Royal Institute Philosophy Talk- Kathleen Higgins, Remembering the dead

What we remember is a central expression of who we are. So what should we remember, and what is best forgotten? Talks will focus on various aspects of the question, such as trauma, conflict resolution, forgiving and forgetting, memorialization, and constructing identities on- and off-line. Explore these questions, among others, through the lens of philosophy at the 2024/5 London Lectures.

Remembering the dead

Speaker: Kathleen Higgins is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Texas at Austin, where she specializes in aesthetics, continental philosophy, philosophy of music, and philosophy of emotion. She has published numerous books and articles on such topics as music, ethics, world philosophy, German idealism, Nietzsche, aesthetics, and love. Her most recent book is Aesthetics in Grief and Mourning: Philosophical Reflections on Coping with Loss (University of Chicago, 2024). She has served as delegate-at-large for the International Association for Aesthetics and president of the American Society for Aesthetics.

Many of us feel that honouring deceased loved ones is morally and psychologically important, and this requires, minimally, that we remember them. Yet it is far from obvious how we can deliberately remember the dead in light of our limited control, the fallibility of memory, and the sense that we should think well of the dead. Honouring the dead through our memories is not a matter of aiming at a fully accurate or perfectly whitewashed image. Instead, it involves using memories to sustain a relationship with the deceased loved one. This requires integrating one’s sense of the relationship in its new form into one’s life going forward. Memories play an essential role, but so does receptivity to new insights that the memories may provoke. Memory’s function is not simply to preserve images of the dead, but also to enable them to contribute freshly to our lives.

Host or Publisher The Royal Institute of Philosophy