstrations and things like that," Morris explains.
When he went to graduate school, Morris became less involved in politics. He received his doctorate from the University of Toronto in 1977. He landed his first teaching position at the University of Ottawa, and then went on to teach in many universities around the country and beyond. He joined the Bowling Green philosophy program in 1987 to help develop a new doctoral program in applied philosophy. In 1990 he was made a Senior Research Fellow at the Social Philosophy and Policy Center. Shortly after that, he also began as a Research Associate at CREA, a research center at the École Polytechnique in Paris. In 1998 he was a visiting scholar at the University of Amsterdam. Some of the others institutions at which Morris has taught include the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the University of California, Riverside, UCLA, the University of Montreal, and the Department of Government of the University of Texas at Austin.
Morris's works include his book An Essay on the Modern State, an anthology on terrorism, an anthology on Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau, and a collection of essays on practical rationality.
For the next few years Morris intends to work on a number of projects. These include an undergraduate applied ethics reader on questions of life and death, essays on questions about moral standing, a short book on democracy, and some essays on war, international justice, and new world orders.
Although Morris was born in Washington, DC, he spent most of his youth in Paris and Brussels. He is delighted to be returning to the Washington area, and to be working with some of the department's best.
"I've known and respected the work of several members of the department
for some time," Morris says, "I am very happy to be involved with this
program."
