Matthew Burstein Visiting Assistant Professor of Philosophy

Matthew Burstein

Washington Hall 319
540-458-8722
bursteinm@wlu.edu
Curriculum Vitae

Professor Burstein is a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Philosophy Department for the 2013-14 academic year.  He earned his PhD in Philosophy from Georgetown University in 2004, and he has taught at Georgetown University, Southern Methodist University, and the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown.
 
Professor Burstein's research examines how substituting a framework that assumes that persons are essentially enmeshed in interpersonal relationships and bound up in systems of socially governed norms dissolves problems that are intelligible only within an individualistic framework and brings into sharper relief what is genuinely at stake in the problems that persist.  His work began in epistemology and philosophy of mind and has proceeded organically to issues in value theory (including gender theory and applied ethics) and cultural studies (including philosophical approaches to cinema).

Education

Ph.D. Philosophy, Georgetown University (2004)

B.A. Philosophy, University of California, Los Angeles (1996)

Research

Epistemology, Philosophy of Mind, Social and Political Thought

Teaching

Introduction to Philosophy, Introduction to Ethics, American Philosophy, Social Philosophy, Antifoundationalism: Theory and Applications, Philosophy and Film, Queer Theory, Technologies of the Self 

Selected Publications

Book Chapters

  1. "The Thanatoria of Soylent Green: On Reconciling the Good Life with the Good Death,'' in Bioethics at the Movies, ed. Sandra Shapshay (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009): 275-94
  2. "Prodigal Epistemology: Coherence, Holism, and the Sellarsian Tradition,'' in The Self-Correcting Enterprise: Essays on Wilfrid Sellars, eds. Michael P. Wolf and Mark N. Lance (Poznan Studies in Philosophy of the Sciences and Humanities: Rodopi, 2006): 197-216
  3. "Epistemology and the Philosophy of Cinema,'' in Film and Knowledge: Essays on the Integration of Images and Ideas, ed. Kevin L. Stoehr (McFarland and Company, Inc. Publishers, 2002): 141-156 
Articles
  1. "Epistemological Behaviorism, Nonconceptual Content, and the Given,'' Contemporary Pragmatism 7 (2010): 165-18
  2. "Taking As: Experience and Judgment in the Life of Agents,'' Philosophical Explorations 10 (2007): 227-243
  3. "Situating Experience: Agency, Perception, and the Given,'' Southern Journal of Philosophy 44 (2006): 1--29