Featuring Professor Dwight Lewis from the University of Minnesota.

This talk about Anton Wilhelm Amo – the first West African to earn a Ph.D. in philosophy at a European university (1734) – and his philosophy emerges as two-prong. First, we investigate spatial justice in our teaching of philosophy with Anton Wilhelm Amo and others to address the possibility of positive liberty in the philosophical canon. Then, we engage Amo’s philosophy in Tractatus de arte sobrie et accurate philosophandi [Treatise on the Art of Soberly and Accurately Philosophizing] to rethink the hows and whys of argumentation (or “the art of disputing” in Amo’s own words) from the perspective of an African in 18^th Century Germany.

Dwight K Lewis Jr is an assistant professor of philosophy and co-founder/co-director of the Center for Canon Expansion and Change at the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities. His teaching and research interrogate philosophy and the world through a historical lens; he concentrates on the Early Modern Period, Africana Philosophy, and philosophy of difference (ie race, sex, power, etc), with a focus on the philosophy of Anton Wilhelm Amo (c.1700-c.1750). He attempts to live his life as James Baldwin says, “larger, freer, and more loving”, for himself and in relation to his community, both locally and globally. Larger, Freer, More Loving is also the name of his podcast with Matt LaVine.