PEGGY O’NEIL

Since the Enlightenment, Western scholarship has progressively shifted toward the orientation that humans are bodies and minds, evidenced by an emphasis on either empirical/quantitative inquiry in the pursuit of casual/natural laws; or, on social theory which by definition addresses only relativity in a subset of humanity. While these are important fields of study which should be continued, in this evolution, what French philosopher Henry Bergson refers to as the “vital force”, and its products, the arts for their own sake, in their pure form rarely exist. In order to recover an interest in as well as the means by which to produce new, creative and interpretive works, I use H. S. Butcher’s translation, based on both Latin and Arabic records, of Aristotle’s Theory of Poetry and Fine Arts, as well as the work of arts and humanities scholars through the ages whose work expanded the Aristotelian tradition. My areas of focus are humanistic education and everyday life, out of which contemporary masterpieces may be found.

Keynote Speaker (March 22, 2022) Building Sustainable Food Systems Symposium https://www.ledc.com/event/building-sustainable-food-system

Invited, primary author (2021, February): IFHE Position Statement to United Nations, 59th Commission for Social Development. (Socially just development and digital technologies) Available at: https://www.ifhe.org/fileadmin/user_upload/UN_statements/UN_2021_CSoCD59_IFHE_statement_digitalization.pdf

Invited, primary author (2020, February): IFHE Position Statement to United Nations, 58th Commission for Social Development. (Affordable housing and homelessness). Available at: https://www.ifhe.org/fileadmin/user_upload/UN_statements/UN_2020_CSoCD58_IFHE_Statement_homelessness.pdf

O’Neil P. (2019, August) Without a home: Just economics? Basic Curriculum for International Federation for Home Economics.