How does change happen?
What are the conditions that court malleability or accentuate permeability? What stifles shift and drift? I focus on curiosity, political resistance, and trans life as loci of transformation. What are the kinesthetic signatures of behaviors, affects, structures, and institutions as they move in these loci? I analyze the microphysics of change at multiple registers.
Curiosity
I argue that curiosity is political. It is a relational and systems-level practice of building epistemic connections that is socially-informed and socially-informing. I also propose curiosity studies as a unique field of inquiry.
Recent Publications
Perry Zurn, “Philosophical Curiosity: What and Who is it For?” AAPT Studies in Pedagogy 7 (2023): doi.org/10.5840/aaptstudies20235260.
Perry Zurn and Dani S. Bassett, Curious Minds: The Power of Connection (MIT Press, 2022).
Perry Zurn, “Feminist Curiosity,” Philosophy Compass (2021).
Perry Zurn, “Curiosity: An Affect of Resistance,” Theory & Event 24.1 (2021): 611-617.
Asia Ferrin and Perry Zurn, “Facilitating Curiosity and Mindfulness in the Classroom: A Socio-Political Approach,” Precollege Philosophy and Public Practice (2021).
Perry Zurn, Curiosity and Power: The Politics of Inquiry (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2021).
Perry Zurn and Arjun Shankar, eds., Curiosity Studies: A New Ecology of Knowledge (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2020). Open access version here.
Perry Zurn, “Curiosity and Political Resistance,” Curiosity Studies, eds. Perry Zurn and Arjun Shankar (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2020).
Perry Zurn and Arjun Shankar, “What is Curiosity Studies?,” Curiosity Studies, eds. Perry Zurn and Arjun Shankar (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2020).
Arjun Shankar and Perry Zurn, “On Teaching Curiosity,” Curiosity Studies, eds. Perry Zurn and Arjun Shankar (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2020).
Perry Zurn, “Busybody, Hunter, Dancer: Three Historical Models of Curiosity,” Toward New Philosophical Explorations of the Epistemic Desire to Know: Just Curious about Curiosity, ed. Marianna Papastefanou (Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Press, 2019), 26-49.
Perry Zurn, “The Curiosity at Work in Deconstruction,” Journal of French and Francophone Philosophy 26.1 (2018): 65-87.
Perry Zurn and Danielle S. Bassett, “On Curiosity: A Fundamental Aspect of Personality, a Practice of Network Growth,” Personality Neuroscience 1.e13 (2018): 1-10.
Public Projects
Curiosity Studies: A New Ecology of Knowledge, open access on Manifold@UMinnPress
“Curiosity Studies,” Choose to be Curious podcast series
Curiosity, Mindfulness, and Education (CME) working group, Humanities Lab, American University
Political Resistance
I analyze histories of political resistance as archives of wisdom. Social movements begin with the collective realization that the quotidian is politically charged and subject to change. Focusing on protest movements, I explore models of epistemic justice, creaturely solidarity, and poetic tactics.
Recent Publications
Kevin Thompson and Perry Zurn, eds., Intolerable: Writings from Michel Foucault and the Prisons Information Group, 1970-1980, trans. Perry Zurn and Erik Beranek (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2021).
Perry Zurn, “Abolition is a Kite-Idea,” Building Abolition: Decarceration and Social Justice, ed. Chloe Taylor (New York: Routledge, 2021), xii-xix.
Perry Zurn, “Prisons,” Oxford Handbook of Feminist Philosophy, eds. Kim Q. Hall and Ásta Sveinsdottir (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021), .440-450.
Perry Zurn, “Curiosities at War: The Police and Prison Resistance After May ‘68,” Modern and Contemporary France 26.2 (2018): 179-191.
Perry Zurn and Andrew Dilts, eds., “Challenging the Punitive Society,” Special Issue, Carceral Notebooks 12 (2017)
Perry Zurn, “Toward an Account of Intolerance: Between Prison Resistance and Engaged Scholarship,” Carceral Notebooks 12 (2017): 97-128.
Perry Zurn and Andrew Dilts, eds., Active Intolerance: Michel Foucault, the Prisons, and the Future of Abolition (New York: Palgrave, 2016).
Perry Zurn, “Work and Failure: Assessing the Prisons Information Group,” in Active Intolerance: Michel Foucault, the Prisons Information Group, and the Future of Abolition, eds. Perry Zurn and Andrew Dilts (New York: Palgrave, 2016), 75-91.
Perry Zurn, “Publicity and Politics: Foucault, the Prisons Information Group, and the Press,” Radical Philosophy Review 17.2 (2014): 403-420.
Trans Life
I aspire to do philosophical and theoretical work that is accountable to (esp. local) trans experiences, histories, politics, and cultural productions. In addition, I am interested in meta-analyses of the trans-formative movement itself. Alongside other scholars and activists, I am also invested in critically facilitating trans philosophy as its own subfield.
Recent Publications
Perry Zurn, How We Make Each Other: Trans Life at the Edge of the University (Durham: Duke University Press, forthcoming).
Perry Zurn, “Trans Philosophy,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, eds. Ed Zalta and Uri Nodelman (October 8, 2024).
Perry Zurn, Andrea Pitts, Talia Bettcher, and PJ DiPietro, eds., Trans Philosophy (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2024).
Perry Zurn, Andrea Pitts, Talia Mae Bettcher, and PJ DiPietro, “Introduction—Situating and Desituating Trans Philosophy,” in Trans Philosophy, eds. Perry Zurn, Andrea Pitts, Talia Bettcher, and PJ DiPietro (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2024).
Perry Zurn, “Scatter: A Trans/Crip Analytic,” in Trans Philosophy, eds. Perry Zurn, Andrea Pitts, Talia Bettcher, and PJ DiPietro (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2024).
Perry Zurn, “The Path of Friction: On Hale’s ‘Rules’ for Accountability to and within Trans Communities,” Transgender Studies Quarterly 10.1 (2023): 71-85.
Megan Burke, Grayson Hunt, Tamsin Kimoto, Amy Marvin, Andrea Pitts, and Perry Zurn, “Transcestry,” QT Magazine (March 2021).
Perry Zurn and Andrea Pitts, “Trans Philosophy: The Early Years,” Conversation with Talia Bettcher, Loren Cannon, Miqqi Alicia Gilbert, and C. Jacob Hale, APA Newsletter on LGBT Issues in Philosophy 20-1 (2020): 1-11.
Perry Zurn, “Waste Culture and Isolation: Prisons, Toilets, and Gender Segregation,” Hypatia: A Journal of Feminist Philosophy (2019). First published online: September 12, 2019.
Perry Zurn, “Puzzle Pieces: Shapes of Trans Curiosity,” APA Newsletter on LGBT Issues in Philosophy 18.1 (2018): 10-16.
Perry Zurn, “The Politics of Anonymity: Foucault, Feminism, and Gender Non-Conforming Prisoners,” philoSOPHIA: A Journal of Continental Feminism 6.1 (2016): 27-42.
Public Projects
AU Trans Experience Project, digital archive and oral history project
