FC Talk: Tina Fernandes Botts, California State University, Fresno

The Spring 2021 FC Talks series presents Tina Fernandes Botts.

Tina Fernandes Botts is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at California State University, Fresno.  She has a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Memphis and a J.D. from Rutgers Law School.  Her areas of specialization are philosophy of law, philosophy of race, hermeneutics, and feminist philosophy.  In the philosophy of law, she writes about constitutional theory and law and society.  In the philosophy of race, Professor Botts publishes about the nature of racial identity, particularly mixed race identity.  Professor Botts has published three books, including an academic monograph, For Equals Only: Race, Equality, and the Equal Protection Clause (Lexington Books, 2018), which traces the changing concepts of race and equality in U.S. Supreme Court cases over the past 150 years.  She is also the editor of Philosophy and the Mixed Race Experience, published by Lexington Books in 2016, and is the co-author, with Rosemarie Tong, of the fifth edition of Routledge’s classic text in feminist philosophy, Feminist Thought, published in 2017.  Professor Botts is currently at work on a textbook in the philosophy of race, to be published in 2022 by Rowman & Littlefield, International:  Philosophies of Race: Classical and Contemporary Approaches. In her talk, she will argue that the legal doctrine of originalism, properly understood, necessarily includes tailoring constitutional interpretation to the needs of the interpretive moment, context, or jurisprudential need.

This talk will be hosted on Zoom by Lucy Schwarz. Please contact Lucy for details if you are interested in attending or if you wish to be added to our listserv.